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Focus

Chinese Calligraphy In this special classroom full of the scent of Chinese ink, all the delegates had one of the most unforgettable lessons in their lives--Chinese Calligraphy. While the delegates were amazed at the the "scholar's four jewels" (writing brush, ink stick, ink slab and paper),the volunteers in senior one from our school introduced the history and the development of Chinese Calligraphy. Shortly after, the calligraphy teacher asked all the guests to have a try. It's no coincidence that nearly all of them wrote in their own languages, except for some who followed the Chinese characters hanging on the wall. Later the teacher taught them to write "Fu", which means good luck in Chinese. All the foreign students listened carefully and practised the character by themselves. Nice try for them!

EmbroideryEmbroidery is the great handcraft art of decorating textiles with needle and thread, dating from 200 BC. Suzhou Embroidery is famous for its ingenious and unique technique and today the delegates experienced the delicacy and beauty of Suzhou Embroidery with our professional teacher.The initial steps are not easy. Tying a knot on the string through the needle needs full concentration but all of the delegates held eager interests in this delicate art. With the help of the teacher, most candidates successfully "depicted" half of a red heart within 30 minutes using their needle, and when a Brisbane girl and her partner finished the work brilliantly, one of them laughed and said: “It is really fun and not so hard!”

By Emily Shen(沈天荷)

Martial-art The martial-art (also called Wushu) lesson was taught by Mrs. Cao, a PE t e a c h e r f r o m S u z h o u F o r e i g n Language School. The content was about a Five-Step Routine which is the fundamental Routine in the martial art. It literally contains five steps, and the participants grasped the essentials quickly and accurately. The teacher was generous in praising all these students' talent in learning martial art, because every move they did was perfectly in place, and they learnt it within only 20 minutes. One of the participants, called Liam, learnt some Kung fu before, and he showed it to the teacher. Another girl told us that, it is her first time to watch martial art in person, and she is very excited about it. 'It’s just so cool!' she said.

By Jackie Qian (钱轶恺)

By Tina Liu(刘雨晨)

Paper-cuttingThe delegates also experienced a Chinese traditional skill-paper cutting this morning. With great excitement and curiosity, delegates learned to cut a Chinese character '喜 ', which is used in events like wedding, and delivers people's best wishes. They followed the teacher's instructions, folding the paper and cutting. With the help of a mould, many students completed the mission quickly. Then they started to make some creative paper cutting on their own. They folded the paper, and cut the shapes they like. Finally, some of them got beautiful images, but some of them felt it so hard to do anything to this small piece of paper. One delegate said, 'Though it is hard, I enjoy it very much and I will continue to try some new patterns after I go back to my dorm.' By Ivy Zhang(张自乐)

Experience Chinese ArtExperience Chinese Art

Interview

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Interview with Mayzura Restalia MunafQ1:I know that you were talking about traffic just now.What do you think about the traffic problems in Suzhou?A：Suzhou is a beautiful city; streets are clean and not very crowded，I don't think Suzhou has a serious traffic problem. Also, I see many bus stations and buses come frequently. Subways are also available.

Q2:So after your group discussion, do you find out any solutionsabout these problems？A:Not yet.We are still thinking about what problems we have. Just now we had a brain storm. We talked about this problem and tried to find out the conflict and coexistence of traffic.

Q3:By the way, how do you like the city exploration?A:Fantastic!The most attractive place I visited is PingjiangRoad.There are a few shops alongside the river. Most of them are selling traditional Suzhou snacks. In addition,the walls and stone roads seem to have a long history. I really had a good time there.

By Cynthia Gao （高子涵）

The Interview with Ms Vivi Trengonno, teacher chaperon of Indonesian studentsQ1: Could you make a brief summary of your students' performance so far?A: They did well. You see, on the first day, they did a lot of research, shared experience with their peersand enjoyed making friends. I think such an exposure is really good, meeting people from other countries, getting yourself involved in team work and also having fun in the teamwork building the other night.

