Posted: November 24th, 2011 | 3 Comments »
The venerable Swindon Book Company of Hong Kong has issued its annual 100 best books for Christmas – all are discounted up till the 25th of December. Midnight in Peking is on the list – under fiction, but never mind! Of course there are many other excellent titles, but those authors will have to get their own blogs!!
Meanwhile,and talking of Hong Kong (and in the interests of fairness) I would also like to point out that I am also proud to be solidly at No.3 on the Dymocks charts in the SAR (trailing Steve Jobs but beating Haruki Murakami – make of that what you will!). And rather wonderfully, I’m holding solidly at No.2 at Bookazine (that bloody Steve Jobs again!!)
While if you’re escaping Hong Kong as the winter and the holiday season kicks in both Relay and Page One at the airport can sell you a copy or three. So no excuses really.
Posted: November 23rd, 2011 | No Comments »
If you happen to be in London this Thursday you could certainly do worse than pop along to Asia House and hear Frances Wood speak on China Before Chinnery. I assume you can also see Asia House’s Chinnery exhibition (as mentioned previously) while you’re there. Details below and booking details here.
Chinnery was the first serious British artist to live and work in China. Dr Wood will explore earlier depictions of China including illustrations produced in Europe from books written by 17th century Jesuits, sketches by William Alexander, a brilliant young artist attached to the British Embassy to China (1792-4), and 19th century ‘export paintings’ produced in Canton for East India Company men.
Dr Frances Wood is Head of the Chinese Section at the British Library and author of numerous successful books on China including The Forbidden City, The First Emperor of China, China’s First Emperor and His Terracotta Warriors and The Diamond Sutra: The Story of the World’s Earliest Dated Printed Book.
Posted: November 23rd, 2011 | No Comments »
Now the delivery of coal in Shanghai was a regular thing and very necessary to keep all those boilers going when, as now, the winter chills swept over the city. It’s not the most glamorous of businesses and usually employs the least glamorous of people (I find it hard to believe that I am actually old enough to remember the coal man with his cart and horse delivering bags of coal to my grandparents in Tottenham!! Blimey!!). However, respect to Hongay Coal (‘The Best Anthracite in the Far East’ – and who am I to argue!) who took some effort to produce this great modernist ad for coal delivery – what images, what typography, what thought – and all for the bags of black stuff. They’d have got my order right enough.
Posted: November 22nd, 2011 | No Comments »
The Shanghai Municipal Gaol, or Ward Road Goal (Ward Road is now Changyang Road), dates back to 1903. It’s still a prison of course – Tilanqiao Nick – and you can wander around it, on the outside at least, and see the decent modernist structure from the front (Kunming Road side) or the back (the Changyang Road side – and where you can see the long visitors queues of several days of the week). The basic structure of the gaol we see today was finished about 1935 – there’s been some modern adjustments to the western side of the prison but not that much else has changed. Inside is a juvenile block (not sure that’s still in use), a hospital, an administration block, workshops, a kitchen and laundry block, and an execution chamber (not sure they still do executions here either), all surrounded by a thick, five metre tall wall with guard-towers. Anyway there’s a longer history here.
So here’s the gaol in the 1930s – complete with Sikh guard (they don’t use Sikhs anymore needless to say!) and the words Shanghai Municipal Gaol etched on the stone work above the entrance. That’s been scrubbed off since as you can see from the pictures of the same spot today below. If anyone’s been inside I’d love to know what’s there and what’s not?
Posted: November 21st, 2011 | No Comments »
I first chatted with the journalist Tim Luard, who was tracing the escape from Hong Kong in 1942 of a one-legged Chinese admiral with a party of British military personnel, ages ago. Tim and his wife followed their path through what was once bandit country but is now part of bustling modern China. Of course their story interested me and immediately offered itself up as a book project. I’m glad to say that Tim has seen it through and the book Escape From Hong Kong: Admiral Chan Chak’s Christmas Day Dash, 1941 (available for pre-order here, I’ll post more when it appears on the shelves), will soon be published.
In the meantime Tim is being interviewed on the BBC Radio 4 travel programme Excess Baggage about the book and Admiral Chan Chak, which you can listen to or download here.
