If like me, you don't know your kau-fu from your dai-fu or to-fu, then a family reunion with the whole spectrum of relatives there can be a daunting experience. On February the 4th, 2008 there was a big family gathering in Newcastle upon Tyne in honour of my mother's side of the family and her parents. In essence it was a gathering of all the siblings of my maternal grandparents and all their siblings and their siblings in turn. A mouthful or what.

Things are even worse for me seeing as I hardly ever go to the family weddings and we live so far from everyone else by being down on the South Coast. All I know is that you can call most people your cousin and chances are you are right. If you really need to know what to call someone who is your mother's older sister's daughter's husband then this web site is just your thing - http://www.kwanfamily.info/familytitles/familytitle.html

There were seven sisters and two brothers from the Shek family there, or more specifically the siblings of F.T. Shek. I'm sure someone will give me what the FT stands for shortly.

The Shek family hail form the little island of Ap Chau or Duck Island to give it its English translation. Most cousins will have probably been there once or twice in their life so far. Even I have been there albeit when I was
4 or so. Such a distant memory. I didn't even go back to Hong Kong until 2000 when I was 32 years old. Duck Island is named as the profile looks like a duck. There's even an island called Duck Egg nearby as well.

Primarily a sleepy fishing community many of its offspring came across to the UK since the 60s. Most of the elder family seemed to have settled in the North East and Scotland, with some still in Hong Kong.

The reunion was about a year of planning and soon came upon us. Thanks to Melissa Chan and Mary Leung in taking the lead plus one cousin from each set of siblings to help organise their own clan.

We booked out the main part of the Happiness Inn Chinese restaurant in Newcastle. Home of many a wedding in the past and many childhood Sunday afternoons for yum-cha and dim-sum. Man, my kantonees is getting so much better. Now that the families are getting bigger it is no longer the place to have weddings anymore as it can't hold the number required, but it still brings a sense of nostalgia compared to Stowell Street. What ever happened to Blue Sky, eh?

The plan was to get there sometime after 5pm and be ready to eat at 6pm. We got there around 4.30pm and it was already getting full. After signing in, hmmm no Chinese characters for me as it would have took too long to remember, practice and finally write, we made our way in.

There was a commemoration banner at the top above the top tables to hold the men and the women. It was then a semi-random guess at where to sit.

Some photos were taken of the family elders and then group shots with each Shek sibling with their immediate family. For me this was probably the first time that I got to know who was whose son or daughter. That Chan family is huge.

There was also a photo of all the second generation onwards. A bit too big to fit on one camera in most cases.

Thankfully the food wasn't too long in coming. Lobster, prawns, chicken, pork and mushrooms were very welcome. The ducks feet were left behind for the most part! I'm sure the fathers were tucking into the food that was on the table full of children and their gameboys rather than feeding the kids.

There were some raffling afterwards. Our family, apart from Teresa all won a packet of money, packet as in one of those red packets as opposed to a huge amount. Even the signing in book got raffled for £60. Each of the Shek sisters and brother got a souvenir album of old and recent photos.

It was soon finished as we had to be out by 9pm. Back to one of the Auntie's house for some tea and nibbles. Then it was off to another one for drinks and some gaming action on the Nintendo Wii.

All in all a great family day and well done to all to help organise and also made the effort to come.

You can see my photos from the event at this link: Gordon's reunion photos.

There's even a group on Facebook for all.