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Miss Saigon VS Senses and other cultural questions

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I went for a walk along South Granville Street last night with my girlfriend, between
Broadway and 15th Ave.
Miss Saigon is playing at the Arts Club's Stanley Theatre. We saw lots
of people walking out the theatre and bumped into some friends who said
they enjoyed it tremendously and it was worth seeing. John Mann (lead
singer of Spirit of the West) apparently steals the show and the
helicopter does fit on stage!

Productions of Miss Saigon have been protested by North American Asian
arts communities for perpetuating stereotypes and for not giving the
lead role of bi-racial character, “The Engineer”, to an Asian actor. As
I watched the audience walk down Granville St, I was amazed that
everybody was caucasian with the exception of one couple where the
woman was Asian. (I should note that my girlfriend is caucasian, and is
very good at putting up with my racial/cultural ramblings).

What would happen if Miss Saigon was staged by all Asians and the story
and cultural stereotypes were reversed. Would Asians flock to the
theatre then? Would Asians relate to the story of an Asian American
soldier falling in love with an exotic foreign woman? Or would the
situation be like what we saw last night in a television documentary on
Nat King Cole.  Despite his universal success and acceptance, Cole
was not allowed by television censors to sit on the same bench, touch,
hug or kiss a white woman on camera. Why? It would challenge the status
quo!

I have long
thought of staging a production of Bernstein's “West Side Story” and
calling it “East Side Story.” I would set it  in
East Vancouver during the late 1970's with the two predominant ethnic
groups of Vancouver at the time: Chinese and Italians.  That's
what life was like when I grew up back them.  Chinese and Italians
forming gangs, and being wary of their sisters or brothers dating the
other ethnic group.  You did not cross over the line. 
However in movies now, we are seeing more cross-overs of Asian and
Caucasian actors and storylines in the studios efforts for more $$. Jet
Li and Bob Hoskins in “Unleashed” is just the latest example. Why
doesn't this happen in Vancouver's Theatre scene?


The Vancouver Recital Society and Vancouver Symphony have both
presented Lang Lang, easily one of the world's currently most exciting
pianists. Many people will go see something as long as it is good and a
quality production – no matter what the event's racial or cultural
origin. The problem is often finding out about the event.

Many Asian new immigrants to Vancouver are not yet familiar with all
the histories of Canadas' cultural icons. Japanese immigrants are not
familiar with Japanese-Canadian author Joy Kogawa's “Obasan”, Mainland
Chinese or Taiwanese are not familiar with Wayson Choy's “Jade Peony”
or Denise Chong's “The Concubine's Children”. But they are familar with
the legends, storylines, tradition Western and Asian music that are
featured in Senses, now playing at the Centre in Vancouver for
Performing Arts.


Senses or Miss Saigon? Both feature women in sexy outfits. Both are
productions that offer music, dance and songs. Miss Saigon is created from the Western perspective and Senses from an
Asian perspective. One is lineal, one is impressionistic. Both
productions would like a cross-over audience, but both seem stymied in
marketing by cultural perceptions and limitations. I wonder how
Vancouver's Vietnamese community feels about the perpetuation of
cultural stereoptypes in Miss Saigon. I did write review for Senses.

Senses features excellent dancers from the Dance Academy of Beijing, as
well as dancer Tang Jiang Li – now famous for her modeling for a book
nude photography, which caused a sensation in China, as this is almost
unheard of. If this had been a Western dancer, would the Vancouver
mainstream media been all over the story? But hardly a peep. Is this
cultural bias or cultural ignorance? Or maybe it is simply that we only
write about that which is in our own experience, and write about what
is beyond our experience.

Miss Saigon VS Senses. An excellent opportunity to examine the
cultural contrasts in how our Vancouver audiences and media respond to
cultural challenges and opportunities.

Letter from Rev. Tim Nakayama, Joy Kogawa's brother re: Origins of the Nakayama name

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Rev. Tim Nakayama and author Joy Kogawa – brother and sister

Dear Todd,

 
Thank you for posting those photos of us on your website.  That was fairly quick!
 
