Spotlight: Five decades on, British charity continues to champion China-UK friendship, understanding

A beige mini-bus ground to a halt at the entrance of some hutongs near Beijing's Lama Temple at dusk one evening last October, discharging a group of British passengers and a caravan of luggage. Exhausted after an arduous journey to China's capital, the travelers were nevertheless cheerful and excited.

In some ways it was an average tour group, in some ways it wasn't. The 14 travelers were part of the 50th anniversary trip to China organized by the Society for Anglo-Chinese Understanding (SACU), which would take them to Beijing, Xi'an and Shanghai. Some of them were visiting China for the first time.

As an increasing number of countries are embracing protectionism and isolationism, organizations such as SACU may have an even more important role to play in promoting cross-cultural understanding and communication. With that in mind, Xinhua recently spoke with Walter Fung and Chris Henson, who have done a lot of heavy-lifting for the organization that looks back at half a century of promoting friendship between China and Britain.

Fung is a soft-spoken British-born Chinese (or "BBC") with a gentle demeanor who edits SACU's quarterly magazine China Eye. SACU emerged from the Britain-China Friendship Association in 1965, he said, and was co-founded by the famous scientist and sinologist Joseph Needham.

SACU's mission is to promote friendship and understanding between the peoples of Britain and China. It is a registered British charity without political ties and run by volunteers. As the only friendship society of its kind in the country, it promotes its mission through events, trips and publications such as a magazine and a newsletter.

Fung reflected on the society's origins and its role as a rare channel to China at a time when the country was internationally isolated.

"Because of the 'cold war' at that time, very few people could actually go to China unless being part of a group or delegation. SACU had connections as a friendship association and was able to run tours to China for its members. People had to join SACU to be able to go. These tours were very successful until the late 1980s, when travel agents and tour operators were able to organize holidays to China," he said.

INTERNATIONAL REACH

When asked about the number of SACU members, the society's membership secretary Henson said that the Chinese ambassador had asked him the very same question recently, and he explained that the numbers are hard to gauge as SACU memberships are either institutional or individual.

"Most of the institutional members are colleges and universities such as the Lau China Institute at King's College London and Chinese and Oriental departments at SOAS, LSE, University of East Anglia, Sheffield, Nottingham, Liverpool, Manchester and others," he said.

"Most of our individual members are academics and old 'China hands,' but we are increasingly attracting younger people with an interest in living and working in China, especially since we became associated with the British Council initiative Generation UK: China Network," Henson said.

A couple of years ago, Henson, who manages SACU's newsletter, estimated the newsletter to have 2,000 to 3,000 readers. "In each of the last 5 years, we have grown the total member count -- individual and institutional -- by about 10 percent, which I think indicates that the British public is at last becoming aware that China will be a very important part of our future," he said.

The organization also has a growing number of members in Europe (Portugal, France, Italy, Belgium, Finland, Denmark and Holland) as well as North America (the United States and Canada) and even a couple who live in Australia.

Now, SACU is also considering partnering with Chinese schools and universities, Henson said, who taught Business English at the University of Liaoning and Shenyang Institute of Technology in China's city of Shenyang for the 2008/09 academic year. This was the time he joined SACU.

SPREADING A TRUE IMAGE OF CHINA

Regarding the challenges SACU faces, Fung said, "As I see it, the current challenges of SACU include spreading a positive and true image of China. ... I am conscious of the racism Chinese people have to put up with and the biased reporting about China in the popular press. I try to present a more positive view of China in my Sino File column in China Eye to counteract this."

"I am very conscious of the 'Century of Humiliation.' Many Westerners do not know the details," Fung added.

The "Century of Humiliation" refers to the intervention and imperialism by Western powers and Japan in China between 1839 up until the founding of the People's Republic of China in 1949.

"On the organization side, the challenge is to reach more people, obtain more members and present our work to a wider audience. We are doing this via China Eye magazine, the monthly email newsletter, by holding events, symposia and conferences at a variety of venues," Fung said.

NETWORKING

In fact, SACU's 50th anniversary in 2016 was the perfect occasion to reach more people through special events and a trip to China for its members.

"SACU organized a 50th Anniversary Symposium at Kings College, London University, which was very successful. We managed to obtain a very impressive set of speakers and many notable guests and former members attended," Fung said.

SACU's anniversary trip to China in October was not only about sightseeing, but also very much about networking. During the trip, Fung, Henson and other SACU members reconnected with old contacts and made new friends, both Chinese and foreigners.

For example, in Beijing, the SACU group attended a banquet hosted by Prof. Sun Hua from the China Center for Edgar Snow Studies at Peking University.

Other guests at the banquet were Michael Crook from Beijing, who is chairman of the International Committee for the Promotion of Chinese Industrial Cooperatives, and his mother Isabel Crook, a China-born Canadian who is over 100 years old and has lived in China for decades, an eyewitness to the country's many changes.

Near Xi'an, "we met representatives of the local government at Fengxian, where George Hogg and Rewi Alley lived. We met Mr. Peter Chin, a scholar at Peihua University in Xi'an who is researching Hogg/Alley and the Chinese Industrial Co-ops," Fung said. Hogg was a British adventurer who saved dozens of orphaned boys during the Second Sino-Japanese War, while Hogg's contemporary Alley was a New Zealander who helped found the Chinese Industrial Cooperatives and the so-called Bailie schools in China.

BACK TO THE ROOTS

Fung first got involved with SACU following a trip to China in 1983, and after retiring, he joined SACU Council in 2001 and can be credited with rescuing the organization's magazine.

"The SACU twice-yearly magazine China in Focus ran into difficulties, sometimes appearing four to five months late. I became editor of a new four-times-a-year magazine, China Eye, and have continued ever since, now coming up to number 53," he said.

Fung's involvement with SACU has to do with his need of going back to his roots after retirement. "I feel I am more Chinese than I was say, twenty or so years ago. I have always wanted to visit my ancestral village (in Guangdong Province), but only did so in 1997 at the age of 53 even though I had always wanted to go. It seems like I am becoming more Chinese every day!"

However, the BBC knows how to divide his loyalties. "When traveling, I always say, I am British, so I have some pride in being British -- I support British sports -- but however if Britain was playing China at football, I would certainly support China," Fung said. Endi