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Nelson Branch Newsletter – March 2012

94

CONFUCIUS INSTITUTE and AGM

The full pdf is available at: NZCFSNelsonMarch2012.pdf

 

~ Next meeting: 9 March ~

CONFUCIUS INSTITUTE and AGM

 

We are pleased to announce that, in conjunction with the Nelson Multicultural Council, we have invited members of the Confucius Institute at Canterbury University to visit Nelson to participate in Race Unity Day (on Sunday 11 March) and to speak at our meeting.

Hong Hu, Deputy Director of the Institute at Canterbury, and possibly others, will be at our meeting. Hong Hu will speak to us about the work of the Confucius Institute in New Zealand and around the world.

The purpose of the Institute is to promote Chinese language and culture, which correlates well with 

the NZCFS goals, and our own Nelson focus. In New Zealand, the Confucius Institute is established at Auckland, Victoria and Canterbury Universities and they are setting up outposts in other centres and schools. Last year they were in Nelson for an interesting promotion at Nayland College, attended by some of our members.

Our Annual General Meeting, including the Annual Reports and the Election of Officers will begin at 5.30 pm.On this occasion, the meal will be ordered for 6.15 pm, to be followed by our visiting speaker.

Friends and visitors are welcome but please notify Barbara when you ring so that we have accurate numbers for the meal.

 

Friday 9 March .. Hearing House .. 5:30 pm

To arrange catering please ring:

Barbara Markland Ph. 544 4712 by Tuesday 6 March

or e-mail: [email protected]

 


Race Unity Day – Sunday 11 March – Victory Square

The weekend of our AGM will be a special one for Nelson, as it will be the first official Chinese participation at Race Unity Day. To add to the excitement, the Christchurch visitors are bringing a lion dance troupe to provide a headline act, and this may be the first time the Chinese Lion has danced here. We hope many of our members will enjoy our Confucius Institute focus on Friday evening and also attend the Race Unity Day events on Sunday, between 11 am and 4 pm, with music, dance, arts and food.

CHINESE NEW YEAR BANQUET: A lively gathering of 63 members and visitors enjoyed celebrating the start of the Year of the Dragon, at the Eastern Cuisine on 23 January.

We were delighted to welcome our National President, Eric Livingstone and his wife, Judy. They had spent the day in Nelson, visiting the Chinese Garden, Rosalina McCarthy’s garden, and some of your committee.

It was also a pleasure to meet some new, and some returning, Nelson residents, many of whom have since joined up, as well as some visitors to the region, even from as far away as Canada.

The banquet was of the usual high standard that we have come to expect from the Eastern Cuisine. As noted in our last newsletter, we did not include our AGM this time, because of the earlier Chinese New Year.

ANNUAL GENERAL MEETING: Items on the agenda will include: the President’s Report, the Financial Report, the Election of Officers, and any General Business. Nominations for all positions will be taken at the meeting and new committee members would be happily welcomed.

2012 SUBSCRIPTIONS: As our Branch accounts are reasonably healthy, the Treasurer will recommend at the AGM that our subscriptions remain unchanged:

That Nelson Branch subscriptions for 2012 remain the same as 2011:

Single $15         Couple $25         School $25         Corporate $30

2012 BRANCH MEETING DATES: Our meeting dates for the year have been designed to avoid long weekends and school holidays as much as possible. As usual, they are all on Fridays at 5.30 pm and are at Hearing House, unless other arrangements are made on special occasions. A range of speakers and activities will be finalised by the new committee when it meets after the AGM.

Please mark these dates on your calendar and keep them free for our Branch Meetings during 2012:

20 April         8 June         20 July         31 August         19 October         30 November

NATIONAL CONFERENCE 2012 and 60th ANNIVERSARY: As noted in the February National Notebook (nzchinasociety.org.nz/8997/national-notebook-february-2012), our Society, then called “The China Friendship Association”, began on 27 February, 1952.

Our 60th Anniversary celebrations began with a delightful banquet in Wellington on 24 February, the night before the regular National Executive meeting. There were several entertaining stories from the past and a congratulatory speech from the Chinese Embassy.

