Our Dance Coach and My Book Project
In his address to the United Nations General Assembly on 22 September, President Xi Jinping called for mutual respect and cooperation between nations, which was in stark contrast to what Trump said immediately before him at the same forum. Trump had made ferocious attacks on China and blamed China for almost everything from the coronavirus pandemic to unemployment in the United States.
Xi appeared so statesman like throughout his speech and never once named Trump’s country for the world’s problems, saying for example that “China is the largest developing country in the world, a country that is committed to peaceful, open, cooperative and common development. We will never seek hegemony, expansion or sphere of influence. We have no intention to fight either a Cold War or a hot war with any country. We will continue to narrow differences and resolve disputes with others through dialogue and negotiation.”
In contrast, Trump could at best be called a rascal, calling the coronavirus the China virus and accused China and the WHO having falsely declared that there was no evidence of human-to-human transmission. With less than six weeks fighting to stay in the White House and with polls against him, the world expects him to behave no differently though. He has already promised that he won’t allow a smooth or peaceful handover if he loses. What sort of a person would say something like that and be allowed to get away?
Some of my friends are firmly of the view that Trump should be put behind bars and believe that he would be as soon as he loses the election, which is why he is struggling so hard to stay above water as long as he could. But it’s so disgusting. Others believe that China would do better if Trump remains in office so that he can exact more and maximum damage to his country, never mind to the world, which won’t do any better anyway.
Locally, our pan democrats have continued to play jokers, calling on the government to account for the arrest at China waters of the 12 fugitives by the Chinese authorities. It makes one sick to be bombarded day and night of such so-called news items.
Moving away from politics, I was very happy to have watched an edition of “Hong Kong Connection” produced by RTHK and aired last Friday 25 September 2020, which featured the professional development and achievements in the last ten years of our Latin Dance coach and his partner, now wife. Sam and sometimes Michelle have been our coach for more than four years by now. Sam is about 30 years old or young and two years ago joined the Youth Development Commission through self-nomination. In the programme, Sam spoke about their hopes and fears, trials and tribulations, joys and sorrows in their dancing career. He also spoke on fundamental issues, such as “why dance?” or “Is winning the goal or the means to an end?” and some topical issues including teaching and learning, emigration and youth issues. It was a brilliant programme; and Sam is brilliant. They are expecting a baby tomorrow, their first. Let me offer our hearty congratulations to them both, from me and Su!
I have not been idle these days either. I have been spending a lot of time in front of the keyboard pounding out chapters after chapters for my autobiography and have made significant progress. It now looks like that I can have the book published by Christmas this year. I have already applied from the Books Registration Office the necessary International Standard Book Number, or ISBN, which is free. The office is in Lai Chi Kok and is within walking distance from where I live. The staff there offered me excellent services. In a few days, they would send me by post the ISBN with ten numbers, so that I won’t need to make another application until I have published ten books. I would need however to deposit with them five copies of every title published. It means that I can allocate one of the numbers to the booked I published in July 2001 – Letters from a Rotarian – shortly after I stepped down as Governor of the Rotary International District 3450, or the District of Hong Kong Macau and Mongolia, as it was then called.
My next job is to get a design for the book cover and to get the source materials into a printable form. I would then need to think about how the book would be printed, if at all, and distributed. I need to decide on the price too. There is something to be learned all the time.
