[ { "id": 207488, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1975", "page_number": 256, "title": "RAS-1975", "content_text": "248\n\nDONALD C. BOWIE\n\nThere was no lift. By now we were caring for 15 patients with active pulmonary tuberculosis. The medical officer staff was slightly different from what it had been in Bowen Road (See Appendix C) and contained one new member, Captain Coombs. The changes had been made by the Japanese and I was not consulted, though Coombs was a valued and welcome member of the staff.\n\nThe building was arranged in two wings, and looked at from the front the left hand wing was given over to Japanese quarters. In the centre was a large Assembly Hall while our hospital occupied the right hand wing. The Assembly Hall was out of bounds to us except on special occasions. I had hoped to get a member of the Hong Kong Volunteers to come with us from Sham Shui Po as a rice cook, but he did not turn up, and Corporal J. O'Grady took charge. Our practice was now to cook all our food in bulk and not by wards and messes in their own containers as in the past. The kitchens had shallow rice boilers and our rice from now on improved considerably. The electricity generator had been damaged during the move but repairs were started by our engineers. The church was sited in the Central Clock Tower room. Saito gave us a Hongkong News from which on the 14 April we learned of the death of President Roosevelt and we held a memorial service for him on the following day.\n\nA refrigerator was converted to act as a steamer, steam being delivered through the top, and the cooks baked some very good so-called cake and made some experimental bread without flour which turned out to be excellent when judged by our standards. We even began to fry the bread sometimes when we had enough oil. On 19 April four blinded men and two old men arrived, the former with attendants to look after their needs. On 20 April Colonel Tokunaga made an afternoon inspection and we were ordered to remove all beds from verandahs and all staff except the steward and one cook were required to sleep in the barrack room. Visitors arrived to deliver parcels the same day but they had to leave them for collection by us some distance away from our front door. With 134 patients and no beds on verandahs our space was pretty crowded. By now our non-medical staff was building up and we had one shoemaker, two tailors, one barber, two cooks, three rice grinders, four vegetable men and three wood men. We also used two men for pots and pans and two appear in my diary as having duties connected with beds though I cannot now remember", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1975.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/j0995146d", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 208104, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1977", "page_number": 143, "title": "RAS-1977", "content_text": "# “LITTLE FUJIAN (FUKIEN)”\n\n127\n\nKong's North Point feel more familiar and therefore more comfortable. Overhearing a conversation between friends in the accents of the homeland while listening to a soft Fujianese melody wafting gently from a shop, one could close one's eyes and imagine being back in Fujian. With eyes open again, though, Little Fujian would have to suffice.\n\nNOTES\n\n1 E.g. Fujianese (Fukienese) and Shanghaiese in North Point; Shanghaiese in Tsim Tsa Tsui; Chau Zhou (Chiu Chau, Teochiu) in Chai Wan, Western District and Kwun Tong; Boat People in Aberdeen and Tai Po. See Guldin (1977) for a discussion of Han Chinese ethnicity and identity levels.\n\n2 See below, fig. 3.\n\n3 In the parlance of the times, and to a lesser extent even today, \"Shanghaiese\" often referred broadly to all Central (and sometimes even Northern) Chinese.\n\n4 Accurate figures are lacking; no detailed colony-wide or North Point censuses were conducted between 1930 and 1960.\n\n5 Based on analyses of Census Block Tally Sheets from 1971 Census made available to me through the kindness of the Commissioner.\n\n6 By \"Fujianese\" I refer specifically to \"Southern Fujianese,\" the Min-Nan speaking Fujianese of Xiamen (Amoy), Quan Zhou (Chuan Chow), Zhang Zhou (Chang Chow) and the surrounding counties. Other Fujianese are present in Hong Kong but Southern Fujianese are the overwhelming majority.