GUNG HAGGIS FAT CHOY | Robbie Burns Chinese New Year

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Join us for an evening of cultural festivities at Floata Seafood Restaurant!

This year's schedule of events include:

A Chinese banquet dinner & Scottish haggis

• Reading by John MacLachlan's White Angel
• Presentation of the Jim Wong-Chu Emerging Writers Award
• Wine and . . . Scotch! 
• More readings, music, and fun!

Purchase an individual ticket for $75 or a table of ten for $700.  Please purchase tickets online.

About Gung Haggis:

Gung Haggis Fat Choy started out as a small fundraiser of 16 people in 1998 in a crowded living room. Twenty years later it serves dinner at the biggest Chinese Restaurant in North America, and has spun off a CBC television performance special, and the SFU Gung Haggis Fat Choy Canadian Games.   The idea for this intercultural celebration originated in 1993 when a Simon Fraser University student was asked to help out with the University’s annual Robbie Burns celebrations. Todd, a fifth-generation Canadian, quickly learned about Scottish-Canadian culture with its traditions of men wearing kilts, carrying swords, playing bagpipes and eating exotic foods.

As 1993 was the year that the Chinese Lunar New Year fell on January 27, only two days away from Robbie Burns Day, which is always January 25, Todd decided to celebrate the Scottish Bard’s birthday along with the Lunar New Year.

“Gung Haggis Fat Choy!” said Wong, “I can celebrate two cultures at the same time.” And thus was born the persona of “Toddish McWong” with his growing appreciation of Scottish Canadian history and culture.  This is the “Little Dinner that Could” which is now growing into a Vancouver premiere! Creator Todd Wong has been interviewed by BBC Radio Scotland, plus local and national media.

Today, it is a major fundraiser event for Asian Canadian Writers' Workshop and LiterASIAN Festival – helping to create positive examples of interculturalism in our community!

For more information, visit https://www.gunghaggis.com/.

LiterASIAN Toronto - Asian Literary Activism

On November 1, 2018, the University of Toronto and Asian Canadian Writers’ Workshop is hosting a new literary event in Toronto as an extension of the existing LiterASIAN festival in Vancouver which celebrates the best in Asian Canadian arts. For LiterASIAN in Toronto in 2018, the theme is Asian Literary Activism in which we will examine the history, cultural influence and the outcomes of Asian Canadian writers involved in changing society as a whole with their work.

The event features two panels with three writers on each panel discussing the past, present, and future of literary activism along with two catered receptions. Honoured guests for our first annual event in 2018 include Joy Kogawa, Cheuk Kwan, Lynne Kutsukake, Kai Cheng Thom and Shani Mootoo. We look forward to their lively discussions and sharing of ideas.

Admittance is free to all members of the public! | RSVP through this Eventbrite

(Un)framed: Half a Century of Asian Canadian Magazines

The Long Sixties kicked off in earnest in Vancouver after moving north from California, as news of the countercultural movement began spreading across the world. However, this period was never just
limited to the Hippies and the Flower Power movement—it involved a renewed sense of activism that
began to dissect power structure, race, sex, and privilege. Asian Canadian magazines, which began with Overseers at the University of British Columbia, took on a new form in Toronto when The Asianadian was founded open three principles: It was anti-racist, anti-sexist, and anti-homophobic.
This led to other magazines like Ricepaper, Bambooda, Rungh, and Looseleaf. Although the nature of the publishing and magazine industry has changed significantly during this time, it is interesting to look back at how the politics of the New Left effectively birthed a new cultural consciousness and became responsible for introducing the works of many prominent writers including SKY Lee, Paul Yee, and Madeleine Thien.

Framed images featuring original and reproductions of front covers from The Asianadian, Ricepaper,
Bambooda, and Looseleaf magazine. Also features a poster designed by Michelle Kuan and Michelle Lu, a reproduction of the Ricepaper anthology, Currents, and photographs of The Asianadian’s founders and collective members.

Date
September 21-22,2018.

In conjunction with LiterASIAN 2018.

Exhibition Credits
Allan Cho, Sarah Suk, William Tham, and Thi Tran. This exhibition was possible thanks to the generous help of the Centre A team.

Opening New Frontiers: The Art of Self-Publishing & Traditional Publishing at Word Vancouver Festival

Traditional publishing has been shaken to the core with new digital technologies and the Internet. Unlike a decade ago, when writers finish writing, they face the question of working with a traditional publisher or doing it themselves as self-publishers. Authors not only have to be concerned about polishing their prose and characters, but they also now need to understand the complexities of deciding on an agent or uploading their books to Amazon. Some of today’s most successful authors even do both through a hybrid approach, traversing both the traditional publisher route and as self-publishers. Join us as a panel of authors share their expertise with you on the perils and promises of the new frontiers of getting published.



Presented by: Historic Joy Kogawa House

Location: Historic Joy Kogawa House, 1450 West 64th Ave.

Time: 7:00 PM to 9:00 pm

With: William Tham, Vincent Ternida & Cynda Yeasting

LiterASIAN 2018 Returns, September 21 to September 23, 2018

Launched in 2013, LiterASIAN is an annual festival of Pacific Rim Asian Canadian writing and a community-building initiative of the Asian Canadian Writers Workshop (ACWW).

The first of its kind within Canada, the festival’s purpose is to promote and celebrate the works of Asian Canadian writers and artists through author readings, panel discussions, and workshop events, creating important and unique networking opportunities between professional and emerging writers, students, and members of the broader public so that everyone participating can learn and discuss topics of importance to Asian Canadian writing.

Explore "Powder and Paint" with PCHC-MoM & Museum Bento as Part of Open Doors Richmond

Join PCHC-MoM and Museum Bento on Saturday June 2 and Sunday June 3 at the Richmond Museum for this year’s Doors Open Richmond, a weekend-long, city-wide celebration of heritage, culture and the arts.  On Saturday June 2, Museum Bento will be displaying different objects from the Powder and Paint: Cantonese Opera and Immigrant Experience box, developed in conjunction with PCHC-MoM, where you can learn about how Cantonese opera shaped the lives of early Chinese immigrants in Canada. You'll have a chance to explore and interact with the items inside the box, ranging from opera masks and dolls to a model of an opera stage.  It will also be engaging in a fun, interactive paper mask-making, where you can create your own unique Cantonese opera mask to bring home!

For more information about the Doors Open programme, please click here.

Location and Time

11:00am-3:00pm
Richmond Museum
7700 Minoru Gate
Richmond, BC
V6Y 1R9