Author Archives: Todd

Burnaby News Leader interviews Todd Wong about SFU Gung Haggis Fat Choy “Canadian Games”

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Simon Fraser University is awash with images of Toddish McWong, dressed in Lionhead mask and Royal Stewart tartan kilt.  The
picture has been adopted by the SFU Recreation and Intramurals
department to promote the inaugural SFU Gung Haggis Fat Choy “Canadian
Games.”  There are 4’x2’ signs hanging from
the ceiling of the Academic Quadrangle, and there are 3’x 2’ sandwich
board signs all around the campus.  I never
expected to see so many images of me in a kilt all around the SFU
campus, 12 years after I first donned a kilt to help participate in the
SFU Robbie Burns Day mini-parade.

 

Katie
from Burnaby News Leader interviewed me today at Simon Fraser
University, asking me questions about the origin of Gung Haggis Fat Choy and the creation of the SFU Gung Haggis Fat Choy “Canadian Games.”

 

The story should appear in the next few days. Here is my recollection of some of the interesting questions she asked me:

 

Q: What is Gung Haggis Fat Choy?

A: It
is the intersection of two seemingly different cultures in which we
discover the similarities.  It is the exploration of Scottish
Canadian and Chinese Canadian pioneers and history that belongs to all
Canadians.  It is the intercultural fusion that happens as more
and more of Canadians from different ethnic and cultural groups marry
into each other's families and cultures.

 

Q:Why?

A: Why
not?  It's going to happen anyways.  Almost all my cousins
have married people who are non-Chinese.  This allows their
children and their children's children to be able to celebrate both
cultures simutaneously and with fun.

 

(At
this point the photographer says that he has a friend who hated all the
family politics and tension filled expectations surrounding Chinese New
Year in his family – but irronically he and his partner have been
attending the GHFC dinner for the past two years, and enjoying it
immensely).

 

Q: How do people react to the cross-cultural fusion?

A:
Very well, they “get the joke,” and after the dinners there are so many
people who leave smiling, saying “I have to tell my friends,” or “Only
in Vancouver could this happen.”

 

Q: Has anybody Scottish Canadians reacted negatively towards you?

A: Do
you mean, “How dare you misappropriate and make fun of our culture and
traditions!” (laughing) No… not at all… never in fact.  They actually think it’s pretty cool that a Chinese Canadian guy is promoting Scottish culture.  Harry
McGrath, coordinator at the SFU Center for Scottish Studies, comes to
the Gung Haggis Fat Choy poetry readings and he told me the other day,
“You’re famous in Scotland.” He was referring to a Canadian Press story
that had interviewed McGrath about this Sino-Caledonian fusion.  Harry thinks it’s grrrreat!

 

Q: How do you feel about people coming to the events?

A: I think it’s great. They get the joke.  As Canadians we have to laugh at ourselves, and have fun with ourselves.  So many Canadian families are now blended cultures.  We are celebrating inclusiveness.  We are celebrating learning about each other’s cultures.  We are celebrating learning about Canada’s own Scottish-Canadian and Chinese-Canadian histories.  It belongs to all Canadians – not just a particular ethnic group.

 

Q: Have there been any other Scottish Chinese dinners like yours, are there any imitators?

A: Not
that I know of (it slipped my mind that the Chinatown Lions’ Club has
done a Robbie Burns Dinner for many years – but apparently not as wacky
or humourously as mine).  There was somebody
who worked with me at the Vancouver Public Library, who told me he and
a group of friends had their own “Gung Haggis Fat Choy” dinner by
ordering in Chinese food, reading Robbie Burns poetry and playing a
bagpipes cd.  I am going to have to put together a “Gung Haggis Fat Choy
Dinner Kit” and include suggested format, Robbie poems, Asian Canadian
poems, my own poems and a bagpipe cd by my piper Joe McDonald
(laughing).

 

Q: Where do you see this going?