David Kogawa, who took the trouble to come down from Surrey to
Seattle to pick me up and bring me back home so that I could attend the
inaugural for OBOV on May 24, sent me  the web-page reference – http://www.gunghaggisfatchoy.com/blog/_archives/2005/5/26/888280.html 
 
You made a common mistake that occasionally befalls my family name
by calling it “Nakamura” which would mean 'middle village'.  Actually,
it is “Nakayama” which means 'middle mountain'.   I sometimes tell
people that my name has “four aces” to ease the spelling, etc. 
 
I was a theological student at ATC, the Anglican Theological
College of B.C. (that was associated with Union College of the United
Church of Canada), and these institutions became the Vancouver School
of Theology.  When ATC still existed when I was in Vancouver from 1950
to 1965, I was associated with the Good Sheperd Chinese Anglican
Mission in Chinatown (I think it was on Keefer Street).  I went there
for “field work”, and later  was involved in the re-establishing of the
Japanese Anglican work as the people returned from the East when we
were allowed back into the so-called “protected area”. 
 
While at Good Shepherd, I received the kindly care of the Rev.
Andrew Lam, and his wife Leatrice, and the parishioners of the Chinese
Mission.  The people took the Japanese ideographs of my name, and read
them in Cantonese, and they remembered and called me, “Chung Saan Jun”
(my phonetic rendition of what I remember hearing rhem say) – of
'middle mountain truth' (Nakayama Makoto). 

The Japanese reading of the
ideographs in “on” reading is “Chu San Shin” or Chuzan Shin”, and in
“kun” reading – which is the poly-syllabic original rendition, it comes
out as “Naka/yama/Makoto”.  Well, the Chinese members associated
“middle mountain” and 'truth” with Sun Yat Sen!  Perhaps you can
decipher the connection of meanings and such an association!  Anyway,
with these associations it was considerably easier to remember my name
in that fashion, than with Na/ka/ya/ma/Ma/ko/to  so many meaningless,
cumbersome syllables, but “Chung Saan Jun” was much easier!

 
Best wishes and kindest regards,
 
Tim

The Rev. Timothy M. Nakayama, Priest, retired
Diocese of Olympia + The Episcopal Church USA
1991-2000 Missionary, Okinawa & Aomori, Japan
1966-1991 Rector, St. Peter's, Seattle
1956-1966 Diocese of Calgary, Canada

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Hello Tim,



I am sorry for the misspelling,
somehow Nakamura got stuck in my brain, not to be confused with a
childhood friend named Nakashima, nor the girl I had a crush on in
Grade 7, then after I moved away after Grade 8, we met after Grade 12,
and finally had a real date – her name was Fujiwara.



I will correct on the website, and
with your permission I will put your reply letter onto the website as I
think it is very interesting.



Diocese of Olympia eh? Former
Governor Gary Locke is a distant relative. His cousin Paul Locke in
Seattle married my Grandmother's cousin Carol. Ever since I was a baby,
we would visit Auntie Carol and Uncle Paul in Seattle once a year. I
don't see them as often anymore, but we do keep in touch.



Now that I have your e-mail, I can
send you the photos as files. I will send them to Roy Miki too. I have
a lot of respect for Roy, and think he does wonderful work.



Peace & Blessings, Todd

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

Hi Todd,
 
Thanks for your message.  In my initial message I made an error! 
The time I was in Vancouver was from 1950 to 1956 (not until 1965 –
juxtaposition of two numbers!) 
 
You have my permission if what I wrote might be 'interesting'.  I
think it is more interesting that you mention our former Governor, Gary
Locke as your relative!  and you mentioned it because I cited the name
of our diocese.  Our “Diocese of Olympia” of the Episcopal Church, USA,
betrays the fact that it was established before Seattle was much of a
place.  The diocese celebrated it's 150th anniversary last year.   The
local church headquarters has been in Seattle, years before I ever came
here.  Olympia was more significant in the early days.
 
Likewise, the 'Diocese of New Westminster' of the Anglican Church
of Canada was begun before Vancouver was very important, and the
Cathedral was located in New Westminster at the beginning.  Christ
Church Cathedral, at Georgia and Burrard, and the diocesan office is 
in downtown Vancouver.
 

