Seeing Red
Hugh is proud to see China emerge as a strong, independent, and prosperous nation after years of Japanese and European control: in July 1997, when Hong Kong was returned to the People’s Republic of China after 100 years of British colonial rule, Hugh helped organize a parade along Michigan Avenue, which he says attracted 10,000 participants. “It was a great success. For the first time we walked proudly on the main thoroughfare of Chicago. We were glad that China had recovered from the humiliation of being colonized by a Western power.”
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But Hugh’s latest effort has divided a community still haunted by the communist defeat of the nationalist government in 1949, the violent excesses of Mao’s revolution, and the crackdown at Tiananmen Square. October 1 marks the 50th anniversary of the founding of the PRC, and Hugh heads a committee that’s organized a parade and celebration in Chinatown this Sunday. People who grew up under the Nationalist Party in China stage a parade in Chinatown every year to celebrate the national day of the Republic of China, which retreated to Taiwan in 1949, but according to Hugh this will be the first time Chicago’s Chinese Americans have celebrated the birth of the People’s Republic. “The current government in Beijing represents China, not the one in Taipei,” he points out. “This is recognized by the whole world.”
Alexander Hugh may find himself opposing Hsiang in the conflict over the parade, but their stories are similar. Hugh grew up in Guangdong, which borders Hunan to the south. He moved to Hong Kong in 1950, a year after the PRC was established, and after high school joined the rest of his family in Chicago; his father, his grandfather, and his ill-fated uncle had emigrated in the 1920s, and the family owned several laundries near Cermak and Wentworth, the endpoint of Sunday’s parade. “I consider myself as an American, but like Irish or German immigrants, I still love my mother country,” he explains. “I am thrilled to see a prosperous China on the horizon. A strong China improves the status of Chinese immigrants here….Since it opened its door to the outside world, China is on the right track. We are talking about a nation which consists of one-fifth of the world’s population. The Chinese people have finally become independent, strong, and somewhat well-off. Our celebration reflects our feelings.”
As the parade draws near, Duc Huang, president of the CCBA, says that his organization has no plans for an official protest along the parade route, though he won’t be surprised if a few nasty placards appear along Wentworth this Sunday. Xing, who remembers Tiananmen Square, hopes to see both Alexander Hugh and Kenneth Hsiang making their views known along the parade route. “After all, we are Americans. One great thing about the American democratic system is that people are allowed to express their opinions. If we attempt to take away the rights of people to march in Chinatown, we become the very thing that we have been fighting against.”
