[ { "id": 209770, "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": 29, "title": "RAS-1983", "content_text": "SO KON PO (M): NOTES FOR THE VISIT MADE BY MEMBERS OF THE SOCIETY, 26TH NOVEMBER 1983\n\nThe Hong Kong Government's Gazetteer of Place Names in Hong Kong, Kowloon and the New Territories (1960) describes the area as follows:\n\n\"This locality is centred around the Government Stadium (KV101659) with a disused cemetery and a cottage resettlement area, known as Ching Man Tsuen or So Kon Po Resettlement Area (ER***H) on the slopes around that stadium.\n\nAn adjoining locality, which includes several sports grounds and a large Government garage north of So Kon Po, is known as Caroline Hill.\"\n\nAs will be seen from Revd. Carl Smith's notes (which follow), this notice gives no idea of the interesting history and development of So Kon Po. A small traditional rice-growing Chinese hamlet in 1841 its main livelihood extinguished by early British expropriation of its paddy fields, along with those of Wong Nai Chung village in the adjoining Happy Valley, to prevent sickness among the new settlers it later saw other farming ventures under different owners, and industrial ventures connected with Jardine Matheson's activities at East Point, close by. After a second take-over of private land by Government in the 1920s it experienced conversion to large scale recreational use, with the Government Stadium and several other recreational grounds and facilities.\n\nThis covering note is, however, more concerned with other aspects of human activity in this still picturesque valley, for it contains a number of, by now, well established institutions. These exemplify the varied strands of Hong Kong's life, and the influences which have been brought to bear on our community over the years.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1983.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/j9607p61v", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 209779, "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": 38, "title": "RAS-1983", "content_text": "The area is bounded to the east by King's Road, to the west by Leighton Road, to the north by Tung Lo Wan Road, and to the south by Caroline Hill Road and Cotton Path.\n\nA prospectus for the new company was issued in August 1897, with J. J. Bell-Irving of Jardines as Chairman of the Board and a capital of $1,200,000. The mill began operation on 1 June 1899 with 12,000 spindles, with an anticipated full capacity of about 50,000 spindles. The company, however, was plagued by set-backs. It closed at the end of 1910. After a time, it was revived only to be forced to close again permanently in 1914, when its machinery was removed to Shanghai and the land and buildings sold for $400,000. The purchasers were the French Sisters of St. Paul of Chartres.\n\nThe Order had come to Hong Kong in 1848 and located in Wanchai, where they opened the \"Asile de Sainte Enfance\" to receive abandoned children. As the years passed, the Wanchai location became increasingly undesirable. In 1908 the Sisters opened a Hospital in Wong Nei Chung valley. In 1914, when they bought the cotton mill premises, they converted some of the mill buildings for their own purposes and later built new and more adequate accommodation for a convent, St. Paul's Convent School, an orphanage, a hospital, and a church.\n\nThe same year that Keswick transferred IL 1018 to the cotton mill, he conveyed the remaining part of the valley to Sir Robert Jardine. In time, the land came into the possession of the Government, which used it as sites for the Hong Kong Stadium, the South China Stadium, and a recreation ground.\n\nOn the Caroline Hill side of the valley was a large Chinese cemetery. Gravestones and other reminders of the cemetery can still be found among the trees and underbrush.\n\nFive trustees for the Japanese Community acquired a site in So Kon Po Valley in 1911 (Inland Lot 1879). The trustees transferred the site to the Japanese Benevolent Society in 1918. In 1920, the Benevolent Society was merged with the Japanese Education Society to form the Japanese Residents Association. A plot plan of the lot shows buildings that appear to be a temple. The lot is probably the same as that now occupied by the Hong Kong Buddhist Association School.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1983.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/j9607p61v", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 212957, "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-1993", "page_number": 25, "title": "RAS-1993", "content_text": "position, to avoid total loss of face for them.