Lost and Found in Zhongshan: Tracing Roots and Observing Change

Christopher Cheng

This March, I returned to China for the first time in six years. As I travelled to and from Zhongshan, I couldn’t help but notice the rapid urban transformation unfolding around me. The most striking change was the development of the Greater Bay Area (大湾区), with Zhongshan emerging as a new regional hub. New highways and tunnels now connect Hong Kong to Zhongshan, making travel much more convenient. In the past, many locals migrated from Zhongshan in search of opportunities abroad. Today, large-scale urban development and new initiatives have drawn people back to an economically prosperous Guangdong. The expansion of the Zhongshan Museum (中山博物馆), including a new wing dedicated to Overseas Chinese, reflects this shift, attracting specialised talent and university-educated professionals from both inside and outside Guangdong province.

I met a retired local historian, Ms. CHEN Diqiu (秋姑), in her 80s, at the Overseas Chinese History Museum. She praised our Heritage Corridor book for its usefulness and comprehensive content, expressing hope for a Chinese version in the future. She mentioned that she could read it with the help of a translation app and her daughter, who shares an interest in overseas Chinese history. Others, upon receiving the book, eagerly flipped through the pages, recognising familiar faces and places preserved in print. They shared their own memories in Cantonese, commenting on the changes they had witnessed in recent years. A book like this ensures that these fragments of memory are never truly lost, even amidst China’s rapid development.

At the Zhongshan Overseas Chinese History Museum (from left to right): KOU Haiyang, Christopher Cheng, Ms CHEN Diqiu, YU Zilong, Kiko Ko.

As I walked through the village of Dai Pong Tau (大庞头), an odd sense of déjà vu washed over me. The last time I was here, I was with my father and family, following in their footsteps. Dad knew the way. But this time, the roles had reversed: I was the one leading, yet somehow, I found myself disoriented as I showed my wife, Kiko, around.

After getting lost, we met Mr. GAO (高伟腾) and his wife, ZHENG Si Hang (郑思航), outside the village and shared a yum-cha meal together. The meal was filled with dishes I had often heard of but never tried—frequently mentioned by Longdu migrants in Australia, such as ‘gok jai’ and ‘Longdu jung.’ Each dim sum had distinct flavours and deep regional cultural significance. Si Hang’s grandfather, JANG Tim (郑添), and mine both came from the same village—Dai Pong Tau (大庞头). While Si Hang’s grandfather had migrated to Cairns, Queensland, in 1898, my grandfather had left Longdu for Wan Shing (环城), now the South District (南区), in the 1940s. Si Hang flipped through the book and found an image of her grandfather’s cardboard toolbox of treasures—remarking on how these tools had endured, remaining useful even after all these years.

Mr GAO Weiteng receives a hard-cover copy of the book Heritage and History in the China-Australian Migration Corridor

Zhongshan Longdu snacks.

Next, I visited the old Sha Chung School (沙涌学校) in South District. Since my last visit, the school had undergone a remarkable transformation. Once the first of its kind in the South District in the 1920s, it had fallen into disrepair and no longer resembled a prestigious institution. Recently, it had been renovated into a library. In 2019, it had served as a shoe factory, a scene captured in both my PhD thesis and our Heritage Corridor book. The school had once seemed disconnected from the past, but now it has been reborn and has become the pride of the village. The village chief, MA Kit-Leung (马杰良), described it as “an attractive, quiet, and comfortable place in the village to study” and was delighted to receive a copy of our book.

On the ground floor of Heung San Reading Room, Sha Chung village representative MA Kit-Leung receives a copy of the book The Heritage Corridor of Chinese-Australian Migration: History and Legacy.

Christopher Cheng reading a new book on Zhongshan’s South District Overseas Chinese diasporic philanthropy inside Heung San Reading Room.

Hopefully, next time I visit, we can provide a Chinese version of our book. It will be inspiring to see locals reading it and rediscovering the stories of their ancestors, spanning both Australia and Zhongshan, as well as the changes within their homeland itself.