The
City as an Open Classroom: Diversity & Dynamism in Urban Conservation
Asian
Heritage Cities Triangle project
8-10 January,
2006
Penang, Malaysia
Workshop
Summary
Between 8-9
January 2006, Lestari Heritage Network hosted an international workshop
entitled "The City as an Open Classroom: Diversity & Dynamism
in Urban Conservation." A total of 20 representatives from
citizens groups, urban planners, architects, and heritage experts
met with their counterparts in Penang to share knowledge and strategies
in urban conservation.
The workshop
was initiated by Nara Machizukuri Centre in Japan with support
from the Japan Foundation. The exchange between Nara, Chiang Mai,
and Penang was expanded, with the help of Lestari Heritage Network,
to include representatives from Phuket and Phnom Penh.
Eleven delegates
from Japan arrived from Nara Machizukuri Centre. NMC was founded
over 20 years ago by citizen's movement in Nara, a UNESCO world
heritage site. 'Machizukuri' is Japanese word for community development
activities for improving existing urban fabric. From Chiang Mai,
Thailand, two representatives came from Urban Development Institute
Foundation, an organization that conducts research and education
on urban sustainability. The third representative is a community
leader from a local temple. From Phuket, Thailand, a heritage
expert on the local Hokkien community and Thai culture was accompanied
by a journal editor. From Phnom Penh, Cambodia, two architects
and two architectural students arrived with a municipal urban
planner.
At the workshop,
delegates heard from Penang's own conservation experts and heritage
organizations regarding challenges, best practices, and lessons
learned in George Town. The main sponsor of the workshop is Japan
Foundation, with additional support from Lestari Heritage Network
through Institute for Cultural Enterprise, and in-kind support
from Penang Heritage Trust and Penang Teochew Association.
Click
here
for Programme
Schedule
Click
here for Delegates
and Presenters
Pressing
problems on Chiang Mai are:
• Many mega projects initiated by the central government
without local need, participation or approval.
• Conflicts of development and the attempts to preserve Chiang
Mai as historic city.
• Lack of understanding of preservation concept from the
government, general public and property owners.
• City for the wealth of people from Bangkok.
During a 2-hour workshop on the second day of the seminar, participants
were asked to separate into four groups of 6-8 persons to discuss
the "burning" issues they brought to the workshop. Afterwards,
each group was encouraged to use any known resources and creative
strategies to solve these burning issues collectively.
Group
I
Presenter: BENG Khemro
Burning issues:
• public awareness of heritage in Cambodia and Penang are
major challenges
Resources:
• finance and technical assistance should be combined from
NGOs and government
• having a shared place to come together to solve problems
is important
• human resources are needed, e.g. committed staff, different
types of experts--both professionals as well as hands-on practitioners
Stakeholders:
• decision maker-government officials usually have final
say; Ministry of Interior of Cambodia need to bring in local governors
to make declaration to protect historical buildings
• public media is needed to explain conservation, e.g. through
television… to set up roundtable to show how conservation
could be conducted
• target general public-through arts and education, so that
all levels of the public could be motivated
• houseowners-need to have specific message, e.g. use brochures
to explain conservation. In Cambodia, trust from the public is
weak, therefore, there's a need to use community assets such as
traditional festivals. Only Buddhist temples are perceived to
be safe places where people could trust the information they receive
• developers-are only interested in short term profits
• there has to be trust between experts and community between
different stakeholders
Group
II
Presenter: Pranee SAK
Illustrator: TAN Yeow Wooi
The group
discussion focuses on tourism. In Nara, participants were concerned
with its impact on traditional ways of life. Too many tourists
are now drawn to the local events/festivals, such as praying in
temples, children's folklore events, lantern festivals. There
are more than 20 events per year, some of these are new. On the
other hand, in Phuket, only one in 50 tourists visit the old town.
Businesses in beach side do not come from Phuket town, thus they
do not care about what happens in town. As a result of the separation
between beach side and town, businesses in old town could not
benefit from the tourists. There should be balance between local
traditional life and tourists. While tourism is necessary for
income which would provide necessary funds for people to restore
their own houses.