I have known about Roy Miki for many years, and I met him, I
believe, in 1995, at my Dad's funeral.  But on May 24th it was our
first face to face conversation.  Also, so near and so far —I hadn't
seen my sister, Joy, for the last 10 years!  We had been in Japan for
almost 10 years, and came back to Seattle 5 years ago.  But her
peripatetic life, and my laid back state, now in retirement, our paths
have sometimes been close, but they didn't cross – until Wednesday
night and OBOV !

 
Delighted to note your signing off with “Peace & Blessings”. 
As it happens I also very often write that before I close with my name!
 
Tim.

ExplorWORD May 28th, at Our Town Cafe – featuring Joy Kogawa

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l-r Rev. Tim Nakayama, Prof. Roy Miki, Joy Kogawa, ACWW vp Todd Wong

Joy Kogawa was the featured author at ExplorWORD at Our Town cafe, for May 28th.
I MCed the event which featured writers Michelle Wong, Jessica Gin-Jade, Alexis Keinlein and Mishtu Bannerjee.

It was organized by Jim Wong-Chu for the explorASIAN festival, and co-sponsored by Asian Canadian Writers' Workshop and RicePaper Magazine.
Sid Tan of Saltwater City TV, was there to film the evening, which will be broadcast next week hopefully on Shaw Cable.

It was a wonderful reading that featured the insightful writings of
young up and coming writers, and closed with the wise reflections of a
well-respected and honoured literary force. Joy Kogawa used her time to
talk about the recent protests by Chinese descendents in regards to the
selective historial perspective of the Japanese government ommiting WW2
atrocities against China.

Joy told the story of peaceful small island situated between China and
Japan where when China visited, they claimed ownership, and when Japan
visited they claimed ownership. And how the island played host to one
of WW2's bloodiest land battles where the peaceful inhabitants were
almost wiped out. It was the story of Okinawa. On the 50th anniversary
of the Battle of Okinawa, the natives named each of the citizens who
had died, and included the names of Japanese and American soldiers…
honouring every human being that died, in an act of tremendous grace
and forgiveness.
Joy revealed that her ex-husband David Kogawa came from Okinawa, and so
their children are descendents of Okinawan heritage.

Joy closed her time with a reading of a poem “Oh Canada”, from her
novel Obasan. It is a beautiful poem acknowledging the bittersweet
qualities that make up the roots of Canada – both in its physical
environment and the qualities of its people. It's context is that it is
set during the time of internment of Japanese Canadians during WW2.

After Joy's reading, I shared with the Our Town audience, my
conversation with Richard Hopkins, following Joy's reading at the
Vancouver Public Library's One Book One Vancouver
event featuring Joy on May 24th. I had told Richard that Joy inspires
us all to be better Canadians. Richard had corrected me and said that
Joy inspires us all to be better human beings.
In closing, I encouraged everybody to attend the One Book One Vancouver
readings throughout the summer that would be built around the novel
Obasan, and that would continue right to Word On The Street in
September.

I encouraged people to support the drive to save the Kogawa homestead
in Vancouver's Marpole neighborhood, that had been taken from the
Kogawa family during WW2. I recounted that at the VPL reading, I had
asked Joy to name some of her favorite Asian Canadian writers, she had
said “We all love Wayson Choy.”

“But tonight, and for this summer,” I said, “We all love Joy Kogawa.”
pictures of this event by Jim Wong-Chu to follow…. stay tuned….

Women's dragon boat Regatta at False Creek May 28

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48 teams of women competed in heats of 4 in the False Creek Women's
dragon boat regatta. This event is the dreamchild of Marina McCready,
and is a fundraiser for the False Creek Women's Dragon Boat team – one of the consistently BEST dragon boat teams in the world, and led by coach Andrea Dillon, one of the most inspiring coaches I have ever been honoured to be on the same boat with.

There is a prize for the best costume. The Lady Bugs were in full
force. There was a team dressed in wedding dresses. One team all wore
black afro wigs, and performed a version of “Stop, in the name of
love… before we beat your boat.”

