When Yu Siu-wah first set foot inside the Sunbeam Theatre, he was a 12-year-old boy with a keen interest in the mainland. It was the early 1970s, and Hong Kong's political climate was still tense after the 1967 riots. There was a belief then that anyone seen with a copy of the pro-China daily newspaper Ta Kung Pao would be beaten by police. But that didn't stop Professor Yu, pictured right, from joining other communists at the North Point theatre. The Associate Professor in Music with the Chinese University of Hong Kong had recently been introduced to the erhu at school, and the two-stringed instrument further peaked his curiosity for knowledge of all things to do with the motherland. Sunbeam Theatre was the only place where renowned erhu players from the mainland would perform. The Commercial Press bookstore adjacent to the complex was one of the few places to buy music for his newly adopted instrument and North Point was the base for many pro-communist organisations. Professor Yu says he considered himself a communist, 'mainly because of the patriotic, anti-Japanese and anti-imperialism messages'. He went on to study the violin for his bachelor's degree at Chinese University and furthered his studies in Chinese music in Northern Ireland and the US. His political views had by then changed somewhat. Mainland schools had required that the their applicants supported the Communist Party. Mr Yu says he could not comply.