\n\nIt has been pointed out by Elizabeth Croll that the party cadres were very much concerned about the scale of wedding banquets which was a symbol of their status and a means to induce favourable attitudes from others. However, these incidents had been condemned by the government-controlled media, and face had been denounced as belonging to the lot of feudal ills which had to be discontinued in the socialist era (Croll, 1981: 124-126). Surprisingly, despite this denunciation, the concept of face or the word itself did not disappear altogether in the press. As a matter of fact, it was even being directly used by government officials and the government media,\n\nOn 19 May 1985, the Chinese soccer team lost to Hong Kong in a World Cup Qualifying Round match. Afterwards, members of the crowd leaving the Beijing Workers' Stadium damaged public properties. They even attacked foreigners, their cars and shouted at them in the capital's streets. News reports and comments which covered this event accused those who created disorder as losing the nation's face.\" While there are direct proofs of the existence of \"face\" in these \"slips-of-the-tongue\", the question as to how much has been swallowed up or how much has been concealed awaits investigation,\n\nNot only was the nation's face being at stake amidst outbursts of hooliganism, but also in terms of economic activities. GNP figures have been low in China, at least not compatible with a big country. The face of the country, the government and her people, was challenged and threatened in view of the growing strength of other countries. This put China into a dilemma. On the one hand, she could not deny the success of other countries, but on the other, she could not sink behind them or lose face before them due to her sense of national superiority (Hsu, 1981: 411).\n\nTo maintain that China was still a great country, a superior nation under the Communists, the burden was put on the media. Figures in bicycle production in China and India, a rather trivial topic, had been compared to highlight the former's success.\" These types of contents were badly needed in view of the growing exposure of Chinese people to Western products and achievements (Funadashi, 1985: 232).", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1993.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/66833t302", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 213289, "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": 111, "title": "RAS-1994", "content_text": "91\n\nThere are, for example, the Nine Stars and the 24 Mountains. The 24 Celestial Mansions, the 24 Fortnightly Climatic Periods, the 24 Characters, and the Five Elements are also represented. The compass, made from timber and coated with lacquer, not only tells direction, namely east, south, west, north and centre (the 'five' cardinal points), but it also shows the position of the sun at different periods of the year. To use the compass the base is placed parallel with the door, wall or other object to be oriented. The rings are then rotated so that things are lined up.\n\nAs a model of the universe, then, the loh poon helps its fung shui master interpret and predict, from the mystic Chinese characters, the client's future. This is done with the 'Eight Trigrams' forming the paat kwa (the eight-sided divining diagram as detailed in the I Ching) which is displayed on the inner section of the compass (Sung, 1934; and Sung, 1935). With the 'Eight Trigrams' two parallel continuous lines represent the 'Great Male Principle', and two parallel broken lines represent the 'Great Female Principle', and so on.\n\nThe ancient book, the I Ching, is regarded as almost sacred in some quarters and dates back to about 2800 BC, although the oldest extant commentaries were probably written closer to 1300 BC (Markert, 1986). The I Ching deals with prognostication, fortune telling and philosophy, with sets of symbols and different ways of combining these symbols so that they form titular statements. Much is written in poetic language which is difficult for the lay Chinese to understand.\n\nThese Trigrams mentioned above, made up of broken and unbroken lines in various relationships, are loathed by evil spirits in the same way that Holy Water, blessed by a Christian Priest, will fight evil.\n\nIn fact in China's Fujian Province, to the North-east of Hong Kong, large circular, communal dwellings have one ring of houses encircling another ring (Huang, 1994, 11). A whole complex, as large as an Olympic stadium, houses hundreds of families. Such structures are said to be earthquake proof and designed to provide natural temperature control. Each complex is shaped similar to the baat kwa, as outlined above.\n\nAs previously stated Chinese culture is woven around the 'Five Elements' in various ways (Needham, 1956, 243). The Five are employed, in fung shui, after consulting both the lunar and solar calendars (which", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1994.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/zk522640g", "rank": 0 } ]