This event attracts many out of town teams. They came from Victoria,
Nanaimo, Portland, Tacoma, Kelowna, Chilliwack… I got to hang with my
favorite US teams: Tacoma Dragon Boat Association and Wasabi Women Team Huge,
receiving hugs from friends on each team. TDBA invited us to go down to Seattle on July 2nd, for dragon boat
barrel racing on Green Lake in Seattle.  This will be part of
Seattle's Sea Fest.  I have always felt that Green Lake would be
perfect for a dragon boat race.

I also saw many friends from Vancouver teams… Pat and Shelly are now paddling on False Creek Women. I shared with Pat that
this year on Gung Haggis Fat Choy dragon boat team, that I gave a new
paddler the nick name of “The Instigator” – the same nickname that I
gave Pat back in 2001 when we paddled together in San Francisco for the Spirit
of Vancouver team. She laughed as we recounted shared stories of our
wonderful adventures on that trip.

TDBA competed as the
Draco Koa Wahines -translated as dragons with Warrior Spirit Women. It
is the TDBA club that last year reated the world's first ever dragon boat barrel racing event. 
The Draco Koa Wahines made the 2nd tier finals, amongst the top 8 teams
out of 48. Very good results for a team with 50% brand new paddlers.

Wow! Roli Women
came first in that race. Louise Lamb drummed Roli to a strong finish…
Louise is one of my favorite drummers ever. I raced with her in Roli's
previous incarnation as GM Turbo Dragons in 2001 for races in Victoria, Kelowna and San Francisco. 
Louise was the featured guest drummer for the False Creek Women's Team in the Thalassa dragon boat documentary that also featured our Gung Haggis Fat Choy dragon boat team as the documentary's multicultural component.

Wasabi Women Team Huge finished
2nd to hosts False Creek Women. These are two of the best Women's teams
in the world. Both medaled at the 2001 World championships in
Philadelphia and have continued their consistency. Suzi Cloutier
of Wasabi is a good friend of mine and wrote me a story about Wasabi's 2004 trip to the World Club Crew Championships in Cape Town South Africa.

Suzi and I love to surprise each other with special gifts.  This time she honoured me with a belated
birthday card + huge chocolate truffle from her favorite chocolateria
in Portland Oregon. My gift to her and her team mate Carey – both of whom I
have known since 1990/91, were Canada Post stamps that featured the 2002 Wasabi team issued in 2003. Carey was very excited to finally have the stamp.

After the races, my girlfriend Deb and I took Suzi and her room mates Kristen and Margie over to Mario's Gelati
for a special treat of Italian gelato and/or sorbetto. Of course Suzi tells
everybody about the time I brought her a litre of wasabi flavoured
gelato from Casa Gelato,
and says it was torture, because it had too much wasabi to eat. 
ACK!   Anyways this time around we all had double scoops on
waffle cones. Suzi and I both picked lichee sorbetto. Of course Deb had
to tell Suzi about my recent obsession with lichee martinis and Soho
lichee liqeur.

Encouraging Women in Politics: Singing “The Ballad of Ellen Woodsworth”

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Encouraging Women in Politics: Singing “The Ballad of Ellen Woodsworth”
Very fun evening.
It opened with Ellen Woodsworth and Libby Davies speaking about their
experiences in politics, and wanting to encourage more women in
politics.

I was a featured guest performer too!
I joked that I was the token male.
…that the qualifications were a male had to wear a “skirt”, have
attended a women's studies course, and spoke about women's health
issues on the CBC Radio. Thankfully I qualified for all of the above
(cheers and applause).

As an Asian male, I could relate to the challenges that women faced in
politics. Afterall politics is dominated by white males… and Asian
males are a minority. And like women, Asian males are taken less
seriously than White males. Asian males, like women, also are slightly
smaller than white males. We also have less body hair too!

I performed “The Ballad of Ellen Woodsworth” in honour of her birthday.
Earlier in the month, I had talked with Ellen about the importance for
Vancouver to have its own Poet Laureate – someone who could imortalize
the current events, or mark special events for Vancouver history for
posterity.


So… for her birthday celebration I volunteered to write something
special for Ellen. I scoured the internet for biographical material and
asked her questions about her values and her life. Then I carefully
documented the significant achievements of her life, identified her
values, her goals and her dreams… and crafted the words to fit the
rhythm of my chosen form.
Basically, I took the tune of “Every Little Thing She Does is Magic”
and added my own verses. It was fun.
I will add it here tomorrow… so stay tuned.

