It looks like a Tiger of a year... with the Olympics in town, and lions running everywhere at Vancouver's Chinatown Chinese New Year Parade

Lions were everywhere in Vancouver Chinatown, celebrating the Year of the Tiger.

All the celebrities, politicians and VIP's walk at the beginning of the parade. 

Next come the Chinese Canadian veterans of Pacific Unit 280 (minus my uncle Dan, who passed away less than a month ago).  But the veterans all wore red Olympic mittens!

Here's a Chinese parade dragon.  How to tell a dragon from a lion?  You wear the lion costume over your body, while the dragon is always held up on poles!

The Kitchen God always marches in the parade.  The trick is to put honey on the Kitchen God's lips before he makes his report to heaven about your kitchen, so he can only say sweet things with honey on his lips.

Here I am with my friend Georgia, who paddles with us on the Gung Haggis dragon boat team.

The Carnival band all tried to dress up as Tigers....

City Councilor Kerry Jang hands out lucky red envelopes called "li-see" for good luck!

Here I am dressed in my kilt and red Chinese dragon vest.  I met this fellow in his black utility kilt outside the skytrain stop at The Bay.  Kilters greet each other, and I invited him to join us for the next kilts night.  Since it was Chinese New Year we took a picture of him waring my Chinese jacket.  Very cool.

Raphael, Todd and Stuart + two members from Spanish team for World Police and Fire Games.

Every 1st Thursday of each month we meet at Doolin's Irish Pub.  Why? If you wear a kilt, you receive a free pint of Guinness.

Kilts Night is more than just kilts or Scottish culture.  It's about cultural diversity enjoying cultural diversity.  We have Asians in kilts.  We have surprised cottish tourists not wearing kilts.  On Thursday August 7th, we met members from the Spanish team for the World Police and Fire Games.  The tall blonde woman is competing in pentathalon.  They loved that Vancouver has a beach named "Spanish Banks" and that many places in Vancouver were named by Spanish explorer Juan de Fuca.

It was Mark Cameron's 40th birthday pub crawl. His kilt met members of the Spanish team for the World Police & Fire Games

Mark and his buddies created a "Troller to the Raven Pub Crawl" immortalized in the Spirit of the West Song.  We gave them a warm Kilts Night welcome from members of the Gung Haggis Fat Choy dragon boat team.

Louis' first Kilts Night... and we put a kilt on him. Only one year ago, Louis was living in Paris with no kilts night!

Kilts Night August 2009

• in 1993, when I first wore a kilt for the SFU, Robbie Burns Day celebrations
• in 1998, with a small private dinner for 16 people in a living room
• how it has grown into an annual Robbie Burns Chinese New Year dinner serving 550 people
• and spun off a CBC TV performance special
• The SFU Gung Haggis Fat Choy Festival, by SFU Recreation department.
  

Happy Gung Haggis Fat Choy dragon boat team paddlers after winning the Recreation B Final (standing l-r) Todd, Steven, Walter, Ernest, Stephen (back), Hillary, Wendy, Karen, Christine, Karen, Joe, Heather, Sean John, Raphael, (sitting l-r) Dennis, Jane, Katie, Tony, Debbie, Ashleigh, Tzhe, (front) Jim.

Katie is interviewed, after her first-ever dragon boat race, for the film documentary "In The Same Boat" - photo Todd Wong

April 6th is Tartan Day the whole world over.  And now there is Scottish Week.

The Centre for Scottish Studies, at Simon Fraser University, organized a conference on "Robert Burns in Transatlantic Context."  I was invited by Dr. Leith Davis to perform on the Tuesday evening, and give a presentation on Wednesday afternoon, and attend the closing reception on Thursday evening.

Tartan Week in Vancouver was also the final stop for Scottish Parliamentary Minister of Culture, Michael Russell, who started his week at the Tartan Day parade in New York City, visited Toronto, Vancouver, Victoria, then Vancouver again.

Toddish McWong meets Michael Russell, Scottish Parliamentary Minister for Culture, External Affairs and Constitution,
Scottish Development International - photo T. Wong

Last year I was featured in a Vancouver Sun story about Tartan Day.  Vancouver Sun: The next celebration - Toddish McWong helps to spread the word about Tartan Day  

Then I helped organize a proclamation by the City of Vancouver: Tartan Day (April 6) proclaimed in City of Vancouver, April 3

This year the major events were organized by Dr. Leith Davis, director of the Centre for Scottish Studies, SFU.

The week started out with a Tuesday evening of music and song for the "Musical Celebration of Burns in North America," featuring Jon Bartlett and Rika Reubsaat, performing "Burns Songs in BC", and also Kirsteen McCue and pianist David Hamilton performing Burns Songs by Serge Hovey.  This was really interesting because Kirsteen is from Scotland, and she explained that these were the musical arrangements that Burns himself had used, but were only discovered a few years ago.

Todd Wong apologizes for being unable to "roll" his "r's" due to Chinese DNA which has no "r-sounds"in the Chinese language.

Leith asked for a performance of "The Haggis Rap" or "Rap To A Haggis", in which bagpiper Joe McDonald and I rap the immortal Burns poem, "Address to a Haggis."  I introduced it by saying that Joe and I had performed this on CBC national television, and our MP3 version had also been played on BBC Radio Scotland two years ago.  Meanwhile, Joe had found a haggis in the kitchen.  Gung Haggis dragon boater Debbie Poon followed Joe into the hall carrying the haggis.

