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Sunday, April 17, 2016 This year’s Banquet marked the opening of the 9th year of TCCFA, and celebrated the Chinese National Day, October 1, the 67rd anniversary of the founding of modern China. We thank everyone who came down on Monday, September 19 to our Annual Banquet which takes place at 6:30 pm at the Gold Mark Chinese Cuisine in Markham. We thank the Toronto Deputy and Vice Consuls for attending and congraluate everyone who won one of the fabulous door prizes! The menu included Peking Duck, La Soupe de Fruits de Mer, Chicken Crimson Phoenix, Caramelized Ribs, Fried Tiger Shrimp, Braised Mushrooms and Broccoli, Pan-fried Grouper and more! 
Sunday, April 17, 2016 We thank everyone who attended our Annual General Meeting and placed bids on the many wonderful items on display at the Silent Auction. Michael Copeland was acclaimed as President and seven Board members were also elected for the 2016/17 year. We also thank Dr. Keith Lowe for graciously chairing the elections. 
Sunday, March 20, 2016 On Sunday March 20, we had a guided tour of the Chinese Galleries at the Royal Ontario Museum. A ROM docent guided us through four galleries: Bishop White Gallery of Chinese Temple Art - three 13th – 14th century temple murals and large wooden sculptures that date from the 12th to 15th century - The gallery is named in honour of William Charles White (1873-1960), the first curator of the ROM's Chinese collections, who had been the first Anglican Bishop of Henan province Gallery of Chinese Architecture - the largest and best collection of Chinese architectural artifacts outside of China - the Ming Tombs, the Tombs of Han and Tang, and the reconstruction of a corner of a Chinese Imperial Palace building are focal points of a collection Matthews Family Court of Chinese Sculpture - statues that span over 1,500 years of Chinese history - each is a testament to the expertise and creativity of the artist. Stone, bronze, marble, ceramic and wood Joey and Toby Tanenbaum Gallery of China - ranked amongst the top ten Chinese collections in the world outside of China, this gallery represents almost 10,000 years of Chinese history - objects of writing, pottery, sculpture, transportation, jewelery, porcelain, furniture - covering prehistoric times up to the 20th century Qing Dynasty Following the guided tour, we visited ROM’s new exhibit: Made in China: Cultural Encounters through Export Art. 
Sunday, February 28, 2016 OISE Building, Room 5150 We thank Yitong Lok for a very insightful presentation about Chinese art through two generations. His father was a respected artist who spent years in a Chinese labour camp during the Cultural Revolution but still managed to produce beautiful art afterward, especially with horses. Yitong Lok has produced many paintings, and his portrait of Norman Bethune is displayed at Queen's Park! Yitong Lok studied painting in Beijing, Vancouver, Toronto and Florence. His father, Lok Tok, and grandfather were both painters. The family has ties with many of the 20th century Chinese masters who changed twentieth century Chinese Art History (Wu Zuoren & Li Ruinan). Both Yitong and his father were involved in these controversies. In 1999, father and son painted large centre-pieces for the Chinese Cultural Centre of Greater Toronto. Then Premier Dalton McGuinty commissioned a portrait of Norman Bethune which is in Queens Park’s permanent collection. After the family settled in Canada, father and son have been carrying on Chinese tradition with Western concept through out their paintings and teachings. Their works have been praised by in both North America and in Asian countries. 
Saturday, January 30, 2016 We thank everyone who came out and enjoyed a wonderful dinner of jiaozi dumplings in celebration of the Year of the Monkey. The venue again was the Downsview United Church and we appreciate all who participated in the preparation of the dumplings. Making jiaozi always involves an opportunity to partake in wonderful conversation! 
Author Yan Li: The Last Love Letter from Norman Bethune Sunday, November 15, 2015 Before coming to Canada in 1987, Yan Li worked as a freelancer and translator in Beijing. She started teaching at Renison in 1997, and became Director of the Confucius Institute in 2007. Li has promoted many cultural and literature exchanges between Canada and China. Ms. Li discussed her novel The Stuff Left to Lil which is based on the last letter Norman Bethune wrote before his death on November 12, 1939. The letter dated Aug. 15, 1939 is to Lillian Smith is about his planned return to Canada in early 1940. Her novel deals with that might have been had he returned. Yan is a bilingual writer having published books in both English and Chinese since 1985. She has won several national and international awards, and had served as Vice-President of the Chinese Pen Society of Canada from 2002 to 2007. In addition to talking about the book, she discussed her visit to Beijing in September where she headed a Canadian delegation in honour of the 70th Anniversary of the end of World War 2. A picture was presented to the Chinese hosts of Mao Zedong and Dr. Norman Bethune. We thank Yan Li for a very informative and entertaining presentation and for asking the many questions posed by the audience. 
