Todd Wong with Lion Head

Asian Canadian adventures in inter-cultural Vancouver
and home of Toddish McWong's Robbie Burns Chinese New Year Dinner.

Welcome to GungHaggisFatChoy.com

Home to my passions for my inter-cultural adventures,

Gung Haggis Fat Choy: Robbie Burns
Chinese New Year Dinner event.


Save Kogawa House campaign,

Gung Haggis Fat Choy Dragon Boat team,

Find what you are looking for by
1) scroll the topics links,
2) use the search function

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Join the Gung Haggis Fat Choy Dragon Boat team
for lots of summer fun, fitness and friendship. We are a social team full of cultural vigor, that likes to eat.

We have been featured on television, local, national and international. We have a unique and internationally famous fundraiser dinner event.

We practice Sunday 1:30 pm -3:30 pm Tuesday 6pm-7:45pm Wednesday 6pm - 7:45 pm

We meet at Dragon Zone clubhouse - just south of Science World in Creekside Park above the Aquabus and dragon boat docks.

Our coach Todd Wong has 15+ years of experience including novice, recreational and competitive levels, and both community and corporate teams.

Our 2005 Season brought us the David Lam Award for being the team that best represented the multicultural spirit of the Alcan Dragon Boat Festival, and Bronze medals at the Vancouver International Taiwanese Dragon Boat Race. In 2007, we won Gold in B Division at Vernon Races.

For more information:
Click on Gung Haggis Fat Choy Dragon Boat team information
phone: 604-987-7124-
e-mail: gunghaggis at yahoo dot ca

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

2009 TICKETS Available in October 2008

WHAT: GUNG HAGGIS FAT CHOY: Toddish McWong's Robbie Burns Chinese New Year Dinner - 12th Annual Dinner, celebrating 250th Anniversary of Robert Burns' birth + Chinese New Year's Eve.

WHEN: 6PM January 25 2009, SUNDAY
doors open 5pm


WHERE: Floata Chinese Restaurant,
#400-180 Keefer St.


CULTURE: Our Performers create something special for us every year with traditional and contemporary performances featuring everything in-between and beyond!

FOOD: A quirky fusion/mix/buffet of Scottish Canadian and Chinese Canadian culture 10 course Chinese banguet dinner
2004 - The debut of Gung Haggis Won-Ton
2005 - Haggis lettuce wrap!
2007 - Haggis dim sum appetizer buffet
2008 - Scotch tastings!
Watch for more surprises in 2008!






Description of 2006 Gung Haggis Fat Choy Dinner featuring performers: Rick Scott & Harry Wong, The Shirleys, Joe McDonald & Brave Waves, Sean Gunn, author Joy Kogawa, with co-host Prem Gill .