Events for Asian Heritage Month May 29 to 31, 2005

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Check out www.explorasian.org for details of the following events.



29/5/2005
Roundhouse Community Centre

THE CHEN LING ACADEMY OF DANCE
Chinese Folk, Minority, Classical and Modern Dance

29/5/2005
CBC Radio Studio One, 700 Hamilton Street, Vancouver
explorSTUDIO:

The Vancouver Inter-Cultural Orchestra

30/5/2005
Pacific Cinemateque

BEYOND
Short Works Telling Asian Stories
Curated by Yasmin Karim

31/5/2005
Alliance Française de Vancouver

Indonesian Evening

Toddish McWong guest performance at “Encouraging Women in Politics Fundraiser & Dance”

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How did this happen?

I volunteered to perform for a special fundraiser for Vancouver city
councillor Ellen Woodsworth and to help celebrated her birthday.

Anyways… the theme is clear. More skirts are needed in Politics,
More Human beings in touch with both their masculine and their feminie.
More Balance… Toddish McWong will be wearing his kilt, and releasing
his inner creative talents with a special song for Women in Politics,
and acknowledgement to Ellen Woodsworth.

Encouraging Women In Politics Fundraiser & Dance

Friday, May 27, 2005 at 20:00 to 1:00 at

WISE Hall

1882 Adanac St., Vancouver, BC

Join Councillor Ellen Woodsworth and friends at the Wise Hall for food,
dance, good conversation and great fun! With special guests, the Joni
Miller / Eastman Band, No Shit Shirleys, and Sara Kendall!

The Joni Miller / Eastman Band is one great dance band, No Shit
Shirleys is an all women acapella group, and Sara Kendall is a hip rap
artist. This will be one great event, so hurry and get your tickets
today!

Tickets are on a sliding scale, $25.00 – $100.00 (No one turned
away). Call or email the COPE office today to reserve your tickets!
604-255-0400 or cope@cope.bc.ca.

Joy Kogawa's novel Obasan is the book for all of Vancouver to read

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Joy Kogawa sharing her happiness with the audience that her novel “Obasan” at the premiere event for One Book One Vancouver – photo Todd Wong

A very HAPPY Joy Kogawa shared her pleasure with the audience at the opening event for One Book One Vancouver
at VPL's Central Branch on Tuesday, May 24th.  Obasan is the
novel written about a young girl's journey through the Japanese
Canadian internment camps of WW2, when the Canadian government branded
all Canadians of Japanese descent as aliens, in its misguided efforts
to ensure homeland security.

The title, Obasan, actually means “aunt” in Japanese, and it is to her
aunt that the young character Naomi looks up to.  Obasan is
considered one of the most important Canadin books of the last 30
years, according to Prof. Roy Miki, who along with Kogawa and his
brother Art, worked to secure redress for Japanese Canadians from the
Canadian government.

“I am very happy today,” said Kogawa, as she tried to describe what it
meant to her to have Obasan chosen as the book all Vancouverites should
read.  Kogawa described her conversation earlier in the day with
her friend fellow author Alice Munro who had recieved the Terasen Life
Time Achievment award as part of the VPL Central Library's 10th
Anniverasay celebrations.  “It just keeps getting better and
better, she told me – the recognition and awards.  I guess I will
have to accept it,” Kogawa smiled.


Kogawa said that when she first heard about the Redress settlement from
the Canadian government, she was very happy.  “But it was over so
quickly – the moment passed.  I'm going to savour this one.” 
Throughout the summer, VPL will hold many events based on the themes of
Obasan.  One Book One Vancouver is described as a book club for
the entire city.  The closing event will be at Word On the Street
Festival September 25th.

Kogawa answered many questions after her all too brief talk.  When
I asked her which Asian Canadian writers that she liked personally she
said, “Oh, there are so many now.  When Roy and I started there
weren't very many…. of course we all love Wayson Choy.” she said.

When asked what was happening with the Kogawa homestead
in Vancouver's Marpole neighborhood, Joy replied: “When we rediscovered
it was still there, Tim and I tried to buy it but we didn't have enough
money, so I let the idea go.  When Roy Miki organized the reading
at the house, it was very special.  I was very excited to see the
cheerry tree again.”  Then Joy held up a little plastic bag and
said “
Seeds from the cherry tree,” as she smiled broadly.

