Hakkas in Western Australia

[Kelvin & Henri <kachie-hakit@account-pro.com>]

Dear friends at the forum,
I've received an interesting email from Dr. Lowe, the co-ordinator of the
Toronto Hakka conference, and Fiona Lee. Fiona is presently working on her
doctorral dissertation, focusing on the ethnicity of the Chinese
communities in Western Australia. She's from Perth.

Maybe Mr. Chung would like to make a few comments on the roots of the
Chinese who reside in Western Australia.

A question for Fiona, can you please tell us the names of the various
Chinese communities in Western Australia, and how many Hakkas live in
Australia.

Apparently, there are a lot of Chinese youths in Australia that don't know
much about their ethnic roots, and where their ancestors come from. As in
many different cultures.

About Fiona's paper, that goes into detail about her thesis:
1.Maybe she can post it herself at the asiawind forum to share with the
rest of us, I'll leave that up to her to decide.
2.It appears that Fiona, in her early 20s, is trying to define who she is
and who is Chinese.
3.She has learnt about "face" among the Chinese, a topic I would like to
consequently explore rather than go into too many details of her paper.
4.There's subjectivity: as a researcher, you bring your personal agenda to
your work, you have your own personal beliefs, and the outcome of your
paper will most likely reflect what you believe in, your values, and the
values of your interviewees. Interviewees have their own thoughts, and
beliefs, and when they tell you what they think, that's the oral history
that they want to preserve, something that's important to them, it defines
who they are, and their beliefs should be repected, just as we respect each
other here on the forum.
5.On Fiona's comment about the Chinese lacking in communication skills and
saying that we suppress our feelings, I would have to disagree with her. I
invite Fiona to personally join us in this discussion at the forum. Please
read all my previous comments about my own ethnicity, and all the emails on
the forum. Maybe we can stir up a debate on these issues here at our forum.
Henrietta