A:  All across Canada.  Gung Haggis Fat Choy dinners in every town.  People are asking about Gung Haggis Fat Choy.  They want to do their own dinners.  I have heard from people in Edmonton, Nanaimo, Tacoma, Nova Scotia, Ohio, Portland…

And if it brings people together than that is great!  I know that my own ancestors had a hard time in this land because of racial discrimination – often because of Scots.  But now we have so many cousins marrying people of Scottish descent.  We are all intermarrying each others’ cultures.  This is creating a uniquely Canadian culture.  And it is all good.

 

We finished by doing a photo session with Mario the photographer.  He
had me jumping into the air, holding my dragon boat paddle in one hand,
and my dragon hand puppet perched on my other hand (I don’t think he
was trying to get a shot under my kilt).  I did a variety of leaps, recalling my jumping repetoire from my days spent freestyle skiing on moguls.

 

Ó 2005 Todd Wong

2005 Menu for Gung Haggis Fat Choy™ at Floata Restaurant

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2005 Menu for Gung Haggis Fat Choy™ at Floata Restaurant

I just got back from the Floata Restaurant where I put the final touches on the 2005 Gung Haggis Fat Choy™
menu with manager Antonio Hung.  We first seriously discussed the
menu items back in November when we filmed the segments for the Dec 7th
broadcast of CBC TV's “The National.”  That was the first time
Floata chefs attempted “haggis wun-tun” and “haggis springrollls.”

Every year we balance lots of exciting and savoury combinations of
dishes with our favorite traditional Chinese New Year dishes and enough
to keep the vegetarians happy.  In 2004, with Flamingo Chinese
Restaurant, we presented “haggis wun tun” and “haggis
springrolls.”  Definitely a “hit” with the patrons and the media –
who “ate” it up!  Seriously!  I took haggis wun tun to Shaw's
“Urban Rush” and Global Morning News, as well as CBC Radio's The
Afternoon Show, and CBC TV's “Canada Now”

Our selections are not a real “traditional” Chinese New Year
dinner menu – but a blending of favorites, and brand new
fusion-fare.  It is created to help introduce “real Chinese
banquet fare” to Scottish-Canadians and to help make “haggis” safe for
Chinese-Canadians.

Here is the menu for 2005, subject to change at my whimsy and the kitchen's demands:

1 –  Appetizer Plate with Haggis Wun Tun, Haggis Spring Rolls, Shredded Jelly Fish, and Spicy Tofu. (Haggis
Wung Tun was first created in September 2003 when I walked into New
Town Restaurant in Chinatown with a Haggis from Peter Black's and asked
them to make wun tuns for me to take to the CBC Radio reception to
welcome Shelagh Rogers and “Sounds Like Canada” to Vancouver. 
Shredded Jelly Fish really is made of Jelly Fish, and it is one of my favorites – yum!)

2 – Hot & Sour Soup (Always
a favorite for everybody – and vegetarian to boot!  Warms up the
innards on a cold January night.  I am sure Burns would approve.)

3 – Deep Fried Shrimp Balls (The
last two years, we have had crab & lobster at the Flamingo
Restaurant – but it has been very messy on the hands and fingers. 
This causes lots of problems for the musicians. In May I emceed the
West Vancouver Rotary Club's “Shanghai Nights Dinner” and was
introduced to Floata's “Deep Fried Shrimp Balls on Crab Claws… yum
yum!  We are dispensing with the claws to keep the costs down…
Can't have 60 crabs walking around the restaurant without claws, can
we?)

4 – Pan Fried Mushroom, Tofu and Vegetables. (After
the rich seafood, vegetables and tofu to clean the palate.  It
could be green beans, snow peas, Chinese broccoli… but it's got to be
fresh!  Tofu is great… I grew up eating it since I was a little
kid.  I know a lot of caucasians who detest tofu… maybe this
venerable bean curd staple is the Chinese equivalent of
haggis?)

5 – Sliced Beef with Broccoli  (Always
a good staple.  Tenderized slices of “Ngah -yook” Beef meat – one
of the first chinese food words I ever learned… actually it was
probably “Ngah-Nigh” which means “Cow's Milk.”  Stir-fried Beef
strips was also one of the first Chinese dishes I learned to cook – I
love adding it to my fettucine pasta with Teriyaki sauce.  What
can you say about the accompanying vegetable, except: Eat your
Broccoli!)

