[ { "id": 204534, "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-1963", "page_number": 15, "title": "RAS-1963", "content_text": "10\n\nLINDSAY RIDE\n\nLet us first go to the top of Monte Fort and view this historic spot where so many foreigners lived their eastern lives and not a few found eternal rest. From the Fort we can see practically the whole of the peninsula and the city of Macao. To the east, beyond the Guia lighthouse, stretches the South China Sea, studded by the Ladrone Islands of which the two nearest - Taipa and Coloane form part of this overseas Province of Portugal. Between these islands and the peninsula lie the Macao Roads and the Outer Harbour. To the west can be seen the narrow neck of land with its barrier gate which bars access to the large delta island of Heung Shan and to the mainland of China. Separating the main portion of this island from the city of Macao, is the Inner Harbour whose two lines of junks, Communist and Macanese, are separated only by the narrow fairway used by the larger sea-going junks, launches and the Hong Kong ferries. Just below us as we view this busy scene, stands, stately and calm, the façade of all that remains of the Jesuit Church of St. Paul, commenced in the sixteenth century, completed in the seventeenth and destroyed by fire in the nineteenth century,\n\nBehind it, almost at the harbour's edge, is a low wooded hill whose trees shelter the Camoens Grotto and on whose lower slopes nestle the Camoens Gardens and the neighbouring cemetery.\n\nIt is but a short walk from the Fort to the cemetery and gardens, access to both of which is gained from a small grassed and treed square the Praça Luis de Camões. On the extreme right as we enter this square, is a high stucco wall pierced by a most unimpressive gateway over which is mounted a small tablet; on which is carved:\n\nPROTESTANT CHURCH\n\nAND\n\nOLD CEMETERY\n\n(EAST INDIA COMPANY 1814)\n\nThis inscription poses a number of questions, a characteristic which, as you will find out later, it shares with many of the inscriptions in the cemetery itself; in fact it is the attempt to solve these problems that supplies much of the fascination and the interest of this cemetery. What was the British East India\n\nPage 15\n\nPage 16", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1963.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/4m90m091v", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 205546, "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-1968", "page_number": 88, "title": "RAS-1968", "content_text": "FAN LAU AND ITS FORT\n\n83\n\noverlooking various approaches in connection with the maritime defence of the Chu Kong estuary.2\n\nIn the past vessels proceeding towards Canton from northerly points used two main routes. The first was an inner route through Fat Tong Mun1 into Kowloon Bay by way of Lei Yu Mun, after which a stop was made near the present day Kowloon City. Vessels then proceeded through what is today's Hongkong harbour towards Kap Shui Mun. Continuing northwestwards, they negotiated the inner Tai Yu Shan passage towards Lung Kwu island, using for their landmark Castle Peak (1, Shing Shan) the same landmark that Sung sailors used centuries ago to pinpoint the then bustling emporium of Tuen Mun, located near its base. From then on, ships continued towards their destination, stopping either at Lin Tin or at Nam Tau with a final clearance at Fu Mun.\n\nA second approach used by vessels was to raise their landfall at Pak Tsim, Yung Hai, or at Tam Kong (see page 87 for these places), and thence to proceed through the Sam Chau Mun picking up the twin-peaked heights of Fung Wong Shan, the highest point in the Tai Yu Shan, as a navigational landmark. On this bearing, ships entered the estuary of the Chu Kong at a point below Fan Lau fort. From Fan Lau they set course for Lung Kwu, before continuing up the estuary to Fu Mun and then to Canton.\n\nThe importance of Fan Lau to the Chinese coastal defence system lies in its location athwart the entrance of the Chu Kong estuary. The headland of Fan Lau too, made an excellent navigational landmark for ships approaching the estuary.\n\nFan Lau fort\n\nThe fort is sited on high ground about 235 feet above sea level. The exterior dimensions are 155 feet by 70 feet. The stone walls vary from 3 to 7 feet in width depending on the extent to which the existing walls have crumbled (plate 7). The height of the walls also varies, being higher at the southern end facing the sea than at the northern end. The area inside the fort covers no more than 7,380 square feet (123 feet by 60 feet). The smallness of this area suggests that the structure was a small outpost fitting the description of “guard-station\" rather than \"fort\", although it appears on a map in the Kwong Tung Tung Chi as the Tai Yu Shan pao tai (*: literally \"Tai Yu Shan gun terrace\").", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1968.