The 2012 National Conference and AGM will be held from 18 – 20 May in Auckland, where the Society began 60 years ago. The theme is appropriately: “By honouring our past, we find our future”.

The opening will include a screening of the 1957 documentary “Inside China” by Rudall Hayward, featuring the gift by his wife Ramai of the feather cloak worn by the Maori King Tawhiao, to Chairman Mao.

Mme Li Xiaolin will head a high-powered delegation from Youxie, and we have also invited our three Chinese Honorary Members including Ma Baoru, a fount of knowledge on Kathleen Hall (He Ming Qing), and Rewi Alley’s translator, Lu Wanru. Mme Li will give a keynote address, as will the Trade Minister Tim Groser, who first visited China as a student in 1971.

The proceedings will also include the premiere of a DVD produced for the Society on our activities in China, shot during last year’s Projects Tour. Our very own Philippa Reynolds may well be on the big screen.

With such an interesting programme to celebrate an important occasion, it would be wonderful to see a good contingent from Nelson there this year. More details, including registration details, very soon.

NZCFS RAFFLE: With a wonderful first prize of two return tickets to China, this raffle was a very popular purchase at our New Year Banquet. As Air New Zealand have provided the tickets to the Society to recognise the number of bookings we make through them for our tours, every dollar of the $5 ticket price goes to the Society, with $1 of that going to our Branch. Tickets will be on sale at our meetings, with the draw done in Auckland on the Chinese National Day, 1 October, 2012.

We would be very pleased if anyone would like to take a book of tickets to sell to a wider audience.

MEMBER NEWS: We welcome Garin College (and Diana Murdoch, International Director at Garin), Celia and Dave Rodley, Barbara and Tim Robson, and Bill Findlater as new members.

NELSON – HUANGSHI SISTER CITY VISIT: Following on from a very delightful visit to Nelson’s Sister City, Huangshi in Hubei Province, to attend their 60th Anniversary celebrations in 2010 and the subsequent visit of officials and businessmen from Huangshi to Nelson last year, the Nelson Regional Economic Development Agency has arranged a visit to China for the Mayor and several local businessmen.

The trip, from 17 March – 29 March, will also visit Beijing, Guangzhou, Shunde, Hangzhou and Hong Kong with a view to developing collaboration and business opportunities. Those accompanying Nelson Mayor Aldo Miccio and Bill Findlater, CEO of Nelson Regional EDA will be: Paul Le Gros, Legal Consultant and winery owner; Nick Patterson, Waiwest Horticulture; Tony Gray, CEO Nelson Marlborough Institute of Technology; Matthew Kidson, Kidson Construction; and Grace Gu, Translator.

CHRISTINE’S EDUCATION PROGRAMME: After the success of the Beijing/Nanjing group being hosted here in August, 2011, another group will be here this year from 22 April to 12 May. This time there are 16 delegates from the Beijing Academy of Educational Sciences.

They are generally older than last year’s group and are mostly education researchers and administrators. They will be doing Christine’s training in teaching methods, visiting local schools and institutions, and having a good look around the district.

Once again, it is hoped that the visitors can board with NZCFS members, and that members can work together to develop group activities. The five homestay hosts last year had a very enjoyable time with their visitors, although language problems existed at times. It is helpful if two, or even three, can stay together. It is likely the teaching venue will be mostly in the central city this time.

If you would like to be involved in any way in this interesting education exchange programme, please let Christine know.

60th BIRTHDAY PROJECTS AND SILK ROAD TOUR: To celebrate our 60th birthday, your Tours Committeehas organised a unique tour, led by North Island Vice President Dave Bromwich, that will combine a classic Silk Road adventure, starting in the very west of China in Kashgar, with a fascinating Projects Tour, where you can explore how the legacy of Rewi Alley, Kathleen Hall (He Ming Qing) and the cooperative movement are expressed in our NZCFS projects today.

You will celebrate 60 years of the NZCFS and 70 years of the Shandan Bailie School, and visit local cooperatives in Shandan; meet our He Ming Qing scholar in Lanzhou, visit the NZCFS Shaanxi Women’s Federation health and cooperative project; see Rewi Alley’s old cave dwelling; and explore Kathleen Hall’s village.

