[ { "id": 204343, "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-1961", "page_number": 111, "title": "RAS-1961", "content_text": "Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society Hong Kong Branch\n\nRASHKB and author\n\nVol. 1 (1961)\n\nISSN 1991-7295\n\n107\n\nV. WELFARE ACTIVITIES OF THE SANGHA\n\nGenerally speaking, the monasteries of the Colony do little in the way of public service, except in so far as a few of them provide food and, in some cases, accommodations for visitors (the most famous in this regard being the Po Lin Tsz near Lantao Peak). An increasingly active role in welfare work, however, is being played by the nunneries of Hong Kong.\n\nFirst mention should probably be given to the 30 nuns and 50 lay devotees of the Tung Lin Kok Yuen A, a Pure Land nunnery established by Lady Clara Ho Tung in 1935. Housed in a handsome set of buildings, it operates: (1) the Colony's only Buddhist \"seminary\" for nuns, which provides an eight-year course in Mahayana Buddhism; (2) a primary day school; (3) a primary night school; (4) the Po Kok Vocational Middle School; and (5) a branch primary school in Ping Shan F, New Territories. The total enrollment (all girls) at these various schools is 1,256,* ranging from 503 for the primary day school to 26 for the seminary. All the schools except the seminary receive a government subsidy, which according to the regulations of the Education Department means that they must charge the standard tuition fees of HK$50 a year at primary level and HK$320 at secondary level. Only 10 per cent of the enrollment in the case of a primary school, and 30 per cent in the case of a secondary school, may be free of tuition. The subsidy covers all operating expenses not covered by tuition, that is, about 80 per cent of gross expenditures for urban schools, and over 90 per cent for rural schools (where tuition is only HK$10 a year). The Education Department does not object to having the tuition partly or wholly donated by the school or its supporters. Thus, in effect, the tuition requirement is only for the purpose of computing the amount of the subsidy.\n\nIn the case of the Tung Lin Kok Yuen, pupils all come from poor families and pay HK$20 a year at primary level and HK$40 a year at secondary (which means that most of their tuition is donated). About one-third of the operating expenses comes from gifts and the nunnery's general income on the real estate that forms its principal endowment. About two-thirds comes from a government subsidy.\n\nThe study of Buddhist sutras forms part of the curriculum for all pupils (other main subjects being Chinese, English, history, and mathematics, plus vocational training in the middle school). Pupils attend Buddhist services in rotation at least once a week; and before each year's graduation they all are given a lecture by a prominent dharma master. After graduation a small number\n\n* Here and below all school enrollment figures are as of June 30, 1960.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1961.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/vd6724704", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 204344, "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-1961", "page_number": 112, "title": "RAS-1961", "content_text": "Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society Hong Kong Branch\n\nORASHKB and author\n\n108\n\nVol. 1 (1961)\n\nISSN 1991-7295\n\nusually decides to transfer into the seminary and become nuns. The educational standards are high: in 1959 and 1960 over 90 per cent of each graduating class of the middle school passed the Chinese School-leaving Certificate examination, nearly a third with distinction.\n\nOther institutions of the Sangha that are noteworthy for their welfare activities are:\n\n(1) The Chi Lin Tsing Yuen, a nunnery established at Diamond Hill in 1945, where 68 nuns now operate a subsidized primary school (opened in 1953) for 236 underprivileged boys and girls; an orphanage with 24 girls from 6 to 15 years old; and the Chi Lin Home for Aged Women which has 100 inmates who live there free of charge. Both the Home and the orphanage were built in 1956 with funds donated by Aw Boon Haw 胡文虎,\n\n(2) The Po Yeuk Tsing She, a nunnery in Shatin where about 30 nuns operate the Po Yeuk Home for Aged Women. The Home was built in 1955, also with funds donated by Aw Boon Haw, and has 100 inmates, who live free of charge.\n\nin Shatin, where a group\n\n(3) The Ts'z Hong Tsing Yuen of about 30 women lay devotees, under the direction of an ordained nun, operate a co-educational subsidized free school with 216 pupils (tuition actually paid is HK$10 a year),\n\n(4) The Taai Kwong Nunnery\n\nnear Tai Po, where about 10 nuns operate a co-educational subsidized primary school with 309 pupils (established in 1945) and are planning to open a middle school in 1961. This nunnery also runs a small orphanage, which now has 4 girls and 5 boys from 1 to 15 years old. Visitors get a very pleasant impression of the atmosphere created by the abbess, who has all these enterprises in her sole charge. Financial support comes from Buddhist laymen.