Self-Needling #1

神庭 Shéntíng DU-24
角孙 Jiăosūn SJ-20
足临泣 Zúlínqì GB-41 (not pictured)
0.28 gauge, 40mm (approximately 1.5 inch)

Most difficult was SJ-20 on the right side. I tried looking in the mirror but it was easier to get the tip in, then close my eyes and feel my way around. There was a fair amount of scalp tugging and movement as I tried to get the needles in my head. GB-41 I've needled on myself many times - good stuff.

This was my first time needling myself in the scalp. I felt a lot of qi come up and I felt very relaxed... I slept well that night.

Spleen, stomach for bananas

Did you know that Google translates Chinese characters? For instance, the first result when you search for "五脏六腑" (five zang six fu) is tcmmedicine.net (http://www.tcmedicine.net/ylyd/11.htm), which has a very basic introduction to the five zang and six fu organs. Click on the "translate this page" option and this is what you get:

Revealing is the human offal call the shopping strip. Heart, liver, kidneys, lungs, kidneys, called five internal organs; Small intestine, gall bladder, stomach, intestine, bladder, Sanjiao named Liu Fu. Sam is the master of human life activities. There are blood and liver storage regulator output functions. Individual nutritional substances digestion, absorption and transport body functions. Lungs "of breathing, and the main gas" kidney "Tibet smart", "Health marrow," "the bone" function. Small intestine is the primary function of receiving food, respectively From Clear to Cloudy. Guts secretion bile and help to digest food. Stomach by the Namibian Food and nutrition will be exported via reduced to the dependent body. Intestine function is transmitting dregs of things, from in vitro through the anus. Bladder urine mainly storage and disposal. San Jiao is not an independent organ main, but by traditional sectors, and is divided into three functional areas : heart, lungs, to focus, spleen, stomach for bananas, liver, kidneys, large small intestine, bladder for the next focus.

So... there are still some kinks to be worked out... in the meantime, all we can do is wonder who Sam is and why he is the master of human life activities...

You're Missing Out

Sunday classes with Steve Jankowiecz continue to amaze and enlighten. Today he performed a Daoist exorcism ritual on a former fighter who had been struck with a 'poison hand' in a match seven years ago and ever since has been unable to raise his right arm over his head. Jankowiecz explained that it was a type of zong qi, nearly alive, that had been put into his arm, along the Lung meridian and was trying to seep into the Heart meridian. The fighter, who had earlier told us that he practiced a Native American fighting style called San Carlos, explained that he had to do special breathing exercises to keep the pain from spreading, and had been five or six different doctors and healers with no results.

So, what did the ritual consist of? With everyone crowded around, Jankowiecz poked the affected area many times with a lancet, and put a vacuum cup on top, drawing out thick dark blood with chunky bits in it. He repeated the bleeding, each time carefully lifting and wiping away the large amount of blood. When he finished the bleeding, he held his hand over the circular area and pronounced it ice-cold. He then inserted five needles around the edge, following the controlling cycle of the five elements, and followed the same pattern with a moxa stick. A student asked if a heat lamp would have the same effect. “NO,” he said. Why not? “Demons aren't afraid of heat lamps.” He finished the moxa portion by going around the circle following the generating cycle and briefly touched the tip of the moxa stick to the middle of the circle.

The next step was to write in the characters of the five phases in bright red vermillion paste, one next to each needle, a circle around the whole thing, and in the middle, that Buddhist symbol that looks like a backwards swastika (the svastika is an ancient religious symbol that predates the Nazis by several thousand years - see picture for example). Then more moxa, and he removed the needles.

Finally came the wooden clappers, 108 times directly over the circle, which he explained to us after was meant to fix the demon in the present while everyone else moved forward. Sounds resonate in many dimensions, and this was an attempt to cover all the bases, in case the demon tried to sidestep the exorcism.

Afterwards the gentleman being worked on expressed his gratitude with a song of thanks in his native language, which I couldn't identify but was quite beautiful and nearly brought tears to my eyes.

This class is full of oohs and aahs. If you're getting bored with standard TCM and the modern zang-fu organ diagnosis, you owe it to yourself to take a class with Steve Jackowicz. He has a Phd in Chinese religion, a bachelors in acupuncture from South Korea, a master's degree from NESA, and obviously knows some off-the-beaten-track stuff that you won't learn anywhere else in PCOM. On top of that he's an engaging and nearly hyperactive teacher, insisting on high performance from everyone and getting it. Each class is like a seminar that people pay a hundred and fifty bucks for once they graduate.

