Local kung fu champion promotes martial arts to public

After warm-up activities like chest expansion and leg stretching, Zhang Hanliang began her martial arts exercises in the morning.

The 35-year-old and her team have produced many traditional Chinese martial arts videos exercising with swords, spears, cudgels and practising Tai chi in the past years, attracting 16 million views on the Chinese online platform Bilibili.

"Online videos attract so many internet users at home and abroad. I hope that more and more people will feel the charm of the Chinese martial arts," said Zhang, adding that she wanted to promote martial arts to the public through the internet.

Zhang, who has practised martial arts for over 20 years, is now a martial arts teacher at Tianshui Normal University in Northwest China's Gansu province.

Her love for martial arts comes from her family, and both her grandfather and father are kung fu masters.

"I've been practising martial arts since I was seven," said Zhang, adding that all the children in her family would learn martial arts at home from a young age.

After a few years of practise, her father sent her to a sports school elsewhere in Gansu. She was the youngest child to practise martial arts at the school.

"I was a hardworking girl back then and would keep practising after routine training every day," Zhang said.

Zhang won her first sword championship in Gansu province at 13. She then claimed sword and spear titles at a national level when she was 17, and at 20, she won a series of championship titles in various categories.

In 2007, Zhang began to work as a martial arts teacher at Tianshui Normal University, obtaining new titles such as first-class national athlete and first-class national judge of martial arts.

In addition to her daily teaching tasks, Zhang has been invited to France, Russia, Malaysia and other countries many times to teach martial arts.

"Martial arts can be a bridge for cultural exchanges between China and other countries," said Zhang, adding that she hoped that more and more foreigners could understand and love martial arts.