| A Photo Worth Thousands of Words |
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By Hepingdao Victoria, British Columbia There is apparently no photo in front of me only a plain sheet of paper covered by a blizzard earth far down below mountains are just like someone else's bread A group of tiny men who were so tiny that no one has ever noticed them but they were there, I know they were there swaying hammers and casting their shadows into rails of iron They were so tired, and hungry, but quietly standing up like chopsticks even a roaring train could not stir them up When Mr. Donald Smith drove the last spike, they were not on site but felt rather released of their heavy duties soon forgotten no one mentions or knows their real names, besides coolies and no one has ever heard of them again just a sheer piece of paper folding its snowstorm around me in the far distance, a train was approaching like a tiger I've never seen Note: In British Columbia, the CPR hired workers from China, nicknamed coolies. A navy received between $1 and $2.50 per day, but had to pay for his own food, clothing, transportation to the job site, mail, and medical care. After two and a half months of back-breaking labour, they could net as little as $16. Chinese navvies in British Columbia made only between $0.75 and $1.25 a day, not including expenses, leaving barely anything to send home. They did the most dangerous construction jobs, such as working with explosives. The families of the Chinese who were killed received no compensation, or even notification of loss of life. Many of the men who survived did not have enough money to return to their families in China. Many spent years in lonely, sad and often poor conditions. Yet the Chinese were hard working and played a key role in building the western stretch of the railway; some boys as young as 12 years old even served as tea-boys. Donald Smith, later known as Lord Strathcona, drove the last spike of the Canadian Pacific Railway, at Craigellachie, 7 November 1885. None of the Chinese workers were invited to the ceremony. (From Wikipedia) Background InformationA former professor and senior geologist, he traveled across continents from Asia to Canada, then to Africa, where he managed projects in Mali and Niger. He shifted his career to study Computer Science when his last project in Congo was terminated by both a civil war and a gold depression at the turn of the Millennium. A graduate from the prestigious Peking University, and after 23 years as a full-time student, he earned many degrees, and is fluent in Chinese, English, and French. He divides his time between his job as a software developer, his family as a father of an 18 year old son and a 9 year old daughter, and still makes time for his hobby as a poet. He has published more than 100 poems in Canada, USA, New Zealand, Australia, Hong Kong, Taiwan, and Mainland China. He is the founding president of a non-profit organization, the Chinese Literature Society of North America, which publishes a leading bilingual (Chinese and English) literary magazine, North American Maple. Among his many accomplishments as editor-in-chief, he organized the "HuaHe Cup" 2007 Chinese Mainland and Oversea Poetry Competition, having successfully invited 32 Chinese literary magazines and newspapers from Canada, USA, Australia, and Mainland China to join this international non-governmental effort. He created one of the most influential Chinese literary websites outside of mainland China, http://maplereview.org, where he has built the largest Chinese poetry database, an innovative Chinese Character analyzing tool, and Chinese-English-French dictionaries, by combining web and search engine technologies with Chinese Literature, English and French languages. His devotion to Chinese immigrant literature has been well-recognized by congratulatory letters from the Honorable Prime Minister of Canada, Stephen Harper, the Premier of BC, Gordon Campbell, and Victoria Mayor, Alan Lowe. |