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/66833948d", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 205728, "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-1969", "page_number": 34, "title": "RAS-1969", "content_text": "28 \n\nT. C. CHENG \n\nNOTES \n\n1 During these early years, schools like the Morrison School, operated by the Morrison Education Society founded by Dr. Robert Morrison, the Anglo-Chinese School (or Ying Wah School) operated by Dr. James Legge of the London Missionary Society (Dr. Legge is best known for his translation of the Chinese classics and for his appointment as the first professor of Chinese at Oxford University in 1874), and St. Paul's College operated by the Anglican Bishop, were dismal failures whether from the missionary or from the educational point of view. In 1855, the Governor Sir John Bowring had this to say about St. Paul's College: \"For the last six years, £250 a year has been voted by Parliament to the Bishop's College for the education of 6 persons destined to the public service, and not a single individual from that College has been yet declared competent to undertake the meanest department of an interpreter's duty\n\nSee E. J. Eitel, Europe in China, London; Luzac and Co., 1895, p. 349.\n\n2 On p. 60 of Fragrant Harbour by G. B. Endacott and A. Hinton, a statement was made that Ng Choy was \"educated at the old Central School (Queen's College)\". I find no evidence to support this.\n\n3 As a result of the founding of the Government Central School (the present Queen's College) in 1862, a number of educated Chinese well-versed in both Chinese and English had been produced, who began to regard Hong Kong as their home town and who began to develop a keen interest in the welfare of Hong Kong. Thus leading Chinese founded the Tung Wah Hospital in 1870 and the Po Leung Kuk in 1880. It is of interest to note that in the 1870's, the educated Chinese actually pressed for the election of representatives to form a Chinese Municipal Board. In 1878, when the foreign community protested against Sir John Hennessy's policy of lenient treatment of prisoners, the Chinese in Hong Kong for the first time despatched an address to Queen Victoria which was in effect a vote of confidence in the Government.\n\n4 G. B. Endacott, Government and People in Hong Kong, p. 94. *G. B. Endacott, Government and People in Hong Kong, p. 94.\n\n6 In 1862 an Institute of Foreign Languages was founded in Peking and translation bureaux were established to translate scientific books into Chinese. In 1866 the first modern shipbuilding yard was started in Foochow, Fukien, and from 1872 to 1875 four batches of selected young Chinese scholars, totalling 120, were sent to the U.S.A. to further their studies.\n\n7 General Chan (陳炯明, Chen Chiung-ming) revolted against Sun Yat-sen in Canton in June 1922. For details about this revolt, see Tang Leang-li's The Inner History of The Chinese Revolution, London, p. 140.\n\n8 G. B. Endacott, A History of Hong Kong, p. 199.\n\n9 G. B. Endacott, Government and People in Hong Kong, p. 98.\n\n10 After 2 years there, Yung Wing (容閎, Rong Hong) went to Yale University and was the first Chinese to graduate from that famous institution in 1854. Yung later became a famous person in the history of modern China, being responsible for the opening of the first school of mechanical engineering in Shanghai; the formation of the China Merchant Steamship Navigation Company; the translation of many scientific books into Chinese; and the sending of young Chinese scholars to the U.S.A. for western studies in the 1870's. In the case of Wong Foon, after 2 years' study in the U.S.A., he crossed the Atlantic to Scotland and entered the University of Edinburgh where he graduated with honours in medicine and surgery. He returned to Canton in 1857 and distinguished himself as a surgeon. See also Lo Hsiang-lin, Hong Kong and Western Cultures, Honolulu, East-West Center, 1964, Chapter 4, \"Yung Hung (Yung Wing) and Foreign Schemes\".", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1969.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/9g553n20d", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 206963, "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-1974", "page_number": 34, "title": "RAS-1974", "content_text": "ADVENTURERS IN HONG KONG: THE MARQUIS DE MORES AND DAVID DE MAYRENA\n\nHENRY JAMES LETHBRIDGE*\n\nAdventurers at Government House\n\nIn the nineteenth century Hong Kong's Government House quickly established itself as one of the best caravanserais in the whole Far East. There were then few good hotels in Hong Kong so that His Excellency the Governor usually felt under a strong social obligation to accommodate at government expense any distinguished visitor from abroad; less prestigious persons would be invited to a function—dinner, soirée, levée — and journalists, writers, and other small fry granted in most cases only an interview. It is clear from Sir William Des Voeux's memoirs1 that at certain seasons Hong Kong swarmed with globe-trotters, nearly all of whom would wish to pay their respects to Her Britannic Majesty's representative at Government House.\n\nDes Voeux declares2 that two of the most extraordinary visitors he received at Government House were David de Mayréna, 'King of the Sedangs', and the Marquis Antoine de Morès, 'Emperor of the Badlands', both of whom arrived in Hong Kong in November of 1888 and left behind the remarkable legend that they had fought a duel. This essay is an attempt to describe their strange histories and to explore some questions relating to what may be termed 'the sociology of adventure'. Inevitably such an inquiry must invite discussion of why Europeans left their homeland, for they went overseas not only in pursuit of wealth but in search of a destiny, a term that suggests a number of psychological and sociological problems.