Red Phoenix

(Japanese): Meal where the food is cooked on the teppan in front of the diners and served when done.
    Thousand-year egg: A duck egg that’s been preserved in a mixture of lime, ash, tea and salt for one hundreddays, making the flesh of the egg black and strong in flavour.
    Tikuanyin (Cantonese; or Tikuanyum): Iron Buddha Tea. A dark, strong and flavourful black Chinese tea. Named because, according to legend, the first tea bush of this type was found behind a roadside altar containing an iron statue of Kwan Yin.
    Tin Hau (Cantonese): Taoist deity, worshipped by seafarers.
    Triad : Hong Kong organised-crime syndicate. Members of the syndicates are also called triads.
    Tsim Sha Tsui: Main tourist and entertainment district on Kowloon side, next to the Harbour.
    Tsing Ma Bridge: Large suspension bridge connecting Kowloon with Lantau Island, used to connect to the Airport Expressway.
    Typhoon: A hurricane that occurs in Asia. Equivalent to a hurricane in the US or a cyclone in Australia.
    Wan Chai: Commercial district on Hong Kong Island, between the offices and designer stores of Central and the shopping area of Causeway Bay. Contains office buildings and restaurants, and is famous for its nightclubs and girlie bars.
    Wan sui (Putonghua): ‘Ten thousand years’; traditional greeting for the Emperor, wishing him ten thousand times ten thousand years of life.
    Wei? (Cantonese): ‘Hello?’ when answering the phone.
    Wing chun: Southern style of Chinese kung fu. Made famous by Bruce Lee, this style is fast, close in (‘short’) and lethal. It’s also a ‘soft’ style where the defender uses the attacker’s weight and strengthagainst him or her, rather than relying on brute force to hit hard.
    Won ton (Cantonese): Chinese dumplings made mostly of pork with a dough wrapping and boiled in soup stock. Often called ‘short soup’ in the West.
    Won ton mien (Cantonese): ‘won ton noodles’; won ton boiled in stock with noodles added to the soup.
    Wu shu (Putonghua): A general term to mean all martial arts.
    Wudang (Putonghua): A rough translation could be ‘true martial arts’. The name of the mountain in Hubei Province; also the name of the martial arts academy and the style of martial arts taught there. Xuan Wu was a Celestial ‘sponsor’ of the Ming Dynasty and the entire mountain complex of temples and monasteries was built by the government of the time in his honour.
    Wudangshan (Putonghua): ‘Shan’ means ‘mountain’; Wudang Mountain.
    Xie xie (Putonghua): ‘Thank you.’
    Xuan Wu (Putonghua) pronounced, roughly, ‘Shwan Wu’: means ‘Dark Martial Arts’; the Black Turtle of the North, Mr Chen.
    Yang: One of the two prime forces of the Universe in Taoist philosophy. Yang is the Light: masculine, bright, hot and hard.
    Yang and yin: The two prime forces of the universe, when joined together form the One, the essence of everything. The symbol of yang and yin shows each essence containing a small part of the other.
    Yellow Emperor: An ancient mythological figure, the Yellow Emperor is credited with founding civilisation and inventing clothing and agriculture.
    Yin: One of the two prime forces of the universe in Taoist philosophy. Yin is Darkness: feminine, dark, cold and soft.
    Yuexia Loaren (Putonghua): ‘Old Man Under the Moon’; a Taoist deity responsible for matchmaking.
    Yum cha (Cantonese): Literally ‘drink tea’. Most restaurants hold yum cha between breakfast and mid-afternoon. Tea is served, and waitresses wheel around trolleys containing varieties of dim sum.
    Yuzhengong (Putonghua): ‘Find the True Spirit’; the name of the palace complex on Wudang Mountain.
    Zhu Que (Putonghua) pronounced, roughly, Joo Chway: the Red Phoenix of the South.

About the Author
    Twenty years ago Kylie Chan married a Hong Kong national in a traditional Chinese wedding ceremony in Eastern China. She and her husband lived in Australia for eight years, then in Hong Kong for ten years. She has seen a great deal of Chinese culture and come to appreciate the customs and way of life.
    Two years ago she closed down her successful IT consultancy company in Hong Kong and moved back to Australia. She decided to use her knowledge of Chinese mythology, culture, and martial arts to weave a story that would appeal to a wide audience.
    Since returning to Australia, Kylie has studied kung fu (Wing Chun and Southern Chow Clan styles) as well as tai chi and is now a senior belt in both forms. She has also made an