We celebrated Chinese New Year with Master Aguilar on Saturday, February 13th, in New Orleans, honoring Grandmaster Chang Yuan Wei. Saturday began At 9:00am in Audubon Park with classes in Ba Gua, Hsing-I and ended with Tai Chi and Push Hands. We later enjoyed a great Chinese dinner at Master Chang's favorite restaurant, Royal China, in Metairie.

The following is a note about the late Grandmaster Chang, written by his senior student, Master Carlos Aguilar.

Master Chang Yuan Wei
1904 - 2002

I consider myself extremely lucky that I had Master Chang as my teacher and more, a great friend.

As I witnessed, he was always very polite and, most importantly, genuine with everyone he met. When he taught, explained, or demonstrated, he did it in such a precise manner. "To the best of my knowledge" was a phrase he always used. He would refrain from talking of subjects he didn't know, which wasn't much, but instead, he would ask what we knew about the subject at hand and ask if we had proof to back it up, always precise, always learning. With that lifetime commitment to precision he possessed the qualities to become a great Colonel and one of the first to start and develop the Chinese Air Force to what is today.

With the computer world developing and Wang Computers incapable of developing one for the Chinese, there were great concerns that the Chinese would fall far
behind the rest of the world. Master Chang's commitments to his people's success in his country drove him to research along with his classmate and invent a method to insert the Chinese characters into a computer. This helped catapult China's way of doing business with the world today. He did not receive a dime for this. He was simply helping his country.

Growing up in a Communist China, serving as a high ranking communist military officer and knowing only one way of life, he was able to open his eyes to all the world had to offer. Having the guts to change and having no discrimination forced him to leave the Chinese Air Force and his country.
Helping martial artists by translating, publishing text, and uniting the Chen Pan-ling students, was his teacher's dream, and he did that to his last days. He lived his life helping others.
That was my teacher, my friend.
I will miss you.

"ALWAYS"