Of the many agreements and Memoranda of Understanding that have been signed during the recent visit of the Chinese president, one was regarding the setting up of a Chinese Culture Centre in Lahore. About five years ago when the Chinese prime minister visited Pakistan, amidst similar fanfare, he inaugurated the China Pakistan Friendship House in Islamabad.
One may ask what really has been the role of this cultural centre during the last five years since its VIP inauguration. Located at the prime site overlooking the federal capital at Shakarparian, this huge facility has been underutilised over this very long period with hardly any significant event, cultural or otherwise, regarding China or the Chinese Pakistan cooperation held there.
Every now and then some event of minor consequence is organised in the huge facility and that too not necessarily about culture; instead, at times, even exhibitions like trade fairs or business displays are held there which do not have much to do with culture per se or the cultural expression of the two countries and its people.
It was very thoughtful of the Chinese to have invested so much money in the construction of this huge facility, and it is quite grand, though not as aesthetically pleasing as it could have been. It should have blossomed as the nerve centre of cultural activity in the federal capital, not necessarily linked exclusively or narrowly to the Chinese. It’s huge and properly-equipped facility could have become a platform for cultural activities in the federal capital but this facility is hopelessly underused.
The Chinese fully conscious of the impact of soft power have opened cultural centres in New York, London and Paris, to name but a few, and these have made the Europeans and Americans to rethink their conventional view of the Chinese as mere imitators of goods, services and ideas. Grand exhibitions are held there, plays staged and dance performances organised, besides making arrangements for the various festivals that dot the Chinese cultural calendar. It has been both an exercise in familiarisation and acceptance of the existence of another culture on an international level.
There are cultural outlets or houses of other countries in Pakistan and they all use it to showcase their own cultural activity focusing on their strengths in this area like the British Council, The Alliance Francaise, the Goethe Institut/ Annemarie Shimmel Haus, the United States Information Service later morphed into the American Centers and even the Iranian Khana Farhang-e-Iran. During the Soviet era, one or two Friendship Houses also sprinkled in some muted form the cultural landscape of the country.
Even after the war on terror and a huge scaling down, all these except for the last two have been quite active in promoting their culture and looking into the areas of cooperation between their own countries and where the centre was located. But, alas, the Chinese example is far from it and it lies isolated and cold, only springing into action occasionally and that too not always for the purposes of culture.
What is desperately needed is to get familiar with the Chinese culture. Despite our vows of unending friendship and a long relationship being deeper than the oceans and higher than the Himalayas, as far as China as a country is concerned we know hardly next to anything about it. The intense relationship has now crossed more than half a century mark but for us it is still a Dark or Enigmatic Country.
The only relationship that we have cultivated and are so proud of revolves round its hard power. The strategic and military links have dominated the narrative and there has been hardly anything about music, dance, theatre, films visual arts and literature. All this could form the very core of a people-to-people relationship which is found to be always more enduring.
In other words, we know nothing about the soft power of the Chinese civilisation, except the ripples that it has started to create in the West with massive displays. We have not received any Chinese exhibitions of that quality or class. It is said that the miniature traditions either travelled from China into the Central Asian, Persia or then here or vice versa and the exchange of artistic ideas a few centuries ago was more frequent than one has been made to understand. But we have hardly seen at any level a vibrant exchange of visual ideas and technical facilitation in the regard.
It should never be forgotten that it is one of the oldest civilisations. Communist China may be a new country but the civilisation is very old and shares in this respect many similarities with us as we are also a new country on an ancient land. The Chinese have learnt through their bloody experience of not denying their roots and the magnetic pull of their long traditions, and we should learn this from them.
Most of these cultural missions in the end are reduced to teaching language courses outlets for visa procurement. It is hoped that besides teaching mandarin, the place will cultivate a wider and sensitive image of this huge country.
The very best of Chinese culture should find a more permanent place on the stage in Islamabad and Lahore. It would be nice to welcome their outstanding artistes who have amazed the world with their skill, their film makers who are forcing the world to take notice of their talent, their visual artists, painters who have made formalistic innovations but are not even known here, the poets/writers who must be fighting for veracity and truth in their novels and short stories and their musicians who go unrecognised even by musicians here.
The Chinese Cultural Centre in Lahore should be doing this and much more rather than becoming a replica of the already existing Expo Centre.