Wing Chun takes the shortest distance from a starting position (or A) to an ending position (or B). Biu Gie provides a natural way to get there if the path is disrupted.

When you were a child and you played in the backyard with the sprinkler, and the water pooled into small lakes and streams naturally. At each lake, the water found its depth and edges. At the streams, the water found the path led by gravity; and on reaching an obstacle such as a rock, the water moved around it on one edge or completely around it. If you poured more water into the stream from your little yellow bucket, the water had the energy to flow over the rock and even to uproot it from the ground. Biu Gie finds the natural path.

Biue Gie is also like life. As a baby, you quickly realized that by crying you could get your mother or father to leave their good sleep and pick you up. You understand how to disrupt their path. At age four, your brothers and sisters played checkers and monopoly with you. To win, you employed new strategies to come out on top. As you grew older and played catch with a friend at the park, sometimes your friend through the ball nicely. Other times, he threw it hard so you could not catch it; this is life as an opponent will always do something to disrupt you. At work, the employer likes to see the competition between teams often promoting the best strategists. It is not enough to say, “I have a degree or I have been here longer than them” –contemplating A to B — to win at work and in business you need to find a new path naturally.

Here is a short story that explains Biu Gie, and perhaps, chi.

In a small bowl swims a goldfish. It wants to enter the bowl beside it.  In its bowl, the goldfish is master of both time and space. But, like each of us, it wants just a little bit more!  So, it swims in circles rapidly and tries to jump from its bowl to the other. It can not reach the other side.

There is another way, naturally. If the goldfish can be patient, the young girl who is cleaning the other bowl, will place the goldfish there shortly.  Positing, timing, placement and accuracy are important in Biu Gie. But, being simple is best!

Here is a video of Ip Ching talking about his father, Yip Man, and the history of Wing Chun in Hong Kong. Biu Gie is displayed biefly at 2:48 seconds into the video by a student wearing a black shirt in the background.