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Chinese Educated VS English Educated: Not A Simple Life
Just yesterday, someone told me that Deanie Ip (inset), the Cantopop singer from Hong Kong had won an award at the 2011 Venice Film Festival. The singer and Cantopop king Andy Lau as well as well-known Hong Kong director, Ann Hui, were earlier reported walking the red carpet in Venice and were rubbing shoulders with Hollywood heavyweights. Then, I was much caught up by what Hollywood legend Al Pacino had said during his speech there: What am I doing standing here, speaking in English? I'm an Italian for God's sake. Why am I speaking in English? I wish I knew how to speak in Italian because it's inside me, you know. Incidentally, someone else had also mentioned to me earlier about Chinese children in Malaysia having to go through the hard job of mastering three languages in school, namely English, Malay and their own language, Mandarin. Not refuting the importance of Mandarin, the latter had said that as far as the local scenario is concerned, English is the language that could get you places, get you far even. Sometimes, I thought it was a matter of having the proper intelligence or not; or perhaps, if you are black or white that could get you ahead. Al Pacino, in his speech, makes me think about one's roots and identity. Perhaps, it makes sense then that when one reaches one's final destination, one would start looking for roots. Sometimes, it would be too late. It's not too late though to say that Deanie Ip won the Coppa Volpi for Best Actress for portraying the role of Sister Peach in the Ann Hui's directed Hong Kong movie, A Simple Life.
Just yesterday, someone told me that Deanie Ip (inset), the Cantopop singer from Hong Kong had won an award at the 2011 Venice Film Festival. The singer and Cantopop king Andy Lau as well as well-known Hong Kong director, Ann Hui, were earlier reported walking the red carpet in Venice and were rubbing shoulders with Hollywood heavyweights. Then, I was much caught up by what Hollywood legend Al Pacino had said during his speech there: What am I doing standing here, speaking in English? I'm an Italian for God's sake. Why am I speaking in English? I wish I knew how to speak in Italian because it's inside me, you know. Incidentally, someone else had also mentioned to me earlier about Chinese children in Malaysia having to go through the hard job of mastering three languages in school, namely English, Malay and their own language, Mandarin. Not refuting the importance of Mandarin, the latter had said that as far as the local scenario is concerned, English is the language that could get you places, get you far even. Sometimes, I thought it was a matter of having the proper intelligence or not; or perhaps, if you are black or white that could get you ahead. Al Pacino, in his speech, makes me think about one's roots and identity. Perhaps, it makes sense then that when one reaches one's final destination, one would start looking for roots. Sometimes, it would be too late. It's not too late though to say that Deanie Ip won the Coppa Volpi for Best Actress for portraying the role of Sister Peach in the Ann Hui's directed Hong Kong movie, A Simple Life.
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