‘East is East, and West is West, and never the twain shall meet’. The opening line of Kipling’s oft-misquoted ‘The Ballad of East and West’ is called upon to describe all sorts of cultural conflicts that plague East-West relations from doing business in China to the war in Iraq. But the spirit of the poem is truly summed in the two lines of the stanza that proclaim that ‘there is neither East nor West, Border, nor Breed, nor Birth, when two strong men stand face to face, tho’ they come from the ends of the earth’. And it is in this spirit that transcendences borders that Project Connect was initiated.

The idea for a cross-cultural exchange of young minds was a result of Brian Jones, co-founder of Cloudbreak Studio, which runs creative workshops, and Susanne Gorman of London’s Soho Theatre. The formula had proven itself with similar exchange programmes done in Japan and Sri Lanka, so Brian, who has made KL his home, decided to extend the project to local youth. The aim of the project is the promotion of inter-cultural learning of the arts, theatre in particular, and to see it in a new context. In turn, participants who benefit directly from the project are expected to train more young people in the arts with the experience they bring back from their host countries.

Project Connect was a year in the making with local groups, Cloudbreak Studio and The Dram Projects, a community theatre organisation, liaising with the UK-based York Theatre Royal and Soho Theatre to further this end. Eventually, both the Commonwealth Foundation and the Commonwealth Youth Exchange Council caught wind of the project and lent much needed support finding it exactly the kind of initiative that was worth fostering between youth in Commonwealth nations.

If you haven’t heard of Project Connect, we don’t blame you. Wanting to work with a group of people, who were already familiar with each other, the process of looking for participants on the Malaysian side was done through word of mouth. The selection of the original ten was easy enough with most of them hailing from local theatre company ‘The Oral Stage’ but the group has gone through some changes in its membership since its inception. Now, the current line-up of participants comes from all disciplines of art with poets, writers and video artists who expressed interest to join the project.

On the surface, Project Connect might seem like any other youth exchange programme offered by any number of social organisations but there is a catch. Speaking to participant and elected voice of the group, Priya Kulasagaran relates that before any actual travelling is done, the ten young Londoners and ten young KL-ites have sent each other packages filled with random objects that are unique to and descriptive of their home cities. The receiving team must then come up with a performance based what they find in the box interpreting the objects as they see fit.

When the two meet up on the arrival of the London team in Malaysia in May, the teams must collaborate on another performance drawing from the two original pieces. While a preview of the performance is slated to occur in KL on 9 June, the final work will only be staged with the KL team in London in July.

But while the cross-cultural exchange dominates the agenda, activities will continue after the team returns to Malaysia. As Priya enthuses, ‘The project is about bringing together youth, community and the arts — three things that are important to us.’ Thus the ‘connect’ in Project Connect isn’t just about the meeting of two worlds but also about linking different spheres of interest together. Among some of the work they’ve done includes facilitating creative workshops at hospices, orphanages and nursing homes like those run by local charity organisations Ti Ratana and The Pure Life Society. At one hospice for people living with AIDS, a forum theatre performance is in development and they hope to stage it one day to raise awareness of AIDS and HIV.

To raise funds for the exchange and their community work, Project Connect has aimed some of their activities at the general public. Thus far, they’ve held movie screenings and sold their Project Connect collective anthology, handmade notebooks and poetry/illustration chapbooks at the last KL Alternative Bookfest. Recently, they organised ‘This is Now’, an interactive art playground where audience and performers were given materials to paint their interpretations of the event as it happened. The latter was very well-received by the audience who were more than happy with the hands-on approach, reaffirming the link between youth, community and the arts that Project Connect is trying to build.

Unfortunately, there is still much work to be done when it comes to raising money for continuing the good work that Project Connect is trying to do. Ultimately, the hope is to have enough to stage the final collaborative performance between the UK and the Malaysian teams here in KL. While having the UK team return seems doubtful, Priya hopes that a restaging of the piece with replacements is in the cards. The exchange that had originally been set earlier was pushed back nearly a year due to the scarce funds. And, while spreading the word among the local youth theatre and art circles yields familiarity, it doesn’t get very far when it comes to looking for financial support from organisations and companies outside the loop. And everyone knows that’s where the big money is.

A more cynical observer might remark that all this is just symptomatic of the insular nature of the local theatre scene with its habit of closed auditions and vanity pieces but the work that Project Connect is attempting is commendable. So, if you’re a philanthropist who shares the vision of this motley group of youths then you could do worse than sending support to these kids who just want to change the world with their art.

For more details on Project Connect, Dianne (012 245 0455/www.project-connect.blogspot.com).