Being Irish in Beijing

　　Ireland seeks to impress China with a massive cultural expo in Beijing and Shanghai this month. But the Irish in China have already been making a name for their homeland in the world's most populous nation.

　　By Mark Godfrey

　　Irish artist John Behan will be returning to China after a 10-year hiatus. He was last here to finish a metal sculpture in Shenzhen, gifted to China by an Irish tycoon. Behan, one of Ireland's most respected and prolific sculptors, will be in Beijing in May to conduct a workshop with a group of Chinese art students. "I'll be there for a few weeks, so the most productive thing will be to work with students in a workshop space using welders" says Behan, who prefers to work large-scale in his favourite medium, bronze. His multi-figure eulogy to victims of the Irish famine has taken a prominent and controversial place in Dublin's docklands.

　　A year ago China was mired in a SARS crisis that appeared to have no end. Flights to the country were empty, flights out were full. Irish professionals, many working at the highest levels of Chinese commerce and industry, help drive the engine of China's economic boom, and they stubbornly stayed put while empty hotels, shuttered restaurants and quiet offices were all symptoms of the malaise that had paralysed the world's fastest growing city.

　　Their confidence in the city is being recognised by leaders back home. Ireland's Minister for Arts, Sport and Tourism, John O'Donoghue launched the lineup for the hotly anticipated China/Ireland Cultural Exchange at a special function in Dublin in March. "The purpose of this exchange is to improve the understanding between the two nations and therefore provide the basis for increased cultural, social, economic and trade relations between the two countries" said a spokesperson for O'Donoghue. The festival is part of a major cultural exchange programme between Ireland and China arising from an agreement signed during the visit of Premier Zhu Rongji to Ireland in 2001. The Irish Festival in China in May and June will be followed up by a Chinese Festival of Arts and Culture in Ireland later in 2004.

　　Sile O'Broin worked in Beijing since 1999 as an associate director in the Beijing office of APCO, an American public relations firm. A Dubliner, O'Broin is uniquely acquainted with China. She first came here in 1979 as a child. Her father Gearoid O'Broin was Ireland's first ambassador to China after Ireland established diplomatic ties with the People' s Republic of China. Beijing was "a very different place" back then she says. "Locals stared and shouted 'foreigner' when we walked from the Friendship Store to the embassy. We were such a novelty to them then."

　　The upcoming Irish Festival in China will feature "...traditional, classical and popular music together with contemporary dance, drama, literature, film and visual arts" according to a press official at the Irish embassy in Beijing. "The programme will be concentrated in two cities, Beijing and Shanghai. In Beijing, Ireland is to be the primary guest nation in this year's Meet in Beijing Festival, an annual month long international arts festival. That's a major event in China."

　　The Irish are a small but distinguished presence in this bulging city of 16 million people. Numbering no more than one hundred according to the city's Irish embassy, the Irish community in Beijing has managed to make the annual St Patrick's Day Ball a highlight of the city's social scene. The city's three Irish bars meanwhile are the meeting places of choice for expat office workers and trendy locals. A photo of a pint-drinking Irish prime minister Bertie Ahern stands next to a mural of freedom fighter Michael Collins over the bar at Durty Nelly's in Sanlitun, Beijing's bar district.

　　Its multi-ethnic players kitted out in Irish green, Beijing Celtic is the most feared side in Beijing's amateur soccer league. The side, established by Irish expats in town made world headlines last year when they travelled to North Korea to play a local side in a friendly. The game was the first visit by a foreign side to the harshly secluded state. Beijing Celtic lost good-humouredly but they remain top of the Beijing league. An on-off football side has jousted with the local Australian Rules side for the honours in friendly games and the two have also joined forces to play teams from Shanghai and Hong Kong.