\n\n7 Based on 1971 Census: table 4; Wai 1957:5; Lam 1967:35; 1975 Census Update.\n\n8 Based on 1971 Census, immigration statistics, and 1975 Census Update.\n\n9 A problem with these categories is the Hakka, a distinct ethnic group, whose places of origin often overlap with those of ethnic Guangdongese. One source though (Kuo 1964:65) has estimated the Hakka population of Hong Kong as 12% of the total. For urban North Point the percentage of the predominantly rural Hakka would be substantially lower than for Hong Kong as a whole.\n\n10 Although membership in these \"Fujian\" associations is theoretically open to all Hong Kong Fujianese and some non-Southern Fujianese do indeed belong, the Northern Fujianese of the Fuzhou (Foochow) area have set up their own associations.\n\n11 Fujianese organizations not aligned with the PRC do exist in Hong Kong but are mostly \"paper\" associations.\n\n12 Few Fujianese in Hong Kong are Christians (perhaps 4 or 5%), but those that are mostly arrived in Hong Kong earlier than the bulk of late 1950s and later immigrants and have been largely isolated (both physically and socially) from most aspects of life in Little Fujian.\n\n13 Aidan Southall (1973) makes a related point in using the concept of interaction intensity as key to a definition of \"urban.\"", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1977.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/np198x23n", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 208232, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1977", "page_number": 271, "title": "RAS-1977", "content_text": "LIST OF MEMBERS\n\nORDINARY MEMBERS:\n\nMAO, Dr. P. W. C. -\n\nMARKEY, J. C.-\n\nMATHEW, D.\n\nMATHEWS, D. A. MATHEWS, J. F.\n\nMARTIN, Miss R. M.\n\nMCCABLE, Mrs. S. J.\n\nMCCAHILL, W. -\n\nMCELNEY, B. S.\n\nMCKINNON, J. W.\n\nMELLOR, Mrs. M. -\n\nMINERS, Dr. N. J.\n\nMINTER, C. J. W. -\n\nMORRIS, M. G.\n\nMORROW, Miss S. E.\n\nMOYLE, G. C. -\n\nMULLOY, G. N.\n\nNEWBIGGING, D. K.\n\nNG, Miss Tonia\n\nNG, P. P. K.\n\nNGUYET, Mrs. T.\n\nNISHIMURA, M.\n\nO'HARA, R.\n\nONG, Dr. G. B. -\n\nOXLEY, C. W. B. -\n\n+\n\n+\n\nPALMER, Mrs. R. M.\n\n+\n\n1\n\n-\n\n+\n\n+\n\n+\n\n+\n\n-\n\n+\n\n255\n\n326-8 Tung Ying Building, 100 Nathan Rd.,\n\nKowloon.\n\nEstates Office, University of Hong Kong,\n\nPokfulam Road, Hong Kong.\n\nJardine Matheson & Co. Ltd., World Trade\n\nCentre, Hong Kong.\n\nSM Bowen Road, 3/Fl, Hong Kong,\n\nc/o Legal Dept., Central Government\n\nOffices, Hong Kong.\n\nFlat B 1, 10 Dianthus Road, Yau Yat\n\nChuen, Kowloon.\n\nPenthouse 2, Valverde, 11 May Road,\n\nHong Kong.\n\nAmerican Consulate, 26 Garden Road,\n\nHong Kong.\n\nJohnson Stokes & Master, Hong Kong Bank\n\nBuilding, Hong Kong.\n\nNew Zealand Commission, 3414 Connaught\n\nCentre, Hong Kong.\n\nc/o The Secretary's Office, University of\n\nHong Kong, Pokfulam Road, Hong Kong. 69 Middleton Towers, 140 Pokfulam Road,\n\nHong Kong.\n\nSurvey Research Hong Kong Ltd., 10F\n\nDevelopment House, 30-32 Queen's Road East, Hong Kong.\n\n504 Tower Court, Hysan Avenue,\n\nHong Kong.\n\nFlat 8C, Cambridge Villa, 8-10 Chancery\n\nLane, Hong Kong.\n\n64 Mile Taipo Road, N.T.\n\n6 King's Park, Kowloon,\n\nJardine Matheson & Co. Ltd., Jardine\n\nHouse, Hong Kong.\n\nHong Kong Tourist Association, Connaught\n\nCentre 35/F, Hong Kong.\n\n304 Man Yee Building, Hong Kong. Arts of Asia, Metropole Building Rooms\n\n1002-3, 5/F1, Peking Road, Kowloon. Fook On Building, Block 3, 11th FL, 2, Wan Tau Street, Tai Po Market, N.T. City Hall Library, Edinburgh Place,\n\nHong Kong.\n\n10A Skyline Mansion, 51 Conduit Road,\n\nHong Kong.\n\nc/o District Office Tai Po, Tai Po, N.T.\n\n2, Old Peak Road 2/F Front, Hong Kong.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1977.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/np198x23n", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 208814, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1979", "page_number": 271, "title": "RAS-1979", "content_text": "244\n\nORDINARY LOCAL MEMBERS\n\nDE BURE, Mrs. Ursula, 550 Victoria Road, Block 29, Floor 30, HONG KONG.\n\nDE SILVA, Ms. Minette, Dept. of Architecture, University of Hong Kong, HONG KONG.\n\nDER, The Rev. E. B.,\n\nHoly Trinity Church,\n\n135 Ma Tau Chung Road,\n\nKOWLOON.