US student competed 5 years in a row, wins

The audience was stunned when Daniel McMonagle wore his colorful costume and women's make-up to perform a moving episode of the famous blockbuster Farewell My Concubine directed by Chen Kaige.

It records a romance about a hero and his lover 2,200 years ago, which has won over thousands of opera fans.

While on the Chinese Bridge stage, there was no emperor's concubine. There was a good-looking 22-year-old man from the United States.

"My idol is the Hong Kong actor-singer Leslie Cheung who acts as a phantom of Eastern beauty in the movie," he said.

"I like the traditional Chinese culture Cheung conveys and would like to study and conduct more research on it. Peking Opera is one of my key interests, through which I could improve my pronunciation and cultural senses of the language."

McMonagle started to learn Chinese at the age of 16 and soon became keenly interested in the language. He said he likes his Chinese name Mu Chenpeng, which was given to him by his teacher. It means "bright future".

He majored in linguistics and Chinese at Binghamton University, State University of New York, learning many languages, including Chinese, Arabic, Korean and German.

This year is the fifth year he has participated in the Chinese Bridge competition in Hunan province.

This year he was named champion of the Americas group.

"Though I failed in the beginning, I made a progress in pronunciation and knowledge on the language. I feel that the bond between me and the Chinese Bridge makes me love China deeper and deeper," he said.

He made many local friends while being an exchange student at Nankai University. They helped him to learn about Chinese language and culture.

"Another efficient method to study Chinese is watching local live shows and TV series. My favorites are Where Are We Going, Dad? Jin Xing Show and Ode to Joy, through which I not only learnt the language but also cultures and daily life in the country."

He said the ideology of Taoism also influences him profoundly in life.

"Though I could not understand the meanings of all the words in books such as I-Ching, the ancient Chinese divination text, they help me to learn about traditional Chinese culture.

"I plan to go to Shanghai to find a job as there are different languages and cultures there compared to the northern part of China. I want to learn more," he said.

(HK Edition 08/18/2017 page22)