\n\nVI. LAY ORGANIZATIONS\n\n1. HONG KONG BUDDHIST ASSOCIATION 香港佛教聯合會 This is the leading Buddhist organization in the Colony. It was originally founded in 1932 as the Hong Kong Buddhist [Studies] Association, to foster solidarity among Buddhists, dis-seminate the dharma, and promote social welfare. During the Second World War it became inactive, one reason being that its members did not wish to have it exploited by the Japanese, who had become adept at using Buddhism for political penetration abroad. It was revived, however, in 1945 under its present name and incorporated on May 2, 1959. Its membership has risen from 1,500 in 1952 to 3,850 in 1960. Of the latter number, 116 are monks, 324 are nuns, and 20 are institutions (e.g., the Po Lin Tsz and the Hong Kong Lotus Association). The rest of the membership is composed of laymen, among whom the purely devout probably outnumber those who take a more intellectual approach to Buddhism. Dues are HK$10 a year for most members.\n\n7 Tuition actually paid is only HK$24 a year.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1961.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/vd6724704", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 205968, "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-1970", "page_number": 48, "title": "RAS-1970", "content_text": "HONG KONG CADETS, 1862 - 1941\n\n43\n\nin academic performance, and a significant number excelled at sport. The fathers of the cadets were in most cases members of the older professions — law, medicine, and especially the church, although two, for example, were M.P.s.29 Few, if any, of the fathers were businessmen or shopkeepers, and none could be regarded as aristocratic. In sum, the typical cadet came from a solid, though not rich, upper middle-class family, went to a public school, but not to the most prestigious, and then went up to one of the older universities, where he read classics or history and was noted for his application to study and interest in healthy recreation. The bounder, the aesthete, the hearty, and the rake, were not represented in the ranks of the cadets. The origins of the Scots were humbler; many had schoolmasters for fathers, whereas the Irish tended to come from the smaller landed families, from the parochial gentry rather than the squirearchy.\n\nTwo things should be noted about the curriculum vitae of the typical cadet. Firstly, it fitted him for the type of job he was expected to carry out as a colonial civil servant in Hong Kong – the need to apply himself with diligence and intelligence to a series of prosaic tasks, and to sustain interest in the minutiae of bureaucratic life; and secondly, the common social background and education of the cadets helped to create an esprit de corps, a class and caste feeling, and an intuitive understanding of other cadets, which helped maintain morale and discipline within a hierarchical service. Cadets, it may be surmised, understood one another without the need for excessive interpretation of motive.\n\nGiven this common background, training, and the fraternity of class, cadets came to the field with many shared assumptions about, and attitudes towards, the people they governed in the colonial territories. Robert Huessler, for example, argues that the attitude of British Colonial officials 'was not unlike that which they maintained from childhood towards the lesser orders at home. One ruled the people and protected them from local and foreign injustice. Otherwise one lived apart'.30 Perhaps a better analogy would be the model prefect at an English public school. The model prefect is expected to be fair, just, upright, dignified, and withal concerned about his charges. However, he is not likely to support ideas of equality and permissiveness; he must exercise authority.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1970.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/ww72j0241", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 205996, "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-1970", "page_number": 76, "title": "RAS-1970", "content_text": "THE BEGINNINGS OF TAIPINGSHAN\n\n71\n\nwhich the European had no place and was not really expected to penetrate. Two Europeans (Richard Oswald and F. J. Porter) did apparently have lots there though how they came by them is not recorded, and the American Baptist Mission Board had a school house and small chapel.\n\nA third area was Tai Ping Shan where many Chinese lived in matsheds, but it is not known how many lived there in these early days.\n\nBut one inconvenient feature soon revealed itself as the demand for building land increased in the Colony on the establishment of regular government in the middle of 1843. The town was restricted in its possibilities of development to the east by the reservation of 'Government Hill' (the area on which the Government Offices now stand) for Government purposes only. Beyond Government Hill to the east lay the military cantonment and, since the main part of the town was now inevitably fixed where the present central district stands, the only possible direction which expansion could take, other, that is, than up the mountainside, was to the west. But, between Inland Lots 43 and 10 on the Queen's Road lay the Upper Bazaar, an uncomfortable fact which not only meant that there would be a large number of Chinese-type houses in the middle of the 'European' town (with their attendant rather greater risk of fire) but that their presence would interfere with the proper development of the area with drainage and streets and so on. In terms of extent, the Upper Bazaar was occupying almost 11 acres of valuable building land for which speculators would be willing to offer far higher Crown Rents than those which the then inhabitants were paying. So almost inevitably, the suggestion came to move the Upper Bazaar lot-holders away to another location.