[
    {
        "id": 208955,
        "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-1980",
        "page_number": 117,
        "title": "RAS-1980",
        "content_text": "FUNG SHUI: ILLUSTRATED BY KAT HING WAI, N.T.\n\n85\n\nThe basic premise of geomancy is the location of ch'i, the cosmic breath, of the site in question. This ch'i is dispersed by wind and carried by watercourse; too much of each or both will drive the site's good influences away, and too little movement will cause stagnation of the influences. An ideal site should be south-facing and constitute the following topographical features: The hills should have the formation of an armchair; those in the rear should fence off evil spirits brought in by the cold bitter northerly wind, those on the left and right should flank it like embracing arms, and the front should be opened or unobstructed such that view, airiness, and sunlight can be brought in by the yang spirit. These features are represented by the four numinous animals: the azure dragon on the left, the white tiger on the right, the red bird in the front, and the black tortoise in the back. Thus, the point where the two forces meet, and in a proportion of three to two of the azure dragon and the white tiger in elevation, is the perfect location for burial and building. As to water, a site with confluence of streams brings good influences; conversely, branching does the opposite. \"Sharp bends are bad since they make straight arrow-like lines, meander being the natural path of good influence...\" However, favourable and auspicious sites are not always readily available, and less desirable ones are remediable by means of tree planting, or building a fung-shui pagoda at proper places, or removing contours and watercourses according to geomantic principles. As fung-shui can bring good influences to people if dwellings are properly placed, so can it cause ill fate if they are placed otherwise. According to a geomantic professor I interviewed in Hong Kong, inauspicious fung-shui can induce illness or even death in the family if, for example, windows or doors or kitchen stoves are mislocated. The same fatality may occur if a beam of a house is erected directly over one's head in a sleeping area. Or a house is in a baleful location if it is situated at the crossroad of a Y-junction. My investigations concur with the Yang Dwelling Classics, which says in the opening paragraph: “All dwellings should not be at the mouth of a thoroughfare, or in a monastery (Buddhist temple grounds), nor come near to a shrine, nor be where plants and trees do not grow (to screen and protect), nor in an old battleground ... nor at the gate or opening of a large wall, nor opposite a prison gate.\"12 In Maurice Freedman's research\n\nyang",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1980.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/kh04md207",
        "rank": 0
    },
    {
        "id": 209599,
        "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-1982",
        "page_number": 256,
        "title": "RAS-1982",
        "content_text": "CARL T. SMITH\n\nCoward was followed, in 1923, with a science-fiction drama, \"R.U.R.\" or \"Rossum's Universal Robots\". It was written by Karel Capek, a Czechoslovakian. The reviewer linked some political events with the theme of the play: \"Saturday night brought us definite news of the elections at Home indicating how the workers of the country, dissatisfied with their lot, turned upon the Government and rose in support of the red flag of Labour. It was a coincidence that on the same night the Hong Kong A.D.C. introduced to the Colony a race of soulless, voteless men-machines, made by man in his own image to do the work of the world while the rest of us recline leisurely in our armchairs; told us they developed discontent and turned and rent their human tyrants\".\n\nWalter Sinclair left Hong Kong in 1925. He continued his directing career in Toronto, Canada and the United States.\n\nAfter his departure, the A.D.C. largely reverted to comedy. It would be unfair, however, to suggest that all their productions fell into the category of the title of a 1925 piece of the A.D.C., \"A Little Bit of Fluff\". In the years immediately preceding the Japanese occupation of Hong Kong, plays were presented by such respectable authors as Emlyn Williams, Terrance Rattigan and Somerset Maugham.\n\nTHE LOCAL SCENE\n\nOpportunities were seized to inject local allusions in productions. As an example we give excerpts from the burlesque \"Fra Diavolo\" given by the Rifle Brigade. The author J. H. Thresher used the original by Byron only as a skeleton on which to lay topical references. His efforts were described as having a decided Gilbertian vein.\n\nAs befitting a production of the garrison some of the local allusions were military, as for instance the following references to the barracks at Kowloon. During an altercation between Lord and Lady Allcash, the Lord says to the Lady:\n\nMadam, drive me not,\n\nFor if you do, I'll show you soon what's what; I'll make things fly, just like the late typhoon",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1982.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/mk61z420p",
