Ａ Ｂｌｏｏｍｉｎｇ Ｏｒｃｈｉｄ ｉｎ Ｍａｌａｙｓｉａ

Dai Xiaohua is a celebrated name in Malaysia. She is not only a leading writer in the Chinese language in the country but also a cultural ambassador between Malaysia and China. A brief profile can well explain her cultural background: with her ancestral roots in Hebei Province in northern China， Dai was born and grew up in Taiwan. She majored in journalism in college. After working as an air stewardess for a while， she studied public administration in America and attained a master degree from San Francisco University.After her marriage， she migrated to Malaysia and became its citizen. She explains her life has three dimensions: “China is my ideological ancestor， Taiwan is my parents， and Malaysia is my husband.”

As a writer in Chinese， Dai is noted for her use of the language in a graceful and elegant way. She writes and publishes in Chinese in Malaysia， where the more-than-5-million Chinese population is the second largest ethnic group of the country and accounts for 26% of the Malaysians. Her readers love her writings.Since she took the position of the presidency of the Chinese Cultural Association of Malaysia in 1998， she has done her best to promote the Chinese culture， and stress harmony between the Chinese group and the rest of Malaysia， and devote herself to the country’s development. Her stories are included in textbooks for the Chinese schools. She is the editor in chief of An Anthology of Modern Chinese Literature of Malaysia and A Collection of Malaysian Chinese Literature.

Although Dai Xiaohua lives in Malaysia， she loves the Chinese as a great people. She was invited as a VIP on the Tian’anmen to attend the gala celebration of the 50th National Day of the PRC. She prays for China’s national reunification. She hopes her father can retire to the mainland for his evening years and her brother can set up a business on the mainland.

Dai Xiaohua spares no efforts to promote friendship between Malaysia and China. In April， 1990， she visited China， the first cultural envoy since the ban imposed by the Malaysian Government on the cultural exchanges between Malaysia and China was lifted. For the following 18 years， she has promoted the bilateral relations in the fields of culture， tourism and trade. In May， 2004， she was awarded a prize by the Malaysian Vice President for her contribution to the friendship between the two countries. Today， she is a guest researcher at Guangzhou Jinan University， guest professor at both Nanchang University and Xi’an Jiaotong University. She donated 300，000 yuan to set up a hope school in Jiangxi Province in the name of her mother. In 1998， she took active part in a Malaysian initiative of donating royalties to the flood refugees in China.

For her contributions to the national development and friendship between Malaysia and China， she was in 1999 awarded KMN (Order of the Defender of Realm)， a top national honor in Malaysia.□