In Beijing you will again celebrate our 60th birthday with friends old and new, as well as visiting the Great Wall, and other classic tourist attractions.

At least 3 Nelson members have expressed very strong interest in going – come and join them! For more information, contact Dave Bromwich ([email protected] or ph 06 8779930) or check out our website: nzchinasociety.org.nz/8532/nzcfs-60th-birthday-tour-september-2012/.

RAY SYMNS IN BEIJING: Nisa and Kevin’s son Ray is back in Beijing for his second year of study. He writes: “I spent 2011 living and studying Mandarin at the People’s University in Beijing. During this experience I was able to meet many foreign students from all over the world, as well as many talented Chinese students too.  Beijing as a city is developing at a frenetic pace. It seems that everyone here is so focussed on improving themselves, whether it be in the classroom or in their private lives. Certainly, many of the students here have set a good example and standard for me to follow!

At the beginning of the year it was a huge challenge to be in a totally new environment and living independently for the first time. Through my language studies, I am now able to cope with the day to day tasks and practical challenges as they present themselves. Overall, attending university here has been such a great experience that I have decided to undertake a further year of study to help hone my Chinese language proficiency for use in my studies in New Zealand next year and my future career. I hope that this note finds you all well and ready for the many opportunities and positive experiences the year of the Dragon will bring. Wishing all a great 2012. Xin nian kuai le!  Warm regards, Ray.”

FERRY AND AUKJE IN ZHANGYE – FROM THE GREEN COUCH: It was great to see Aukje Bothand Ferry van Mansum at the New Year Banquet, just a few days before they flew out to start their new teaching stint at Hexi University in Zhangye, Gansu Province. Hexi University has a relationship with the NZCFS and Zhangye is about 65 km away from Shandan and the Shandan Bailie School. We look forward to receiving regular updates from them on their experiences there. They write:

“Sitting on one of the bright “Granny Smith” green couches in our apartment on the campus of Hexi University in Zhangye, it seems a good time to write down some of the first impressions before they become part of our daily routine. The apartment is on the fifth floor of a six-storey block of flats built about two years ago, so things still look fresh. There is even a study with computer, printer and spare bed, so there is room for visitors. We share the front door to our part of the building with eleven other apartments, all of them home to other foreign experts, except one on the ground floor where Mrs Wu, the caretaker, lives.

There is no elevator, which is one of the reasons why our washing machine is not installed yet. It is waiting downstairs for the students to return from their spring holidays to help carry the thing upstairs.

Our apartment is on the corner of the building, with windows and views from three sides. 

The best view is from the windows behind our bedroom. They look out over still bare trees and plots of land that will look nice and green when winter is over. On clear days there is a snow covered mountain range in the background that will even have snow in summer. We are already at 1,500 meters, so those mountains are impressive.

The worst of winter is in January, so days of minus 20 or more are behind us.We’ve already had some nice sunny days that remind us of Nelson in mid-winter, where it warms up nicely during the day. The apartment is tropical. Coming from outside, the first thing we do is peel down to the last layer and then open a window. And close it when the wind picks up, because with deserts all around us, those shiny laminated floors are soon covered in a layer of blackish sand. The apartment had been empty for a year, and although it had been cleaned, shopping for cleaning material was high on our priority list. Now all we need are a few “nice things” to make the flat look more like a home. We’ve already scored a nice poster of an impressive 34.5 meter resting Buddha that we saw in Dafosi, a temple in Zhangye. Dafosi is a beautiful temple complex, where we will certainly return in a different season.

Zhangye itself is a city with great contrasts. We walk wide lanes and narrow streets, see new cars with unknown Chinese names and old bikes and carts. In front of the newest fashion stores, people in traditional dress sell their wares from their old or brand-new tricycles. Next to modern apartment blocks are alleyways where people live in small cob houses. There is a lot to see and write about at a later time.

We have not started teaching yet. The teachers in the English department are busy and have not yet found the time to give us our teaching schedule and fill us in on the curriculum. We are supposed to start our job in a few days, but if that involves teaching as well is not yet clear. I guess time will tell….”

BADGES: If anyone has any name badges at home, we would love to have them recycled – thanks.