Question:
• How to draw attention of people from the beach to come
to Phuket town
• How to get tourists interested in the history of Phuket
• Promote Strait-electic style architecture
• Promote in photograph the history of Phuket to tour operators
overseas
Resources
and Strategies:
• Target new market of tourists who are interested in culture,
start from tour agencies from abroad to come see the historic
city of Phuket
• Start a Peranakan Trail to link with Penang, Malacca, and
Singapore
• Improve island transportation-"city and beach tour"-have
new buses bring tourists from one beach to another and bring them
to town and then back to the hotel
• Establish historical museum-to tell story of Phuket town-through
historical trail
• Design a new trishaw tour route on the island, since many
European tourists like taking trishaw in the evening
• Promote local food to attract people in town
• Establish new boutique accommodations from old houses
• Sell one ticket for all facilities and events
• Re-establish flights (currently, connections between Phuket
to Penang have been hampered-in the past, there are flights from
Phuket to Had Yai, then 2 hrs to Penang. Now people have to fly
to Kuala Lumpur then fly to Penang)
• Write new histories on Phuket-make comic book
• Make Phuket an artist town-attract Thai artists
Group
III
Presenter: Clement LIANG
Burning issues:
• What has been compromised because of tourist dollars? Townscape?
Old lifestyle?
• Private sector has taken over physical development
• Is there really a need for tourism?
Resources
and strategies:
• Since we have no politicians in group…
- Journalists
can write articles and make suggestions
- Architects can write more reports to let others understand
heritage
- More research can be done on tourists of why they visit the
city
- Artist-writers need to write more history/culture books to
introduce cultural heritage
- Publicize through websites; use different kinds of media to
publicize problems and solutions
• Education
is the most important
- Because
the majority do not know about conservation
- To form pressure group to lobby proper control for the interest
of the community to keep their lifestyles
- In the schools, no subject is taught on culture or heritage
conservation in formal education, can it be part of the curriculum
- Encourage community involvement
- Movies may be a media to encourage classical culture, animation-good
media to change people's values to be aware of what they have
loss
• Networking
is important
- So people
could learn from another
- To rotate exhibitions to other cities
- Annual international workshop
- Next year's meeting in Chiang Mai?
• Proper
city planning to harmonize with humans; can people walk safely
in the streets?
Group
IV
Presenters: Ratana SOUN and Sitho SIM
Strategies
and resources for Phnom Penh:
•
Perhaps should learn from the Prime Minister: to make the cake
without flour
• Resources: people with good heart
• Strategy: Like the chicken under the elephant's feet-tries
to tickle the feet of the elephant in order to survive
- Organize
people from outside and bring local people to focus on religious
institutions-like Thai people, knowledge to the people can be
passed down through religious leaders
- Focus on art-because it is with people everyday-songs and
performances can be used to pass on to people
- Use students as networks to spread word on conservation-make
use of young people to make rap songs or hip hop
Concluding
Remarks
KHOO Salma
Nasution
Heritage is a new form of public interest, like environment or
transportation.
What is private interest and public interest? People need to know
why they have to support heritage. From experience with state
heritage council, developers and politicians-the government does
not understand what "public" is because it is used to
dealing with many pressure groups and it often hears from private
interests.
Lestari can be a network to put others in touch.
Ryotaro
KATSURA
Face to face contact is very important, so that people can trust
each other. Sympathy is very important; community relation is
very important because of post-war trauma and globalization. NGO
in Japan is not very strong. Human beings need to get in touch
with nature, love, and community. Family relationship has been
destroyed because of westernization. This seminar was successful
because of Ichiro and Salma. NMC needs to change Japanese government
for focusing too much on economic development.
DUONGCHAN
Apavatjrut Charoenmuang
It is not enough to listen to 10 people, you need to see it once
for yourself. This was her first visit to Penang. Appreciate guidance
from NMC. Will focus on using media to better publicize information
for others.
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