A message from Brian…..
Hello from Britain has a long history in China and people are always asking me how it all started!
So………. READ ON!
Since I was 11 years old all I have wanted to do with my life is to work for a Radio Station. When I was 14 I had wires running up and down my street connecting a small studio in my bedroom to my neighbours houses. I used to make programme for them.
For many yeas before coming to China I was the controller of a Radio Station in Scotland. My ambition had been achieved. I was working for a Radio Station and had even won top awards. And.. the Radio Station gave me free use of a car.
The "dream" of MOST Western people is to live in the countryside That seems very different to the thinking of Shanghai people but of course the countryside in China is not YET as well developed as the cities!
In MY Scottish countryside we have digital telephones, electricity and water and sewage disposal. Milk is delivered every two days, the post is delivered each day and the rubbish is taken away each week. We also have cars and my nearest town is 25 kilometres away and it takes 17 minutes to drive there.
BUT........ I had achieved my ambitions and was BORED. I love Scotland very much but it is a big world and all I was seeing of it was what I saw on Television. I wanted to see it for myself.
NO WHERE is "Further away" than China so in 1988 I decided to take a look. Although I was controller of a Radio Station I did NOT have much money so a Radio Station in London paid for my air ticket in exchange for me making a Radio programme about China!
I was utterly fascinated by what I saw here during my first visit. The people were warm, friendly and almost unbelievably curious. I really did feel like a spaceman.
Radio is my life and during my first visit I listened to YOUR Radio. It was cold and boring. "How come the Chinese are so friendly and how come that friendliness does NOT come over the Radio" That was a question I have asked myself many times here but LESS since the changes to Radio in Shanghai in 1992.
I was offered the chance in both Beijing and in Shanghai to produce Radio programmes. They said they could not pay me because they were too poor so I would have to find advertising and pay THEM!!! That may sound FUNNY but it is not TOO unusual in the Radio business especially in America.
I could certainly SEE that the Radio workers here were poor and their working conditions at that time were not good either. BUT it was obvious that China was developing at incredibly high speed and I found it an exciting opportunity but HOW to begin?
First I needed to start a "Company" Now that brings us to a great difference between our two societies. In China the people think of a "Company" as being something that is BIG but OUTSIDE of China that is not at all true!!!!!! Anyone can start a Company! Its very easy! ....... It costs RMB 1000.
The next problem is what do I CALL my "Company" I wanted a name that Chinese people would find attractive. During my first visit EVERYONE was talking about "Open Door" so I thought why not a .......... WINDOW.
But I needed an ADVERTISER! It was a lucky co-incidence that DHL had just opened in Shanghai together with its partner SINOTRANS. DHL in London agreed to support me as an experiment.
We started "Hello From Britain" in August 1989. I used to record the programmes at 3 oclock in the morning in the studios of the Radio Station in Scotland and send them to Shanghai by DHL.
WHAT A RESPONSE!!!!!! It was really an exciting day when the first letters arrived from our Shanghai listeners. They were sent to me by the Radio Station in Shanghai because I did not have enough money to come back to Shanghai at that time!!
I came back to Shanghai again at the end of 1989. I took unpaid leave from my work in Scotland and came for a week to have more meetings. I then went to Hong Kong and worked for the Radio Station there for 4 weeks. In Hong Kong they pay VERY WELL!!! Four times more than my work in Scotland. That gave me enough money to pay for my air ticket! In Hong Kong I also went to see potential advertisers........
Many of them were snobbish and rude and some of them laughed at me. "How can an ENGLISHMAN make a Radio programme in China they said!!! Anyway....... Chinese Radio is VERY BORING they said"
Then I went to see Nescafe. They were polite and quite friendly but I think they thought I was a little mad.
I went back to Scotland and spent three weeks non stop sitting in front of my computer writing them a full proposal for a programme in Shanghai. I then found a Chinese student in Scotland and recorded a sample programme and sent it to Nescafe in Hong Kong together with my proposal.
I hardly slept for two weeks waiting for their reply.
They said YES but we had to re-negotiate the price with the Radio Station and I did NOT have enough money to buy the air ticket to come back. I sold 10% of my company to a Scottish Lawyer for 10,000 RMB and flew back to re-negotiate the contract in Shanghai.