Joy speaks very clearly, patiently and perceptively.  She shares
with the audience that Obasan was also just chosen for the One Book
program in Medicine Hat.  She answers questions about what it was
like living in internment camps, as she describes that some readers
have felt that the condtions were so inconcievable that it must have
been fiction.  Joy counted the members of her family, plus her
father's friends that all lived in a chicken coop filled with fleas and
chicken smell. 

“12 of us… after she names each person.”

At the end of the evening many people thank Joy for such an inspiring
talk.  She shared her buddhist philosophy of “letting go” when
asked about dealing with the pain and suffering.  She shared her
perception of American Christians creating a Christian bomb that landed
on the most important Christian Cathedral in Japan. 

“Joy Kogawa teaches us to be better Canadians,” I shared with Richard
Hopkins, professor at the University of BC Library School. 
Richard smiled and said succintly, “Joy Kogawa teaches us to be better
human beings.”

The next Joy Kogawa events are:
Thursday night at the Vancouver Museum for a sampling of the songs from
Vancouver Opera's forthcoming production of Naomi's Road, based on Joy
Kogawa's children's book.

Saturday night at Our Town Cafe for a sampling of Asian Canadian
writers featuring Kogawa, Alexis Keinlein and Gleen Deer. organized by Asian Canadian Writers' Workshop.


Joy Kogawa signing books
with Janice Douglas (VPL Director of Community Programs) and Paul
Whitney (VPL City Librarian) – photo Todd Wong

Joy Kogawa signs a book for VPL Board Member Chrissy George – photo Todd Wong

Relaxing after the reading: Rev. Tim Nakamura (Joy's brother), Prof. Roy Miki, Joy Kogawa, and Todd Wong – photo by David Kogawa

Gung Haggis dragon boat team practice review May 25

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Hi everybody

Wednesday's practice went well.

Early birds at 5:30pm all got one on one coaching with educational
correction. We went down to the boat early to practice paddling, and I
gave coaching tips, and corrected people's posture and
techniques.  We all agree that this is some of the best coaching
we can do.  Everybody feels they are paddling better after the one
on one work.

At 6:25 we went out in the boat.  I steered and coached leading
drills and pointers from the back, as Bob Brinson was unable to attend
practice due to work (this is why we have 2 coaches!)

We picked up Ashley and Randa from the Dragon Zone dock then did some
more practice starts, and we did the “parking exercise” where we talk
with our seat partner about what we want to work on for our own
improvement.

The next starts were gradually more explosive, and our short race piece
was surprisingly good except for our finish where we went out of time.

On the whole, the team is progressing well.  At this point we are
looking now to assign specific seats to people, as by now you know
which side you prefer, and we have a better idea of your abilities.

We finished the practice off with some group work, alternating fronts,
middles and backs.  Some technique work for the 5-5-5 drill (5
draw strokes to the side, 45 deg angle 5 strokes, + 5 strokes
forward)  After the exercise, everybody was paddling quieter, the
paddles were deeper, and the catch was very together.

Short intense practice – less endurance or strengther training. 
We also taught people the stealth blades for preparation at a start,
and how to be always ready at a start by creating some race situations.

For Sunday's practice:
DRAGON ZONE AT SCIENCE WORLD

Please arrive by 12:15 pm at Dragon Zone
We are on the water by 1pm, and want to ensure that everybody is race
ready, as we pretend this is an actual race event, and will do a quick
warm-up then do a race with some other boats.

June 5th is Race Regatta Day
This is where we do an actual 500m race with other boats, as the ADBF
does a dress rehearsal for the technical side of the races…

June 18/19 is coming up fast…

Cheers, todd

Cross-cultural wedding in Canada – Celebrating our shared heritage.

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Weddings… great places for cultural traditions to mix and match, as
more and more Canadians of diverse ethnic and cultural backgrounds
decide to tie the knot.