Escape from Hong Kong Admiral Chan Chak’s Christmas Day Dash, 1941
Tim Luard
Royal Asiatic Society Hong Kong Studies Series
On 25 December 1941, the day of Hong Kong’s surrender to the Japanese, Admiral Chan Chak – the Chinese government’s chief agent in Hong Kong – and more than 60 Chinese, British and Danish intelligence, naval and marine personnel made a dramatic escape from the invading army. They travelled on five small motor torpedo boats – all that remained of the Royal Navy in Hong Kong – across Mirs Bay, landing at a beach near Nan’ao. Then, guided by guerrillas and villagers, they walked for four days through enemy lines to Huizhou, before flying to Chongqingor travelling by land to Burma. The breakout laid the foundations of an escape trail jointly used by the British Army Aid Group and the East River Column for the rest of the war. Chan Chak, the celebrated ‘one-legged admiral’, became Mayor of Canton after the war and was knighted by the British for his services to the Allied cause. His comrade in the escape, David MacDougall, became head of the civil administration of Hong Kong in 1945.
This gripping account of the escape draws on a wealth of primary sources in both English and Chinese and sheds new light on the role played by the Chinese in the defence of Hong Kong, on the diplomacy behind the escape, and on the guerillas who carried the Admiral in a sedan chair as they led his party over the rivers and mountains of enemy-occupied China.
Escape from Hong Kong will appeal not just to military and other historians and those with a special interest in Hong Kong and China but also to anyone who appreciates a good old-fashioned adventure story.
Tim Luard is a former Beijing correspondent for the BBC World Service.
“Escape from Hong Kong is a crisp and comprehensive account of one of the epic untold tales of the Second World War – a unique Chinese-led British escape, under fire, from the Japanese invaders of Hong Kong.â€â€”Tony Banham, author of Not the Slightest Chance: The Defence of Hong Kong, 1941.
Posted: November 20th, 2011 | No Comments »
As we move into November so the Christmas Balls are approaching for those that go to them (they’re hardly the once classy affairs of yesteryear – the British ones at least are now little more than a chance to swap grubby business cards, show of terrible levels of obesity and wear inappropriately tight clothing). Women will of course require something flattering and delicate to reflect their natures!! (hey, this is a blog about old Shanghai – patronising language towards the little ladies is allowed!!). As a service to the sumptuous ladies that loyally read China Rhyming we’d like to recommend the newly opened (ay least in June 1940 – talk about timing!!) Grosvenor Gowns situated on the Rue Cardinal Mercier (now rather drearily known as Maoming Road South). And they can cater should your Christmas soiree by a fancy dress ball as they do costumes too…and not forgetting hats. And all under the personal supervision of a European cutter to boot!
And if anyone attending a ball in Shanghai this Christmas sees anyone dressed even approaching as glamorously or as slim as the model in the advert I’ll be a monkey’s uncle!!
Posted: November 19th, 2011 | No Comments »
I do get the impression that Singapore has improved its attitude to heritage and preservation in recent years after a couple of trips down there and some conversations with people this year – especially when you think back to the days when no shophouse was safe and the island nearly lost all of them! There used to be a sense of saving western style buildings – churches, hotels etc but laying waste to Chinese or Straits-inspired architecture and removing all kampongs. This CNNGo article, whic rightly mentions the ridiculousness of preservation when it is simply ‘facadiside’, on the campaign around the Old School, or the former Methodist Girls School, at Mount Sophia, now a bit of an arts and galleries centre. Good luck to to the campaigners and the article notes their Facebook camapign. I fear that later buildings – 1950s, 1960s etc may not yet be fully appreciated.
Posted: November 18th, 2011 | No Comments »
I’ve just spent a few days in Singapore promoting Midnight in Peking and have a nose around the island state so I feel that one of my occasional Singapore-related posts should be allowed. And I want to note the rather lovely Tan Kim Seng fountain near the Padang. Every time I stroll by it I get a smile as it reminds me so much of the old corporation water fountains you see in parks in the industrial cities of northern England or Scotland (or indeed occasionally in less ‘company town’ England in places such as Halstead in Essex which was a Courtaulds town).
And there is sits dating back to 1882 when the Singapore Municipal Council decided to erect it to remember the trader and philanthropist who donated a large sum of money to bring Singapore a modern water system. Sadly he’d been dead 18 years by the time they did this so he never saw his fountain…but it’s the thought that counts surely? apparently it was originally in Fullerton Square and moved to its present location in 1925. It seems to get a regular lick of paint though I’ve never personally seen any water coming out of it.