　　Another Dubliner, Elaine Kinlough, teaches at the International Montessori School of Beijing. Kinlough, 33, came to Beijing six years ago to teach at the 350 student-school. "Beijing really interested me. All of Asia interests me. Beijing is a lot different now to what it was then. I have a fantastic job and I love Asian culture." Kinlough spends her weekends mountain biking and running long-distance road races in the mountains surrounding Beijing.

　　A talented singer, Sile O'Broin last year sang in the chorus of an acclaimed production of "Lady In the Dark," a Gershwin musical and the first Broadway-style show staged in Beijing. Hype and uninformed fear about SARS hit the show hard. "The show was badly effected because the Chinese didn't want to be in a big building, they didn't know the facts."

　　From Churchtown on Dublin's southside, Richard Mullins, helms the English service of China Radio International, China's flagship broadcaster, on Wednesday mornings. Mullins chats to locals about gender equality, relationships and life in the professional rat race. In his easy style Mullins could be the local Tony Ryan, only his interviewees are rarely as relaxed and liberated as callers to Irish talkshows. This is China after all, only now truly opening to the world and to Western sensibilities.

　　Across town, in the studios of China Central Television, Richard Doran is getting ready to co-present Centre Stage, the channel's popular culture programme., Doran has made a name for himself with his easy grasp of Chinese and his soft on-screen humour. Married to a local woman, Doran never planned to come to China but grasped an English teaching offer while between jobs during a sojourn in Australia.

　　Like this writer, Irish expatriates had been enjoying life in Beijing. But then that's easy in a massive, colourful city that's re-discovering itself and building for the 2008 Olympic Games. Western expertise is in demand and fortunes have been made amid the thickening forest of cranes that service the city's 24-hour construction sites. A first-rate meal costs the price of a Dublin pint.

　　There are plenty of opportunities in China but the hardship package hitherto given to western professionals is a thing of the past, says Sile O'Broin. "China is booming and there's jobs for foreign specialists but be prepared to look around and accept a local salary. Plenty of foreigners are coming here on their[what?].

　　Meanwhile, the Irish in Beijing have plenty to look forward to. Legendary Irish traditional music group The Chieftains returns to China after 21 years with a special concert to open the Irish programme on 9th May as part of the Meet in Beijing Festival. In 1983 they were one of the first Western music groups to visit China. Cinema Ireland is a season of Irish feature and short films, selected in association with the Irish Film Institute, which will be screened in late May at various cinemas in Beijing. This programme will also form a major focus for the annual Shanghai International Film Festival in June. The opening film will be the recently Oscar nominated In America directed by Jim Sheridan.

　　Irish literature is represented with readings from recent Pulitzer Prize winner Paul Muldoon and leading Irish language poet, Nuala NíDhomhnaill, accompanied by two of Ireland's finest young traditional musicians, Caoimhín óRaghallaigh and Michelle Mulcahy. The two national broadcasters, Radio Telefís éireann and China Central Television, will each screen a selection of the other's programmes for their respective domestic audiences. CCTV will screen Irish programmes in May 2004 and RTéwill screen Chinese programmes in late summer.

　　There will be plenty worth viewing. The Spirit of China and Ireland Concert, set for screening, will include the world premiere of Fusion III, a new contemporary music composition specially written by Jia Daqun for Irish and Chinese musicians. Celso Antunes, Director of the National Chamber Choir of Ireland, will conduct this new piece that will feature his choir, a string section from the Shanghai Conservatory of Music led by Fionnuala Hunt together with several traditional musicians from both Ireland and China. The National Chamber Choir of Ireland will perform several pieces from their own current repertoire, including Marantha, a new piece by renowned composer Mícheál óSúilleabháin.

　　Several Irish artists will perform during May and June in Beijing and Shanghai. Along with sculptor John Behan, another luminary of Irish art, Riverdance lead dancer Colin Dunne will also be in residence in China during May as a guest of the Chinese Dancers Association. A delegation of Irish writers will travel to China in late May as guests of the Chinese Writers Association to meet their counterparts, give readings and hold seminars.