\n\nDIAMOND, Mr. A. L.,\n\nPublic Records Office of Hong Kong,\n\n2 Murray Road, HONG KONG.\n\nDOHERTY, Ms. Kathleen Rose,\n\n11 Coombe Road,\n\nFlat 1A,\n\nHONG KONG.\n\nDOLFIN, Mr. John, III, 155 Argyle Street, KOWLOON.\n\nDRAKEFORD, Mr. Louis S., 124 Miles Clearwater Bay Road, KOWLOON.\n\nDYER, Mrs. C. E., 233 Prince's Building, HONG KONG.\n\nELSOM, Mr. Graham, J. B., G.P.O. Box 11508, HONG KONG.\n\nEVANS, Prof. D. M. E., School of Law, University of Hong Kong, HONG KONG.\n\nEVANS, Mr. C. J., Flat 9.\n\n8 Mansfield Road, The Peak,\n\nHONG KONG.\n\nFABRY, Mr. K. G., Rural Retreat, Taipo Kau, NEW TERRITORIES.\n\nFABRY, Mrs. R. G., Rural Retreat,\n\nTaipo Kau,\n\nNEW TERRITORIES.\n\nFAN, Mr. Jack F. S., 1-25 Shu Kuk Street,\n\nMay Lun Apartment 14/F, North Point,\n\nHONG KONG\n\nFITZPATRICK, Mr. John,\n\nc/o Jardine Matheson & Co. Ltd. World Trade Centre, 30/F, Causeway Bay,\n\nHONG KONG.\n\nFORSYTH, Mr. A. H., c/o Stevenson & Co., 821 Central Building, 3 Pedder Street, HONG KONG\n\nFORSYTH, Mr. James J., Flat 102,\n\n80 Macdonnell Road, HONG KONG.\n\nGAILEY, Mr. H. G., 81 Mt. Nicholson Gap, HONG KONG\n\nGAILEY, Mrs. Norah, 81 Mt. Nicholson Gap, HONG KONG.\n\nGAMLEN, Mr. Richard, 62 A-D Robinson Road, 19th Floor, Flat B, HONG KONG.\n\nGARCIA, Mr. Arthur, Victoria District Court, HONG KONG.\n\nGARRETT, Mrs. Valery M., 19 Vivian Court, 20 Mount Kellett Road, HONG KONG.\n\nGATELY, Major Charles, c/o Environment Branch, Colonial Secretariat, Lower Albert Road, HONG KONG.\n\nGHOSE, Mrs. Rajeshwari, St. Paul's Convent School, Causeway Bay, HONG KONG.\n\nGIBB, Mr. Hugh, c/o Hong Kong & Shanghai\n\nBanking Corp.,\n\nP.O. Box 64,\n\nHONG KONG.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1979.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/2801w5938", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 209980, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1983", "page_number": 239, "title": "RAS-1983", "content_text": "217\n\nwas great and must have left them with little time or money to spare for their ruined temple. Finally, and almost certainly the most seriously, the influx of a new population, and immense schemes of redevelopment completely altered the generally rural background of village and market town life that still characterised pre-war East Kowloon.\n\nThus, in the Tung Shan Temple we can see a temple, founded for purely rural reasons slowly growing until it became the predominant community temple of the whole of rural East Kowloon. During this period its management changed from a purely private, clan-based system to a typical community temple structure of committee members and chairman of a type typical not only of the rural community temples in the rest of the New Territories but also of those in urban Hong Kong at this date.\n\nFounded in a rural community this temple could, and did, develop both physically and in its management structure to reflect the needs of that community. It could not, however, survive the complete destruction of that community, and its ruination directly reflects the collapse of its founding community in the face of massive urbanisation, and the establishment of the new urban communities created by that urbanisation. The new urban communities have formed their own shrines, and their flourishing condition, alongside the continued ruin of the main temple of the defunct rural community, show more clearly than anything else can the essentially community basis of the temples of this area and their management groups.\n\nNOTES\n\nIn the 1904 Block Crown Lease for Survey District No. 3, New Kowloon, the ownership is recorded in the monk's name Shing Kin (Hsing Star Bridge) and the property is listed under Lot 1101 as temple 0.7 acres, house 0.2 acres, and potato ground 0.33 acres. An entry \"Kwun Yam Temple, Ngau Chi Wan\" had been crossed out by the Assistant Land Officer who recommended that a lease for the temple buildings and site be given to the Registrar General, 28 April 1904.\n\nFrom south-east Kowloon, Ngau Tau Kok and Cha Kwo Ling; from east Kowloon, Ngau Chi Wan, Ping Shek, Sha Tei Yuen, Upper and Lower Yuen Ling and Chu Shi Liu; from central Kowloon, Tai Hom, Po Kong, Nga Tsin Wai, Upper and Lower Sha Po, Nga Tsin Long and Kak Hang; from Kowloon City, the commercial areas, Sai Tau, Tung Tau and Hoklo Village.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1983.