Filming began in Dunedin yesterday for a documentary which will trace the history of Otago's Chinese community from the 1860s until the recent construction of the Dunedin Chinese Garden.
Partly inspired by an earlier award-winning documentary on the Journey of the Otagos, Toitu Otago Settlers Museum staff are making the film, with a budget of about $40,000, and strong community support.
The film, The Journey to Lan Yuan, will be screened at the Chinese Garden to explain its historical background in Dunedin and Otago.
The garden's Chinese name is Lan Yuan, and New Zealand's oldest urban Chinese settlement is in Dunedin.
The film follows the historical journey early Chinese made to establish themselves in Otago, including in their early work as gold-miners.
At the request of the Chinese community, the documentary is being presented by Toitu curator and historian Sean Brosnahan, who has curated five exhibitions on the Otago Chinese in his 27 years at the museum.
The project aimed to help viewers "get a full understanding of where our Chinese community originally came from, what they went through in getting here, and how they had to establish themselves in difficult conditions'', Mr Brosnahan said.
Filming began in April at many rural locations around Otago, including at former gold-mining sites on the Old Man Range, and in Northern Southland.
And further locations in Northland, Australia and Guangdong Province, China, will be filmed next month.
The research has been based on historian Dr James Ng's volumes of Windows On A Chinese Past.
Dunedin Chinese Garden Trust chairman Malcolm Wong said the documentary would inform interested locals, and would also become "essential viewing for any historically minded Chinese visitors to Otago''.
Mr Brosnahan said Chinese people were first invited to Otago in 1865 by the Otago provincial government, and there were more than 5000 Chinese in the province by 1880.
"This is part of our history as New Zealanders that has not been completely told through film before,'' he said.
