NEXT MEETING:
Michael Wong will tell us about his family history and his journey to document this.
Date: Friday 5th August
Time: 7.30pm
Where: Hastings District Council Chambers in Lyndon Road.
Hawke’s Bay born and bred, Michael’s great-grandfather came out to New Zealand in 1896. Michael has been a contributing
author for a book about his ancestral village of Gwa Leng in Quangzhou, China, that profiles early Chinese immigrant families to New Zealand.
Michael believes that it is important to record the history of Chinese New Zealanders from Gwa Leng for future generations. He is a chartered professional engineer.
CHIT CHAT
Thank you to everyone who paid their subscriptions promptly. A draw was held at the last meeting and the three members who paid promptly received their prizes.
LAST MEETING: 
The historical movie A Bright Moon gave an insight into the life of the oldest son of the number one concubine in a wealthy family. Born in 1880, Li Shutong was a young man drawn to the arts, including calligraphy, painting, music, sculpture, and drama. As a young man he lived in Japan for several years and married his second wife there. He organized a drama group and they all moved to China and this was the beginning of modern drama there. He worked for seven years as a music and arts teacher at the First Normal University of Zhejiang Province in Hangzhou.
In 1916, Li Shutong underwent a 17-day fast at a Hangzhou temple and this transformed his life. By choosing to be ordained as a monk, he gave up his artistic life and family and began a holistic life dedicated to propagating Buddhism and its code of conduct. He took the name Master Hongyi and became a highly venerated itinerant monk steeped in the school of precepts and morality.
The Communist Party of China (CPC), celebrated the 90th anniversary of its founding on July 1, 1921 in Shanghai.
Hu Jintao, the party’s general secretary and president gave a 90-minute speech to mark the occasion, that was televised across the nation. He reviewed the history and origins of Chinese socialism with Chinese characteristics and looked forward to the rest of this century.
Excerpts:………..Three major events [winning national independence and liberation of the people, establishing the basic socialist system and the new revolution of reform and opening up] reshaped the future and destiny of the Chinese people and the Chinese nation. They irreversibly ended the misery endured by China in modern times. They also irreversibly started the Chinese nation’s historic march for development, growth, and great rejuvenation. They gave China, a civilization of over 5,000 years, a completely new look and created unimagined prospects for the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation.
….. The entire Party must be keenly aware that at a time of profound changes in global, national and intra-Party conditions, we are now faced with many new developments, problems, and challenges in our effort to enhance the Party’s leadership and governance and its ability to resist corruption and degeneration and to withstand risks, and strengthen its governance capacity and advanced nature. And the whole Party is confronted with growing danger of lacking in drive, incompetence, divorce from the people, lacking in initiative, and corruption.
….. Leading officials at all levels must bear in mind that our power is entrusted to us by the people and can only be used in their interests. In exercising power, we must serve the people, hold ourselves accountable to them, and readily subject ourselves to their oversight. We must not turn our power into an instrument for making personal gains for a handful of individuals.
….. People’s democracy has always been a glorious goal pursued by the CPC. Since the reform and opening up policy was introduced, the Party has reviewed both positive and negative lessons in developing socialist democracy, and it has come to the conclusion that without democracy there can be no socialism.
….. To promote social development, we should focus on ensuring and improving the people’s wellbeing. [We will] give high priority to promoting employment in our economic and social development, and accelerate the development of education, social security, medicine and healthcare, low-income housing and other social programs. We will ensure that all the people have equal access to basic public services, make more efforts to regulate income distribution, pursue prosperity for all, and strive to ensure that all the people enjoy the right to education, employment, medical and old-age care, and housing.
….. Most of the founding members of the Party and its members of succeeding generations joined the Party when they were young. Young people represent the future of both China and its people. They also represent the future and hope of the Party. The whole Party must care about young people, listen to what they have to say, encourage their growth, and support their entrepreneurship.
….. Ninety years ago, the CPC only had a few dozen members. Back then, China was a poor and backward country and its people were leading a miserable life. Today, the CPC has more than 80 million members. China is prospering and its people are living a happy life. All the achievements of the Party over the past 90 years have been made by the Party together with the people. We will never forget that the people are the real heroes.
Go to the members only section of our website for the full speech.
