I am truly greatly honoured that my first activity on arriving in Shanghai in my capacity as Commissioner-General of Section for the Caribbean Community is to take part in the launch of this unique book `The Emperor, His Bride and the Dragon Robe’.

You can imagine the sense of pride I am experiencing in addressing you at a book launch in China at which the author is a CARICOM national, resident in China. Of course, the fact that she is the daughter of Trinidad and Tobago – my first home country – my second being Guyana, of course, has nothing at all to do with it!

Today’s launch is symbolic of the strong cultural ties which exist between China and many CARICOM Member States. Over the years, the Government of China has expanded its cultural exchanges and cooperation programmes with countries in our Region, and today, CARICOM is able to reciprocate through a publication which brings together the creativity of the Caribbean and the legends and traditions of China. This is undoubtedly a tangible addition to Caribbean-China cultural relations. And how fitting it is that this book should be launched during Expo 2010 Shanghai, which brings together, people from all over the world.

The setting of this book, with its beautiful illustrations, takes the reader back to ancient China, and provides an insight into the legends and cultural practices of that era. But even though the book is written to reflect old customs, it makes an important juxtaposition to life’s morals and values which are highly treasured in every society today. The author uses fictional characters to portray some important underlying themes such as wisdom, honesty, kindness and love to which the reader can relate as virtues for life. On the other hand, the book brings out deception, cruelty and greed to which we can also relate as we go about our daily lives.

The book has certainly illustrated that frequently one needs to use wisdom in discerning the true character of people and that the outer appearance does not necessarily reflect the inner beauty of persons, which is portrayed in their moral principles.

While written with children in mind, I am confident that the book will also resonate with adults. It is not often that an author is able to span that bridge between child and adult and to achieve such an impact. It is to her credit that Ms. Sankar-Zhu has been able to do so and in her first work at that.

I invite you to read and to read `between the lines’ for the real meaning of the story.

I want to make a special appeal to the author and the distributors to do all in their power to make this book available to readers in the Caribbean. I am confident that they would be very receptive to this extraordinary work.

In closing, I wish to thank the organizers of today’s event for allowing me the privilege to express my sentiments at this launch and I wish the author every success in disseminating this beautiful book.

I thank you.

CONTACT: piu@caricom.org