\n\nThe story of the removal of the Upper Bazaar is of interest on several counts: it is the first 'resumption' of land for public purposes in the history of Hong Kong, a process since employed on an ever increasing scale by the Government for the improvement and redevelopment of the environment. It provides us with an insight into government practices of the day and the cumbersome manner in which decisions could be taken and implemented, and also of the role of the Press at that time. Finally, it led to the establishment, as a matter of deliberate Government policy, of a", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1970.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/ww72j0241", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 206530, "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-1972", "page_number": 78, "title": "RAS-1972", "content_text": "72\n\nHENRY JAMES LETHBRIDGE\n\ntheir duties effectively. Of this latter group, student-interpreters in the Consular Corps probably made the greatest contribution — such names as Herbert A. Giles, E.H. Parker, E.D.H. Fraser, W.F. Mayers, Thomas Watters, G.M.H. Playfair, E.T.C. Werner,44 speak for themselves but Hong Kong cadets, although few in number (from 1861 to 1941 only eighty-five were appointed), also made a significant contribution and one should cite not only Lockhart but Sir Cecil Clementi45 and Sir R.F. Johnston. All these early British 'scholar-officials' helped to lay the foundations in Britain of Chinese studies and were among the first to staff and to head new departments of Chinese studies or to interest people in the study of a unique Asian civilisation and culture.\n\nLockhart, of course, was a busy, conscientious and efficient civil servant who could not spend his working hours brooding over knotty problems of translation or sinological conundrums; but he was always a remarkably energetic man and, according to his daughter, rose early in the morning and did his private work long before his Department was open officially.\n\nLockhart's studies appear to have extended into the evenings as well. There is an interesting reference to him, by T. Kirkman Dealy, in the Preface (1907) to his revised edition of Chambers' English-Cantonese Dictionary:\n\nI still vividly retain very clear recollection of a periodical after-dinner meeting which I was privileged to attend, in the middle eighties, at the former London Mission House, where, round a lamp-lighted table, under the personal presidency of the then venerable head of the London Mission [Dr. John Chalmers], sat the late Dr. Faber, Mr. J.H. Stewart Lockhart (now His Honour the Commissioner for Wei-hai-wei), Mr. (now Dr.) G.H. Bateson Wright, Head Master of Queen's College, Mr. Addys of the Hongkong and Shanghai Bank, the late Mr. A. Falconer, Second Master of the old Government Central School, and others, eagerly discussing, assiduously comparing, commenting on, and revising, translations of portions of a minor Chinese classic made, since the previous session, by individual members of the class.46\n\nThis very Victorian passion for work, which embraced not only his official duties but his private interest in sinology, allowed Lockhart to publish in 1893 his first book, a Manual of Chinese Quota-", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1972.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/gm80qf99h", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 207164, "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": 235, "title": "RAS-1974", "content_text": "NOTES AND QUERIES \n\n229 \n\nthe building was blessed. There were then 540 pupils in fourteen classes. The first matriculation class was formed in 1933.\n\nWith the beginning of the European War in 1939, the Government interned enemy aliens on the College premises. The Japanese used it as a hospital. The Brothers re-occupied the buildings after the liberation of Hong Kong, but from 1949 the British Army took it over for use as a hospital. During these periods the College was housed in temporary quarters.\n\nToday the school is under the direction of Brother Raphael Egan. There is a student body of some 1,500, the greater majority being Chinese, though there is still in the student body a number of Portuguese boys. They continue the contribution this part of Hong Kong's population has made to the history of the school.\n\nOther Schools in the Area\n\nNorth of Boundary Street between Waterloo Road and La Salle Road is Oxford Road. In one block there are six Middle Schools: Pui Shing Middle School, Tung Wah Hospital No. 1 College, Ying Wa College, Moral Training English School, Jockey Club Government Technical School, and Bishop Hall Jubilee School. Maryknoll Convent School opened in 1936 is nearby at the corner of Boundary Street and Waterloo Road.\n\nOf these schools, three have roots in Hong Kong's early history. While the association of the Royal Hong Kong Jockey Club with education through financial support is of recent origin, the Race Meets were a prominent feature of Hong Kong life from early days.\n\nYing Wa College continues the tradition of the Anglo-Chinese College established by the missionaries Robert Morrison and William Milne at Malacca in 1819. In 1843 it was moved to Hong Kong by the Rev. James Legge. The school was closed in 1856. It had been organised and conducted by representatives of the London Missionary Society. In 1914 the Society opened a school in Kowloon bearing the Chinese version of the English name, of their former school: Ying Wah, that is 'Anglo-Chinese'.