Joe McDonald pipes in the haggis for Scottish Week.

We closed off the evening by leading a singalong of Auld Lang Syne with the first verse and chorus in Mandarin Chinese.  Then dragon boaters Steven Wong and Debbie Poon helped lead some "volunteers" in a Chinese dragon parade, complete with two children carrying the Chinese lion masks.  It was fun, and lots of people thanked us afterwards with positive compliments.

On Wednesday there was a Community Research Forum on "Burns In BC."

Jon Bartlett and Rika Reubsaat started the forum by talking about the history of Burns dinners in BC.  They were followed by Robert Barr who gave a history of the Vancouver Burns Club.  I followed with a history of Gung Haggis Fat Choy, its origins and its cultural fusion context.

I explained that BC is a young province.  While we are celebrating the 250th Anniversary of Robert Burns' birth, we only just celebrated the 150th anniversary of the colony of BC.  Vancouver is only 123 years old.  I explained that to me, the "Two Solitudes" of BC are the Scottish and Chinese.  Each arrived from an opposite direction, and lived in conflict.  I explained that if the Scots hadn't been in political power, there probably wouldn't have been a Chinese Head Tax or an Exclusion Act to keep the Chinese out of Canada.  To which many people applauded my statement.  I went on to say that many generations later, there are many Scots and Chinese intermarried, and sharing Scots and Chinese DNA, just like in my family.

I shared how I first wore a kilt for the 1993 Burns ceremony at Simon Fraser University, and how the Gung Haggis Fat Choy dinners grew from 16 people in 1998 to 550 people in 2009.  A CBC television performance special was aired in 2004 and 2005.   And with the SFU Recreation Department, I helped create the SFU Gung Haggis Fat Choy Festival in 2005 with dragon cart races, and later with the human curling event.  It was a good talk that also included how I was chosent to play Robert Burns for the Celticfest's inaugural "Battle of the Bards" which I won against actors playing Dylan Thomas and W.B. Yeats.

Making Burns relevant in a global 21st Century, is what Gung Haggis Fat Choy events do.  The growth of copycat dinners in Ottawa, the Yukon, Seattle and Santa Barbara, demonstrate that Gung Haggis is reaching people in a positive way.  While promoting Burns, it also addresses multiculturalism and racism.

Thursday's Scottish Week finale is a reception for Michael Russell, Scottish Member of Parliament.

SFU Centre for Scottish Studies hosts a global Robert Burns conference

The 250th Anniversary of Robert Burns birth, was celebrated at the Burns statue in Stanley Park with an small informal celebration organized by Todd Wong (red vest) and Dr. Leith Davis (2nd row with purple shawl, behind her front row daughter in red skirt) - photo T. Wong

How does the poetry and songs of Robert Burns affect Canadians in West Coast Vancouver?

Dr. Leith Davis, director of the Centre for Scottish Studies, Simon Fraser University, has organized a conference about the global Robert Burns - titled "Robert Burns in a Transatlantic Context."

2009 SFU Gung Haggis Fat Choy Festival features "dragon cart racing" invented by yours truly - photo Todd Wong.

How did I first meet Dr. Davis?

After brief email introductions, I called her with the idea of a wreath laying ceremony at the Burns statue in Vancouver's Stanley Park to mark the 250th Anniversary of Burn's birth.

That evening she and her husband were guests of honour at the 2009 Gung Haggis Fat Choy dinner.  Leith gave "the immortal address" and marvelled at all the songs, guests, food and performances at the Gung Haggis Dinner, and especially at the impromptu ceremonial cutting of the haggis by Vancouver mayor Gregor Robertson.

Please check out the free public events for the:

SFU's Centre for Scottish Studies presents

"Robert Burns in a Transatlantic Context"

Public events:

Tuesday, April 7^th

Doors open at 6:30 p.m.; concerts starts at 7:00 p.m.

A Musical Celebration of 
Burns in North America

Jon Bartlett and Rika Ruebsaat, 
“Burns Songs in BC”

Kirsteen McCue and David Hamilton, 
“Burns Songs Set by Serge Hovey”

Gung Haggis Fat Choy Performers

Scottish Cultural Centre, 8886 Hudson Street , Vancouver

Wednesday, April 8^th, 3:00 - 3:30 p.m.

Michael Russell, Scottish Minister for Culture,
External Affairs and the Constitution
“Connecting Scotland and the Scottish Diaspora”

Room 1425 SFU Harbour Centre, 515 West Hastings Street , Vancouver

Wednesday, April 8^th, 3:45 - 5:00 p.m.

Community Research Forum on 
“Burns in BC”

Room 2200 SFU Harbour Centre, 515 West Hastings Street , Vancouver

Wednesday, April 8^th, 7:00 p.m.

Lecture: Dr. Robert Crawford, 
“Writing Burns’s Biography”

Room 1400, SFU Harbour Centre (reception to follow)

Thursday, April 9^th, 3:00-4:30 p.m.

Workshop: “Connecting Diasporas: 
Scotland, Asia and the Caribbean ”

Room 2200, Harbour Centre, 515 West Hastings Street , Vancouver

All events are free and open to the public. 

Please contact Ron Sutherland to reserve a seat:

rsutherl@sfu.ca; 604-988-0479

Sponsored by SFU’s Centre for Scottish Studies; the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada; and the Vancouver Burns Club