\n\nOn 14 November 1888 the Danish steamer Frejr, a small vessel of 397 tons, engaged in the coastal trade and commanded by a Captain Lund, anchored in Hong Kong harbour after a three days\n\nMr. Lethbridge who is Reader in Sociology at the University of Hong Kong is well known for his earlier contributions on local society and government which have appeared in this Journal and elsewhere.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1974.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/x633mp077", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 206973, "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-1974", "page_number": 44, "title": "RAS-1974", "content_text": "38 \n\nH. J. LETHBRIDGE \n\nsize—we hear the gong, and set off along its passages into the dining room. It is a regular hall, 50 or 60 yards long. The far side is broken by a row of French windows opening on to the stone verandah, which looks out over the harbour. A double row of great white punkahs, down the whole length of the place, swing slowly. The bright blazing sunshine outside is tempered by green blinds, let down over the arches of the verandah. Thirty or forty Chinese \"boys\" in complete and flowing white, keep up a perpetual come and go in their attendance on the tables. These suitably imposing surroundings became the setting for Mayréna's Hong Kong adventure.\n\nMayréna, the China Mail animadverted, ‘from an ardent pietist became a man of the world... He became an admirer of the opera and with royal prodigality distributed tickets to his friends'. The 'Queen' with her dames d'honneur were welcomed frequently at the Hotel, the 'Queen' arriving in a chair with four bearers, draped in regal sashes. Hong Kong, of course, was electrified by Mayréna's theatrical coups; but money was not forthcoming from the amused public. J.J. Francis, for example, was almost persuaded to finance a company for the working of the new kingdom but at the last moment backed out; other astute European businessmen refused to invest. But the King continued to make friends, to enchant his visitors, and to hold nightly revels in the public rooms and tap-rooms of the Hotel. After all, Mayréna, a great showman, provided splendid entertainment for a dull little Colony, accustomed to a stale diet of 'At Homes' and stodgy dinner-parties.\n\nUnluckily, Mayréna's waking hours were dogged by one Afong, a Chinese shopkeeper from Haiphong, who had supplied a large number of uniforms for the King's warrior hosts and had come to Hong Kong to present his bill. The jaunty Mayréna at first ‘gave it out that the Chinaman was a member of a syndicate that wished to advance him money; but as this story would hardly hold for long, the Chinaman was finally appeased'. It soon became clear, then, that Mayréna was not a man of substance, that his schemes were insubstantial, and that he was simply an amusing adventurer, good for a convivial debauch but hardly a sound partner in any serious business venture.\n\nIt was, however, the editor of the China Mail, George Murray Bain, who really brought about Mayréna's downfall by a systema-", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1974.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/x633mp077", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 207483, "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": 251, "title": "RAS-1975", "content_text": "CAPTIVE SURGEON IN HONG KONG\n\n243\n\nRed Cross X-ray films but by then we had no developer. We were very glad to receive from the Japanese some bars of coarse washing soap which we badly needed. We were also given 200 envelopes of tooth powder, some material for sewing and for boot repairs and some drugs including T.A.B. for inoculations.\n\nIn January 1945 we had to render yet another list of patients suffering from serious visual defects, arranged by nationalities, and this list recorded a total of 65. No mail had come in for some time but some did arrive on 18 and 19 January, my latest letter from home being dated August 1944. Christmas and New Year messages were delivered to us from Red Cross Societies in many of the allied countries.\n\nThe month however was dominated by American air attacks on Hong Kong. By 8 January we had had 17 air alerts without a raid and on 15 January we had a two-hour raid. On 16 January occurred the most spectacular and effective of all our raids. It began about 8 a.m., went on till noon, was resumed during the afternoon and continued until dark. The all-clear was sounded at 9:30 p.m. During raids, all movement in the hospital was prohibited but we had to go out of doors to reach our kitchen and as the morning went on, I went out myself, as of course there was no interpreter about and by signs got the agreement of the guard to draw breakfast, which we eventually got about 11 a.m. It was 2 p.m. before we got dinner and not till after 6 o'clock was it possible to draw tea. All bearers of food had to hasten to get under cover with the greatest possible despatch.