Nescafe agreed to support me for a six month experiment and I sat down and worked out how much it would cost to spent several months in Shanghai flying with the cheapest airline and staying in the Seventh Heaven Hotel. I also needed some professional machines. I worked out my sums and calculated that I could JUST cover all the costs but ONLY if I paid MYSELF two thirds of what I had been getting in Scotland.
I resigned from my work in Scotland. They thought I was mad and I went to Shanghai with two digital tape recorders, 1,000 songs and a cheap computer. My bank agreed to give me an overdraft of 5,000 Pounds.
I will never forget the experience of producing the first Nescafe programme in the studios in Shanghai and will never forget what they said to me after we had finished the first programme......
"What do you think? Are we professional like in your country?" I did not know how to answer.
We also began to record Hello From Britain in the studios in Shanghai with my translator JANE. It was great fun to be able to make HFB in a style that was MUCH more lively because of the excellent simultaneous translation from Jane!
A few days later the listener letters began to arrive. I was deeply moved by the response to Nescafe Music Time and the INCREASED response to Hello From Britain. The only way I can describe it was that it felt like a MOUNTAIN of.... LOVE. Somehow I think we seemed to have touched the hearts of the people. It was a wonderful feeling that has never left me.
The differences between us see at times to be impossible BUT through MUSIC and through the RADIO I think we have found a precious way to begin and expand our understanding of each other. Through the hard times ahead it would be and it still IS that FEELING that gives me the energy to continue.
It was a condition of my contract that I bring two people from Shanghai Radio to Britain. The trip cost 3,300 pounds and I did not have it. I begged for it from a charity in Hong Kong and got it for free because they thought I was mad but "interesting" The trip would have cost more but we saved money by staying in my house and with friends. I also borrowed a car from my ex Radio Station!
It was fun showing my country to two people from Shanghai and interesting for the FIRST time for me to see MY country from a foreign perspective. BUT the recession was beginning to hit my country hard and the DOLLARS I was receiving from Nescafe became worth less POUNDS each day. I was running out of money fast. I even had to borrow some money to pay for the food we ate in London.
When I returned to Shanghai towards the end of 1990 I had almost nothing.
Then I received a fax from Hong Kong. My work in Shanghai had won an award from a Charity for "Best Media Project 1990". Normally when you win an award for "Artistic" work you get NO money. This time I got HK$ 100,000 and was able to pay my bills.
I was the Chairman, Managing Director, Producer, Engineer, Presenter, Sales Representative and Secretary and ONLY employee of a company that was 2 years old. In the first year before coming to Shanghai I made US$ 100 profit but paid myself NOTHING at all. In the second year even after the award money I LOST US$ 2,500 and was earning MUCH less that I had been getting from my work in Scotland. In those first two years I had given the Radio Station in Shanghai more money than the value of my house and its contents in Scotland.
Then we really started to grow! Nescafe and DHL expanded their programmes in China with fourteen cities for Nescafe and six for DHL. Sony also supported the "Sony Double Countdown" in Shanghai. I built a REAL studio in Scotland and employed more people. Up until the end of 1998 we were employing 5 people and occupying 65 hours per week of airtime in 14 cities throughout China!
We were making a profit. It was not large but averaged around US$30,000 per year. This money was used for equipment and people.
Since it all began we have given Chinese Radio Stations more money than FIVE Western People would earn in their whole lives and we have paid more than US$100,000 to Chinese Hotels.
Now..... I can hear you saying "He is rich now" When my COMPANY makes a profit does it mean that I can go and spend it? That is nonsense and is the thinking of a child. It would also be illegal.
I have NEVER worked for money alone and never wish to be the type of person who does. I am happy to give the money that I do to Chinese Radio Stations because It is the market price and because it is used for their development and modernisation. A businessman who does not SPEND money is either a criminal or the luckiest person in the world!!
What OUR business makes does not need a factory or lots of workers. In a Western country it needs just ONE person to make a programme.
AND….. we now just have ONE person again!
