"The Community Hall is exactly what you'd expect; a little community centre behind some flats that used to be joined to a church. They host salsa lessons and political meetings, and extremely loud art-rock concerts and drawing lessons. It's very weird; like a little primary school with school chairs and coat hooks and loud Japanese heavy metal." - Jonathan
Every Wednesday a Ba Gua class is taking place at the West Hill Hall. In a mix of classes today there the Brighton Bagua teachers are offering workshops in Ba Gua, and cheaper classes in Chi Gung.
It may be that the closest I come to understanding the I-Ching is the mention in Philip Pullman's The Subtle Knife, and Thai Chi cycling past a man in a field doing slow arm movements, but I'm interested in a curious British way all the same.
"Ba Gua is a Daoist practice. It's the physical manifestation of the I–Ching, the Book of Changes. Like Tai Chi though it can be be practiced to maintain and enhance your health, as a meditative practice or as a martial art."
It sounds quite Tai Chi-ish to unqualified and simple me. At the beautifully introduced West Hill Centre, a regular and cheap Ba Gua is taking place over at the beautifully introduced West Hill Hall in Seven Dials. This costs £7 an hour for a drop-in at 7.15pm- 8.45pm - maybe today's the day to get .. spiritualised. And healthy.
The real reason I know anything at all about The West Hill Hall is because there's a cheerful but flighty cat who lives next door. I sometimes chase him excitedly down the driveway to the entrance, and then am sprung by the caretaker, so I have to read the listings on the notice-board with a furrowed, serious brow, while the cat gingerly escapes.
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