I was browsing through the Silat Lincah blog at silatlincah. blogspot.com and the latest update included a thumbnail of a poster for the documentary film One Step Into The Beyond or its Bahasa Melayu title Selangkah Ke Alam Batin (which sounds way cooler than its English counterpart) produced by Pertubuhan Seni Silat Lincah Malaysia.

I was wondering, who has a copy of this film, either on VHS or VCD? And I am NOT talking about the Chinese narrated one, where narrator pokes fun at each and every one of the stunts the Silat Lincah people perform, turning it into a C-grade version of a Shocking Asia rip-off (yes, it WAS the light of our generation).

I would love to get a look at the original and maybe find a way to purchase a copy for the Silat Melayu Archives. If you have it, please contact me at silatmelayu@gmail.com

The latest issue of SENI BELADIRI magazine has hit the stands! Of interest in this issue include:

Feature
Guru Amran’s passion for silat drove him to study style after style. Then, an old man who appeared to him in a dream changed it all prompting the founding of a new style based on the old man’s cryptic words.

Secrets of the Ancient Warriors
The Melayu warriors of old knew their omens well. Calculations and spiritual measurements based on maxims that foretold of dangers or opportunities, whether it was to sit down to a meal, or in meeting a King or persons in power.

If Looks Could Kill
Pak Teh defines the movements that answer the question, just what should silat look like?

Available at newsstands throughout Malaysia at RM5.90.

For more information, go to SENI BELADIRI

Do you have any copies of PENDEKAR magazine that was published in Malaysia in the late 1980s and early 1990s? I would like to source them from you if you do. I am also willing to buy them for a reasonable price. But, if you are willing to donate them, I will include your name into the Silat Archives list of donors.

The Silat Archives or Pustaka Silat, is a collection of silat-related documents which include books, ebooks, magazines, photos, videos and other printed or recorded materials. We hop to gather and preserve as many of these possible as a comprehensive record of silat in Malaysia and the world.

For more information and to quote a price, please email me at silatmelayu@gmail.com

This is probably the most embarrassing entry I’m going to post on this blog. A good friend of mine, someone I have never met before but have had the pleasure of having inspired silat discussions with, has posted an entry about me on his blog.

Jeff Davidson, who writes at his blog Balisong Journal is a teacher of Silat Kuntau Tekpi in Michigan, America and has a long history in South East Asian martial arts and the sufi traditions. Known online as JD Tekpi and also likes to be called Jaafar ibn Daud, Jeff has shown great interest and admiration for silat. I have found him to be a careful proponent of the Melayu arts, and has tried to keep as true to the traditions they were founded upon. You can read his article on Silat Kuntau Tekpi at silatmelayu.com.

Jeff has, on several occasions, admitted himself to being a land displaced or a closet Melayu, due to his taste for our arts, our food and our women (just kidding). Here’s hoping he’ll actually make it to Malaysia to complete the transformation.

I have never ceased to learn something new from Jeff everytime we have our discussions and our lives have paralleled each other’s within the last one year. To Jeff, thanks for the compliment. Here’s mine in return, deficient as it may be.

See his post http://balisongplayer.blogspot.com/2006/09/silat-melayu-on-move.html

The SILAT MELAYU Ezine (SME) was an experiment conducted in late 2005 to create an English language silat resource that could mine information on silat in Malaysia directly from its source.

The ezine lasted four issues and was distributed in PDF format to friends of the author and interested parties. The feedback was encouraging. However, due to logistical and financial constraints, this project couldn’t take off properly and ended within a month of the first issue’s publication.

Silat Melayu: The Blog and SilatMelayu.com is an extension of this effort and is hoped to carry on from SME as an accurate and reputable source of silat in Malaysia for the English-speaking world.

For those who are interested to download a copies of the 4-issue run, please go to MalaySilat.org, the official United States Gayong Federation website.