        "rank": 0
    },
    {
        "id": 209869,
        "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": 128,
        "title": "RAS-1983",
        "content_text": "106 \n\na boarding house where Europeans can put up at cheap rates on the \"Peak\". \n\nAn interesting feature of the island is that nearly all the land is owned by a family association called the Wong Wai Tsak Tong, which has its headquarters in Namtau21. All the buildings, however, are owned by the people who built them, or their modern representatives, who pay a small ground rent to the Tong for their sites. Most of the European houses are on hills, and so are on Crown land, unclaimed by the Tong in 1905 when the land settlement was made. This system of ground landlordism is found very rarely now elsewhere in Hong Kong. It is a relic of the system of paying land tax in distant Namtau by deputy, as happened before 1898, when the Territories were leased. \n\nTo the north-east of Cheung Chau is Neikwuchau (“Nun Island\"). This island once had three villages on it: but two are deserted; the third (Ngau Tau Tong, Cow's Head Pond) still flourishes.22 Pak Pai took its name from the high white rock in the bay off it; Kwo Lo Wan (\"The Bay Along the Road\") is where the limekiln used to be, Chau Kong (\"Old Man Chau\") 28 is a small island lying off Neikwuchau opposite Kwo Lo Wan. It is practically a desert island. I have never seen anyone on it. \n\nFurther to the north-east, beyond Neikwuchau is Pingchau (\"Flat Island\"). Pingchau is another dumb-bell island, its houses being built on the isthmus, with limekilns thick along the western and southern shores, facing sheltered water. An industry not mentioned so far is gambling, which flourishes vigorously in the large, long shops fronting on the main street. As no Police live on Pingchau, nothing serious can be done to stop it. The island is full of Hakkas and Hoklos, who have little in common save mutual dislike. I once had a very bad riot case to try, in which a man had been killed by someone unknown, and the only thing I could do was to bind everyone over to keep the peace. The chief point is that to my amazement they did so! \n\nLeaving Pingchau and travelling east we first come to a group of small uninhabited islands. The first of these, Kau Yi Tsai (\"Little Armchair\")24 is a little desolate island, chiefly",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1983.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/j9607p61v",
        "rank": 0
    },
    {
        "id": 212585,
        "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": 139,
        "title": "RAS-1991",
        "content_text": "119\n\nare then ritually washed and cremated, or, in the case of New Territories' villagers, re-interred either in horseshoe-shaped masonry graves or in two-foot high, ceramic, funerary urns, called kam taap (金塔). The bones are positioned in these pots, foetus-shaped, ready for reincarnation.\n\n'There is a time to live, a time to die, and\n\na time to be born again.'\n\n37\n\n38\n\nLike\n\nSpots selected on hillsides should have 'neutral' feng shui; high voltage electricity, too powerful a 'charge' can render living relatives vulnerable. Hong Kong citizens can now occupy grave spaces at Shenzhen Overseas Chinese Mausoleum, just over the Hong Kong border in China, where they can be interred in perpetuity.\n\nIncidentally, bodies were sometimes buried 12-feet under in cemeteries in Happy Valley (a lovely name), in early British Hong Kong, to protect them from grave robbers.\n\nGraves should be sited on hillsides. At the base of a mountain ridge, where the dragon spirit of the mountain stops its run, between spurs to give an 'armchair' effect, is a good position. There should be a commanding view, preferably of water (representing money). The surroundings may take the form of a dragon, a snake, a crab or a prawn, and 'dragon's vapour' (feng shui) needs to be captured or restrained in the correct proportions. The siting of a grave metaphysically influences the lives of descendants. A body decomposes and the 'five Elements', minerals from bones and flesh, remain in the soil. Nothing dies. Everything is transformed. Universal impulses and high vibrational and spiritual frequencies are transferred from graves along electromagnetic ley lines, and resonances and energy are received and inherited from father to son and by other living relatives. Such activities are most effective when one is buried in one's native soil, some believe.38 Today, however, in public cemeteries in Hong Kong, a person is allocated the next vacant grave space. He has little control over feng shui, although some people do try to change their position in a queue in order to obtain a 'good' grave number.\n\nReturn Visit\n\nIn this study, on the 12th night after death (duration depends upon deceased's date of birth3), all close family members waited in the dead",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1991.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/k356gt84j",
        "rank": 0
    }
]