2006 - Best Gung Haggis Fat Choy ever! with Prem Gill, Joy Kogawa, Rick Scott & Harry Wong
This was indeed the best ever Gung Haggis Fat Choy: Toddish McWong's Robbie Burns Chinese New Year Dinner. Every year has a different quality, different performers, different guests, different co-hosts and different suprises... We celebrate the diversity of a "gung haggis" world - full of intercultural fusion, no longer confined to self-contained boxes of multiculturalism.
Max Wyman, one of Canada's leading cultural advocates and critics, as well as head of Canada's UNESCO program, was very excited about last night's dinner event. He first told me, then shared with the audience, that it was wonderful to see Canada's amazing cultural diversity expressed through the arts. All the hard work setting the ground work helps to make it possible for us to show case our Asian Canadian and cultural fusion artists.
Todd
Wong and Max Wyman converse about the importance and expression of
cultural diversity. Max loved the Gung Haggis Fat Choy dinner concept
and the performance lineup. In the front left is the Hon. David
Lam trophy for the dragon boat team that best exemplifies the
multicultural spirit of the Alcan Dragon Boat Festival. The
winner in 2005 was the Gung Haggis Fat Choy dragon boat team - photo
Ray Shum.
How else would we be able to see Moyra Rodger or Out To See Productions direct and produce a television performance special such as Gung Haggis Fat Choy for CBC for prime time audiences?
How else would we be able to see Jeff Chiba Stearns' unique animated film "What Are You Anyways?" shown both on CBC primetime and for CBC Zed.
How else could we see developing artists like LaLa work with Sean Gunn, and have Joe McDonald and Brave Waves have their work supported in the many festivals, and events around town, such as explorASIAN - Vancouver's Asian Heritage Month festival?
Rick
Scott and Harry Wong re-created songs from their 5 Elements cd,
bringing a special intercultural energy to the evening. Harry
flew in from Hong Kong that morning... the duo next performs a special
concert in Toronto on January 28th for the Royal Conservatory of Music
- photo Ray Shum
Rick & Harry represent a very unique collaboration between a Canadian artist and a Chinese artist. It had developed out of Harry listening to Rick's cd's and writing songs for them, and the project expanded. 5 Elements is a wonderful album about friendship and understanding each other's cultures, and they brought this to Gung Haggis Fat Choy last night.
The
Shirleys brought their own special performing magic to the show,
working in the word "haggis" into a call and response song with the
audience - photo Ray Shum
The Shirleys, are six (or seven) sassy soulful women whose ancestral ethnicities represent many different cultures that they all share with each other and with their audiences. They brought such energy to the show with their African songs, and a cross-cultural beauty to their arrangement of the classic Chinese song Mo Li Hua (Jasmine Flower).
And how did the evening start off?
Joe McDonald leads the piping ceremony - photo Ray Shum
With the traditional piping in ceremony.... the performers usually follow Joe McDonald & Brave Waves - but this time it was Vancouver Mayory Sam Sullivan being piped in. What a surprise!
Vancouver Mayor Sam Sullivan is piped
in, he follows Dohl drummer Preet, and is followed by Lynn Zanatta, and
ACWW president Don Montgomery. - photo Ray Shum
Mayor Sam Sullivan gave a warm welcome to the audience, where he recognized that 6 city councillors were also attending the dinner, naming Suzanne Anton, Heather Deal, George Chow, Raymond Louie, BC Lee and Elizabeth Ball. "We have quorum!" he exclaimed. Then he read a poem in Cantonese from the Tang Dynasty.
Lots of surprises during the evening, and our City TV co-host Prem Gill handled them very well, whenever spontaneous creativities leaped in to the program.
Clan NDP showed up and we had Chinese descendant Mary-Woo Sims and Scottish born Ian Waddell each dressed appropriately reciting verses of Address to the Haggis. Bev Meslo, Bill Siksay, Peter Julian, Svend Robinson and David Askew - all sitting with my good friend Meena Wong, and NDP organizer, who was born in Beijing.
Co-host Prem Gill of City TV, asks NDP candidate Ian Wadell about his kilt - which once caught Queen Elizabeth's eye, while Qayqayt Band Chief Rhonda Larrabee and Kelly Ip look on - photo Ray Shum
MP for Chinatown Libby Davies gave a welcome to the audience, recognizing the importance of saving Kogawa House, and all the good work of Asian Canadian Writer's Workshop and Ricepaper Magazine, and the multicultural fun of the Gung Haggis Fat Choy dragon boat team.
Clan Green Party also showed up with national party leader Jim Harris being invited to come up and read the 2nd verse of Address to a Haggis. He read it so well with a good brogue that free-range Haggis rancher Peter Black gave him a big hug that he will be taking it back to Toronto with him. Green candidates Jim Stephenson and Christine Ellis also attended, along with my good friend Cladia Cornwall, a Green Party organizer - who was born in Shanghai to Jewish parents escaping Nazi Germany.
