Erle Montaigue is regarded internationally as one of the leading instructors of the internal arts of taijiquan, pa-kua chang, and qigong. He has been practicing the internal arts since 1968 and can trace his lineage directly back to Yang Lu-ch'an, the founder of the Yang style.

He has taught in Sydney, London, and Hong Kong (in fact, he is one of a select few Westerners who have taught taiji back to the Chinese in Hong Kong) and has given workshops all around the world. In 1985, Erle became the first Westerner to perform at the All China National Wushu Tournament, at which time he was tested for hours by three of the world's leading internal martial arts experts and received the degree of master. He is believed to be the only Westerner to have earned such an honor.

Erle began his martial arts instruction at the age of 11, training in karate and judo at the local police Boys' Clubs in his native Australia. His forte in these early years, however, was wrestling, which later led to a stint as a professional wrestler!

An eclectic and colorful character who has never allowed himself to be pigeonholed into any one art, pursuit, or career, Erle is also an avid musician. He has always "marched to the beat of a different drummer," and his somewhat rebellious nature can be traced back at least as far as 1966, when he was expelled from school for painting the building yellow, among other "small" things.

In 1967 he took a telephone maintenance course, where he happened to meet his first teacher of taijiquan, Mr. Wong Eog. By the late sixties, Erle was married with two children. He was performing in stage plays and in a band, and he already had a No. 1 hit record, "Can't Wait for September," to his name. When he was "expelled" from the telephone job for dyeing his hair green and singing on the job, he took up music as a profession and became a rock-'n'-roll star, producing several hit records and albums by the early seventies.

In 1974, Erle went to England, where he met his second taijiquan instructor, Mr. Chu King-hung, who took Erle on as one of his first students (if not the first). Chu King-hung is one of only three disciples of the late Yang Sau-chung (1909-1985), the eldest son of Yang Lu-ch'an's grandson Yang Cheng-fu. Erle continued his acting career while in London, performing in several plays, musicals, and films before returning to Australia at the end of 1977.

In 1981 Erle traveled to Hong Kong, where his form was evaluated by Yang Sau-chung and where he studied with Ho Ho-choy, a direct disciple of bagwazhang Master Chiang Jung-jiao. In 1982, he began teaching taiji in Sydney and became the chief of therapeutic movement at the NSW College of Natural Therapies. He opened his own school in Sydney in 1983. The next year, he found his main internal martial arts master, Chang Yiu-chun, from whom he learned the secrets of dim-mak and h'ao ch'uan (taijiquan). Chang Yiu-chun was one of only two students of Yang Cheng-fu's brother Yang Shou-hou.

In his "spare time," Erle writes his own column for the prestigious British martial arts magazine Fighting Arts International and for Australasian Fighting Arts Magazine, one of the longest-running quality martial arts magazines. His photo has appeared on the front cover of both of these publications, as well as that of Karate/Kung-Fu Illustrated, published in the United States. He also serves as the editor of Combat & Healing magazine. In addition, Erle has produced several books and a video with Paladin Press. Erle's magazine articles and books have helped change the way people view the internal fighting arts, and his 150 self-produced video titles have helped students learn from quality tapes in lieu of a teacher.

Today, Erle teaches primarily in Australia, and he serves as head of the World Taiji Boxing Association (WTBA), which has schools in more than 30 countries. All of these schools have learned taiji in some way from Erle Montaigue.

Check out Erle Montaigue on the World Wide Web at: You can also contact Erle as follows:

MTG Video and Books
P.O. Box 792
Murwillumbah NSW 2484
AUSTRALIA
Fax: + -61-66-797028

Sourced from Erle Montaigue's Taiji World Martial/Healing Arts: Bringing People Together All Around the Worlds.

A warrior is not just a person who has learned some moves, is able to kick at 90 miles per hour or who has won the world championships at kick-boxing. A warrior must earn his title. The martial artist is a person who knows things that go far deeper than just self defence, he is someone who walks into a room full of people and an immediate calm falls upon that room, he is a person who can touch a person's head, or arm, or hand and cause an inner stillness and peace to fall upon that person. You know a warrior not from the way he looks, his big biceps, or his rolled up sleeves revealing a row of tattoos, or his shaven head or the fact that he wears his full gi (karate uniform) to parties!

We know the warrior by his presence and the healing he automatically gives to everyone he meets. His energy, his 'Qi' is touching you, you don't feel anything physical, but rather the internal effect of this touching, and peace is with you.

The warrior looks upon the earth in a different way than those who are not warriors, everything, from the smallest insect to the largest mammal, and the most insignificant rock or tree is important and has life, the grass he walks upon, he thanks for softening the rough path he walks upon, the trees, he thanks for giving him shade and oxygen. Everything has importance because it was put there by mother earth for some reason.

