Zhou TingJue - Believe It Or Not?

Ripley’s Believe It Or Not!Months earlier, I had seen a very intriguing video on Zhou TingJue by Ripley’s Believe It Or Not. This guy was supposedly a Wudang qigong master who could heat wet paper towels to almost boiling point to heal people with and had the qing gong skills to walk on framed paper suspended in the air. This got my curiosity going. And he lived in L.A.. So, I decided to scope him out for myself while I was conveniently here.

Well, we were all kinda curious… So, after the Kunlun workshop ended - me, Oscar, Sheen, Mandana, Dharam & Dionne all went to his clinic together. ZTJ immediately recognized Dharam, as it turned out he was actually a former longtime martial arts student of his. And Mandana had also tried him out a few times for healing before, but without noticeable results. So, it was hard to get a definitive opinion on him. Different people all seemed to experience different results.

ZTJ was seeing another patient when we arrived, so I had a brief chat with with his wife in my choppy Mandarin first.  We made some small talk, she gave me some background info and I took this opportunity to inquire about his qing gong demo.  She told me that he actually hadn’t done that in years, but just when he first got here and only weighed about 60 kg (130 lbs).  And the paper he walked on was about as thick as 2 sheets of typing paper or a single business card.  So, that was some interesting clarification.   Then, ZTJ was ready and I went in for my healing session.  Which went pretty much as you see in the video above…

Light Massage

He started off by laying me face down and giving me a light-handed, brisk rub down. I didn’t feel much physically or energetically - so was skeptical of any therapeutic value it might have?

Well, then he proclaims that NOW he’s going to use qi in the next phase. Of course, I’m thinking to myself, “What kind of qigong healer only turns on his qi halfway through a session?”

Aluminum Heating Pads

And this is when he prepared his wet towel and aluminum foil packets. He would take small strips of aluminum foil folded up in paper towels and then cover them again with wet paper towels soaked in a tray of water. And then place these makeshift “heating pads” on me and move them around to heat up different areas.

They would heat up very fast and sometimes the searing heat would get almost unbearable. Steam would actually exude from the wet paper towels! But, fortunately he always moved them right before they got too hot. Gotta give him credit for that, at least.

Then, he even unwrapped one of the packets after he was done with it to reveal that the aluminum foil had been powderized into a dull gray powder. He showed this as “proof” of his gong fu.

Chemical Evidence

Of course, me and Sheen took this more as probable “proof” of clever stage trickery. Basically, we both believe that the aluminum was combined with another chemical with the water to create an exothermic reaction. This reaction produced both heat and oxidized aluminum as byproducts.

The guy is a fraud
There’s an old “Bar bet” wherein the person takes the Aluminum foil from a cigarette pack, wets is with some Hg2Cl2 and pinches it between both thumbs and forefingers, and says “I bet you can’t hold in your hand what I’ve got in mine.” The sucker accepts the “gift” of reactive Al foil and gets a burn as the air oxidation causes it to heat up. The Bichloride of Mercury used to be available as an antiseptic.The chloride ion will break down the oxide layer on the aluminum, allowing the aluminum to oxidize assuming there’s some water present to ionize the mercurous chloride. - Bill Smith, Oct 2, 2006

I would guess that the towel had been soaked in the bichloride of mercury solution, then dried; once it has been rehydrated, and the aluminum foil added, the reaction takes place. The heat from the towel/foil will then transfer to the hand. I agree with Alex; this kind of parlor trick taints all legitimate practitioners of Qi Gong. - Anthony, Oct 20, 2006

I have since discovered that “Master” Zhou is a fraud.

I went to see him. I got a massage from him and he did his thing with the foil and wet paper towel. It got hot alright, but afterwards when he left the room to wash his hands I dipped my finger in the “water” that he used on the foil and touched it to my tongue. It burned! It tasted like something very caustic. Also, the water was milky white. I got to my car as quickly as possible and washed my mouth with water for a long time. I forgot about rinsing my finger, and later I must have rubbed my eye and it burned for hours. I didn’t confront Zhou at the time. He doesn’t speak English, and I wanted time to think.

I did some research and discovered that Sodium Hydroxide, NaOH, commonly known as Lye, reacts with aluminum and generates great heat. Chronic exposure to this would also be consistent with the roughness of Zhou’s hands, and the fact that they are discolored very dark, kind of blackish purple.

I called his other office where they speak English and told them what happened. They didn’t believe me (or were lying) but agreed to tell Zhou that I wanted to meet with him and have him prove to me that he actually has some kind of power. He agreed surprisingly, and I met with him yesterday.

I brought my own materials (paper towels, foil, water, and container). He grabbed the material and began to prepare them on his glass-topped work table(why an auxiliary glass top? It’s just water, isn’t it? Conveniently chemical resistant. The Formica table it covered wouldn’t suffice) . He brought it to my shoulder and I could hear it sizzling as it passed my ear before he even put it on my shoulder and began to “put Qi into it”. I stopped him. I wiped my finger on the wet table and tasted it, and got that same chemical taste. I insisted that we prepare on his wood waiting table. I began to prepare the stuff myself and he said (this is all through an interpreter by the way) that he needed to touch the foil himself. I haggled with him about that, but he insisted that he had to touch the foil. I let him begin. He was getting his hands wet and splashing the water on the foil and paper towels and splashing on the table too. He put it on my shoulder and though it took a lot longer than usual, it began to sizzle and heat up. I then insisted that I taste his hands! And again, that same chemical taste. I then prepared the foil myself against his wishes, and put it on my shoulder, and he refused to try to heat it up. He said he gave me one chance and that was all he was going to give. Then I told him that I would let him prepare the materials again, but let me try to put Qi into it without him (I’m sure it would have heated up). Again he refused.

I also asked him why he needed foil at all. I told him that I had been to several other QiGong doctors, and studied with a QiGong master (both true) and all of them directed Qi with their hands alone. He wouldn’t give me a straight answer.

As we were speaking the water that he had splashed on the wood table had turned the finish white. I pointed that out and he tried to explain it away and shrug it off at the same time.

I told him that I felt betrayed by him. The he attracted me under false pretenses and that he was only doing a cheap magic trick, and that I deserved my money back for my last visit. After a minute of haggling he agreed to give me half my money back because he thought he should be paid for the massage he gave me.

If he were for real, he would have really let me prove his power (if he had, he would have had a loyal follower, and referrals to all my friends and family), and he never would have agreed to any kind of refund.

I am not denigrating the practice of Qi Gong, or of Chinese medicine, I am denegrating Mr. Zhou. He is a fraud, stealing through deceit, from ailing people.

If you still want his contact information, his number is 310.478.1798. But be warned. - Eric Zammitt, Oct 15, 2007

Now, I cannot prove this without actual chemical analysis of his ingredients. But why else would he have to use these packets in the first place? And keep making new ones as each one got “used up” quite quickly? And seemingly use the water to activate the reaction? And powderize the foil? I even asked him at one point to simply project heat at me with his bare hand, but he just ignored me.

Don’t get me wrong, ZTJ is a very nice guy! And even showed me a little extra courtesy because I could speak Chinese. However, it is my personal opinion that his “heat therapy” is more likely a usage of chemistry, rather than qi.
So, believe it or not?  Well, at this point, I’d have to say…NOT (at least as far as this treatment was concerned)!