Tillson Lever Harrison & A.A. MacLeod' Sunday, October 18, 2015 We thank Michael Copeland for a very insightful presentation entitled 'From WW1 to China to Hollywood: Henry Norman Bethune, Tillson Lever Harrison & AA MacLeod'. In attendance was a member of Dr. Bethune's extended family! Tillson Harrison is known as the second Norman Bethune in China. He was born in Tillsonburg, Ontario in 1880. He fought in eight wars in six countries. While serving with UNRRA in 1947 he died of exposure a week after delivering a trainload of supplies from Shanghai to the Eighth Route Army. He was the first person ever to die while serving the UN. In Shanghai he is remembered by a bronze statue, in Kaifeng, Henan, the Dr. Tillson Harrison Memorial School, and in Hengshui, Hebei, the Harrison International Peace Hospital. A.A. MacLeod was a Board Member of the Committee to Aid Spanish Democracy that financed Norman Bethune’s work in Spain, and a member of the group that brought him back to Canada and the USA to drum up support for the Spanish Republican cause. MacLeod was a leading member of the China Aid Committee, an organ of the Communist Parties of both the USA and Canada that sent him to China. 
ANNUAL FALL BANQUET Monday, October 5, 2015 We thank everyone who attended our Annual Fall Dinner at the King Dragon Restaurant in Thornhill. TCCFA members and guests enjoyed an 11 course meal which included Peking Duck. We also thank staff of the Chinese Consulate for being our honoured guests and also for providing a bottle of wine for each table! Congratulations to the winners of our traditional raffle which included many wonderful door prizes. 
Sunday, August 16, 2015 TCCFA members attended the Commemoration of the 70th Anniversary of the End of the Second World War at the Norman Bethune Statue in Gravenhurst. Among the speakers were the Consul-General of China, the Honourable Michael Chan, the great-nephew of Norman Bethune and TCCFA President Michael Copeland. After the speeches, the guests were treated to a lunch at the Opera House and then a tour of the Bethune Memorial House. 
4TH CANADA-CHINA CULTURAL DIALOGUE August 5-6, 2015 TCCFA members attended the 4th Canada-China Cultural Dialogue on Aug 5-6 at the Hilton Toronto. They held a two-hour meeting with representatives from the Chinese Peoples' Association for Friendship with Foreign Countries and also participated in the Dialogue's other events. The Consul-General of China also attended the event. 
MIDDLE POWER, MIDDLE KINGDOM by David Mulroney Former Ambassador to China David Mulroney spoke about his book on Canada-China relations through his book "Middle Power, Middle Kingdom", recently published by Penguin Canada and signed copies afterwards. David Mulroney was the Canadian Ambassador to the People’s Republic from 2009 to 2012. His appointment was the culmination of many years of experience in a wide variety of very senior postings in the Department of Foreign Affairs. He speaks Chinese, and earlier in his career had served in both China and Taiwan. In the preface to his book, Middle Power, Middle Kingdom David writes: "I retired after more than thirty years feeling profoundly discouraged by what I saw as a steady drift of Canadian foreign policy, most manifest in an inclination to elevate rhetoric and image over strategy and substance, and in a marked preference for seeing the world - and Canada as an actor within it – as we want to see it rather than how it is.. " 
CANADA'S BUSINESS RELATIONS WITH CHINA by Sarah Kutulakos Canada China Business Council On Sunday, March 15, Sarah Kutulakos Canada China Business Council’s Executive Director and Chief Operating Officer spoke on 'How Canada Needs to Be More Strategic in its Business Relations with China'. This is a very important topic given the large impact that China has on Canada and the rest of the world. Sarah has an MBA in marketing and she speaks Mandarin fluently. Before joining CCBC in 2007, she worked on a number of projects in China for a major multinational corporation. We thank her for a very informative presentation. 
YEAR OF THE RAM NEW YEAR'S EVENT JIAOZI DINNER We revived our traditional Jiaozi Dinner celebration to welcome in the Year of the Ram at Downsview United Church in Toronto. Making jiaozi involves lots of chopping, of cabbage, ginger, scallions, quite a bit of them, and then doing the wrapping. Everyone had a lot of fun joining in the preparation and were rewarded with a very enjoyable meal. We thank everyone who came out and helped out. We also thank Xu Si and Mu Jianfeng from the Chinese Consulate for attending. See you next time! You can click on any of the pictures to see a larger resolution. Thanks to Ron Tsang, Michael Copeland and Steven Ratnik for the photographs. 
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