Our fellow-student is a minor web celebrity!

Say hello to bamboogirl.com, the self-publishing enterprise of Margarita Alcantara-Tan. I actually followed this website many years ago when I was an undergrad, and was briefly on the bamboogirl mailing list. From what I can remember she used to be into knife fighting...

From the website:

What is Bamboo Girl Zine about? The manifesto:

"Challenging racism, sexism, & homophobia from the Filipina/Asian Pacific Islander (API)/Asian mutt feminist point of view since 1995."

Because life isn't only Black & White. There's more to life than straight white male patriarchy. And there are many stories to tell. Mine & others'. Our collective voice can create new truths.

Gancao.net

John Pai Reference of the Week

As for myself, I never doubted the efficiency of traditional Chinese medicine, since I came to China specifically to study it here. Yet — perhaps it was me, who was most astounded after Dr. Pai Wen-chiang from the Veterans Hospital's Research Centre for Traditional Medicine inserted one single needle between two of my fingers to treat a literal "pain in my neck" that had bothered me for two months, keeping me from turning my head. After less than three minutes he removed the needle and simply said "Now- turn your head" I turned it to the farthest natural extent and there was no pain anymore!

From a German TCM website. See the full article>>>

Which Nigel Dawes Has Better Hair?

Is it our own Nigel Dawes, Japanese acupuncture specialist, or Nigel Dawes of the New York Rangers, specialist in scoring goals from the left wing?

Children of Beslan Treated with TCM

Some survivors of the Beslan terrorist massacre are being treated with TCM on Hainan, China's southern resort island. No details on treatment protocols...

"After medical examinations, we found that most of the children still suffered serious mental trauma and they are even afraid of talking to strangers," said Liu Dexi, president of the Traditional Chinese Medicine Hospital of Sanya.

A group of armed militants took more than 1,000 students, teachers and parents hostage in a school on the first day of the new semester. The crisis killed 335 people, including 186 children, and injured more than 600.

A total of 10 medical experts from the People's Hospital of Hainan and Liu's hospital are studying the best recuperative and treatment plans for these 10 children together with their Russian counterparts.

A group of doctors including Liu were dispatched to Russia's Beslan by China's Ministry of Health last month to help diagnose and treat the injured children. With a recommendation from the Russian side, the Chinese health authority chose 10 children for free treatment for one month in China.

"Children are urgently in need for psychological treatment instead of physical injuries as the hostage crisis have brought them more mental suffering than physical pain," Liu said in an interview with China Daily.

"As a result, traditional therapies, such as massage, acupuncture and ointments might play a major role for sooner recovering," said Liu.

Full story>>>

A poem what I wrote

drink medicine, bitter and black on your tongue
roots and scum and dried beetles frothing
on your kitchen stove, tendrils of the past one

thousand generations reach your tongue cracked and
pale, trembling in your mouth like leaves in the
wind. who is it now that stands at your door? why,

it's John Pai shaking a finger, laughing but
uncomfortable. you make him cry inside, you
don't understand the medicine, you moxa

the yin channels and of your formulas I
can only ask – thousand island, blue cheese, ranch
or viniagrette? stand up straighter when you reach

for the needle. Hua Tuo is watching you and
he doesn't like what he sees. a fountain of
phlegm blue-black and frothy wells up, confounds your

orifices and seals your portals. Shake it
loose, gently. be calm, take the wind out your sails.
breathe slowly and deeply, empty yourself so

that you might be filled. we are only channels
after all, qi pumps, unlimited phosphorescence
in a galaxy accelerating towards

nothingness, separation of yin and yang
and eventual return to the one, which
produces the two and so on until we

get back here, to PCOM, to teachers with big
egos and students with big loans. Let's all pray
and hope – that I can give a good performance –

and that it doesn't rain.

Acufunkture Tonight!

Jeremy Pulsifer, our recently graduated student body president, has personally guaranteed that this party will be totally awesome. It's open to all, not just TCM people. So come on down!

Mystical Taiji Man says Welcome Back