It is with great sorrow and enduring sadness that we announce the death of Zorica Rajic on Saturday July 1st 2023.

Zorica was one of the founder members of the Archway Academy in 2003 and one of its first instructors. She taught beginners classes up until 2007 when she decided to teach only private students. However she continued to train at the academy mainly attending workshops and seminars and the occasional classes when in preparation for competitions. She was popular with the other instructors and members alike and will be greatly missed for her joyful company and sometimes eccentric conversations.

Zorica was made a disciple of Grandmaster Wu Kwong Yu in 2006. and was registered as a certified instructor with the International Wu Style Tai Chi Chuan Federation in May 2006.

Below are some of the tributes and eulogies that have been offered about her

Don Spargo, Chief Instructor at the Archway Academy writes:

I first met Zorica in 1999 when she came to my classes at the Wu's style Tai Chi Academy in Osnaburgh street. She was lively, effervescent and joyful, always smiling, laughing and joking and always good company. She took to Tai Chi Chuan like a duck to water and started teaching students only a few years later. She was very popular with the other instructors and with the students because she managed to make the training fun and lively as well as accurate and understandable. She was one of the co-founders of the Archway Academy and one of its first instructors and as such her presence will have touched and influenced many lives. She was not a person that once you had met her you would forget. I was asked recently to sum up Zorica in a couple of sentences - Impossible! joyful, friendly, annoying, eccentric, intelligent, Stylish, beautiful, vivacious, fun to be with, artistic, spiritual, concerned for the world and its people, not easy to ignore, memorable. I shall miss her immensely but I do have many memories of the time we spent together, whether it was in the training hall, travelling to competitions or residential courses together, or even on one memorable road trip holiday in 2015 where Gillian Goodchild, Zorica and I drove from Podgorica in Montenegro to Athens and back and then to her family home in the North of Montenegro. She died far too young and it is hard to realise that she is no longer with us.

Don & Zorica in Montenegro

Dave Mighall - Senior Instructor at the Archway Academy writes:

Zorica was one of the most interesting people I have ever met. She was intelligent, witty, and always had a smile on her face. We shared a love of Tai Chi and spent many happy hours practicing together. Zorica had a great sense of humour and could always make me laugh. She had a way of looking at the world that was unique and refreshing. She was never afraid to speak her mind and always stood up for what she believed in. Zorica will be missed dearly, but I know that she will always be with me in spirit. She touched so many lives with her kindness and generosity. Rest in peace, my dear Zorica. David Mighall.

Zorica 'strangling' Dave in a workshop

Marcos Patchett writes:

I met Zorica about 25 years ago at a Tai Chi class in Osnaburgh St. She was doing the Sabre form beautifully, and reacting with prickly impatience to some of the critical feedback she was receiving. I thought she was a little intimidating, and at the same time I enjoyed her open and extraverted humour; her prickly demeanour changed like quicksilver with an easy laugh and an affable smile. Since then whenever I had occasion to train with her or on those occasions where I met her out of class I always had fun, and was constantly impressed by her adventurous spirit and self-possession. She seemed to live in technicolor, jumping out of planes or being buried alive, always learning new things in defiance of limits. I'm sad she left the party early, but grateful that she came.

Zorica with Dionisis and Sofia (Tstetselis) at a post workshop meal in Athens

Pat Saults wrote:

"I can't believe Zorica has gone. She embodied life, fun, energy and determination. Someone with a great sense of style, her panache and sense of aesthetics were reflected in her tai chi. I will miss the vibrancy and energy she brought with her to everything "

On a beach in Greece

Jae Willis wrote:

Although I met Zorica through Tai Chi, she became a great friend outside of the kwoon. She encouraged in me a cheeky and jovial nature, because that was the way she was herself. She was always great company, informed and intelligent, and incredibly warm hearted, and a good training partner too, I should add! She very quickly became like a fun aunty to my kids. In fact after the first time she met them as very small kids, she fell completely in love with them, and they with her. She would call them "my darlings!" in that excellent accent that I would tell my kids she was Transylvanian, because she was a secret day walking vampire. She would always laugh at this and never corrected me. I found out later that the boys completely believed me and though they loved her to bits, they also respected her restraint and thought she could turn on anyone if she had to. Not too far from the truth as she had a formidable aspect to her personality, but she was a gentle soul and too full of love to hurt anyone. As I'm sure is the same for everyone, her passing was a huge shock and so unexpected. The thought that she was suffering silently is heart wrenching as I would have like to have been able to support her in some way, as I'm sure so many others would have. People deal with things in such individual ways, perhaps her silence around her suffering was her thinking too much about others and not of herself, was reflective of her nature, and in that what can you say? She was Zorica, the exotic Serbian Transylvanian vampire who loved too much and died too young. I will really miss her, I already do. She enriched my life, and meant so much to my kids, I'm so grateful to her for that. I have to stop writing now because the tears are running into my keyboard. 

At home in Montenegro

Dan McGiff wrote:

Dear Don, I remember Zorica well from seminars and also the Singapore/HK trip with yourself and others. We had great fun with a shopping scam I've done a few times in HK and China with women who want to shop. She went into a store and showed interest in clothes, artefacts etc and spent a while haggling.

I would then enter as the frustrated angry husband berating her for spending more of my money and would pull her out of the shop. The seller would follow and make better offers.

I would then take over as the purse holder who did not want to buy anything and the scene was set to get the lowest price possible . Zorica enjoyed this immensely and we had a good laugh.

A couple of years later she contacted me saying she was staying temporarily in Southgate, quite near me, and wanted to meet up to train. Unfortunately I was too busy, I wish I had made the time now. So - rest in peace Zorica