Shanghai’s French Concession had a Rue Palikao but I did not know until the other day that Paris has a Rue de Pali-Kao (why Paris went for a ‘de’ and a hypen I don’t know)….
Shanghai’s was alternatively spelt Palicao sometimes and constructed around 1865, hence it is quite narrow. The road was a continuation into the French Concession of Yunnan Road, close to the Great World Amusement Palace and known for its numerous night time streetwalkers.
The Paris version is in Belleville and was known as the Rue Napoleon till 1864 – how fortunes change. It is not Paris’s most beautiful street though there is a small garden and an artists commune once flourished on the street in the 1980s.
The Battle of Palikao by Emile Bayard
Both roads are of course named after a decisive battle in the Second Opium War that took place in Palikao (now Baliqiao), otherwise known as Eight Mile Bridge near Peking. On 21 September, a combined Anglo-French force that had recently occupied Tientsin (Tianjin) engaged the Chinese army numbering some 30,000-strong at Palikao. The Anglo-French forces inflicted massive losses (perhaps as many as 25,000) on the Chinese army and then proceeded to invade Peking. By contrast, the French lost only 1,000 soldiers. The French troops were led by Charles Guillaume Cousin-Montauban (1796-1878), who was later awarded the title of Count of Palikao by Napoléon III and also got a road named after him in the Concession. The Chinese detested Cousin-Montauban for obvious reasons and it was alleged he had made a fortune during the subsequent looting of Peking though these allegations were not conclusively proved.
WHAT: “Women in Chinese Silent Cinema: Gender roles and modernity” by Prof. Paul Pickowicz
WHEN: Oct. 6, 2023, Friday, from 7:00-8:00 PM Beijing Time
WHERE: The Courtyard Institute, 28 Zhonglao Hutong, Dongcheng district, Beijing
MORE ABOUT THE EVENT: This presentation uses clips from rare silent films produced in China in the 1920s and early 1930s to explore the complicated and diverse roles played by women in the Shanghai global metropolis and other urban settings. You will learn more about how gender roles were shifting at a time when modernity was having a significant impact on Chinese cities. Paul G. Pickowicz is Distinguished Professor Emeritus of History and Chinese Studies at the University of California, San Diego, and associate producer of the documentary films China in Revolution, 1911-1949 (1989) and The Mao Years, 1949-1976 (1994).
NOTE: After the talk concludes, a few RASBJ Council members plan to have dinner with Prof. Pickowicz at Black Sesame Kitchen (BSK), adjacent to Courtyard Institute, starting after 8:15 PM. BSK is a private dining establishment with communal dining. If anyone independently wishes to book a seat at BSK’s communal dining table that evening, please contact BSK separately at 136 9147 4408 and pay directly to BSK.
From war in London, and being the only active Chinese foreign correspondent in Europe in World War Two, to persecution in Communist China, Xiao Qian (Hsiao Ch’ien) experienced it all — and wrote about it in his classic memoir, Traveller Without a Map. Click here….
Join award-winning food writer and cook Fuchsia Dunlop in this exploration of Chinese culinary culture, from its mythical and historical origins, through the 19th century and up to today.
Following the publication of her book, Invitation to a Banquet: the Story of Chinese Food this year, Dunlop explores why, though China has one of the world’s most popular cuisines, it is also one of the most poorly understood and appreciated. Through a mouthwatering ‘menu’ of 30 dishes she explores the origins, ingredients, techniques and concepts of Chinese food, from field to table. What makes Chinese food Chinese and how can we appreciate it more deeply?
An official Hong Komg evacuation order from 1940. From The Commodore, Hong Kong, aboard Indrapoera, built 1926 for Rotterdam Lloyd hired to the British Government. The ship sailed in July 1940 to transport refugees from Hong Kong to Australia. Here is the original ticket No. 564 to allow a Mrs. Medewells to board the vessel…
This week on The China Project Ultimate China Bookshelf one of the best selling books about China to come out of World War Two – Teddy White and Annalee Jacoby’s Thunder Out of China... supportive of China’s war effort; critical of Chiang Kai-shek, it kept on selling well into the 1950s and the two Life writers (not best appreciated by KMT/Chiang supporting own Henry Luce) heavily influenced America’s ‘Who Lost China?’ debate after WW2…click here
An interesting photograph of Mongolian falcon sellers in Peking around 1930 (I am afraid the photgrapher is unidentified). Apparently these sellers would come to Peking anually with falcons caught on the Mongolian plains and transported as you see below. The American linguist, missionary and Sinologist Samuel Wells Williams recalled in his 1848 book, The Middle Kingdom: A Survey of the Geography, Government, Education, Social Life, Arts, Religion, Etc. of the Chinese Empire and Its Inhabitants that though used initially to discourage rodents and pests (something falcons do in many major cities still tosah globally) they would eventually come to infest the gates, towers and trees of the city, impudently forgae food in markets and food streets, snatching food from stalls and out of people’s hands in a rather startling fashion (they’re pretty big birds)…..
Edward Wilson-Lee’s A History of Wateris a fascinating tale of 1500s Portugal that does eventually reach Macao and has a sub-plot concernig the life and Asian adventures of the poet Camoes….
A History of Water follows the interconnected lives of two men across the Renaissance globe. One of them – an aficionado of mermen and Ethiopian culture, an art collector, historian and expert on water-music – returns home from witnessing the birth of the modern age to die in a mysterious incident, apparently the victim of a grisly and curious murder. The other – a ruffian, vagabond and braggart, chased across the globe from Mozambique to Japan – ends up as the national poet of Portugal.
The stories of Damião de Góis and Luís de Camões capture the extraordinary wonders that awaited Europeans on their arrival in India and China, the challenges these marvels presented to longstanding beliefs, and the vast conspiracy to silence the questions these posed about the nature of history and of human life.
Like all good mysteries, everyone has their own version of events.
