Those Midnight in Peking Locations – Courtesy of Google Earth

On my website (www.midnightinpeking.com) there’s a walking tour of all the locations from Midnight in Peking – click here – but then I was mucking about on Google Earth – of course the Second Ring Road wasn’t there in 1937 and where the railway runs between the Fox Tower and Armour Factory Alley wasn’t there either and was a silted up part of the Grand Canal complex. Sadly also the Tartar Wall, though you can see part of the last remaining bit of it here, runs out a bit further on as, of course, Mao had it all knocked down.

Zed Asian Arguments #3 – Thailand’s Hidden Workforce

Just a quick note that the third book in my series for Zed Books, Asian Arguments, is now available for pre-order, Thailand’s Hidden Workforce. The book will be available in June. It’s a great subject that has been little reported to date – millions of Burmese women migrate into Thailand each year to form the basis of the Thai agricultural and manufacturing workforce. Un-documented and unregulated, this army of migrant workers constitutes the ultimate “disposable” labour force, enduring grueling working conditions and much aggression from the Thai police and immigration authorities. This insightful book ventures into a part of the global economy rarely witnessed by Western observers. Based on unique empirical research, it provides the reader with a gendered account of the role of women migrant workers in Thailand’s factories and interrogates the ways in which they strategize about their families and their futures.

Ruth Pearson is Professor for Development Studies at the University of Leeds. Kyoko Kusakabe is an Associate Professor of Gender and Development Studies, and Associate Dean of the School of Environment, Resources, Development (SERD), at the Asian Institute of Technology, Thailand.

Coming Down Alert – Shaanxi and Nanchang

Back in January 2010 I noted the imminent demise of the building on the corner of Shaanxi Road and Nanchang Road (Avenue Roi Albert and Route Dolfus) in the former French Concession. That building has now gone as part of the blanding of the area around the old Xiang Yang Market, now some rather uninteresting tower block offices and the disjointed line 10 bit of the Shaanxi Lu subway station. Let these photos serve notice on the officials, estate agents and naive foreigners in Shanghai who keep telling me that there won’t be any more destruction on the former French Concession – the vandalism goes on pretty much unabated.

Here’s a couple of pictures of the building when it was first being cleared out but was still structurally intact and perfectly suited to restoration and refit

and here’s the empty gap that exists now the building has gone forever….

Honor in the Dust: Theodore Roosevelt, War in the Philippines, and the Rise and Fall of America’s Imperial Dream

Books on Roosevelt’s Asia-Pacific policy keep on coming – perhaps given the recent imperial adventures of the USA they are finding it instructutive to look back on an earlier time of overseas engagement. Roosevelt of course was deeply involved in the Philippines – what’s interesting about anything on the American occupation of the islands is how many American judges, administrators, consuls, businessmen, whores and gangsters wound up making the jump from Manila to Shanghai in the first years of the twentieth century. They crop uo again and again in Manila and then in Shanghai. So, Gregg Jones’s Honor in the Dust – blurb below as usual.

Enjoying a Taxi Dance

Today, here’s a shot of some American GIs out on the town in Shanghai enjoying a taxi dance!

Chengdu Lit Fest 2012 – Sneak Preview

The Chengdu Bookworm’s Literary Festival has announced its programme – lots of goodies – Carol Birch, Justin Hill, Derek Sandhaus, Jonathan Fenby, Tim Flannery, eerrr ME and plenty of others – here’s the full programme.

“…don’t be surprised if Midnight in Peking turns out to be this year’s Suspicions of Mr Whicher”

Hey, it’s not me that said it!! The Getting Away with Murder newsletter in the UK got an advance copy of Midnight in Peking (out in the UK end of May) and that’s what they said – and I’m not going to argue. Of course I enjoyed Kate Summerscale’s true crime The Suspicions of Mr Whicher as much as anyone so it’s a good compliment. I’m also very happy that the Penguin press release for the UK says, “Imagine the period detail of The Suspicions of Mr Whicher combined with the tension of The Killing, and you’re getting close.” Having just stayed up very late on several nights to get to the end The Killing (the Danish version of course) I’ll take that as a compliment too. Maybe I’ll treat myself to one of those Sarah Lund Danish jumpers!!

I’m pleased they liked the special Midnight in Peking newspaper wrapping paper too – it is pretty cool!

A Bridge over the Soochow Creek – 1880s

Not exactly Sure where this bridge was – some where around where the Sichuan Road Bridge is today I think. I think this because of the water tower in the background which was on what is now Jiangxi Road (formerly Kiangse Road) where you can still see many older buildings originally erected by the Shanghai Water Department. Kiangse Road was also, of curse, Shanghai’s “Line”, a street of upper end bordellos and the madams of those bordellos (mostly American women) were known as the “Water Tower Women”. This picture is circa 1880 so you can see that the bridges are still largely wooden and the buildings lining the banks of Soochow Creek still comprador in style. Nice to see there’s a rickshaw waiting on the other side, around where now of course you can see the marvelous old General Post Office building.