6 – Haggis (You
can't have a Robbie Burns Supper without Haggis… The first time I
tried haggis – I gagged.  It reminded me of poi – the Hawaiian
taro paste.  I put some haggis in with my rice… it wasn't
bad.  I added sweet & sour sauce.  Plum sauce was great
with it.  Then I learned that I didn't like the lard recipe haggis
and there were many other haggis recipes.  My favorite is from
Peter Black and Sons, found at Park Royal Shopping Centre in West
Vancouver.  It is savoury with Peter's unique and special
recipe.  Featured on CityTV's City Cooks for the past two years in
a row!)

7 – Vegetarian Lettuce Wrap (This
is always fun.  Imagine a hamburger without the bun.  Oops…
nothing is holding the patty together eithe and this time it's
vegetarian made up of diced mushrooms, carrots, celery, etc.  Add
the Hoi-Sin bbq plum sauce in the middle of your lettuce and remember
that when it comes to filling the lettuce – less is more. 
Otherwise your lettuce will crack and break and the sauce will run down
your fingers. Delightfully messy!)

6 + 7 = Haggis Lettuce Wrap (Combine
Haggis with a lettuce wrap…. people will think we are crazy. 
Oops, we are crazy.  This is Gung Haggis Fat Choy Crazy! 
Take a large spoonful of haggis, plunk it on a lettuce leaf, add the
vegetarian filling, smother it with Hoi-Sin Chinese plum sauce, and
voila – Another Toddish McWong culinary-fusion treat!  Actually we
taste-tested haggis lettuce wrap last year, at the Flamingo a week
before the Gung Haggis Fat Choy dinner – just to see what would
happen… and it was G-O-O-D! but we were already committed to
marketing the Haggis wun tun, so we saved it for 2005)

8- Crispy Skin Chicken ( A regular for Chinese banquets – need
we say more? – better than Fried Chicken and healthier too! Everybody
say “Chioy Pei Gai”.  This is the dish that comes with the pastel
coloured deep fried shrimp chips – Always my favorite when I was a kid.)

9 – Buddha's Mixed Vegetables 
(So called because it is a favorite vegetarian dish for Buddist
Monks.  It is also a traditional New Year's fare to bring
enlightenment for the coming months.  Did you know that it was
Buddha who first summoned the animals to come see him, and that he
would name the years of the Chinese Zodiac after them? The Rat arrived
first. I was born in the year of the Metal Rat).

10 – Special Vegetarian Chow Mein with Mushrooms and Onions (Always
a Chinese New Year traditional dish, as the long noodles represent long
life.  Sounds kind of superstitious to me.  Just remember the
origins of Italian pasta go back to Marco Polo's journeys to
China.  He was also probably the one who smuggled maps of Chinese naval voyages to Italy where they ended up with Christopher Columbus.  Every had the Chinese version of pizza?)

11 – Young Chow Fried Rice (Non-vegetarian. 
I think we've put enough vegetarian dishes on the menu for 2005. 
This dish will have diced BBQ pork, and baby shrimp, and maybe diced
chicken… a good way to finish of f dinner – if you are still a wee
bit hungry after a Chinese banquet.  Not bloody likely! 
Whoever first came up with the idea that you are hungry an hour after
eating Chinese food – probably never ate at a Chinese banquet.)

12 – Dessert (This
will be a mix of puddings and pastries We do recognize that not
everybody like to have red bean pudding after a banquet dinner. 
Mango pudding and almond jello are my favorites.  We will
definitely NOT have blood pudding – Scottish resturant for that stuff)

Hope you enjoyed these delicious descriptions… 

Dinner
& show starts promptly at 6:00pm.  After first doing this
event in a restaurant since 1999, we've had plenty of practice how to
figure out how to combine an entertainment program with a simultaneous
dinner program.  Serve the dishes approximately every 15 minutes,
Performances for 10 minutes with a 5 minute intermission.  That's
the idea anyways.  It used to be pretty easy serving everybody
withing 5 minutes so there wouldn't be any waiters bringing food to
your table while performers will demanding your attention to the
stage.  But that was easier done, when we only had 4 to 20
tables.  Now we will have about 60 tables for Gung Haggis Fat
Choy.  I think we will have to be a little more lenient and
patient with the dinner schedule.

