CHineseINK

Newly re-elected Mayor Kerry Prendergast launched the Asian Events Trust’s programme to celebrate the Year of the Rat in 07 February 08. Rebecca Tom (left), Stephanie Tims and Linda Lim, have been doing this work under contract to the Wellington City Council for seven years and each year the event gets bigger and better. What began as a street parade down Courtenay Place, with a hundred people, ten floats and a Lion dancing in a pear tree has grown into a not-so mini Asian Arts Festival. Indeed there is some danger that by 2010 Wellington could have a 10 month long International Festival of Wearable Chinese New Year Managerie. Good on them for developing a vehicle that helps get a share of China’s cultural diplomacy allocation for Wellington.

One thing that is bound to get bigger is the Falun Gong marching band, now that they have won the right to join this year’s Wellington Farmer’s Christmas Parade. These occasions must be a great treat for its members who travel long distances from throughout New Zealand to join our local family festivities. In Auckland, the City of Triangle Television, the jury is still out, and for now so are they

The Xiamen Association and the Sakai Association, flag bearers for Wellington’s sister cities in China and Japan respectively, held a joint Christmas celebration at Hede Japanese Restaurant. There was a minimum of formalities before we were able to enjoy the meal which included menu items which were variously, and confusingly, intended for individuals, couples, trois and quadruplets. Some piggies got double rations and some, like Tom Yuan (Wellington City Councils Asian Liaison Officer who had to go the airport during the festivities) got none.

WXA and WSA are the natural homes of those with cultural or business links with China and Japan respectively and it appears the political sponsorship of the Council makes all the difference in gaining access and making an impact in those cities.

I have been working on a film about the Chinese in Molesworth Street which is the heart of the Government Centre. Originally created as a contribution to Wellington City Council’s InSite/IntensCity urban design/arts project, I arranged to interview a number of Wellington Chinese identities at the sites of their former businesses.

The stars of the film are Mrs YH Lowe, Laywood Chan representing his father Dan Chan, Ken Chan, Alan Tso, Willie Wong, Sonny Tom and the baby of the group, Richard Young, who had businesses opposite the Railway Station, at the Court of Appeal, the Accident Compensation Building and the State Services Commission. An on-site summing up was provided by Nigel Murphy from the National Library, also conveniently located on Molesworth Street.

The interviews were all conducted in four hours with camera and sound technicians arranged by Siv Fjaerestad from Enjoy Art Gallery who was also the director. Best Boy and stills photographer was Peter Wong. Willie Wong got hold of the genuine props (used in every scene!) and acted as Transport Master. Christine Chan-Hyams was copyright adviser.

Film and sound editing has taken some time, because in zero-budget film-making one is rather dependent on the goodwill and time availability of the post-production team, and this is a busy time of the year for students of film who must submit their own projects to the University for assessment. As this film is being made on behalf of the Wellington Chinese Association, we are trying to arrange Chinese translations and subtitles.

The world premiere of this film will be held in February 2008, coincidentally, just before the International Festival of the Arts, at the New Zealand Film Archive. We have negotiated a deposit agreement with the Film Archive which will make the film available for viewing to (but not copying by) students and researchers. Copyright in the film will be jointly vested in the Wellington Chinese Association and Enjoy Art Gallery. We have model releases from the participants; nevertheless any future use of the images must respect the personal dignity and cultural sensitivities of those portrayed in the film and the community they represent.

Apart from the stars of the film and the production team, the premiere will be attended by representatives from Enjoy Art Gallery, the Wellington City Council and Asia NZ Foundation. We hope that there will be good turn-out from the local Chinese community.

Already this new connection with the arts community has had some beneficial spin-offs. The Association has been asked to support a project organised by Enjoy in which No Chinatown Malaysian installation artist Kah Bee Chow will work in Wellington as part of a national One Day Sculpture project. Members will be invited to interact with the artist during a research visit and later witness the creation of a work in 24 hours. Also, in 2008, we will have the opportunity to support the visit of a Hong Kong artist taking up a painting residency in the Bolton Cottage in Bolton Street – part of New Zealand’s increased interaction with Asia.

*Ching Kong refers to Wellington’s Clear Harbour. Our budget was probably smaller than Peter’s; about $27 for the tapes and miscellaneous items, plus $66 for the cost of the wrap party.