"The
groaning trencher there ye fill, Your hurdies like a distant hill, Your
pin wad help to mend a mill In time o' need, While thro' your pores the
dews distil Like amber bead." Haggis
Rancher Peter Black watches over National Green Party leader Jim Harris
as he reads the 2nd verse of Robert Burns immortal poem "To a
Haggis." Faye Leung, "the hat lady" awaits her turn for the 3rd
Vers - photo Ray Shum
Travelling dinner guests included Betty Chan Klepp who drove all the way from Vernon. Betty Chan as a youngster was Highland Dancing champion, and her father Ernest Chan was the first Chinese Canadian to recieve the Order of Canada. Lensey Namioka, children's author of the book Half and Half, a Scottish-Chinese-American family in Seattle, travelled up from Seattle with her husband. Victor Wong, executive director of Chinese Canadian National Council, was in town from Toronto, and really really loved the dinner event. On Thursday, following a news conference, I dressed him in my kilt for a fun picture. He was absolutely amazed at how many times I used the term "head tax" last night... but this is my family, and this is our world.
Faye
Leung, the famous "hat lady" with Todd wearing a Maple Leaf tartan...
Red is a good luck colour in Chinese culture, and looks good in kilts
too! - photo Ray Shum
Literary
highlight of the evening was poet/author Joy Kogawa. Partial
funds from the dinner go to help Save Kogawa House committee, working
with The Land Conservancy in an effort to help save Joy Kogawa's
childhood home from demolition. At age 6, she and her family were
forcibly removed from the home and interned during the WW2 - photo Ray
Shum
Joy Kogawa was our poet for the evening. The room was almost dead silent as she read a new work about overcoming challenges and developing friendship. And then she mentioned a character named "Toddish McWong." I went into stun phase. After hugging Joy for her reading, Prem Gill says "Joy Kogawa has written a poem about you... how incredible is that!"
Our
Head Table: seated - Vancouver Mayor Sam Sullivan, Joy Kogawa, Qayqayt
Band Chief Rhonda Larrabee. standing - MP Libby Davies, ACWW president
Don Montgomery, Lynn Zanatta, The Land Conservancey executive director
Bill Turner, Gung Haggis Fat Choy creator Todd Wong, and Libby Davie's
guest - photo Ray Shum
Joy Kogawa, Max Wyman, Jenni Kato, (standing) Todd and Moyra Rodger,
Don Montgomery and Jeff Chiba Stearns - photo Ray Shum
Joy Kogawa, Max Wyman, Jenni Kato, (standing) Todd and Moyra Rodger,
Don Montgomery and Jeff Chiba Stearns - photo Ray Shum
Our head table guests included four Order of Canada recipients: Joy
Kogawa, Mayor Sam Sullivan, Max Wyman and brand new member Bill Turner
who attends his investiture on February 17th. Also at our tabes
were Lensey Namioka, Seattle author of "Half and Half", Jeff Chiba
Stearns, film animator/creator of "What Are You Anyways?", MP Libby
Davies, and Moyra Rodger - director/producer of the CBC television
performance special Gung Haggis Fat Choy. And Qayqayt band Chief
Rhonda Larrabee,
my 1st cousin- once removed, whom I pointed out to the audience that on
one side of her
family she's fighting for land claims, and the other side for head tax
redress.
Gung Haggis Fat Choy really is about the people who attend the dinner, as much as it is about the people we have on stage performing. So many times I was stopped while I walked around the room greeting people, to be asked to take a picture with them, or to be told that they are Chinese, and their partner is Scottish or the other way around. So many people said that they had always wanted to attend the dinner, and are so glad they could finally make it.
The wonderful crowd of almost
500. Head table with Mayor Sam Sullivan in front, to his right in
kilt is Bill Turner, executive director of The Land Conservancy and Joy
Kogawa - photo Ray Shum
It's a lot of work, and we are so indebted to the many volunteers of Ricepaper magazine, Gung Haggis Fat Choy dragon boat team, and Save Kogawa House/The Land Conservancy. Afterall, they do have to work for their fundraising... But by bringing organizations together, and sharing our diverse talents, we can create an event that is bigger than ourselves as individuals. Gung Haggis Fat Choy is about our community. It reflects our community and the people in it. And I am feeling very grateful to be part of such a wonderful community.
Everybody
sings Auld Lang Syne - Our special guests: (seated) Todd and Moyra
Rodger (director/producer of the Gung Haggis Fat Choy tv special, Deb
Martin (my girlfriend and front of house manager), Don Montgomery (ACWW
president and E.D. of explorASIAN), Joy Kogawa and Mayor Sam Sullivan.
- photo Ray Shum
