New Asia College The Chinese University of Hong Kong eNewsletter

The second lecture of the New Asia Lectures on Contemporary China 2016/17 was held in the Yun Chi Hsien, New Asia College, on 26 October last year. It was our honor to have the partner of PricewaterhouseCoopers Consultants (Shenzhen) Limited, Shanghai Branch, Mr. Victor Jong and Managing Director, Hong Kong and Taiwan, F5 Networks, Inc., Ms. Juni Yan as the speakers.

The topic of the lecture was "The joy and anger of working in mainland China". Both guest speakers are alumni of CUHK, graduating from the Department of Economics and knowing each other for more than twenty years. At the time, they graduated, more and more job opportunities were to be found in Mainland China, which attracted Hong Kong people to work across the border. Mr. Jong bore witness to China's improvements, and observed that China and Hong Kong were becoming more similar in many aspects. Although he is not well adapted to China's way of life, he has no regrets about working them as it has given him more chances of career development than Hong Kong.

Ms. Yan has been working in China for many years, and felt trained in independence since she needed to tackle all difficulties by herself. She believed that China was an excellent platform for young people to learn and develop. She reminded students not to label mainland people as "locusts" or any negative names, and pointed out that some of the China cities were more developed and civilized than Hong Kong. She emphasized that students might lose many learning opportunities if they refused to work in China. Lastly, they both admitted that working in China meant sacrificing time with their families and friends in Hong Kong. Students should understand that everything has gain and loss.