I joined a class of International MBA students for dinner at the invitation of the course director Dr Paul McDonald. The course gives students, who are highly motivated but have business and family commitments, the opportunity to attend lectures delivered face-to-face by Victoria academic staff in Hong Kong, and to receive a genuine Victoria University degree. The course is coordinated by the Chinese University of Hong Kong’s Asia-Pacific Business Institute.

Most members of the class tour New Zealand as part of the course experience. It was thought that as students in a Victoria MBA programme they should know something of New Zealand’s history and culture, but as Chinese they would be interested in the history and culture of the Chinese in New Zealand.

So once again I was able to dine out on my favourite subject, by giving a talk that started by contrasting the Treaty of Waitangi with the Treaty of Nanjing and ended by asking how the Chinese were going to take a full part in a New Zealand which is becoming increasingly bicultural (with a special place reserved for Maori in its constitutional arrangements).

It struck me later that these students already had experience of special constitutional arrangements. After the British took Hong Kong under the Treaty of Nanjing they limited the constitutional rights of the Chinese living there for 100 years. When the British left Hong Kong became a Special Administrative Region of China and while the people have the privilege of continuing to live there, once again they have limited political rights. No wonder Hong Kong people just concentrate on making money instead.

No expense was spared in putting on the Beijing Olympic Family Showcase (St James Theatre, Wellington, 11 November) one of the events marking the 35^th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between New Zealand and China and the more-recent sister-city relationship between Wellington and Beijing. The show was contemporary, with Chinese motifs incorporated into a jazz band performance, modern dance, ballet and Chinese and Italian arias – so much so that one of the dance numbers had the look and feel of Shanghai Noon at Caesar’s.

The costumes were magnificent, but in keeping with the underlying formality of inter-governmental relationships, most of the dancers were well-covered. The few who dressed a little more risqué were barely voluptuous enough to carry it off. The back-drops, lighting and smoke were very elaborate and generally well-managed, but the St James sound system was pushed to its limits for several items. However, it was hardly needed for the star’s rendition of Nessun Dorma and O Solo Mio.

The audience was dominated by new migrants - out in force to see their own. Thankfully there were no speeches.

What did we learn? That popular Chinese culture has been heavily influenced by the west and that the modes of contemporary Chinese representation are not bound by tradition.

Along with some Asian members of the Diplomatic Corp and their ladies I was privileged to observe and sample the work of some of the 30 Beijing chefs brought here as part of the celebration of 35 years of diplomatic relations between China and New Zealand. Some of the skills displayed were practical, such a making large quantities of jiaozi by hand; some were decorative, such as making life-like flowers with coloured dough; some were esoteric, such as slicing chicken breast as fine as thread and turnip as transparent as tissue paper- while others were highly energetic stretching fingers of dough into lariats and lariats into noodles. The combination of exotic fruits and seafood appears to be a recent innovation in contemporary Chinese cuisine.

While this week food is part of a diplomatic vocabulary of goodwill, in the past it has also been used elsewhere to convey the opposite. A senior official recalled that while posted to Vietnam in the 1980s he sat through a dinner consisting solely of snake, from snake’s blood in spirits to snakes steamed, boiled, stewed, fried, grilled, baked and barbequed, possibly when border negotiations were not going so well.

Last night I attended a dinner to welcome a delegation led by Mr Lin Jun, vice-President of the All-China Federation of Returned Overseas Chinese. The joint hosts were the Wellington Chinese Association, the Tung Jung Association, the Seyip Association and the Poon Fah Association which include many cantonese and English speakers, and the New Chinese Friendship Association whose members are predominantly mandarin speakers.

To help bridge the language gap I made a bilingual PowerPoint presentation which outlined the scope of the five community group’s work, showed photos of recent activities and hopefully listed items of cultural maintenance for which we sought Chinese government support. I think the finer points of Mr Lin’s speech in response was lost on the English-speakers as there was, on this occasion, no translation. That there might still be non-Chinese-speaking Chinese people left in the world seems increasingly strange to Chinese officials.

Nevertheless I did have a rather fascinating chat, in English, with my dinner companion, the Chinese defence attache. I was surprised that the People’s Liberation Army had posted a Senior Colonel (Brigadier) to liaise with New Zealand’s somewhat smaller defence force. After some light interrogation between the soup course and the chicken course I learned that the PLA was maintaining a continental self-defense posture and was not planning to project power globally. Between the roast duck and the sweet and sour fish, I learned that (post Desert Storm) the PLA was reviewing its doctrine of fighting a “people’s war” and re-quipping with smart weapons to fight a digital war. Between the prawn rolls and bok choi I learned that China had independently developed its own fifth generation fly-by-wire fighter-bomber aircraft. And before dessert I learned that the PLA had personnel recruitment and retention problems in a booming Chinese economy. You can see that for national security reasons, long dinners should be discouraged.