Q2: Do you think our teenagers will view and solve the conflicts and coexistence from a rather different perspective from the adults?A: Nowadays, not only our adults are experiencing conflicts and coexistence, but also teenagers, even themselves are a part of conflicts. It will be effective if they can solve such problems from their own perspective——they are more creative now. The question has been passed on to them, the future generation. Adults, like me, has been the old generation. Actually, it's part of their responsibility; they should be more aware of the conflicts existing around us.

Q3: What do you think of Suzhou and our school?A: Suzhou, I can say it's a city of discipline, very clean. You are hardworking students and I can see from the board there on

which "vision" is written that the school has prepared a future for you. By Simon Chen(陈翌炜)

Q1: How are you doing with the group discussion? A: I think the discussion is very informative, and my group mates are really intelligent. We have worked out plenty of solutions.

Q2: What do you find about your peers from other nations? A:They are all intelligent. They come up with ideas very quickly, and these ideas help solving the problem a lot. I think they are really good leaders.

Q3: Does what you have experienced here differ a lot from your previous expectation? A:Well, it is my first time coming to this Forum. I thought it would be a serious activity, but we actually had a lot of fun, like when we looked around the city yestoday. And, I think the discussion was great, because everyone was involved in it.

Q4: Do you think this activity affect you in some respect? A:The effect was very positive. Just as I said, everyone is so inclu- ded that I never felt like I was excluded. We share ideas with each other and I benefit a lot from them.

By Jackie Qian (钱轶恺)

Interview with Benedict Prawira & Andhika Rizky Putra

Interview delegates and chaperon from IndonesiaInterview delegates and chaperon from Indonesia

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Kunqu, also known as Kun opera, is one of the oldest extant forms of Chinese opera. It boasts a 600-year history and is known as the "teacher" or "mother" of almost a hundred operas because of its influence on other Chinese theatre forms, including Jingju (Peking Opera).At the end of Yuan dynasty and the beginning of Ming Dynasty, some tunes grew popular, spread to the south of the Yangzi River, finally formed the Kunshan tune. Starting as melodies sung by the common people, it wasn't until two hundred years later that the first play: Huanshaji(浣 纱 记 ) was written and officially incorporated these tunes into drama. Today, Kunqu is performed professionally in seven Mainland Chinese cities: Beijing, Shanghai, Suzhou, Nanjing, Chenzhou, Yongjia County/Wenzhou and Hangzhou, as well as in Taipei. Non-professional opera societies are active in many other cities in China and abroad, and opera companies occasionally tour. Kunqu was listed as one of the Masterpieces in Oral and Intangible Heritage of Humanity by UNESCO in 2001. Its melody or tune is one of the Four Great Characteristic Melodies in Chinese opera.

Suzhou has an extensive and profound cultural history, with rich reserve of cultural relics. Kunqu opera and Guqin (a sever-stringed instrument) are included as the representative masterpieces of human dictation and non-tangible legacy, while Suzhou embroidery is listed among the “Big Four Embroidery Arts”.

Embroidery is the handicraft of decorating fabric or other materials with needle and thread or yarn. It may also incorporate other materials such as metal strips, pearls, beads, quills, and sequins. Embroidery is most often used on caps, hats, coats, blankets, dress shirts, denim, stockings, and golf shirts.

Embroidery has been dated to the Warring States period (5th-3rd century BC). The process used to tailor, patch, mend and reinforce cloth fostered the development of sewing techniques, and the decorative possibilities of sewing led to the art of embroidery. In a garment from Migration period Sweden, roughly 300–700 CE, the edges of bands of trimming are reinforced with running stitch, back stitch, stem stitch, tailor's buttonhole stitch, and whip stitching, but it is uncertain whether this work simply reinforced the seams or should be interpreted as decorative embroidery. Embroidery can be classified according to whether the design is stitched on top of or through the foundation fabric, and by the relationship of stitch placement to the fabric. Edited by Spencer Zhang (张心怡)&Nancy Lu(陆梦佳)