BBC Radio Scotland: Interviewed this morning for 'The Radio Cafe'
We talked about why a 5th generation Chinese Canadian would be
interested in Scottish culture. I explained that Canada's true
temperment as a nation is much more Scots than English, and that the
Scots are part of Canada's pioneering heritage, as they helped explore
this country such as Simon Fraser, one of the first Whites to cross
Canada and explore the Pacific Coast, by paddling down the Fraser
River, later named after him.
The Scots came to Canada from across the Atlantic, and named the new
land 'Nova Scotia.' The Chinese came from across the Pacific
Ocean and called the new land 'Gum San' – meaning Gold Mountain.
We talked about how I came to invent
Gung Haggis Fat Choy and shared some of my personal story. I told Bronwen that I wore my maple leaf tartankilt for our Canadian Club celebrations for flag day, and that it had
the colours of Canada represented in the greens, yellows and reds of
the maple leaf.
It's a wonderful expression of multiculturalism, when we can learn to
embrace each of the different pioneer cultures and history of
Canada. But it becomes more than tokenism, when we start to
explore the historical interactions of the cultures, and the impacts of
the cultures on Canadian culture and society. It's amazing at the
conversations that can be sparked when you are wearing a kilt. At
the last kilts night at Doolin's, I met a fellow and we talked about
Scottish and Chinese explorers such as the Chinese Admiral Zheng He,
written up in the book 1421, the Year the Chinese Discovered the World.
The interview will be broadcast on BBC
Radio Scotland's arts and culture programme, 'The Radio Café' the week
starting Monday 3rd April. It's a series I'm running across the week
with New York's Tartan Week (April 1-8) as the peg.