\n\nIn the hospital, Japanese standing orders were to keep all shutters closed during raids or run the risk of being shot at. My little bunk in a converted lavatory overlooked the harbour and it was not difficult to open a shutter far enough to get glimpses of what was going on. Three large Japanese cargo ships were anchored in the harbour and the American air attack was pressed by dive-bombing through very heavy fire in the most courageous fashion. At times the whole atmosphere seemed full of the sound of sustained gunfire and bomb explosions and the amount of ammunition used in the defence must have made a serious inroad on Japanese stocks. I did not see any aircraft brought down though there must have been casualties, but at the end of the day three cargo ships were badly listing and clearly unseaworthy for a long time to come. Fires were left burning in oil storage tanks on Stonecutters Island and elsewhere, and this day was to us a most impressive...", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1975.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/j0995146d", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 212193, "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": 135, "title": "RAS-1990", "content_text": "112 \n\nto walk along the paths which follow the mountain slope, when it began to rain heavily. Spying close-by a house, with an attractive green-tiled roof, we approached proposing to ask permission to 'phone for a taxi. \n\nI rang the bell and put my request to the Chinese boy who opened the door. He showed me in, leaving the door ajar, so that my wife, who remained outside, should not feel shut out; and led me to the 'phone in the hall. He was about to dial for me, when a voice in the distance asked, curtly as I thought, who I wanted. We were by then pretty well soaked and I suppose we did look rather like tramps. It was the lady of the mansion. I explained our predicament. She motioned to the instrument, then moved to the far end of the room, without inviting in my wife, whom she saw waiting outside. The boy got busy on the 'phone and eventually connected me, when the voice was heard instructing him to \"close that door\". He was most embarrassed and apologetically shut it on my wife. The taxi firm having promised to send for us, I rejoined her outside in the rain, where we remained for ten minutes until the car arrived. \n\nI would not have the reader think that such behaviour was typical of British manners in Hongkong. It was not, but it was characteristic of a small clique, which is found in most British colonies, courting a reflected lustre on the fringe of the official hierarchy. \n\nI think possibly its geography explains to some extent the notorious snobbery of Hongkong. Living, say, in Victoria, an invitation to dinner on the Peak was of doubtful attraction. It meant starting off in a taxi to the higher level, where there would only too probably be a heavy mist, and perhaps rain as well. You would have to leave your taxi to walk up several hundred steps to the house, built on the steep hillside, arriving with wet feet and, if wearing a raincoat, probably also drenched in sweat. \n\nOn another occasion the invitation might be to dine in Kowloon. That would involve going down to the jetty, crossing the harbour in the ferry, picking up a taxi on the other side, and so reaching your host's house without too much difficulty; but, unless you left in time to catch the last return ferry at midnight dinner in the Far East \n\n― \n\nyou would have to \n\nseldom starts before nine, or half past nine search for a walla-walla boat, a small type of taxi motor-launch; there \n\n! \n\n! \n\nPage 135\n\nPage 136", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1990.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/d79206299", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 212394, "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": 336, "title": "RAS-1990", "content_text": "313\n\nlarge balloons in the sky with banners attached calling on Group Members to purchase real estate.\n\nThe group leaders, Rosemary Lee and Anita Wilson, had done their preparatory work thoroughly. But the weather did not behave according to plan. Rain prevented a visit to the botanical gardens on the last day. The newly completed Harbour View Holiday Inn Hotel was comfortable with generally good service. The plumbing really worked unlike in some provinces such as Inner Mongolia and Xinjiang even if there were complications with key tags having to be wedged into light master-switches with a small wad of paper. But all banquets come to an end and Members arrived back in Hong Kong with fond memories of their three days' break.\n\nT\n\nI-\n\nDAN WATERS\n\nFurther Reading\n\nCourtauld, Caroline, An Illustrated Guide to Fujian, (1988) Hughes, George, Amoy and the Surrounding Districts, [1872]\n\nMcCunn, Ruthanne Lum, An Illustrated History of the Chinese in America, (1979) Pitcher, Philip Wilson, In and About Amoy (1912)", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1990.