I was invited to the Embassy for the launch of the 5th Chinese Film Festival, part of the celebration of 35 years’ of diplomatic relations between China and New Zealand.

Old friends on the circuit, Ambassador and Mayor exchanged warm compliments. Probably not for the first time, visiting dignitary followed suit to also politely extend compliments to “mayoress” Rex “Prendergast” who could only gamely smile.

Later the party adjourned to the Rialto Cinema for New Zealand premiere of The Knot.

(Spoiler) 1940s leftist Taiwan med student/English tutor falls in love with artist schoolgirl, declares eternal devotion, flees Nationalists, joins PLA in Korea, meets perky nurse but refuses to reciprocate feelings, transfers to Tibet, finally succumbs to nurse who has in desperation changed her name to that of artist schoolgirl and tracked him to his mountain posting. After a brief period of happiness, both die in an avalanche. Meanwhile artist declines repeated forlorn offers of honourable but dull suitor who tries to track medic for her, but eventually she lives alone. Niece of artist re-traces medic’s journey, finds his now-adult son and, rather unnecessarily, connects him to his father’s true love via a webcam in Tibet.

Mawkish devotion and lack of conflict may mean the story has little appeal outside country of origin.

Kim Lee was a Chinese shopkeeper who was incarcerate on Somes Island in Wellington Harbour because he was thought to have leprosy. He was shunned by other inmates and further isolated on Mokupuna Island, a rocky outcrop off the main island, where, not surprisingly, he died after a few months. The centenary of his death was commemorated March 2004.

A small group met at my office to discuss the possibility of making a documentary about Kim Lee.

The Office of Ethnic Affairs (Winifred Manhowa) organised a Community Forum on Cultural Representation in New Zealand’s Identity held today at the Dom Poliski (Polish Community Centre) in Newtown. Many of the usual suspects from the various ethnic communities were there and on the other side were representatives of the Ministry of Culture & Heritage, NZ On Air and TVNZ.

Generally, it was reported, the news was rather depressing: It appears that the onus was on each ethnic group to make a case for funding to these agencies one by one for a share of a minuscule budget which might or might not be granted. There seemed to be no policies at present within government agencies to develop adequate representation of New Zealand’s ethnically diverse society in state-funded media.

I didn’t make it to the morning sessions so was given the truant’s job of writing up one of the afternoon feedback sessions as it progressed. The main points:

1. OEA will be writing a report of the forum and sending it through to the various government agencies who attended; however, it has no control over what steps these agencies might or might no do in response.

2. European, Maori and Pacific Island cultures were represented in media but, it was noted that others such as the Chinese, who had been here for more than 150 years, were hardly represented at all.

3. The lone exception Asia Down Under was appreciated but other groups did not have any outlet.

4. Having adequate representation of all groups making up New Zealand society was important not only for these groups, but also beneficial to mainstream New Zealand which need to have knowledge of, for example, India and China which were destined to be the two main engines of growth in the 21^st Century.

5, Rugby dominated TV Sport but little was seen of other sports of interest to a internationally-minded audience. However it was pointed out that just the rights alone to broadcast international sport were expensive – then there was the cost of being there to do the broadcast.

6. Stories about Africa consistently represented that continent in a very negative light showing poverty, war and disease; reports about Iraqis or Iranians implied that most of them were terrorists. This representation was unbalanced.

7. In India there are micro broadcasts and podcasts: technologies exist to cater to minority interests.

I8. t was perhaps a mistake to think minorities were all poor: in fact the Indian and Chinese communities spent considerable sums to access satellite TV – because their needs were not being met by New Zealand media. This was revenue lost to TVNZ.

9. Local programmes unique to New Zealand (such as Korero Mai and Ask your Auntie on Maori Television) were much more relevant than local rehashes of programmes apparently popular overseas like My Dog is Too Fat.

10. Rather than have more minority programmes (which were of interest only to minorities,) it was necessary to include minority representation and participation in mainstream programmes.

11. Peter Parassini, TVNZ’s head of programming (and interestingly half Italian, half Seyip) was required to develop a diversity policy for TVNZ in 2008 and intended to correct the current impression that TVNZ saw and represented New Zealand as middle-class white Aucklanders, starting with the 6 o’clock News.