Media Inquiries
Call Gung Haggis Productions 604-987-7124

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Year Archive
View Article  Joy Kogawa opposes Bill C-333 - ACE program "so-called" Chinese head tax redress
"This is almost exactly what happened with Japanese Canadian redress. My new/old novel, "Emily Kato" (a re-write of Itsuka and just published) describes the panic when government tried to pull the rug out from the redress movement. But we did stop it." wrote Joy Kogawa to me in an e-mail....   more »
View Article  Naomi's Road - Community Concert at Nikkei Place Sat Nov 26
This Saturday, Naomi's Road, the Vancouver Opera Touring Ensemble production of Joy Kogawa's children's story plays at Nikkei Centre in Burnaby - just off Kingsway. It's a wonderful production, full of hope and tears, great singing, staging and acting.   more »
View Article  Joy Kogawa is one of Almanc's 100 Greatest British Columbians
This past week CBC Radio host Mark Forsythe of BC Almanac, has been promoting his new book Almanac's 100 Greatest British Columbians. This is a BC Version of CBC television's The Greatest Canadian. The names are all listed by categories with no numerical value. BC's top ten literary writers include Joy Kogawa, George Bowering, Wayson Choy, Dorothy Livesay   more »
View Article  Fundraising Drive Launched for Joy Kogawa House
Organizers of the drive to preserve the childhood home of novelist and poet Joy Kogawa were jubilant after Vancouver City Council voted unanimously on November 3 to grant a 120-day demolition delay order to preserve the home and to recognize its historical and cultural heritage. The four month period will allow the Save Kogawa House Committee to raise funds to purchase the property and convert it into a major centre for Canadian and international writers.    more »
View Article  REVIEW: Save Kogawa House Nov 12 Special Concert
The concert event went well today. About 100 people in the Alice Mackay Room, at the Vancouver Public Library + CTV coverage. Pretty good for very short notice. The event started with Harry Aoki and Alison Nishihara playing Pachabel's Canon on harmonica and piano. Then I welcomed everybody and explained what the SAVE KOGAWA HOUSE committee was all about. I also told people that we were very grateful for the Vancouver Opera Touring Ensemble gifting us with a performance. I had seen excerpts at a Roy Miki lecture, the Vancouver Arts Awards, and still I had tears in my eyes when I saw performances on opening weekend and just last week at the library.   more »
View Article  Ricepaper Magazine loves Save Kogawa House concert with Harry Aoki, Raymond Chow, Vancouver Opera Touring Ensemble
Ricepaper magazine is Canada's only nationally distributed magazine covering Asian Canadian arts and culture. Editor Jessica Gin Jade and Publisher Jim Wong-Chu were interviewed on CBC Radio's Sounds Like Canada by Sheila Rogers on Thursday Morning. Jenny Uechi, writer and managing editor attended the November 12th Celebration and Awareness concert for Save Kogawa House. Jenny wrote: "Naomi's Road" a huge success at Vancouver Public Library!   more »
View Article  SAVE KOGAWA HOUSE Celebration and Awareness Concert Nov 12
Saturday November 12, 2005 2:00pm Vancouver Public Library 350 West Georgia Street Alice Mackay Room Admission is free, all are welcome.    more »
View Article  120 days given to Kogawa House, as demolition timeline extended
This afternoon Vancouver City Council voted unanimously to grant an unprecedented 120-day delay of demolition for 1450 West 64th Avenue, the childhood home of author Joy Kogawa. The present home owner bought the house in 2003, unaware that the Save Kogawa Homestead committee was trying to raise funds to turn the house into a writers’ retreat. The owner has now decided to demolish and rebuild on the site, prompting the now renamed Save Kogawa House committee to action, soliciting support from writing and arts organizations across the country.   more »
View Article  Kogawa House Demolition: Todd Wong's Nov 3rd presentation to Vancouver City Council
The following is the basic text of my presentation to Vancouver City Council's Standing Committee on Planning and Environment, November 3rd, 2005. Hello Council members and guests Thank you for receiving our request for a delay of demolition for 1450 West 64th Ave, known as “Kogawa House.” Thank you also to council for attending the Joy Kogawa Cherry Tree planting and ceremony that took place here on Tuesday. Save Kogawa House committee is a local and national advocacy committee in existence for two years since Kogawa House first came on the market.   more »
View Article  CBC French Television: films Save Kogawa House committee in action at City Council Nov 3
Just watched Radio Canada - French television Our segment looks GREAT! We taped it! - now to digitalize and convert to a webcast... hmmm.... new technology.... I am having enough of a challenge working on the new weblog www.kogawahouse.com Shots showed the house, Obasan cover, One Book One Vancouver stickers, etc... Short interviews with Todd, and Joy, pictures of Ann-Marie, Diane Switzer, our lunch meeting at Kirin Restaurant with Marion Quednau, Jackie Byrn and my girlfriend Deb Martin.   more »
View Article  Kogawa House: Vancouver Council votes unaminously to create 120 day delay to demolition application
GOOD NEWS today! We had a good committee presentation with good support from Vancouver Heritage Foundation, Alliance for Arts and Culture, Writers Union of Canada and Periodical Writers Association of Canada. CBC Radio-Canada Television (french language) even showed up to film us during our lunch meeting at Kirin Restaurant, as we made our presentations, and as we shared congratulations with each other afterwards.   more »
View Article  Writing Associations across Canada support preservation of Kogawa House
OUR VISION FOR KOGAWA HOUSE The Save Kogawa House Committee believes it can preserve that heritage by purchasing the property from its current owner and converting the home into a writers-in-residence centre. Ten writers associations representing several thousand writers have endorsed our proposal and would select members from their organizations to reside in the house for a period of approximately one month each. This is their vision of the house as well: Brian Brett, Chair of the Writers Union of Canada: “The Writers’ Union of Canada, representing over 1,500 professional writers, supports the effort to save Joy Kogawa’s childhood home on 1450 West 64th Avenue in Vancouver from demolition, and would like to encourage its conversion into a major writers centre for Canadian and international writers. Vancouver would greatly benefit by designating the Joy Kogawa House as a literary landmark and establishing it as a writers-in-residence centre in which Canadian writers and writers from abroad could write first hand about our complex and evolving multi- and inter-cultural society and how different values and traditions can peacefully interact.”   more »
View Article  Globe & Mail: Joy Kogawa Cherry Tree planting at City Hall from the
Group rallies to save Kogawa home: Heritage house featured in classic novel chronicling Japanese internment in 1942 By ROD MICKLEBURGH Wednesday, November 2, 2005 Page S1 VANCOUVER -- Time is running out on the childhood home of celebrated Japanese-Canadian author Joy Kogawa. The modest, but still well-appointed, bungalow where Ms. Kogawa spent six happy years before her family's anguished internment in 1942 is under threat of demolition, a victim of history and Vancouver's high property prices. The house features prominently in Ms. Kogawa's prize-winning 1981 novel Obasan, a heart-rending, barely fictionalized memoir of her internment experience that was recognized by Quill and Quire as one of the most influential Canadian books of the 20th century.   more »
View Article  Vancouver City Hall "Joy Kogawa Cherry Tree Planting"
Today, Vancouver Mayor Larry Campbell pronounced November 1st as "Obasan Cherry Tree Day." Campbell read the proclamation in celebration of the planting of a cherry tree graft from the childhood home of author Joy Kogawa. Mayor Campbell acknowledged Councillor Jim Green who spearheaded the tree planting initiative, going to the house with Kogawa last year to take the tree clippings that were nurtured for a year for the planting. Also speaking at the ceremony was Paul Whitney, City Librarian, Vancouver Public Library, and James W. Wright, General Director, Vancouver Opera. Joy's novel Obasan was the 2005 choice for the library's award winning program One Book One Vancouver. James Wright said that when he came to Vancouver he was given a copy of the book "Great Canadian books of the century" written by Vancouver Public Library (1999) (ISBN 1550547364). He said that he read about Obasan, and it was one of the first books he read after arriving in Vanouver. Next he discovered Kogawa's children story Naomi's Road, and was so moved by it, he commisioned it as an opera. PICTURES!   more »
View Article  Tree planting at City Hall today: Cherry Tree graft from Kogawa House
Tree planting at City Hall today: Cherry Tree graft from Kogawa House