Toddish

Ó 2005 Todd Wong

Dragon Boat Go-Carts lead the SFU Gung Haggis Fat Choy™ Canadian Games

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Gung Haggis Fat Choy™

Canadian Games

Friday January 28, 2005

12:00 Noon Convocation Mall
Simon Fraser University

 

Imagine
if the Scottish Highland Games became “Chinese-ified,” or the Chinese
dragon boat races became “Scottish-ized.”  What would happen if
the same concepts that created Gung Haggis Fat Choy™: Toddish McWong's Robbie Burns Chinese New Year Dinner were applied to an intramural event for Simon Fraser Unitiversity?Imagine
an event where Scottish highland dancers share a stage with Chinese
lion dancers, Scottish bagpipers play together with Chinese musicians.

Imagine a 7 person dragon boat on wheels being propelled around convocation mall with curling brooms.

Discover the Gung Haggis Fat Choy™ Canadian Games
 
ORIGINS
The SFU Gung Haggis Fat Choy Canadian Games first took shape when SFU Intramural Coordinator Geoff Vogt approached Gung Haggis Fat Choy™founder
Todd Wong with the idea of creating a special event for SFU to bring
the large Asian communities together with the Scottish heritage of SFU.
Wong, who has attended the BC Highland Games and is himself very
involved in Vancouver's dragon boat community, quickly came up with an
intercultural concept based on a blending (or “bending”) of the
traditional Scottish Highland Games and Chinese sporting events, such
as a dryland dragon boat race, propelled by curling brooms for
“paddles.” Thus was first born the idea of a dragon boat go-cart race,
or Dragon-Cart Race.

Vogt subsequently had many staff meetings
with SFU Recreation and also invited Todd Wong and other speakers from
different cultural communities in for consultations and
presentations.  The Highland Games concept morphed into  the
“Canadian Games” and the Dragon Boat Go-Cart concept was chosen as the
marquee event.  These are now being built by Gung Haggis
Productions, designed and built by Bob Brinson, who together with Todd
Wong, coaches the Gung Haggis Fat Choy dragon boat team.  Bob
absolutely loved the idea, as he too has been involved with many dragon
boat teams since 1988 and with the Dragon Boat Association, he has
refinished the teak wood dragon boats originally donated to the City of
Vancouver for Expo 86, by the Hong Kong Board of Tourism.The origins of Gung Haggis Fat Choy™ and Toddish McWong  began
one cold and snowy Winter's day on the Simon Fraser University Burnaby
Mountain campus in 1993, when  student tourguide, Todd Wong, was
first asked to wear a kilt and help out with the annual Robbie Burns
Day ceremony.
Ó 2005 Todd Wong

Victor Chan on the Dalai Lama tonight at Vancouver Public Library

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Necessary Voices Lecture Series
Presentation  The Dalai Lama and Mind Science:
a talk by Victor Chan
Program highlights  Victor Chan talks about
the latest advances from the two decades long collaboration between the
Dalai Lama and top neuro-scientists and implications for our mental and
physical well-being.

Victor Chan is the co-author (with HH the Dalai Lama) of The Wisdom of Forgiveness: Intimate Conversations and Journeys, a remarkable look into the life and mind of the Dalai Lama. He is also the author of Tibet Handbook: A Pilgrimage Guide.
Date  Wednesday, January 19th 2005
Time  7:30pm
Location 

Central Library
Alma VanDusen & Peter Kaye rooms – Lower Level
350 W. Georgia St.
Phone: (604) 331-3603
Admission  Free
Co-sponsor  Necessary Voices Society & VanCity

Gung Haggis Fat Choy gets BLOGGED! all around the world!

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Gung Haggis Fat Choy gets BLOGGED! all around the world!