Towards the end of 1998 we were hit by the "Asian Economic Crisis" We lost our contracts with Nescafe and Sony. DHL also reduced their support for programmes in all cities except Shanghai.
So……. From 1999 we are back to where we started!
The year 2000 was OK although we have now lost ALL the profits from previous years and had little money.
Hello From Britain was taken OFF air in Shanghai at the beginning of 2001. We were given no warning of any kind. We were told that this was because of some sort of directive from the Shanghai Municipal Governments Broadcasting Bureau forbidding non Chinese nationals from speaking into a microphone.
The programme continued in Hangzhou until early 2002 when DHL SINOTRANS in Beijing refused to continue support.
The programme was funded by DHL in the UK and Hong Kong from 1989 until the end of 2001.
Producing Radio Programmes in China was a true adventure and I will be forever grateful to our sponsors ALL of which were NON Chinese. But..... it is YOU the LISTENER who made it all worthwhile.
We are ALL "ordinary" people. There is nothing "Intellectual" about a successful Radio Programme. Exactly the opposite! In China you have "The Masses" The Masses ARE China. They deserve a smile and some warmth. They deserve the nice feelings that a good tune and some true words of genuine friendship can bring. But....... the masses are YOU and it is YOU who made our programmes a success.
The response we had from our ORDINARY listeners in China truly made it all worthwhile. We received many HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS of letters. When I was in China I also meet may listeners and have even met some Chinese People in Britain and in America who used to listen to the programmes.
The response to our Web site has been MUCH better than we expected and its very encouraging to sit here in Scotland and read what everyone is saying in the guestbook. We are NOT web design experts and the site is maintained by Brian in his spare time.
THANK YOU for your support and THANK YOU for listening!
Without YOU we were NOTHING!!
Now it is all over.
It - sadly - seems hard for some people in China to understand but I did NOT go to China in search of money.
I did NOT expand my work in China because of money.
We are all in this world for a short time.
We are ALL going to die.
YOU are going to die.
Sometimes we are presented with an opportunity to help to make the world a better place.
I was given this opportunity in 1989.
I am happy with what I did, and the fact that YOU are reading these words proves that I was right to do what I did.
All of the money has now gone and now I have nothing.
There are SOME Chinese people who made a LOT of money from me and my programmes.
Towards the end I was astounded and disgusted with their greed and selfishness.
It is THEY who will have to live with their conscience and it is unlikely that I will ever return to Shanghai.
As for me....... outside of my window as I write, the sky is blue and the birds are singing.
I am happy.
BRIAN ANDERSON.
Window Communications Hall of fame…..
This is a list of people who have worked with us to make it all possible.
Our Sponsors...... David Allen, Chairman of DHL. Lim Khing Fong, Cindy Lau, Lam Yim, Cassian Cheung, Bernard Kam, Steve Watson and Cheah Yoke Fong from Nestle. Henry Lee from Sony. Peter Crowhurst from the Gloria Plaza Hotel in Beijing. Bert Pinoli from Northwest Airlines. Carole Culioli from Newcastle Brown Ale.
And our Staff.......Katherine MacFarlane - JANE - Monique Sykens - Shirley - Neil Shaw - Norman MacLeod - Xiao Dong - Paula Whitelock - Yeen Yao - Frank Hossack - James Lyon - Norman Barrington - Fang Zhou - Ar Yen - Zen Yong - Christina Gibb and Maggie.
Some of our Ex staff have moved on to other things in broadcasting.......
Katherine MacFarlane is now a TV producer. Paula Whitelock is a successful DJ on Radio Forth in Edinburgh. Norman MacLeod is studying economics at university in London. Jane is now living in Chicago. Neil Shaw is an ACCOUNTANT and still involved with Window Communications. James Lyon is Commercials producer with Northsound Radio in Aberdeen. Frank is running his own company in Shanghai.
Brian has worked in KOSOVO helping to produce information programmes for people affected by the war.
Recently Brian also worked in Cape Town South Africa working to produce information programming aimed at workers throughout South Africa.
Brian has also recently worked in Botswana helping to set up an educational radio drama series to help combat the aids epidemic.
Brian has also worked in Afghanistan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan.
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