The Long March: Helping to ease the culture shock

Sunset in Pudong, Shanghai. Picture / Kenny Rodger

When migrant life goes wrong, it's often Lela Hoi Ang Leong who helps picks up the pieces. She emigrated three years ago from Macau, a former Portuguese colony that has been in Chinese hands since 1999. Lela, 34, is a social worker for the rapidly growing Chinese New Settlers Services Trust .

She says most of her callers are after straightforward information on, say, public transport, schools, or when the trust will hold its next learn-to-drive course. But she is seeing a rise in family violence, divorce and isolation among older people.

Lela says too many migrants are naive and haven't done their homework before deciding to come to New Zealand. They arrive with no English - "sometimes they can't even tell the alphabet" - and no experience of non-Chinese culture.

Until relatively recently, leisure travel from China was strictly controlled - even if you had the money. In Chinese culture there is no broadening "OE" (Overseas Experience) - something New Zealanders take for granted. Although Chinese can now travel freely to New Zealand, many don't see the need to visit a potential new home homeland in advance. They arrive unprepared for the shock of a new land and culture.

Lela says few Chinese migrants arrive with enough savings to tide them over if they can't land a job, and the dole is not available until a migrant has been a permanent resident for two years.

Add to that the stress and loss of face from being unemployed, or perhaps being unable to make a business succeed, and the spiral to depression can be swift. Domestic violence is as much a hidden shame among Chinese as among the general population, Lela says.

Even if finances are stable, migrants may still be homesick and feel anxious that the move may have been a mistake.

Those from China's moneyed middle classes are often shocked that they can no longer afford things they once took for granted - such as a full-time housekeeper for $400 a month.

Divorce is on the rise among Chinese migrants, Lela says, because they are no longer so pressured by family and society to stay together. "Here, if you split up, so what?" Lela says.

Adjustment, financial difficulties - and different approaches to life in New Zealand - can exacerbate an already tenuous union, but Lela has seen some partners stay only long enough to acquire permanent residency, where a spouse has become an economic tool.

The dole, which doesn't exist in China, is another incentive to split.

One problem migrants often don't foresee is what happens once they have children. She has counselled families where parents - still steeped in their native culture and perhaps with poor English - find themselves battling children who are growing up as Kiwis, speaking English as their first tongue and seeing Chinese language and culture as a parental anachronism.

Lela tells of the 6-year-old boy who was extremely embarrassed and then angry with his mother because she spoke to him in Mandarin within earshot of classmates. The reaction, she says, signals shame and confusion about identity.

To prevent such identity crises, the Trust set up a parenting programme last year.

Called Wang Zi Cheng Long, or Little Kiwi Dragon, it is aimed at parents with children under 5.

Lela says she always puts heavy emphasis on migrant parents continuing to use their native tongue with the child at home.

"They have to teach their kids to be proud of being Chinese, and they have to teach then when they are small. The children need to feel comfortable with their identity."

The course emphasises that parents should also learn about the values of the host culture in which their child is immersed, and pay attention to the media, in which their children are likely to take a keen interest.

"A lot of Chinese parents have never heard of NZ Idol - so how can they communicate with kids who talk of nothing else?"