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/d79206299", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 212401, "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": 343, "title": "RAS-1990", "content_text": "320\n\nwho acted upon them. By piecing together this information, Bartlett has begun the reconstruction of the inner, secret workings of the Qing government. We can build from this base to explore other crucial issues.\n\nMICHAEL IPSON\n\nArthur Power Dudden. The American Pacific: From the Old China Trade to the Present. New York and Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1992. xx + 314 pp. Index.\n\nWhen Christopher Columbus discovered the Americas, he was attempting to find an alternative sea route to the exotic trading wealth of Cathay, as Westerners then called China. It is perhaps symbolic that 1992, the quincentenary of his momentous voyage, should finally bring the publication of a work which summarizes between one pair of covers the history of American involvement in the Pacific. Despite a plethora of monographs, many of them excellent, on almost every aspect of this topic, and several fine works on American relations with particular Pacific countries, there has long been a need for such a volume. Both Arthur Power Dudden, the Fairbank Professor of History at Bryn Mawr College, situated in a city with more than two centuries of activity in the China trade, and Oxford University Press, are to be thanked for producing this survey. General readers and college students in search of an introductory survey will unite in welcoming The American Pacific.\n\nFor more than two centuries, the United States has been active in Pacific affairs. From the late eighteenth century onwards, the Pacific was the major focus for American missionary endeavours and an important venue of United States commercial activities. The Philippines, by far the most substantial American \"colony\", were acquired in 1898. In the twentieth century, the Pearl Harbour attack would impel the United States into war against both Japan and Germany. Under the pressure of the Cold War, within the next three decades Americans would engage in costly interventions in civil wars in both Korea and Vietnam, in the second case destroying much of their own self-confidence in their imperial mission. Today many Americans see the economic power of Japan as the most serious international threat to their own country, while Asian immigration has dramatically changed the racial mix of the United States.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1990.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/d79206299", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 212601, "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-1991", "page_number": 155, "title": "RAS-1991", "content_text": "Maymyo 1941 \n\nGUERILLA TRAINING* \n\nP. H. MUNRO-FAURE \n\n135 \n\nThe shortage of British shipping along the China coast became more marked during 1940 and 1941. The vessels built for this traffic, generally between three and four thousand tons in measurement, with comparatively shallow draft, were particularly suitable for use in the Persian Gulf and along the shores of North Africa. Many had been taken to serve as transports in those seas. Moreover, the Admiralty, sensitive to the dangers threatening the peace of the Far East, had directed such larger ocean-going vessels as still were available not to proceed west of Singapore. Consequently there was pressure on the remaining cabin space, and I was fortunate to obtain a berth in a small coaster, which took seven days to reach Hongkong from Shanghai, as against the usual four.\n\nHongkong was very quiet, a state of affairs not to be attributed to an entire absence of females. It was remarkable how many had succeeded in avoiding the order to leave the Colony. I had to wait a whole week for a passage to Singapore, where formerly berths on a dozen different ships would have been offered in the time. This gave me an opportunity to look around. Friends took me out to Deep Water Bay, where we sunbathed on the beach, and drank our tea on the club verandah, looking out over the little golf course. High up on the hill towards Wong Nei Chong Gap I could see the green tiled roof of the house where my wife and I, only three years previously, had been caught in the rain. I wondered whether the lady of the mansion was one of those who had contrived to remain behind. In the evening we drove round to the next bay and bathed from the Lido, a steel and concrete building of pleasing design housing a restaurant, and bathing booths. The hot weather had set in, but here a cool breeze blew down a gully on the hillside into the windows. I had always liked the place because of its informality. You could eat your dinner, and dance and talk, in shorts, and so keep cool, as compared with the stricter etiquette of the Gloucester and Hongkong Hotels, or the Repulse Bay Hotel, or even the Peninsular Hotel across the harbour, where several nights a week you were required to don “black ties”.\n\n*This is the third part of the Memoirs of Col. P H. Munro-Faure. See Editor's Note, p 61, vol. 29, and Plate I", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1991.