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INCHEON Ichiro Suzuki Jersey , South Korea, Sept. 16 (Xinhua) -- DPR Korea will send Olympic gold medalists and world champions to the upcoming 17th Asian Games to be held in Incheon, South Korea, from Sept. 19 to Oct. 4.


According to the organizing committee for the Games, DPR Korea will send 150 athletes to compete in 14 of 36 sports, featuring Olympic champions and winners of recent world championships.


Om Yun-chol, the 2012 Olympic weightlifting gold medalist and the 2013 world champion in the men's 56kg division, will take part in the Asiad. The 152-centimeter dynamo holds the world record in clean and jerk with 169kg, which he set during the Asian Interclub Championships in Pyongyang last September.


DPR Korea has another world record holder in weightlifting with Kim Un-guk, the 2012 Olympic gold medalist in the men's 62kg class. His winning total of 327kg has stood as the world standard for more than two years.


Rim Jong-sim, another Olympic weightlifting champion in the women's 69kg, will also be in Incheon, west of Seoul.


Ri Se-gwang is expected to duel South Korea's Yang Hak-seon for the gold medal in the men's vault in artistic gymnastics. Yang won the 2010 Asian Games gold, two years before claiming his first Olympic title, while Ri was the 2006 Asiad gold medalist.


In wrestling, Greco-Roman wrestler Yun Won-chol, the 2013 world champion in the men's 55kg class, will compete at the Incheon Asiad.


The table tennis mixed doubles duo of Kim Hyok-bong and Kim Jong won the world championship last year in Paris and will try to claim their first Asian Games gold together.


In judo, Sol Kyong, who won the 2013 world title in the women's 78kg, and Hong Kuk-hyon, the world silver medalist in the men's 73kg last year, will headline the delegation.


DPR Korea ranked among the top 10 in Asiad medals in 1974, 1978, 1982, 1990, 1998 and 2002, but finished 16th in 2006 and 12th in 2010.

" Liu Suibin shows Kung Fu Panda's Po some Qingcheng Tai Chi moves at the entrance to Mount Qingcheng in Southwest China's Sichuan Province in 2011. Photo: Courtesy of Liu Suibin

The basis for the mountains where Po from DreamWorks' Kung Fu Panda practices martial arts, Mount Qingcheng, has become a tourist hot spot for foreigners looking to explore the culture behind yin-yang and tai chi.


According to employees working at Mount Qingcheng in Southwest China's Sichuan Province, the number of foreign visitors began picking up over the past few days in advance of the spring peak season. According to a people report from 2015, data from the Mount Qingcheng tourism bureau shows that the site witnessed a significant rise in the number of foreign visitors in 2014.


Located in Dujiangyan, a city 36 kilometers west of Chengdu, capital of Southwest China's Sichuan Province, the green-clad site featuring magnificent mountain views was included on the UNESCO World Heritage List in 2000 along with the Dujiangyan Irrigation System. Numbering among the four great mountains in Taoism, Mount Qingcheng has been a major center where Taoist philosophy has flourished for thousands of years.


Religious and philosophical center


At the very top of the mountain one can find several Taoist temples, where Taoist practitioners prayed to their gods by burning incense.


For some foreign visitors, Taoism is a mysterious school of thought represented by the famous black-and-white symbol of yin-yang and "secrets about health management," Pascal, a French visitor to the mountain, told the Global Times on Saturday.


"It is incredible. I am here to explore more," he said.


According to one of the Taoists walking up the long stone steps to the top of the mountain, while there are plenty of foreigners coming to the temple to learn more about Taoism, there are no foreign members of the temples just yet.


Taoism remains a mystery for even many Chinese today, as their impressions of the religion often stem from martial arts novels where Taoist masters, or daoshi, have superhuman abilities to tell fortunes or utilize qinggong, a martial arts skill that allows them to make great leaps through the air.


"Real Taoist culture is definitely different from what people read in novels," said Liu Suibin, council member of the Taoism Association of Sichuan Province and also head of the Qingcheng martial arts school, which is famous for its tai chi practice.


"In 2004, [famous martial arts novelist] Louis Cha visited Mount Qingcheng and apologized to the Qingcheng sect, saying that he didn't know enough about our martial arts back when he was writing about them in his novels."


"The public perception of so-called fortunetelling actually comes from our studies of the I Ching [Book of Changes], which is actually a Confucian classic. But since Taoists are keen to study about methods to improve health and even to prolong life, we also study it to learn more about these aspects," Liu told the Global Times.


Land of kung fu


According to Liu, he currently has more than 100,000 foreign students around the globe who practice Qingcheng martial arts. From political figures to beauty pageants queens, these foreign disciples, or waiguo dizi, include people from all walks of life such as the Miss Sierra Leone winner Mariatu Kargbo and a 34-year-old Canadian, known by his Chinese name Ke Danian, who won gold at the Chengdu Traditional Martial Arts Competition in 2009.


"It's more than just tai chi," Liu said. "In my class with managers from the world's top 500 companies, I teach them to explore Taoist philosophy and the wisdom behind these tai chi moves so they can improve their businesses and family life."


Qingcheng Tai Chi has also made a name for itself in Hollywood. The school's marital arts moves are used by Po the panda in Kung Fu Panda 2 in the scene where he confronts the evil Lord Shen. Posters for the film can be seen at the parking lot. Cristiano Ronaldo Portugal Jersey Dimitri Payet France Jersey Eric Dier England Jersey Ante Coric Croatia Jersey Cristian Zapata Colombia Jersey Lucas Lima Brazil Jersey Kevin De Bruyne Belgium Jersey Diego Maradona Argentina Jersey Alvaro Gonzalez Uruguay Jersey Denis Zakaria Switzerland Jersey