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/j9607p61v", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 210872, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1986", "page_number": 223, "title": "RAS-1986", "content_text": "206\n\nCARL SMITH\n\nWhen the London Mission closed its work in Malacca and moved to Hongkong in 1843, Ho A-sun came with it. He wanted his children to have the advantage of education under the direction of Dr. Legge. His eldest child, a daughter, had already been under instruction of Mrs. Legge. She was the one who later married Ng Mun-sow. Two sons were of an age to be in the first small class in Hongkong of the transplanted Anglo-Chinese College.\n\nHo A-sun set himself up in the Lower Bazaar at Hongkong as a block-cutter and printer. His shop was next to the London Mission Chapel on Jervois Street. He had been baptised in Malacca and was an ardent propagandist for his new faith. When customers came to his printing-stationery store he gave them Christian tracts.\n\nHe was always ready to discuss religion with those who showed any interest. After shop hours he would go about the streets distributing literature and explaining the religion the foreigners had brought to China.\n\nWhile he had not the skill at preaching or the education or scholarship of one like Ho Fuk-tong, he had devotion and earnestness which in their own way were impressive. The mission called him “a humble, unobtrusive Christian.”\n\nThrough hard work he was able to acquire sufficient real estate in Hongkong to leave valuable properties at his death in 1869 to each of his six sons. He also provided that the family house on Hollywood Road west of Aberdeen Street be retained as a residence for his widow, sons and grandsons. This property was resumed by Government in 1883 for the purpose of acquiring ground for the erection of a new Central School.\n\nHis older children attended Dr. Legge's school. The younger ones were students at Central School after it was opened in 1862.\n\nThe eldest was Ho A-lloy. He became the most prominent of the family. Dr. Legge characterised him in 1852 as a very promising lad. He was disappointed later, however, when A-lloy had to be excluded from church fellowship for taking on a secondary", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1986.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/jq08c7063", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 212330, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1990", "page_number": 272, "title": "RAS-1990", "content_text": "249\n\nand at six o'clock on December 1st, 1890, 50 electric lights were switched on in Queen's Road Central, Battery Path, and Upper Albert Road. All testing had been done in secret so nothing would mar the excitement of that first night. On the second night a fault put the electric lights out and sceptics were saying, 'I told you so!' A week later, during rain, the lights went out again, and they were not restored for two days. There were no more breakdowns from then on for 26 years.\n\nLater, all streets west as far as Bonham Strand and Caine Road at Mid-Levels, and, later still, along Queen's Road East and Wanchai Road to Mission Hospital Hill (the present site of Ruttonjee Sanitorium) were lit. Hong Kong and Shanghai were the first two Asian cities to have a public electricity supply, and Hong Kong Electric is the only surviving company of the many that pioneered electric power throughout the Far East. It is one of the oldest suppliers of electricity in the world.\n\nOf the three chief men who pioneered the Hong Kong Electric venture, Bendyshe Layton is credited with providing the momentum, and Sir Paul Chater, who was a director for 37 years, was responsible for finance. Capital amounted to $300,000, divided into 30,000 shares of which half were offered to the public. The third person was William Wickham the electrical engineer. He designed and supervised the building of the first power station and remained as manager of the company until 1910.\n\nInterest in electricity soon developed, and, in the 1890s, the first private homes were wired up and electric fans began to replace punkas. Also, by 1898, the first substation was constructed to service the new tall buildings, which had electric lifts (elevators), along the newly reclaimed waterfront. By 1905 the company was supplying power for 15 lifts, hundreds of fans, the equivalent of 34,500 lamps and street lighting. The Royal Naval Dockyard, near where Queensway now runs, was a blaze of light.