"Hahhh!" We were literally and figuratively blown away. In the middle of a qigong demonstration, Master Wu pushed his palms out with a loud shout. The energy that radiated from his palms was so forceful that even at a distance of ten feet, we barely managed to stop ourselves from rearing back.
It is the year 2009 and we are in Hai Nan Island in South China. Hai Nan is a former penal colony mid-way between China and Vietnam that boasts of shimmering white sandy beaches and a deep blue sea. In the last 30 years, it has been transformed by the firm hands of China's economic revolution into a Hawaii-esque playground brimming with six-star resorts for the rich and famous. It has also been the chosen venue for the yearly Miss Universe pageant.
It is doubtful whether Master Wu pays much attention to Miss Universe. He is a Shao Lin Kung Fu master of the highest order and spends most of his days honing his prized Kung Fu skills, from smashing bricks with his bare fist to doing a hundred push ups on three fingers. His boyish, unassuming good looks belie his seriousness towards his art.
We flew from Hong Kong to Hai Nan to meet Master Wu. He started by giving a two-hour recital of the Heart Sutra in his beautiful voice, and proceeded to give us a demonstration of various qigong moves. We waited patiently for him to finish, then at the end of the session we approached to ask the one question that we have been waiting for. "What is the most ideal food for a human?" He fell silent and looked pensive. Then, his face brightened, his eyes sparkled, and with a slow smile, he said: "A steamed vegetable dumpling, made by your mother."
This was unexpected. At the time, we were strict raw vegans, and saw and judged everything with a raw vegan mindset. We were waiting for him to give us the answers that we wanted to hear. Would he say raw sprouts? Green juices? Chlorella? Tou Fu?
Embedded within this simple statement is a high wisdom of health and happiness. Master Wu went on to expound that the essence of Traditional Chinese Medicine is the balance of the elements -- wood, wind, fire, metal, and water, plus a sixth element -- love, whose beneficial vibration is transmitted through water, the most impressionable of all the elements, to the food.
This simple and important truth spawned a new realization of a lifestyle diet that included raw, as well as lightly steamed and boiled food that is heated to below 100 degrees celsius (212°F). 100°C is the upper limit beyond which water dissociates into steam; the upper temperature limit that still enables the quantum information in the food to be retained and transmitted to the body.
For those of you who would like to look better, feel better and last a long time, we have an easy new way to do it. Just try this for one day: eat/drink what you like, but take nothing past boiling point. Make your best effort to eat organic and add no condiments/sauces that include processed foods, which are usually heated to very high temperatures in production at the factory. Use Himalayan salt or raw sea salt instead.
This 100°C Vegan lifestyle breaks the unrealistic bonds of all-raw, while maintaining the parameters of perfect health and life-long sustainability.
"It changed my life. It did. Because I was definitely on my way out." -- Bill Edward, V.P. SJLuxury, HK, Ltd.