Connecting young leaders in China

Last month, 10 Young Leaders in China met in Beijing at a gathering organised by Asia:NZ. The aim of the gathering was to build relationships between young leaders living in China, and to identify opportunities for the China cluster to add value to the work of Asia:NZ.

Many of the young leaders had not met each other before, so the gathering provided an opportunity to get to know each other, and discuss how the cluster could better work together in the future

“We have some difficulties communicating with young leaders in other regions,” said Liz Kwon, who is based in Beijing, “as many of the social networking sites are blocked or monitored by the Chinese government. During the meeting, we came up with the idea of using Weibo (a Chinese site similar to Facebook) to stay connected.”

Besides making internal connections, we also asked the group to help young people in New Zealand get a better idea of what life is like in China.  They were tasked with creating four photo resources – on transport, food, architecture and education – that New Zealand teachers could use in the classroom. Participants brought along their own photos, but we also sent them out into the city to gather any extra photos needed to show the variety of life.

“The photo challenge was a great activity, and it was excellent that we were able to produce something tangible and useful for New Zealand schools,” said Charlie Gao.

Later in the day, the group was split into pairs to take part in a team-building cooking challenge. Each pair had to create a different dish, which was then judged on its taste, creative flair and presentation. They then got to enjoy the dishes they had created, served on a rooftop terrace – looking over the surrounding hutongs.

On Saturday morning the young leaders had their last session at Beijing Huiling Community Services, a charity that provides services to people with learning disabilities. The organisation rents its facilities to groups to subsidise its costs, and it provided a great venue for update on Asia:NZ’s current work, and to finish off the photo slideshows for schools.

“It was meaningful in the sense that we were doing something good for the people in China while we were doing some productive work for New Zealanders,” said Liz.

Images:
1. Karl Loo, Charlie Gao and Wei Luo demonstrating their culinary skills
2. Karl Loo and Sam MacKay taking pictures for the photo resource