“Gung Haggis Fat Choy” has been
reported on the net all around the world. “You're famous in Scotland,
you know, you've been posted on Friends of Scotland,” Harry
McGrath  told me last night at the Vancouver Public Library
reading for Gung Haggis Fat Choy Poetry Night.  And Harry should
know about Scotland, he was born there, and he is coordinator of the SFU Centre for Scottish Studies Program, Last year when he was quoted in the Canadian Press story Chinese Don Kilts,
the story got picked up across Canada, the United States and especially
in Scotland.  “All my friends and relatives were calling me,”
Harry told me when the story first came out.

The following are
links to blog sites, most are pretty recent. Most are very funny in
their reaction to discovering that such an event called “Gung Haggis
Fat Choy” actually exists. Many have posted the poster. But I will
start off by listing the dinner event reviews by Roland Tanglao the
foodie website he shares with partner Barb Lee. 

VanEats
Barb and Roland's guide to dining and cooking in Vancouver established June 2000
Gung Haggis Fat Choy 2002

Gung Haggis Fat Choy 2003
Gung Haggis Fat Choy 2004

tygar-blog.com in Berkeley Califonia
Fusion taken too far
Unbelievable

www.marginalia.org
haggis wun tun
“This is the 3rd generation of haggis wun tun.”
If this quote doesn’t fill you with fear, then just maybe you should be going to Gung Haggis Fat Choy next January 30th.

The Wolves of Gilsbury Cross:
The Words and Worlds of K. Bannerman
Gung Haggis Fat Choy! November 24th
For
the last week, I've had the pleasure of long conversations with Todd
Wong, aka Toddish McWong, the man behind the cultural fusion event of Gung Haggis Fat Choy.  In my opinion, one of the best things about Vancouver is its post-modern approach to celebrating social diversity.

Penmachine.com
Smug and Lovely –
a post about the CBC TV December 7th show “The National”, which
featured me as one of the “Urban Road Stories” about Vancouver.

The Realitysitck: Observations of a lovely cumudgeon Gung Haggis Fat Choy!“One
of the more…well…eclectic newer traditions celebrated in Vancouver
is Gung Haggis Fat Choy: Toddish McWong's Robbie Burns Chinese New Year
Dinner.  With long-time CBC voice Shelagh Rogers as one of the
co-hosts, it promises to be a bonnie 事件,结果,竞赛 *.
And people call Vancouver a “no-fun” city?

Random Fate
Geek Cool:
It's not technology related…  …but it's still “geek cool”.
A true example of diversity, and how not all is grim and serious. Makes me wish I was in Vancouver so I could go!!!

Liuzhou Laowai: Random thoughts from the heart of Guangxi
A man's a man for a' that!
I
am of Scottish descent and I have to say that it came to me as no
surprise to learn that the organisation is Canadian. It was well known
when I was a kid that the only people you ever saw wearing kilts in
Edinburgh were Canadian tourists.
As a true Scot, I think I'll stick to Luosifen!

Honk: The Musical – Pinetree's students exceed expectations extraordinarily!

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Honk!
a musical – Music by George Stiles
Lyrics by Anthony Drewe

Director: Shanda Walters, Musical Director: Marcia Carmichael

January 14 to 23
Pinetree Secondary School

by Todd Wong – Reviewed January 14th, 2005
photo by Paul vanPeenen/NOW
The Cat played by Laura Du Preez, prepares to make a meal of Ugly played by Mike Horntvedt.

I haven't seen a high school stage production since I
was in high school. In the past year, I have reviewed the Vancouver
Opera's production of Madama Butterfly, the action-musical Terracotta Warriors, Battery Opera's Reptile-Diva + attended the touring production of Rent,
theatre plays at Firehall Arts Centre, Waterfront Theatre, Theatre in
the Park, and the inaugural production in Nanaimo for Denise Chong's
“The Concubine's Children.”  All have good and bad moments, some
have great moments, where I have to exclaim “Wow!”  This
production of “Honk” by Treehouse Productions has a number of “Wow!”
moments.