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/k356gt84j", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 212602, "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-1991", "page_number": 156, "title": "RAS-1991", "content_text": "136\n\nThe charming English custom of dressing for dinner is ill adapted to the perspiring tropics.\n\nWhen the walla-walla boat took me out to the coaster anchored in the harbour, I found she was even smaller than the ship I had come on from Shanghai, and slower. The run to Singapore, which the larger ships cover in a little over three days, again took a week. It is true we had to make a considerable detour to avoid the extensive belt of mines laid round the Singapore harbour, and we were kept waiting outside pending permission to enter.\n\nWhile anchored there, I was astonished to observe a launch, flying the Japanese flag, and towing a string of fishing craft, steam in over the minefield. On enquiry I was told that Singapore could not do without fish. It later transpired that many of the fishermen were Japanese naval officers in disguise, and that there was little they did not know about the British minefields. Only a few months previously, while undergoing cross-examination in court, a Japanese consular official detained on a charge of espionage had swallowed poison to avoid having to give evidence; but, presumably in the interest of the breakfast table, the Japanese fishermen continued to receive the benefit of the doubt. The big talk of the moment was the scandal of the bribes which had been paid on large contracts for the construction of the new concrete pill-boxes, which were being erected around the island. It was alleged that the quality of the concrete supplied was sometimes little better than plaster, and that some of the leading British firms were implicated. It was all a trifle disturbing.\n\nThe further you got from Shanghai and the nearer to India the worse the plumbing. In Shanghai, American influence had overcome British conservatism with happy results. In the foreign home there was generally a bathroom to each bedroom, and the fixtures were as pleasing to the eye as in use. Stainless steel vied with coloured plastic and the right use of glass to gratify the visitor. In Hongkong the standard lagged a bit. In Singapore it was a long way behind. The bathroom floor might be mere wood, and the walls just homely white tiles. No incentive here to dawdle in delectable contemplation. Even in the famous Raffles Hotel, a barrack descended from earlier times, the bathroom, though no doubt sumptuous enough by English standards, left much to be desired. If I remember rightly it even contained a primeval article of furniture called a \"wash-hand stand”.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1991.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/k356gt84j", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 214101, "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-1997", "page_number": 169, "title": "RAS-1997", "content_text": "138\n\nlikely each walled, using courtyards to form internal spaces for living and congregating and no formal external spaces for public gatherings. The latter structures were erected by Portuguese engineers, naval officers and church officials according to the general principles of building of their culture and time. The city was immediately divided into two - a fortified western city and housing for the Chinese outside the walls.\n\nIn the course of these first three centuries of occupation, we see a growing formalisation of the city. The earliest map we can find of the city is one published in 1796 by Sir George Staunton in his report on the Macartney embassy to China (Hong Kong Museum of Art 1996). Redrawn for clarity here as Figure 1, the original is annotated to identify six forts, three parishes, two colleges, four convents, four chapels and sixteen locations of note, including two Chinese temples. There are obvious mistakes in the overall shoreline when compared to more modern surveys but the form of the city can be seen. The inner and primary harbour is on the northwest shore which is more protected. The outer harbour on the southeast, the Praia Grande, is lined with buildings,\n\nFigure 1: 1796 including the governor's house, the houses of leading traders and significant ecclesiastical institutions. At the southern tip is a hill on which forts and churches stand, with temples as its base. The urban pattern is one that urban theorists in Europe such as Camillo Sitte would be familiar with and perhaps use as an exemplar. Organic growth between the Praia Grande and the harbour has led to narrow winding streets that open into wider intersections.\n\nPlazas are formed adjacent to the significant churches. A large market square is found in the middle of the city. The fabric of the city is woven from filaments of narrow lanes and nodes where people gather. Although we have no earlier maps of the city, the same pattern can be seen in the 1598 engraving of Macao (Amacao) by Theodore de Bry (Hong Kong Museum of Art 1996) with the Praia, the harbour, squares and churches.\n\nLooking at the 1898 map (Figure 2, from Hurley 1898), we see the", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1997.