[
    {
        "id": 211468,
        "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-1988",
        "page_number": 184,
        "title": "RAS-1988",
        "content_text": "160\n\nBy the time Helen was learning to crawl, Father had a two-bedroom house built with the help of his cousin, Chan Ngit Chiu, and a few of his carpenter friends. They ended up stealing some of the lumber and leaving part of the house interior unpainted. This was something Father should have foreseen, since Ngit Chiu was an opium addict. It did not bother us much for we were utterly happy to be in a new home of our own. This was a two-bedroom house located on Board Road, which ran off Buckle Lane, an area where many upward mobile Chinese had relocated after the Chinatown fire, such families as the Wei's, Lee Lit's, Yee Mun Wai's, Lam Toy's, Lam Quan's, Yee Yap's, C. K. Ai's, to name a few. The narrow roads were of dirt and gravel and I often nursed a scraped and bleeding knee when I fell while running home on the slight incline.\n\nA right-of-way in front of our house led to the home of a Chung family and to a newly-built home of Chun Sun Kee adjoining our lot. Across the way was a very large L-shaped property owned by David Notley, an Hawaiian-Caucasian politician. There were many people and much activity in his spacious home and we enjoyed the sounds of merry-making and sweet music when he had a luau or a political rally. Across from us on Broad Road there was another large piece of property extending the whole length of the road, with the house facing Buckle Lane. Mr. Dutro, the owner, a gruff and fat Portuguese, would descend upon us growling if he caught us trying to \"steal\" any of his mangoes hanging so temptingly over the fence. I have never seen so many species of mangoes as he had. We were always on the alert for any that would drop onto the road.\n\nNext to the Dutro's on Buckle Lane was a stable occupied by a Mr. Silva, who had a draying business and with whose daughter I had a few casual contacts. I can recall the sight of horses and the smell of hay and manure in his yard. The Ai's lived next to the Silva's until they moved to their beautiful home on Beretania Street in 1915. The Lam Toy's, who had lived across from the Dutro's, sold their home and bought the Ai property in order to better accommodate their large family and visiting relatives.\n\nAs there were very few Christians in the neighbourhood, Father introduced Mother to the Ai's whom he had met at church. Gradually Mother began to meet neighbours who were also converts to the Christian",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1988.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/ft84gb83q",
        "rank": 0
    },
    {
        "id": 211469,
        "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-1988",
        "page_number": 185,
        "title": "RAS-1988",
        "content_text": "161\n\nfaith, the Lam Toy's and Lam Quan's, who became our life-long friends. By this time Chinese women were freer to visit with each other, and Mrs. Lam Quan taught Mother how to sew Western style dresses for us children, to bake cakes, to make delicious ice cream (which was a great treat in those days), and to use Western medicine. When Mr. and Mrs. Ai took a trip to China in 1913, their son, Samuel, would often play with me or Helen. One afternoon while he, Mung Yee Yap and I were playing ball, the family dog, tied to a mango tree, bit Samuel repeatedly when he tried to retrieve a stray ball. I stood immobilized and horrified by his screams. He happened to be wearing clothes his friend had loaned him when his head became wet while playing in a stream, and the unfamiliar scent must have provoked the dog. Fortunately his sister Bessie, who happened to come to the front door, rescued him. It was also traumatic to hear Samuel's scream while he was being treated on the back porch by Dr. Francis Wong-Leong.\n\nAmong Mother's non-Christian friends was the first Mrs. Siu Kit who lived in a small lane behind the Dutro's. She had come from China with her oldest child to join Mr. Siu, who ran a butcher shop at the corner of King and Aala Streets. She bore five more children, but the youngest died of whooping cough before he was even a month old. After the death of this infant, Mrs. Siu seemed to have no will to live, and, again, pregnant, became very ill, possibly from influenza. She died in 1919, insisting to the end that Mr. Siu had taken in a concubine in his village. There was no foundation to her accusations, because only after her death did he go to Japan, where he met and married a young girl from the village selected by his family to be his second wife. This second Mrs. Siu also became our life-long friend, who looked upon Mother as a surrogate parent and was always generous and thoughtful. She found the care of five undisciplined stepchildren and seven of her own a difficult responsibility. When the exchange rate was very favourable, Mr. Siu retired to Shekki with his whole family but gradually sent his children, two or three at a time, back to Honolulu. He died during the Japanese occupation of China. Mrs. Siu returned to Honolulu after the Second World War to live with her daughter, Siu Ying Chun, and died in 1985 while on an extended visit in California.\n\nThis was a worry-free and happy period of my life in spite of the fact that occasionally I had a stormy time with Mother, who did not spare",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1988.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/ft84gb83q",
        "rank": 0
    }
]