[cbloom]

OP : you should find a good teacher/class and do what's fun for you. The truth is the exact style doesn't matter that much, and the schools/teacher differ a lot. I highly recommend a school that focuses on sparring, not forms. You want to spend your class time fighting, not standing around listening.

I did Wing Tsun seriously for about 5 years. (similar to Wing Chun but a slightly different branch with minor style differences). I had a school/teacher I liked; I moved to a different town and the teacher sucked, I never would have done it there, so it varies a lot. The emphasis was entirely on practical training, and we trained a lot of other styles to learn them and how to fight against them. I've sparred with experts in many styles, and to me there is nothing that comes close to touching hands with an export in WT/WC. (I've sparred with Emin Boztepe and Leung Ting among other). They feel like water, you just can't touch them - every punch/move, they slip away, and suddenly their hand is in your eyes, your throat, your groin.

That said, I thing WT/WC doesn't do much for you at first. You have to actual train and practice for years to get the feel. Proper WT/WC comes from long practice of "Chi Sau", which develops soft muscle reaction. Those who know the history know that WT/WC was developed as the "easy to learn" Kung Fu, in that it could be mastered in only a few years, as opposed to animal styles which take 10+ years to master. Also, Kung Fu was really developed to be used against opponets armed with blades, so that trading blows is unacceptable, you can't just lie on your back like a Jiu Jitsu fighter because someone with a sword will chop you up; you have to block/dodge their blows and criple them. Obviously in a fight with gloves, etc. different styles will be optimal.

Also, the point of modern day martial arts practice is not really to become a "killing machine" and anyone who judges it that way is being foolish, because that's not the goal. If you want to be a killing machine, spend a lot of time working out and fighting in high-contact sparring. Martial arts are about the training, the history, the technique.

I like Sambo/Sombo too because it's totally practical and they've worked out techniques for various situations (opponents armed in different ways). It's very hard to find a good school in the US, though.