Honk is the award winning musical based on the Hans
Christian Anderson story about the Ugly Duckling.  An individual
grows up different from the rest, is named Ugly, and suffers low
self-esteem and negative self-identity.  He then goes on a
personal journey to discover who he really is.  Even when he first
meets like-minded individuals, he is slow to recognize the shared
values and assets. When he grows into himself and learns
self-acceptance, as well as valuing his traits such as
helping others and goodness-of-heart, then he truly comes into his
own and is finally accepted by those who first rejected and made fun of
him.  Gee, kind of like real life!

This is the first time a
musical theatre course was offered as a Fine Arts course at Pinetree
Secondary School, and the teachers were a little anxious about how it
would turn out.  They did not know how many students would
register, what calibre of performance the students were capable of,
would any males register or would it all be female?

Well, they
needn't have worried.  The all-student cast certainly exceeded
their performance expectations and shine at every opportunity they
get.  Several times during the production, spontaneous applause
erupted in the audience to acknowledge the fine acting on stage. 
This is amazing because many of the students in lead roles had not
acted before, or in the case of the Ugly Duckling's Mother, Ida,
played by Lisa Scott who told me she hadn't acted since Middle School.

Both Lisa Scott and Troy Hatt, exude confidence and
presence in their performances as the Mommy and Daddy ducks, named Ida
and Drake.  They sing and dance with aplomb and experience beyond
their high school years.  These kids were born to be on stage. Wow!

Watching the young woman who played The Cat (Laura Du
Preez), correction – the young actor who became a cat – was
amazing.  She slinked across the stage, with cat-like movements,
with cat-like attitude.  Even during the curtain call, she stayed
in character aloof and embarrassed by all the celebration of the bird
characters and by her own character's misadventures.  Wow!

And
then there was Bullfrog (Jeff Rawlings), more than just hopping onto
the stage, a personality emerged of Frog Wisdom from the swamp, the
equivalent of a Yoda to Luke Skywalker.  He was a singing and
dancing frog that reminded me of the brilliant classic cartoon where a
song sings “Hello My Baby.”  This Bullfrog was full of surprises,
and lots of “Wow” moments.

And then there is Ugly, played by Mike Hornvedt, who
must help his character mature from an unappreciated misfit to a
confident swan.  Hornvedt handles the role well, allowing the
situations to unfold around him, and letting the character experience
growth and confidence through each scene, as he  plays off each
new character he meets.  It is a gentle approach that very much
anti-heroic.

Even the smaller roles were
amazing.  Not over the top and over-acted – but sometimes subtlely
with simple facial expressions and actions, or with deeply thought out
characterizations, expressions and behaviors.  Good examples were
the Swans.  The pretty young female swan Penny (Janelle Eichel) is
rescued by our hero, Ugly. This Swan moves with grace
with through slow balletic motions that conjured up images of
Swan Lake, while simultaneously developing a possible love interest
role like Natalie Portman's Queen Amadilia to the Young Darth Vader.

Oh, and did I mention the musical production
numbers?  There is one number in particular that stands out, Ugly
meets a flock of geese.  He initally meets the the flock leaders,
Greylag and Dot (Troy Hatt, Lauren Frances), who are dressed like Air
Force officers.  Each sing and perform their roles
wonderfully.  Then it gets better.  The rest of the flock
joins them, and suddenly they are all singing and dancing in a Busby
Berkely-like production coordinated like a synchronized swimming team,
moving around a central singing character.  Then it gets
better.  That group next creates a formation that resembles an
airplane… and still there are more surprises.  Imagine what
happens when they put a parachute on The Cat, and take her with them
for a ride! Double and Triple Wow! 

How did all this happen?  How could high school
students, many who had never stepped foot on a stage, nor sung a
musical note before in their lives, suddenly become quality performers
generating spontaneous applause and standing ovations?

