By Huang Chun-Yi, Taiwan.

The views in this article belong to the author.

As a child I liked to watch the knights in cartoon series. I wanted to be a knight, not a princess who always waits for others’ help. I always felt that I’m a knight at heart. I wanted to study swordplay to learn being brave and keeping calm when facing difficulties. I live in Miaoli, a medium sized town at the West coast of Taiwan, one hour by train from Taichung in the centre, and 1.5 hours from Taipeh in the North.

When I was a first year university student in medical technology in Taichung, I found lots of HEMA and longsword videos on youtube. It was like discovering a hidden treasure. I sent an email to the HEMA Alliance and got some good tips on sources. That was in 2011. I used the videos to teach myself foot work, movements and postures. My first book was David Lindholm’s book on Ringeck’s longsword. Now I also train with friends at university in Taichung. We have a weekly study group of people with a background in Chinese martial arts. There I teach the basics of longsword to anybody who is interested. We drill and spar in university rooms or in the park. For sparring we use padded swords called EPW (Exile Padded Wasters) and sport fencing gear for protection. My main areas of study are German longsword after Sigmund Ringeck and sidesword after Dall’Agocchie. I have a steel sidesword brought back by a friend from the Czech Republic and a Cold Steel waster bought on-line. It is very difficult to get hold of HEMA specific gear like jackets or steel feders here.

In 2014 I found the “Fu Jen University European Swordmanship Club” in Taipeh on the internet. It was founded 2 or 3 years ago. Their head instructor is Li Tsui-Hua (Exile) who also produces the Exile Padded Wasters. His favourite weapon system is German longsword. The club has a monthly meeting called EPW meeting, where they practice all weapons including katana and European swords. I take part whenever I can. I learned a lot from sparring there. I have to adjust my tactics, because I’m short (147cm). I’m rather afraid of Scheitelhaus, and some counters don’t seem to work for me, but I rather like to attack the lower openings!

My study group is small, 5 people. There are about 10 training regularly in the club in Taipeh, but many just learn by themselves using internet videos, which is a pity. All in all there are maybe 100 people in Taiwan studying Historical European Martial Arts. It’s difficult to promote, because many people think HEMA is swordfighting they see in Western movies: brutal and dangerous, with little actual skill involved. If we use a steel feder, they believe it is a “real” sword”.

In Taiwan a woman with an interest in swordfighting is considered extremely “unusual”. Most people’s view of women here is very traditional: they should wear skirts and the can’t practice martial arts. But I’m lucky. My friends welcome girls at training, because few women attend, and my parents support me. Some male fencers will look down on me, and think that as a woman I am much weaker and easier to beat. I take this as a challenge to fight them. I want to show them that skill is more important than gender, that I’m not as weak as they thought, and that I can beat them! I like to test myself!