Cold Steel GIM sword review with great photos!

Great job as always, though I can't really see the can you're trying to cut though :? ...guess its the way the camera is set up. I also notice that your CS gim's fittings look very different compared to the one Paul Southren reviewed years ago on the home page!
BTW MakChingYuen, keep this post here but add some captions to your article and add it to the Sword Review section! I think a lot more people visit that area and you'll find a lot more sword enthusiasts there! I think its an excellent review of the updated CS Gim model and some members looking for a sword but be interested with your review.

Now in action!

Thanks Mak for the video explaining the meaning behind the symbols and decorations on the sword as related to virtues, that was very interesting! What was the philosopher's name that you mentioned?

Welcome! his name is Chuang Tze, 庄子, you can find his book and the first chapter is what I quoted. The book is hard to understand if you read those English translated stuff because they might be misleading again, but then basically the book cannot be understood by just read a few lines, you need to read the whole chapter or a few chapters and link them together to get it. That's why it's so hard for modern people to learn it too, people's grammar is different back then and they don't write the way we do today.

Just an update - after doing some forms with this sword, I really find the weight abit kinda light and easy for me. Maybe abit more weight will be better. But then, the sword is really good for anyone who get into sword, it's a must own! I really like it! The theme of it and the sword form I do is actually matching and it's really cool. Agile and flexible movements, fast! I kinda think Cold Steel saying this is a Wu-Jian is kinda BS for marketing though, it's really not like what they described (longer and heavier blade, no way!) If they made this a heavier sword with a thicker blade, maybe yes, but now it feels more like a poet's sword instead!

I think we can related it like this..

Jade Lion Sword -- Business-man's sword or rich dude's sword
GIM sword -- Poet and Civil vibe sword..
Battle Gim -- battle............

hahaha

Great! I never know you are so into CHINESE reading! hahaha!

Haha.. cool... But the truth is, many philosophies are good except some are really BS-ed by the kings and queens to praise their stuff for money making instead. When it comes to philosophies, it's really best to also study history together to make sure what you are reading is real. I once saw some documentry busting some FAMOUS philosophers stuff with facts showing how FAKE these things were and how contradicting it was and they mention it was somehow due to the kings whatever BS etc,.. and later on XXX kings made up the crap..etc,.. forgot how it work out but then it turns out very weird. I was shocked at that time to find out but I dig into it myself and really found interesting facts too.

Just like Confucius ... (that movie sucks) he promotes something that he don't even go by, read into his life and you got kinda confused too. He ditched his wife and family for many years just for his own dream.. and now he call that good... uh..sigh.. not a good husband or father man. But he was praised so high, why? Politics. Dig into history and things reveals by itself. Scary about how many Chinese history flaws there are. When I am studying it the NORMAL way, you think everything is okay and good. When you hear the historians explain it in these Chinese documentary films, they start to unleash all the flaws and tell you how crooked it was. Scary! China is a very enclosed country and it IS even today. To understand their culture, you can't think like a westerner, you need to know how Chinese brains are working back then. It's not so logical to the normal westerner's brain. So there are MANY dark things there for you to explore later on. Hope you find some English source of things like that and it's really eye opening to see how many people got tricked by the conspiracy and crooked politics too!

Have fun exploring!

Yup, that's right. Chinese philosophy is very much like a database system with many databases all inter-linking to each others. But the thing is, not all the "masters" like to share their stuff in books in the past. There is a saying in Chinese from the old days "magic (or knowledge) will not be passed on or talked about when there are 6 ears". Now you know how enclosed it is. It's not like in the west where knowledge is so open for public and everybody can buy a book to know about the greatest invention and stuff like that. Even Chuang Tze is known to be a Taoist, his Taoism is not even revealed to the public at all instead of just a brief thing saying he is one, but there is nothing about his lineage, master and sect too. But he is one, that's all. Man, people really are so like the carp jian theme back then. Powerful, knowledgeable but all concealed. You can't even estimate what's in them because they are so hidden. haha....

Your review prompted me to go and buy this sword. Ordered it from Kult Of Athena last night so it should be here in a couple of weeks.