All things old China - books, anecdotes, stories, podcasts, factoids & ramblings from the author Paul French
There were many fur shops and furriers in old Shanghai – not least the well-known Siberian Fur Store on the Avenue Joffre (see my post on them here). Chan Kee was less famous but still seems to have had a good selection – sable, leopard, ermine, squirrel and beaver. This ad for the store is from 1930….
I read a story the other day that the Beijing government is planning to poison the city’s female poplar and willow trees – the ones that produce the floating cottonwood, or catkins, that suffuses the air of the city in early Spring. Now I know a lot of people don’t like it and it upsets their nasal passages etc, but personally I love it and see it as an essential part of Peking. The plan involves injecting poison into the trees.
I’ve mentioned this before and one irate reader contacted me to say that I shouldn’t care about the poplar and willow trees as they were all planted in the 1960s by the communists and I don’t like them so I shouldn’t like the trees. Well, it may be true that I don’t much care for communists but it’s not quite the case about the trees – there was indeed a bunch of new plantings in the 1960s but the willow and poplar go back much further and have been an integral part of Peking’s exit from a harsh winter into a mild spring for a lot longer.
Nowadays people do mostly moan about the drifting cottonwood but they used to think very differently – here’s that old Pekinger Harold Acton on the subject:
‘The air was full of willow-fluff that blew up from the trees on the southern side of the (Tartar) Wall (the Chinese will tell you that each of those flakes is a wandering soul).’
So next time you feel inclined to moan about the cottonwood remember that each tuft may just be a wandering soul….
I was rereading Harold Acton’s Peonies and Ponies last week and he notes that the cocktail everyone was drinking in the late 1930s in Peking was the Gloomchaser – Japanese incursions, war threats, dust storms, depleted numbers in the foreign colony, and then the horse racing at Paomachang got cancelled – who wouldn’t need a Gloomchaser? So here you go – a generous measure of Grand Marnier, the same of Triple Sec, slightly less of lemon juice, a dash or two of grenadine and some ice – shake and serve…it was all the rage in Peking in 1937….
Acton in Peking
Heritage walking in Burma with Kenneth Barratt…
Myanmar, also called Burma, is one of Asia’s least-known destinations—a situation that is rapidly changing now as the country welcomes increasing numbers of foreign visitors. This is the first walking guide to present all the important heritage attractions and historical sites in the country. Author Kenneth Barrett not only takes you there, but explains in loving detail how each district and building evolved, who built what, and the special significance of the fascinating sites encountered along the way—everything you’d want in a Myanmar travel guide.
25 Walks in Myanmar helps you discover this ancient land by guiding you on foot through the old neighborhoods and bringing them to life. The works of great Burmese kings, the grand trading houses and colonial offices built by the British, the temples and mosques erected by Indian and Chinese traders—all are preserved in this time-locked land, and each tells a unique story.
Written from a highly personal viewpoint, 25 Walks in Myanmar is your companion in a series of urban strolls that open up new worlds which would otherwise remain unknown. Now is the time to explore Myanmar and Kenneth Barrett is your knowledgeable guide to an unforgettable journey through Asia’s most fascinating land.
Shanghai Low was a very famous Chinese restaurant in Reno, Nevada. They were based down on North Center Street. I’ve blogged about the restaurant before and it’s rather east-west Thanksgiving menu. Shanghai Low was always coming up with new ways to attract custom – such as this attempt in 1924 to sell you drinks and food while you listened to the wireless reports of the Presidential Election. Presumably those that voted for Coolidge stayed for the dancing; those who voted for the Democrat John W. Davis or the Progressive Party’s Robert La Follette went home early. I’m sure if Shanghai Low were still on business they’d have an inauguration day special on the menu!
This article in 1923 is perhaps a bit confused – Shanghai is loving the telephone (naturally) and, of course, being an international city people are speaking on it in many different languages. Calls have to go through the operator (no direct dial yet) so, as the Herington Sun of Kansas notes, both callers and operators have to use pidgin. However, pidgin didn’t come along with the telephone but had long been a standard form if interaction in the treaty ports; one that merely adapted swiftly to telephone use.
The journalist Clare Hollingworth passed away last week at 105 in Hong Kong. Unsurprisingly there were so many obituaries and tributes to her long career. I slipped a small tribute into the Literary Hub focussing on her China experiences – you can read that here. In that tribute I refer to a photograph of the 62-year-old Hollingworth on assignment as the Daily Telegraph’s Peking correspondent around 1973 – she is in the Forbidden City examining a rifle belonging to a group of militiamen; boys really. For me it sums up Hollingworth’s great strength as a reporter in Cultural Revolution China; namely her ability to disarm anyone she was interviewing and show an interest in their lives so as they told her more than they might have intended.
December 1924 and Gimbels Department Store in Philadelphia is running a “Shanghai Street” promotion. Chinoiserie fashions were the rage, though sadly i don’t have a picture of the display with “booth-like rooms, not unlike a Chinese shop” and then “table after table” on the other side of Chinois goodies. Anyway, you get a taste and obviously “Mandarin Coats” were all the rage that winter…
Gimbels – sadly demolished in 1987