Cheese, chocolates, watches and…stick fighting?

July 2, 2011

wikipedia

Ahh…modern day Switzerland.

What comes to mind? Rolling, velvety-green hills surrounded by the snow-capped peaks of the Alps. Heidi, cheese, chocolates, watches, neutrality, democracy, banking, and cow-bells. (Had to throw that in–you can never have too much cow-bell).

That’s what shows up on the surface. As we dig a little deeper we come up with the Pope’s Swiss Guards, the Geneva Convention, mandatory army service for all male adults, semi-automatic rifles in every home, and Pierre Vigny.

Who?

Pierre Vigny, a Parisian-born guy who ran a “stick-fighting” school in Geneva in the early 1900’s. He later moved to England for a time and became the head instructor of E.W. Barton-Wright’s Bartitsu school. Bartitsu, of course, being the martial art of Sherlock Holmes. (Although Sir Arthur Conan Doyle spelled it “Baritsu” in his novels–maybe he thought it best to keep the “tits” out for the censors of that era?)

“London Women of the Upper Tendon Are Learning Protection Against Ruffians”
Vigny’s wife even got into the mix, and taught women how to “poke men under the ear” with a parasol. Check out the article “The Parasol for Defense” at the bottom of this page.

From Heidi to stick fighting. I’m not sure how I started talking about Pierre Vigny in this post.

I really wanted to talk about Nazis. I guess that’ll be next time.