Welcome to the Gung Haggis Fat Choy World Poetry Night –



  Joe McDonald Bagpiper – Todd Wong Accordion – photo Jamie Griffiths


January 16th, 7:30pm
Vancouver Public Library
Central Branch
Alice Mckay Room

Co-produced byWorld Poetry Reading Series, Gung Haggis Fat Choy, and Vancouver Public Library



Hosts are: Todd Wong, creator of Gung Haggis Fat Choy, and the team of Ariadne
Sawyer and Alejandro Mujica-Olea – hosts and creators of World Poetry
Reading Series at VPL, and the World Poetry program on Co-op Radio.

Q: When Chinese New Year meets Robbie Burns Day…  what happens?

Q: When Scottish poets meet Chinese poets… what happens?



A: They write poetry… and they have babies called Canadians!


Enjoy our 3rd annual event combining poetry, music and now…. dance!

A litte bit of China + a little bit of Scotland = Canada

The Burns Club makes its first appearance for Gung Haggis Fat Choy World Poetry Night.
Fiona Tinwei Lam is a Chinese Canadian poet born in Scotland – Her
first poetry collection Intimate Distances was nominated for 2004
Vancouver Book Award.
Bagpiper Joe McDonald, born in Canada, is a singer/songwriter and leader of bands Brave Waves and The Mad Celts.
Alexis Keinlen is a multi-racial writer (including equal parts Chinese and Scottish), and also is Literary Editor for Ricepaper Magazine.


The evening starts with
welcomes… then goes back in time to recognize Robbie Burns and
Chinese dancing….  We progress to contemporary Scots with Joe
McDonald (born in Canada) and Fiona Tinwei Lam (born in Scotland).




The singalong Loch Lomand calls people back to the room.  We introduce
contemporary Canadian poets James Mullin, Todd Wong and Alexis Keinlen
– progressing from Scottish-Canadian to 5th Gen Chinese Canadian to
multi-gen, multi-racial.  We finish with a dance, a song, and Auld Lang
Syne.



It will be a fairly quick moving show with quick turnarounds – We have lots of performers for our GHFC WPRS – variety show!