This afternoon saw the launch of the Worlds Apart project at the National Youth Theatre’s headquarters in Holloway Road.and the announcement of the winning entry in the online creative writing competition run in partnership with BBC Blast. The ten young writers who had been shortlisted for the competition spent the morning in a writing workshop with Natasha Betteridge. After lunch, they took part in a Q&A session with some of the judges including the National Youth Theatre’s Artistic Director Paul Roseby and playwright Mark Ravenhill. Natasha, meanwhile, was putting the finishing touches on the afternoon’s programme which included performances of all ten shortlisted 100 word plays, two plays from the parallel competition being run in China and some short films. A talented cast of National Youth Theatre members had been put together especially for the performance and had spent a few days working with Natasha and Jennifer Lim, Assistant Director, on developing and rehearsing all the plays.

The final performance hit just the right note – informal, yet highly professional and very enjoyable. The plays were all inspired by the theme ‘My World – Being a Young Person in Britain Today’ and as ever with 100 Words projects, were very different in their approach. The quality was extremely high with four plays eventually shortlisted – Plural Life by Tom Lyons, Pathways by Mikel Iriarte, The Story of My Body by Roisin Nagle and I’m Not Growing Up by Amy Clarke. These will all be performed in Beijing later in the summer when Worlds Apart moves to China. The unanimous choice for the winning play was My World by Xing Bing, a thought-provoking exploration of how, as individuals, we all view and interpret the world differently. My World will now be turned into a short film, to be directed by award winning director Asif Kapadia and shown on 30 April 2008 at East to East, a free lunchtime event in East Winter Garden, Canary Wharf with a live link to a similar event in Beijing.

With thanks to all the writers (Matt Broomfield, Heather Brown, Hannah Brownlow, Amy Clarke, Xing Ding, Connie Greenfield, Mikel Iriarte, Tom Lyons, Roisin Nagle and Elidh Wagstaff), the cast (Asha Bhatt, Venetia Campbell, George Chilcott, Leaphia Darko, Ned Derrington, Joel Duncan, Tiburcio Fortes, Nelufar Hedayat, Sanya John Adegbola, Catherine Jones, Adam Price, Nancy Wallinger and Daniel Ward) and the technical team led by the National Youth Theatre’s Production Manager, Mark Beasley.

We’ve hardly drawn breath since arriving in Guangzhou on a warm Sunday evening. Immediately we set to work, having a business meeting with the British Council over delicious Cantonese food then pulling together presentation material for a meeting the following day with representatives from the Education Bureau and Foreign Affairs Office from Guangzhou Municipal Government. This was a crucial meeting and gave us the opportunity to present 100 Words to key officials in the local government. We also talked about the schedule for the following days, in particular the development of a 100 word play for the Twin City Conference next week, and a potential project activity plan for 2008. The Education Bureau seem very taken with the project and have suggested that it runs in all 22 schools in Guangzhou with links to counterparts in Birmingham. There’s a lot more talking to be done, but we all felt that the outcome from the meeting was extremely positive.

Monday afternoon was spent at Guangzhou Overseas Chinese Foreign Language School, seeing some plays that been developed and performed by students in a festival at the school last autumn. We then returned to our hotel, which overlooks the old city in west Guangzhou – it’s a fascinating area and we had the chance to have a quick look round in the early evening. Looking down from the hotel, the pedestrianised streets seem quietly busy. At street level, the noise is amazing with people stationed outside every shop trying to attract your attention by clapping, shouting and playing music. We ventured into an open air food market, were given plastic baskets and chose what we wanted to be cooked (mushrooms, tofu, corriander and a lot of chilli). It was then into a taxi to meet up with the Director of British Council Guangzhou. We checked out the cocktails at Wilber’s Bar, recently opened in a renovated house before returning to the hotel for late night drinks and chat.

Tuesday morning was spent visiting the British Council’s new office. They’ve introduced hot desking for all staff and a fantastic selection of bean bags and chairs. Decorations on the ceiling have been produced by the local fine art college. After yet more wonderful food (dim sum in Asia’s largest shopping centre) we then returned to the Guangzhou Overseas Chinese Foreign Language School to run a workshop for 28 junior middle students. Some were from the GZOCFL School while others were from the Middle School attached to South China Normal University Nan Hai Campus, accompanied by their British Council-supported Language Assistant from the UK. They all had very good English language skills and were able to cope with the pace and speed of the workshop with ease, enthusiasm and enjoyment. In less than three hours, small groups of students had all written and performed 100 word plays, two of which will be developed into performance material for next week’s conference. We had dinner with the lovely teachers from GZOCFL School then a stint of work back at the hotel. They’ll be another workshop for teachers tomorrow afternoon and rehearsals with students on Thursday morning. For me, it’s back to Hong Kong in the evening for a return flight home after another exhilarating, rewarding China trip.