\n\nPower was later extended, underground, to West Point, then the centre of the colony's busy night life. Subsequently electricity reached the Peak and Shau Kei Wan, and, by 1916, Aberdeen and Ap Lei Chau were supplied. Gradually large organisations like Dairy Farm, Taikoo Docks, the Peak Tram and the University, which had been", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1990.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/d79206299", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 213336, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1994", "page_number": 158, "title": "RAS-1994", "content_text": "140\n\nbeing much lower. One reason for this may be connected with our public image. In the past, our leadership has been closely tied to the Hong Kong \"establishment\", and in tone and membership the Society itself was outwardly and distinctively British. We were probably more interested in learning and passing on information about China to other expatriates than in encouraging local Chinese membership. We could be snobbish and certainly inward-looking, and with very little difficulty could easily degenerate into a cosy little club of people who all knew each other and were mutually comfortable in the association of like with like.\n\nBy degrees, as Hong Kong changed, and as the knowledge of English widened to include a very large school population being educated up to secondary level and above, the Council had become more concerned with encouraging Chinese membership, especially as the Shanghai Chinese element mentioned above had diminished with the passage of time. We had thought of going bilingual, as one or two other of the local cultural societies had done from time to time. We also wondered whether we should change the Society's name by dropping the \"Royal\" prefix; though this has never been a bar to the continued existence, and undoubted success, of the RAS Branches elsewhere in Asia.30 These and other topics were discussed at length during a well-attended Symposium on the present and future state of the Society held in 1987, carefully prepared and largely motivated by the coming reversion of Hong Kong to Chinese sovereignty in 1997.11\n\nFollowing the Symposium, there was a gratifying and considerable increase in membership, perhaps due to the re-energizing of the Society that took place then, and the number and quality of its programmes. However, to this day, there has been no great interest among the English-speaking Chinese public in becoming members. The fault may of course lie in ourselves, through being too British. Yet we have usually prided ourselves on being friendly and outgoing, especially in the last decade; and our venues have been popular and easily accessible ones, like the Urban Council's lecture rooms in the High Block of the City Hall in the Central business district and the lecture room at the Hong Kong Museum of History in Kowloon Park. Partly offsetting this discouraging trend, it should be noted that the Council and its working sub-committees have always included keen Chinese members who contribute much to the Society and its work.\n\nT", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1994.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/zk522640g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 215625, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-2001", "page_number": 402, "title": "RAS-2001", "content_text": "353\n\nA CONTENTIOUS CHRISTIAN MISSIONARY IN CENTRAL CHINA, 1887\n\nKEITH STEVENS\n\nChristian missionaries, especially Victorian, came in for much criticism and derision, as well as great praise for, amongst other things, their devotion to the Chinese man-in-the-street. During the years of bigoted and the blood and thunder Christianity of the Victorian era it was not uncommon for them to be mocked and lampooned by the expatriate business community, sometimes not without reason.