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National Notebook July 2011

Year of the Rabbit

In 2010 NZCFS started a rabbit raising project for hamlets in poor rural areas in the interior of karst Guangxi. This year, your Projects’ Team is promoting the extension of this project to reach more families. For $80, a new household can receive a team of rabbits to get started. Read more on this website under Projects, Guangxi.

On 6 July 2011 we received a report from Mr. Yuan, the Animal Husbandry Technician, training and advising the farmers. In the 17 households in two villages, 172 rabbits were sold between January and May this year for return of 24 Yuan ($4.50) per kg. This i

The 2010 Projects’ Tour visited Sanzhiyang rabbit farmers.

s 700-800 Yuan (NZ$130-150) per household for the 5 winter months when their previous average income was around 700 Yuan for the year.

Thank you to Timaru, Wairarapa and Hawke’s Bay Branches who have contributed towards the next families receiving rabbits.

To make a donation Direct Credit to:

03 0658 0213133 25 and put ‘rabbits’ as a reference.                       

 

 

 

 

 Study Tour: Learning Mandarin, Experiencing China and Enjoying Chinese New Year

NZCFS and Beijing Bailie University offer a Chinese language and culture month of study. The course combines: Mandarin language learning, a range of cultural activity, and regular local sight-seeing trips in the Beijing area and includes Spring Festival Celebrations. It targets New Zealand learners of Chinese language at an elementary level, of all ages.

Beijing Bailie University motto

Location: Beijing

Period (dates to be confirmed): 4 weeks in the period 27 December 2011, to January 2012.

Estimated cost (including living expenses in Beijing): $1700 to $1800 plus International airfare -up to $2400

The NZCFS Education Team encourages everyone to promote this study tour to other interested parties they have contact with, such as:

    schools, tertiary institutes, Mandarin corners, night classes….

In April 12th, 2008, Premier Wen Jiabao inscribed the University motto, ‘Hands and mind, create and analyze’, written by two great friends of China, Rewi Alley and George Hogg.

 

Tours

As we finish the final planning for the NZCFS Projects’ and Tibet Tour, October 2011, we wish to indicate a future tours’ plan. Details will be released as the plan develops, watch this space!

At this stage, the Tibet tour is almost full, but 2 further people could still be accommodated.

 

NZCFS 60th Birthday Tour

23 or 24 days, September/ October 2012

Planning is underway for this important tour, and some people have already indicated interest.

Visit NZCFS sites with historical and current connections, eg  Kathleen Hall’s village in Songjiazhuang and Rewi Alley’s connection to Shuangshipu and Shandan, to look at NZCFS’s legacy and how our Society relates to this today.

Combine this with a classic ‘silk road’ tour in the west.

Future Planning

Explore China Series:   A series of tours with a regional theme focus looking at specialties of each region. This will not demand extensive travel, with a close look at several sites within each region. We feel an indication of these plans will help you to choose NZCFS as your tour operator in China.

Following tours to the North Central (April 2011), Tibet (October 2011), and the 60th birthday 2012 tour to the North West, our draft future plan is as follows:

Draft Five Year Plan

2013 The South East             2014 The North East            2015 The South West

2016  Central China              2017 The Northwest

Bill Willmott in Nanchang

 

Lake Ruqin in Lushan Mountain.

 

 


 

 

 

(Photos—Mike Earle on the 2010 Prominent Person’s Tour in Jiangxi.)

 

Themed Focus Tours    These tours will be one-off and based on a specific theme combined with general sightseeing,  for example, projects’ tours, garden tours etc.

Currently, a Photographers’ Tour is being planned for April 2012.

The Tours Committee is happy to hear from Branches and people with knowledge and ideas about theme topics in China, or who are members of interest groups who would like to assist with developing such a tour. The range of themes that could be developed is extensive, and the Tours’ Committee can work with you to develop an itinerary.

 

Volunteer’s will teach English.

NZCFS hosted Madame Li Xiaolin, Vice President, of the Chinese People’s Association for Friendship with Foreign Countries (Youxie), to a luncheon in Wellington in November 2010.  Arising from the discussions, Madame Li invited three NZCFS members to teach English in her home province, Hubei, from 9-30 October 2011.  They will work in schools in Hong’an County, to the north of Wuhan, the home of her father, Li Xiannian (see his details below).

 

The following people have been selected and are looking forward to their trip:

Jenevere Foreman, President of Hamilton Branch and a National Executive member, will lead the group. She is a qualified teacher in TESOL (Teaching English as a Second Language) and taught at Changsha University for two semesters.

Murray Hoare, Secretary of Auckland Branch, has lived in Hong Kong and does business in China. Murray has a basic knowledge of Mandarin and speaks Cantonese and French.

A third person is yet to be confirmed.

In 1926 Li Xiannian was engaged in the work of the peasant association and in November 1927 took part in the Hong’an—Macheng armed uprising and joined the Communist Party of China (CPC).  In 1931 he joined the Red Army, taking part in the Long March in 1935 and was involved in numerous military initiatives. 

He served as Party Secretary of the Hubei Provincial CPC Committee from 1949 to 1954 and during this time held other positions including Chairman of the Hubei Provincial People’s Government, Mayor of Wuhan City, Vice-Chairman of the Central-South Military and Administrative Commission and was a member of the Central People’s Revolutionary Military Commission.

From 1954 to 1967, he was China’s Minister of Finance and later was one of the architects of China’s economic recovery after the Cultural Revolution.  In 1983, after the passing of a new Constitution, Li was appointed President of the People’s Republic of China (PRC).  In July 1985 he visited the United States , the first visit from the Head of State of the PRC.  In 1988, he resigned as President and became Chairman of the Communist People’s Party Consultative Committee until his death in 1992.

 

Hong’an County is known as the ‘County of Generals’ in that more than 400 Chinese army generals have been born there, a total far greater than for any other county in all of China.