Sure, he has to live in modern times, he must drive a motor car and go to the supermarket and mow his lawns, but always, he never loses sight of what he is, and more importantly, where he is. He knows that what he is, is not only what he has made himself to be, but also what is handed down to him and what is an accumulation right inside the very cells that he is made of, from his ancestors. Everything that they were, is now him, every bit of information that his fathers and mothers gathered is now inside of him, this is how we live on in our children, we literally, and I mean literally, pass on our knowledge, along with eons of knowledge accumulated since the beginning of time, to our children. Everything that we are at the conception of our children is passed on to them. We think that we have certain talents, but the warrior knows that all that he is, has come from the beginning of time, he knows that he is made up of the same stuff that a rock is made of, or a tree or a blade of grass, the difference is only physical. He knows that he owns nothing, and that all animals are free, his animals chose him to be with, he does not go to the pet shop to chose a new dog, he knows that the dog has chosen him to come to that pet shop to chose it.

The warrior communicates with the earth, he talks to the dogs, to the cats and owls, to the snakes, not so much verbally, but simply by being. This is the one thing that everything on earth has in common, being. He knows that there are forces at work on this earth, forces that he must learn to go with and to live with, otherwise he will surely perish. The energy within the warrior has the power to join with these forces, and then he has the power to change. But this comes not without payment, for he also knows that we cannot receive without first having paid for it. The whole of the universe is based upon this giving and taking, it is called yin & yang. For every up there must be a down, for every happiness, there must be a sadness, for every full tummy, there must be an empty one. The warrior knows that he must lose in order to gain, and so he sacrifices. He sacrifices his food, he sacrifices his sexual longings, his every day comforts, in order that he has the power to change and to help others to change. Not in going out specifically to help others, but to have the internal power always there to automatically help others to be peaceful, and in doing so, they too will be able to see where they are, and who they are. We are not only someone's son or daughter, we are the sons and daughters of an infinite amount of people, those who have passed on to us their cells inside of which is hidden the very substance of creation and everything that has happened. Not 'since time began', because there is no beginning or ending.

Being a martial artist is only one hundredth of what a warrior is, it is only a part of the whole, it is what gives us the confidence to become a healer, the internal energy to make changes.

A warrior knows that we do not have teachers, but guides, the people we meet who are able to give us something internal, that something extra to cause us to become our own greatest teachers. Just by simply being, a guide helps us to realize that it is we, ourselves who teach us, because the warrior also knows that locked away inside of everything, is that primordial cell that contains all information. He learns to read this information which comes in the form of 'flashes' at first, and this is too much for his feeble human brain to handle, he shuts off as soon as the flash arrives. But soon he learns to read these flashes, and they become longer in duration than just a moment. This is when the warrior knows that he is reading time.

He learns to communicate other than speaking, he knows that his physical needs are being looked after, and needs not worry about where the next mortgage payment will come from.

The warrior finds his place on the earth and stays there, where the power is. It is not a physical searching, but rather the warrior is 'taken' to where he must be, and there he stays, and the whole world will pass by, he needs not to travel, because the universe is there within him, and those who will in turn need to seek him out, will do so when their time is right, in just the same way that he did when he had to travel the world searching for his own guides. They then will learn to teach themselves from within, and also then go and find their own place, and he may never see them again, but this does not worry the warrior, he is in contact.

The warrior is not the master, he is not the sifu nor the sensei, these are just physical words that we put upon ourselves to make us seem important, or better than those who we guide. The warrior is a friend to his students, and so cannot be our master. He does not wish to gather students as they will search him out, and those who need to have a master or a sensei will not stay, they will keep searching until they realize that what they search is within them, and who they search, can only be their guide.

copy from website Montaigue

Datum: 8/9 november 2008.
Vervoer: IC treinen Hasselt-Antwerpen centraal-Amsterdam (rijtijd 3,5 u enkel)
Overnachting: Shelter Jordan Christian Hostel, bloemstraat 179, 1016 LA Amsterdam. www.shelter.nl, tel. 0031/20/6244717.
    22€ per nacht incl. ontbijt. 20' wandelafstand van centraal station. Slaapzalen van 4 tot 18 personen afh. v. beschikbaarheid. Kleerkast met     
    (zelf te kopen) hangslot (3€) ter beschikking.
    Opm: waardevolle spullen direkt opbergen: fototoestel uit mijn rugzak verdwenen !!
Alternatief: Hotel Tourist Inn, spuistraat 52, 1012 TV Amsterdam. Tel. 0031/20 421 58 41 Fax: 0031/20 427 09 00 info@tourist-inn.nl 
    www.tourist-inn.nl (op 500 m van station).
Alternatief: Shelter City, Barndesteeg 21, 1012 BV Amsterdam. Tel. 0031/20/6244717 Fax: 0031/20/6276137

Bagage: met rugzak (9kg) (ideaal gewicht)
Doel: Tai Chi stage Jerry Shaw