Moral of the story, don’t eat poisonous fish heads from someone you plucked an eye from

The cruel tutelage of Pai Mei was always my absolute favorite chapter in Kill Bill. Gordon Liu is a legend.

He needed to break her, empty her mind of what she knew so he could teach her what he had to offer to prepare her for what was coming he liked her,and knew what  Bill's gang was about.

Sooo, basically every old-school Kung Fu flick we all watched on Saturday back in the day.  Fun fact:  Ironically Gordon Lui plays Pai Mei when Pai Mei was always his arch enemy in the old school films.

Pai Mei reminds me of a line from the book Starship Troopers.

"I may have given the impression that boot camp was made harder than necessary.  This is not correct.  It was made as hard as possible and on purpose...
I do know (now) that the psych officers tried to weed out any bullies in selecting instructors... a bully is too stupid, himself too emotionally involved and too likely to grow tired of his fun and slack off, to be efficient."

Ah yes, the latest episode of "Why psychologists fear fictional characters".

The fact Beatrix  despite her love for bill refused to teach him that technique says it all,Beatrix understood what pai mei saw in bill.

This basically sounds like the methods used by Special Forces to train their new recruits. When someone signs up for Special Forces or another elite unit that has high standards, the recruit has already passed through basic training and his advanced individual training or specialty training; their essentially career soldiers. By this point they're put through various tests and exercises that at first seem like the way they always train, but it becomes consistent, confusing, exhausting, and mentally trying. They put them through forced marches that wear them down. The Rhodesian Special Air Service would start with keeping their recruits up for 48hrs doing physical activities before making them do a prolonged forced march with full gear along with other exercises. This is all designed to wear down the recruit and get them to quit, but this stage it isn't a matter of the sergeant yelling at them, they have to drive themselves or else they won't pass the selection. They look for those who have the stamina not to quit. I remember this one Justice League episode where Batman tells the villain Doctor Destiny what his superpower is, "I never give up."

If anyone has ever had a very brutal and unforgiving martial arts teacher, boxing coach, grappling coach. Someone who teaches by sewing failure into your flesh. They already know the character of Pie May.

The actual Historical figure Pai Mei was based on was a Shaolin monk named Bok Mei, who founded the Pak-Mei school you see in the game, Sifu.
His sparring matches tended to end in fatalities.
When the Qing Emperor decided to take down Shaolin temple, Bok Mei provided the floor plans. Shaolin Temple wasn’t burned down; they were basically “SWATed”

It wasn't because the monk didn't bow, it was because he didn't acknowledge Pai Mei's incredible generosity, offering the slightest of nods to the monk.  I have often slaughtered an entire monastery for someone not noticing my head tilt 0.5mm forward in passing, so I understand Pai Mei's pain.

What I took away from this was that Pai Mei was testing Beatrix because he knew what kind of scumbags she w3as going up against. And he was right - one of those scumbags ende dup killing him later on.

Glosses over important details about pai mai and the shaolin monk.
Bill says "in a practically unfathomable display of generosity, pai mei gave the monk the slightest of nods.... the nod was not returned"
The video leaving out this detail makes it seem like the monk just ignored pai mei

"No, you're not a bad person. You're a terrific person. You're my favorite person, but every once in a while you can be a real c___."
This is because she has ironclad fundamental standards, "The Code". Every other character is compromised, except her and Pai Mei. This is why Bill loves her, because she has a purity of purpose, a selflessness, he doesn't have. It is also why he shoots her, because he thought she was being selfish for running off to marry somebody else. But she didn't do that for herself, she did it for the baby.

Pei Mei was actually referring to a martial arts character called White Crane. In kungfu films he is known as a ruthless fighter who rarely trains apprentice and that other martial arts practitioners would steer clear of or show utter respect.

The actor who played Bill I believe was in a old film about White Crane, so I feel like this bit in the movie was a reference to the old film.

I’ve watched virtually every Pai Mei movie since the 1970s such as the Executioners from Shaolin. Love this guy. He and Dark Knight’s Joker are my two favorite hard line characters of all time. It’s difficult to call them villains ; in a way they are but much more than that. Gordon Liu played Pai Mei brilliantly

Just the fact that he could so easily pluck someones eye out that fast was chilling enough in my humble opinion.

Judging about what he knew about Bill, his group and his business; he knew straight away that Beatrix was roadkill.  I don't think he ever intended on helping her at the start.  But her good character, work ethic and respect of him garnered a kind of affection from him.  She became his surrogate daughter and he gave her his perfect technical move as an inheritance.  She never told Bill because it was a treasure only for herself and that Pai Mai gave it to her because it was his recognition of her.  He never recognized anyone before her or after her.

Ultimately, his training did allow her to survive.  And maybe, Pai Mai always intended to kill Bill just like Hattori Hanzo.

The Pai Mei sequence was a flashback. They were still on good terms back then.

The "Slaughtered a whole temple because 1 monk failed to bow" is probably actually a nod to a horriffic incident back in early dynasties. One nobleman from a city was ordeered to go to the palace. He was delayed on a road by bandits robbing his caravan, and was late arriving to the palace. He rushed to the palace and apologized, but The emperor said he had already been forced to slaughter the entire city as a human sacrifice to himself to make up for the man's crime.  There is no internal logic, these men just love killing people.