Why did a Chinese row ruin a bake off?

Beyond Today

BBC

News

4.6 • 1.1K Ratings

🗓️ 13 November 2019

⏱️ 19 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Pro-democracy protests in Hong Kong have been going on for months now. In the past few days the violence has escalated and schools are being closed for safety reasons. The row centres on a fight for national identity. For Hong Kong protestors this is a fight for freedom from influence from mainland China. For the Chinese authorities it is a fight to protect their nation. In this episode, we meet Maggie Watson, a cake maker from Derby who was surprised to witness the ferocity of this row at a cake competition in Birmingham. We speak to Vincent Ni from the BBC’s China desk who explains why this happened and what it tells us about the Chinese psyche. He explores how the scars of the past affect trading relationships with Western mega brands like the NBA, Versace, Dior and Gap and how China is sensitive to foreign interference in its affairs. Presenter: Tina Daheley Producers: Lucy Hancock, Duncan Barber. Mixed by Nicolas Raufast Editor: John Shields

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	BBC Sounds, music radio podcasts.
0:04.6	Hello, I'm Tina Dehealy.
0:08.9	Welcome to Beyond Today from BBC Radio 4,
0:12.1	where we ask one big question about one big story.
0:15.0	Today, why did a Chinese row spoil a bakeoff?
0:27.0	Pro-democracy protests in Hong Kong have been going on for months now.
0:35.0	In the last few days the violence has escalated and in the last few hours
0:39.5	it's been announced that all schools will be closed from tomorrow.
0:45.3	Hong Kong's complicated relationship with China has consequences for the rest of the world.
0:51.9	At the heart of it is a row about Chinese national identity
0:56.2	which is sucked in the likes of LeBron James and Chiquil O'Neill and
1:00.7	even Western companies like Zara Vassache and McDonald's are involved.
1:06.0	And now it's touched the lives of cake makers in the UK.
1:11.0	I'm really good at fonden. I make lots of of detail so I like to make things quite realistic
1:15.8	I like magic awesome makes unicorn cakes and went along to Cake International at
1:21.0	Birmingham's NEC. Are we excited?
1:24.0	Yeah, I didn't sound very good.
1:27.0	Are we excited?
1:28.0	Maggie didn't expect to witness a geopolitical row at a cake competition.
1:33.9	But that's exactly what happened when someone entered a cake
1:37.0	that appeared to side with the protesters in Hong Kong.
1:40.4	It was a square two-tier cake and it had lots of umbrellas on it. I think it had a yellow hard hat and it had the mask with the
	...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from BBC, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of BBC and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.