News Archive

A polished and hilarious performance by a new graduate and a surprise speech by the Nobel Laureate were the highlights of the opening of a new Chinese cultural centre at UWA.

The Chinese Culture Experience Centre, to promote Chinese culture and language to the general public, is now open five days a week at the Confucius Institute, at UWA's Claremont campus.

It was officially opened with a triumvirate ribbon-cutting by Professor Zhou Ji, President of the Chinese Academy of Engineering, Winthrop Professor Philip Mead, Acting Dean of Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences, and Nobel Prize winner Professor Barry Marshall.

Professor Zhou was on an official visit to UWA and graciously accepted the Confucius Institute's invitation to launch the new centre.

Andrew Chubb, who has just completed honours in Chinese Studies, and who earlier in the year won a global competition for foreign speakers of Mandarin, donned a pair of big fake glasses to perform a funny folk story from the Ming dynasty.

He told the story of the Monkey King, who thought like a human and wanted to learn the secret of eternal life, and his encounter with a living Buddha.

Even those who could not understand a word of Mandarin enjoyed Andrew's performance.

But the biggest surprise was when Professor Marshall made a short speech - in Mandarin. He has been learning the language at the Confucius Institute and quoted from Confucius himself when he said: "It is always delightful to welcome guests from afar."

The acting Director of the Institute, Associate Professor Jie Chen, said that this year the total number of people who had attended classes, events, shows and courses at the Institute reached 23,042.

And they are continuing their outstanding outreach program with the new centre and plans for specific tours of China next year for business people to study Chinese business culture and business language.

"We provide cultural training for the government and business sectors, including big mining companies such as Rio Tinto, and the WA Symphony Orchestra and sporting bodies," he said.

The new Chinese Culture Experience Centre has resources including books, CDs, DVD, talking posters and touchscreen technology from Beijing to extend the training informally to anybody who wishes to visit.

Published in UWA News , 29 November 2010