Today at 1pm, Vancouver Mayor Larry Campbell and city councillors will plant a cherry tree graft taken from the old cherry tree at Kogawa House, 1450 West 64th Ave.

The cherry tree and the house figure prominently in both books Obasan and Naomi's Road, written by Joy Kogawa.  The cherry tree is getting old and diseased now, so grafts were taken to help preserve its memory.  Unfortunately, the tree was pruned severely last fall.  But imagine 5 year old Joy Kogawa, swinging and climbing from a younger tree, still full of vibrant life and cherries. (Read one of my favorite books Shel Silverstein's "The Giving Tree.")

Vancouver City council passed a motion to plant the tree graft in September - the same week an inquiry for demolition of Kogawa House was made.

Also attending the tree planting will be Paul Whitney, Chief Librarian of Vancouver Public Library, and James Wright, General Directof of Vancouver Opera.  Obasan was VPL's 2005 choice for One Book One Vancouver program, and Naomi's Road premiered on September 30th, as a 45 minute opera commissioned to tour BC schools.

Also listen to CBC Radio's "On the Coast" 4-6pm, Paul Grant's Art Report interviewed me yesterday about saving Kogawa House.

Cherry Tree at Kogawa House - photo by Don Montgomery

Cherry Tree at Kogawa House - photo by Don Montgomery

Cherry Tree at Kogawa House - photo by Don Montgomery


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