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/wp98g7579", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 214103, "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-1997", "page_number": 171, "title": "RAS-1997", "content_text": "140\n\nMacau's inner harbour is extended around the north-western flank and ship yards appear along the coast. The city grows to meet the new edge with street patterns in keeping with the forms of the older city. Streets follow contours or natural edges. Larger spaces appear at intersections of streets of odd angles. We see the first intimations of a more formal city plan being made at the northern, agricultural edge of the city in the centre of the peninsula in an area now known as San Antonio. Here the planner has organised city blocks in a rectilinear street pattern with a large square where streets meet at 45°, reminiscent of Cerda's plan for Barcelona of 1859.\n\nFigure 3: 1912\n\nThe map of 1927 shows us the first dramatic intentions to grow. The initial expansion shown in 1912 is mostly completed, the central square implemented, diagonal streets breaking up the overlaid grid. City blocks and urban forms are created which show more order than the old city but still retain the same scale. The new sections of town show another heritage, however, large sections of reclamation are laid out with indications of intended street patterns, all laid out on strictly rectilinear forms. The expansion into the small remaining areas of agricultural land mediates the change, shifting from tightly woven streets to straight avenues. Accidental gathering places no longer happen as streets meet at odd angles. A large park is shown in the centre to provide a formal open space of a city scale. This is the section of town into which the growing middle class move, traders without established trading houses. Many too are the members of the growing Eurasian community who now control much of the local economy.\n\nThe scale of the 1927 expansion is significantly different from previous growth, just as the scale of the harbour facilities shown are larger. A new sense of the world is manifested - the impact of an ordered manufactured world can be found in this by now quiet trading station. Massive reclamation is required to implement this plan. In an effort to bring back some of the sea-going shipping trade, the main harbour is to be moved from the inner harbour to the outer. Harbour walls are to be built to the south east in an (ultimately futile)\n\nFigure 4: 1927", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1997.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/wp98g7579", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 214497, "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-1998", "page_number": 355, "title": "RAS-1998", "content_text": "324\n\nthey danced they conspicuously imbibed large quantities of beer and Chinese spirit wines and were showered with water. Although some of the drink was spat out, the dancers' actions became increasingly drunken, with some entering a short-lived trance-like state. After about thirty minutes the dancing concluded with the eating of lettuce, the presentation of _lassie_ and the lighting of a string of firecrackers. The group then set off by van for other markets and fish trading establishments, with the final dance of the morning outside the \"Red Market\" due to be the most drunken of all.\n\nFor much of our knowledge of the Dance Festival, in particular the history and legend, we are indebted to Mrs. Ana Brito, an anthropologist from the Macau Maritime Museum, who as part of her studies on the Festival had interviewed a number of the dancers the year before. Copies of her notes in English, generously supplied to us by Mrs. Brito, show that the Festival was brought to Macau some decades ago from Sek Kei District in nearby Zhongshan County. According to a version of the legend that gave rise to the Drunken Dragon Dance, a certain village had been plagued by a terrible epidemic. In despair the villagers held a procession in Buddha's honour. As the procession was winding its way through the village a dragon in the guise of an enormous serpent arose out of the river. The serpent was killed, hacked into pieces and thrown back into the river, which turned blood red. The villagers drank the water and were miraculously cured.(1)&(2)\n\nLeaving the Dragon to make its way through the Inner Harbour area we left for Coloane Village, where festivities were centred on the Tam Gong Temple on the waterfront. This was heavily decorated and had all the trappings and atmosphere of a well-attended Chinese festival. There were many worshippers, as well as beggars, and clouds of smoke from joss sticks and fireworks. We played our part with Dr Patrick Hase lighting the RAS HK string of firecrackers. Nearby a large matshed had been erected where stars from the Cantonese opera world were soon due to perform.\n\nTowards noon the Tam Gong Festival procession gathered in the Rua da Cordoaria, off the village square, and then made its way through the village to the Temple. This procession was a less spectacular affair than the Tam Gong processions held in Ah Kung Ngam Village, Shaukiwan, Hong Kong, but was equally attractive within its own", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1998.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/1g05n0794", "rank": 0 } ]