\n\nWilliam Spencer Percival relates a hard-to-believe story in the late 1880s during one of his boating and shooting excursions to the Gorges of the Upper Yangzi. The description of Chinese reaction to such an aggressive missionary is probably reasonably accurate and possibly even moderate for the day; and from today's point of view not without some justification.\n\nHis story is related here in full, without comment. While up the river I met a gentleman who was a missionary. He was an Englishman; but belonged to an American-Scotch mission. This may appear to the uninitiated a little mixed, but it is substantially correct.\n\nAmong the various means adopted by the missionary body for Christianising the heathen, this gentleman chose the most curious and original method I ever heard of. Before he was appointed to the ------ mission he was stationed at one of the fortified towns some miles lower down the river. Here he resided in one of the strongholds of Buddha himself, among a people who were entirely ignorant of the first principles of Christianity. I cannot say he hit upon a very wise plan in his style of religious instruction.\n\nThis place, as I have said, was a fortified town, and a very stringent rule of the city - which was occupied by a detachment of troops - was, that the gates should, every night, be closed at ten o'clock. Our worthy Free-Lance of the Cross was very fond of rambling round the country in the cool of the evening, and on many occasions returned long after the gates had been closed. When he found that no entrance was to be", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2001.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/zg651950g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 216222, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-2002", "page_number": 521, "title": "RAS-2002", "content_text": "455\n\ncould sometimes hear barking deer calling from Victoria Peak. At the time one could still hire a sedan chair and four coolies to carry one up to Conduit Road. There were half a dozen or so parked regularly in Wyndham Street, in Central, up until the late 1950s. The fare was 30 cents for each 15 minutes with a 30 cents surcharge. The working life of a chair coolie was said to be eight years.\n\nAs with many houses in Conduit Road at the time, 41 Conduit Road had a superb view and, long before the days of cross-harbour tunnels, one of the pastimes of children was counting the number of ferries they could spot. Between the two World Wars an eccentric Englishman who lived in Robinson Road, not far away, did not own a clock. He used a telescope to tell the time from the clock tower then standing in Pedder Street. In the \"good old days,\" more than one British Governor used the activities in the harbour as a barometer of the strength of the economy. We are talking of times, up until the mid 1930s, when a cannon was fired from Blackhead Point, in Tsim Sha Tsui, to let residents know when a typhoon was approaching or, alternatively, the mail ship had arrived. Occasionally, inhabitants were not sure to which of the two events the firing referred!\n\nWhen the FCC vacated the premises the final days had come for the old mansion at 41 Conduit Road. In 1960, it was bought by Cheng Hing Realty and, in 1966, rebought by Court Properties. As with so much of Hong Kong it was a case of 'Hungry for the new forget the old.' The old building was demolished and the site remained empty for some time. The sale price was reputed to have been $13 million. The site was then redeveloped. In the summer of 1970, there were 1,200 applications to purchase the 400 flats at Realty Gardens. My wife and I were successful in the ballot and we took possession of our newly completed flat in Venice Court, for which we paid, in mid 1972, the princely sum of $114,000. Prices were still low after the property slump brought on largely by the drawn-out 1967 riots. My flat has been a splendid investment. We let it for the first four years, unfurnished, at $2,000 a month. We moved in ourselves on 1 March 1976.\n\nAlthough I can see a narrow strip of the harbour and Stonecutters Island (an island no longer) from my bedroom window, my flat at Realty Gardens in fact faces south. It is thus shielded from the cold north-easterly monsoon in the winter and receives the benefits of the cool", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2002.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/mp4901278", "rank": 0 } ]