I attended a wedding reception for the son of one of my older cousins, Joe Wai, the architect of so many buildings in Vancouver's Chinatown and around this city.  Joe recently designed the Millenium Gate,
and previously designed the Chinatown Parkade, the Chinese Cultural
Centre Museum and Archives, as well as being one of the architects of
the Dr. Sun Yat Sen Gardens. 
I have always counted Joe as one of my early role models for his vast
amount of community work, and ability to blend East and West together.

His son Jonathan had just gotten married.  I had never before met
the bride.  But when I walked into the Fortune Garden
Restaurant at
1475 West Broadway St. this past Saturday, I immediately identified her. 
She was standing, radiantly beautiful, wearing an intricately
embroidered antique Chinese jacket, and skirt emblazoned with dragons and phoenix
in stunning relief.  Calm and serene, she had presence and
dignity.  I was to discover later that the jacket and skirt had originally
belonged to my Auntie Rose and Aunt Lannie and had been given to one of my cousin's
wives recently.  They were loaned to the bride for this very special
occasion. Definitely now a museum-quality piece in all the good ways!

The bride was also wearing, which was to be revealed later, a red
Chinese cheong-sam – the traditional Chinese wedding dress.  Cheongsam
means “long dress.” It is floor length but with a slit on the side up
to the thigh, and it features a mandarin collar. It was featured in the
Spider Man movie worn by actress Kirsten Dunst.
 
What is amazing is that the bride,
is Caucasian, and the groom is Eurasian.  I learned many things
about Lisa Sowden the bride.  She is an actor
and she speaks more Cantonese than my younger cousin Jonathan, who is
now developing his law career.  Our families have always been
ethnically and culturally diverse.  Inter-racial marriage has
generally long been accepted on both sides of my family.  On my
father's side, 6 of my 9 cousins including Joe married
non-Asians.  On my mother's side, 10 of my married cousins
including my brother chose non-asians.

For me, the small Chinese banquet reception (50 guests) seemed so
Canadian. 
More than half of the guests were caucasian, and we dined
on shark's fin soup, prawns, rock cod, crab and lobster, chinese
mushrooms, duck, chicken.  It was truly a grand wedding
banquet. Such gourmet delicacies are usually only ordered for
weddings.  Long Life noodles and Happy Marriage fried race
finished off the meal with Red Bean soup dessert.  As many of the
guests were not familiar with the significance of the menu items. 
My cousin Hayne Wai and I explained things such as the importance of
the head and tail being included in the fish and chicken dishes, to
signify wholeness.  The chinese pronounciation of Fish (Yee) is
similar to coin, the mushroom caps are uncut like large coins. 
The noodles are long to encourage long life. 

I got up briefly to talk with the bride and groom, and imagine my
surprise when I returned to my seat to find the cooked chicken head on
my plate.  Immediately I told the chinese wedding tradition about
putting the chicken head on a string and dangling it in front of the
bridal couple with the instructions to kiss it to bring good
luck.  Of course the person with the string pulls it up at the
last minute, initiating the couple in a kiss.  I think it worked
better in the days of arranged marriages when the couple didn't know
each other, and probably were no strangers to kissing each other.

At our table, I sat next to Lisa's friends Maria
(another actor) and her boyfriend Darren who not too familiar with
Chinese cuisine.  On my other side, Carole jumped right into each
of the dinner courses and enjoyed it tremendously.  While Carole
has a
French-Canadian background, it is her sister Tina, that married Joe's
younger brother Wayne, so… Carole is familiar around many of the
family's Chinese-Canadian activities and dinners.

At the evening's close, I gave a special bottle of Pinot Blanc Special
Late Harvest (-13) desert wine to the bride and groom.  It is Red Rooster Winery's “-13” or Minus Thirteen, created to celebrate the Year of the Rooster. 
It even has Chinese characters on the label, which is what initially
drew my attention tot he bottle.  Checking their website, I was
surprised to discover an Asian-Canadian winemaker, Richard Kanazawa. Of course I chose this bottle to celebrate the year they got married – Year of the Rooster. 

What does it mean for a Canadian couple of diverse cultural background
getting married in the Year of the Rooster and the Astrological sign of
Gemini?  Many things to many people!  And that's the great
thing about being Canadian, or to quote Bob and Doug Mackenzie, “Beauty, eh?”