Former HKEx chairman Charles Lee busy building Chinese culture website
At the age of 77, Charles Lee Yeh-kwong is in retirement mode after stepping back from public office in 2012. And on the face of it, the current focus of his energy - a website devoted to Chinese history and culture - seems modest compared to his many previous ventures such as setting up the Mandatory Provident Fund and introducing H-shares to Hong Kong.
Some foreigners want to learn about Chinese culture to facilitate their businesses in China. Our website can benefit [them]
Launched in 2002 by the Academy of Chinese Studies, which itself was set up by Lee with backing from a group of Chinese culture advocates including scholar Jao Tsung-I, it was funded by about HK$100 million in grants from the government and donations from philanthropists.
"When the central government saw our website, they were very impressed. They said even the mainland didn't have such a comprehensive website and asked us to make a version in simplified Chinese characters," Lee recalls. "I originally thought it would be an easy job as software can help convert the original Chinese characters to simplified Chinese. But it turned out we needed to get people to rewrite all the picture captions and text as the mainland and Hong Kong use different turns of phrase when writing. Eventually, the simplified Chinese version was launched in 2005."
Even though it is more than 10 years old, the site is still a work in progress, he says. The website has drawn more than 54 million visitors from over 130 countries and regions so far, and features contributions from more than 1,000 scholars from the mainland, Taiwan and around the world. However, there are another 100 topics to be added, including sections about Taiwan, famous lakes on the mainland and the development of Zen culture in China.
Moreover, all the material is being translated into English, a process which is expected to take another two years.