With a
lot of hard work, dedication and enthusiasm.  Theatre teacher
Shanda Walters and music teacher Marcia deserve a tremendous amount of
recognition and achievement in addition to credit.  Walters has
been emphasizing the importance of physical theatre in her recent work,
and the students were able to respond creating characters that easily
went beyond themselves. Simply put, they got out of their own skins and
climbed into new bodies and personalities.  This is easily said,
but harder to do when the only costume you are given is a change of
clothes that you would wear on the street, in which only the colour
designates what kind of animal you are.  For example a duckling
wore a yellow shirt, yellow skirt and orange leggings.  The frog
wore green pants and a jacket with large sunglasses.  Much harder
to create a barnyard animal characterization from street clothes and no
mask or make up – Wow!

The enthusiasm and quality of this
production reminded me of witnessing the National Youth Orchestra's
performance at the Chan Centre this past summer.  These were
simply the best of the best of Canada's young orchestral classical
musicians performing under the baton of conductor Kazuyoshi Akiyama,
following a month of focussed rehearsals.  These are musicians who
train year round, performing in the leading youth orchestras across the
country with one of the most experienced conductors leading them. 
And the Pinetree secondary students simulated a similar drive and
enthusiasm to make their performance special, and give it that little
special extra oomph.  Director Shanda Walters says that she
“believes that student actors are capable of amazing work on stage,”
and the students certainly prove it under the  guidance and
expertise of Walters and Marcia Carmichael, who are themselves the
founders and current or past-presidents of the Coquitlam Drama Teachers
Association and the Coquitlam Music Teachers Association, as well as
actors, directors and performers in their own right.  Wow! and
Wow!

Go see Honk! for the simple reason of
seeing a quality high school musical theatre production.  You will
be amazed at what a simple “amateur” production can achieve.  Wow!

Tickets:Adults $10 Child & Seniors $8.
Call Pinetree Secondary School 604-464-2513
Final Performances are this weekend, January 21, 22.

Coquitlam Now's Preview: Ugly Duckling gets a new look.
Discover the composers' web page here: Honk!
See Tri-City News, and click on Entertainment

More to come…  and hopefully some pictures.

2005 Todd Wong

“Gung Haggis Fat Choy” – the CBC TV special will be re-broadcast on Feb 9th – Chinese New Year Day

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Great News today!
"Gung Haggis Fat Choy" will be re-broad cast at 7pm on Feb 9th, 2005.  This is the special
that recieved 2 Leo Award nominations - for best musical / variety show, and for best direction musical / variety show.

This is a great show that features The Paper Boys, Silk Road Music, George Sapounidis, Joe McDonald &
Brave Waves. Neil Grey also performed "Address to a Haggis" and my friend LaLa sang "Auld Lang Syne" with Brave Waves.

Myself, my parents, my grandmother, my girlfriend and my friends were all featured in a segment for Chinese New Year dinner.
Very Cool!  Check out my reviews and impressions of the first broadcasts the filmings

The official CBC press release from 2004 went something like:

CBC TELEVISION
GUNG HAGGIS FAT CHOY 
A QUIRKY CULTURAL CELEBRATION

Explore the curious fusion of two cultural traditions, Chinese New Year and
Robbie Burns Day, in Gung Haggis Fat Choy, a half-hour performance special
featuring fusion performances from West coast artists. The special captures the
essence of Gung Haggis Fat Choy: Toddish McWong's Robbie Burns Chinese New Year
Dinner, a celebration started by Vancouver's Todd Wong to salute his
Scottish/Chinese heritage. 

Performances include Celtic fusion band The Paperboys with special guest Jian
Ming Pan, award-winning ensemble Silk Road Music, Ottawa-born Chinese singing
sensation George Sapounidis with the Vancouver Academy of Dance, and world beat
"fusicians" Brave Waves.
http://vancouver.cbc.ca



Todd appears on CBC Radio's “North by Northwest”: Chan Legacy Project

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I visited radio host Sheryl MacKay in her North By Northwest
studio early on Sunday morning.  Upon my arrival, Sheryl greeted
me, and I was amazed to see that she was the only person on the
floor.  No production assistants.  Nobody.  Sheryl does
it all.  She is an amazing woman.

“You brought Show-and-tell!” she exclaimed when
she saw the large package I was carrying.  I had brought archival
pictures of my family history, as I was being interviewed out my
upcoming presentation for the January 22 A Taste of History Fair,
organized by the Chinese Canadian Historical Society of BC.  This event will be held from 10am to 4:30pm and will be at the Vancouver Museum on Chestnut Street.

 

My Great Great Grandfather
Rev. Chan Yu Tan and Mrs. Chan Yu Tan (seated), second from the right
is my Great Grandmother Kate Chan Lee(standing). On the far right
is her husband Ernest Lee, my Great Grandfather.

I opened up the package and spread the poster cards out
along the floors and walls of the CBC radio studio, explaining which
one was my  Great great grandfather, the Rev. Chan Yu
Tan. His elder brother Rev. Chan Sing Kai had arrived in 1888 at
the request of the Methodist Church of Canada to help found the Chinese
Methodist Church in Vancouver.  My great great
grandfather had followed his brother from Hong Kong to Canada in
1896, their two missionary sisters Phoebe and Naomi came later.

Here was a picture of Grand uncle Luke
who became an actor in Hollywood.  Here was my mother's cousin
Rhonda Larrabee who became First Nations Chief of the Qayqayt (New
Westminster) Band with her grand children who are now only 1/8
Chinese.  Here is my grandmother's cousin Carol who married the
cousin of just former Washington State Governor Gary Locke.  Here
is my grandmother's eldest brother who married the aunt of Canada's
Governor General Adrienne Clarkson.  Not all descendents of Rev.
Chan Yu Tan – but related through marriages to the family.

We had a great chat – it was warm, just like
Sheryl's voice – warm, velvety and reassuring.  Perfect for Sunday
morning radio.  The time passed quickly, and before the show
ended, Sheryl asked me to put on my other hat and tell the radio
audience about Gung Haggis Fat Choy events – the poetry reading with
Fred Wah, and the Gung Haggis Fat Choy dinner on January 30th.  I
shall try to make a transcription of the show in the days to come.

Gung Haggis Fat Choy World Poetry Night at Vancouver Public Library – tomorrow!

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World Poetry and Gung Haggis Fat Choy come together for one night –
January 17th,
 7:30pm at the Vancouver Public Library – Central
Branch – Alice McKay Room.  350 Georgia St. Vancouver.

Check out our fabulous GHFC World Poetry Poster

At 7:30pm bagpiper Joe McDonals will
“pipe” the performers into the Alice MacKay room at the Vancouver
Public Library, Central Branch.  The evening of poetry and music
will include singalongs, some poetry by Robert Burns and references to
Chinese New Year.  We blend together Canadian contemporary poets
born in Scotland, China, or of Chinese or Scottish ancestry.  Gung
Haggis Fat Choy World Poetry Night addresses what came before, what is
in-between and what is beyond.

Fred Wah is our featured poet –
retired University of Calgary English Professor and winner of the
Governor General's Award for Poetry for his prose poem collection
“Waiting for Sasketchewan.  Fred says his father was
Scottish/Irish/Chinese – Canadian and his mother was Swedish-Canadian.

Joe McDonald is our featured musician – bagpiper and leader of the ethno-fusion band Brave Waves. Joe
and Brave Waves were featured last year in the CBC TV special “Gung
Haggis Fat Choy.”  Joe is also a fascinating contemporary
singer/songwriter.

Dugald Christie is an activist
lawyer and champion of human writes.  He was born in Scotland and
writes poetry in Canada.  In February he will be given a life-time
achievement award by the World Poetry Society.

Shirley Sue-A-Quan is a writer, and
poet, born in China – she also writes for local Chinese language
newspapers.  She brings an insightful global vision to her work.  She
is married to writer Trev Sue-A-Quan, born in Guyana, who was featured
at last year's inaugural Gung Haggis Fat Choy World Poetry Night, as
well as the Gung Haggis Fat Choy dinner.

And… there will be a poems and words from co-hosts Toddish McWong, Ariadne Sawyer and Alejandro Mujica-Olea.  A specially composed original group poem will also be presented for the evening…

…and maybe a surprise!