\n\nThe Tung Wah No. 1 College opened in 1962 is a part of Tung Wah Hospital efforts to provide education for under-privileged children. This programme began in 1880 when a Free Primary School was opened in the Chung Wah College premises adjoining the Man Mo Temple on Hollywood Road. A school under the direction of the Temple Committee had been operated on these premises for many years previous. A lot had been granted by", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1974.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/x633mp077", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 208438, "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-1978", "page_number": 162, "title": "RAS-1978", "content_text": "146\n\nC. MARTIN WILBUR\n\nto such matters as the dates for village fairs, the mutual protection of crops, and the like.\n\nThe elders of the village are largely responsible for inter-village relations. One of their primary duties is to uphold the \"face\" of the village in its district. Many village improvements find their origin almost entirely in this desire to outshine neighboring villages in material ways. Temples which cannot be afforded and markets which are not needed are often constructed in a spirit of rivalry. Likewise \"face\" affords an impetus to scholarship, every village being extremely proud of its learned men, and their achievements. Indeed, in Phenix village the progress of the students of the village, even when they are away in middle school or college, is the solicitous concern of the whole group.1\n\nWhenever a member or group in a village becomes involved with another village or members of it, the matter is thought to be the concern of the village elders. Every contact is a potential conflict, and the responsibility for such disturbances will fall upon the heads of the leaders. For this reason, quarrels, law suits or sales of property which involve outsiders come under the supervision of the elders of both groups. This system has the advantage of decreasing the number of situations which would of necessity go to the magistral courts, lacking any other machinery for settlement.\n\nThe village elders are in some degree responsible for the behavior of members of their village even when these folk are in town, or in a neighboring village. If trouble arises during such an occasion, the offending member may be punished by the village court, while redress will be made through the agency of the respective village temples. In the same way, strangers in a village, if they happen to be ill-treated by the natives, may go to the temple and demand satisfaction. Thus it will be seen that in a wider range of relationships than the village itself, but still through the familistic, customary and traditional methods, government entirely divorced from the central system is maintained.\n\nII\n\nThe relations between the village and the central government are normally very slight. The two primary interests of the government\n\n1 Kulp, Daniel H.; Phenix Village, p. 125.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1978.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/8g84t8593", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 209685, "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": 342, "title": "RAS-1982", "content_text": "320\n\nBOOK REVIEWS\n\nThose who had worked in the Party and government organisations, as well as in cultural, educational and scientific research institutions in the late 60s and early 70s will still remember that many of these organisations were either closed down or amalgamated when the country went in for cadre schools in a big way. Quite a large number of people working in organisations that were retained, indeed the greater part of them, were sent down to cadre schools for re-education. Trains were used to transport furniture, luggage and other goods and materials to places all over China where these people now had to make their homes. In the chapter entitled \"Going Down to Cadre Schools: A Chapter on Separation\", one can find vivid descriptions of this. In the process of moving, much damage was done. Take, for instance, the School of Philosophical and Social Studies where Mr. Qian and Mdm. Yang were staying. As the school was to be handed over to some other units, it could not but take to the Yanjing paper mill all the reference material amassed and compiled over the years, only for it to be turned into paper pulp. Books and other reference materials left behind were piled up in the corridors, bitten by rats and worm-eaten. What a pathetic sight, especially to those like us who have spent most of our time studying! How sorrowful we were as we could do nothing about it!\n\nYet it was even more distressing to see time being wasted and talent trampled on. In 1970, sometime around the Spring Festival, I went to a cadre school in Liyu Zhou near Poyang Lake, where I spent 19 days visiting friends and relatives. There I saw many highly-respected teachers from the famous Beijing University doing manual labour in a wasteland where snail fever was widespread. Grey-headed scholars slept in haystacks and ate in the open. After work, they still had to attend study classes. Very often they were wakened in the middle of the night or in a violent storm to undergo military manoeuvres. They had only chaff and wild herbs to eat on New Year's Eve and were told to chant quotations from Chairman Mao. While I considered myself lucky to belong to a cadre school where living and working conditions were much better, I was, nevertheless, greatly saddened to see people of such talent being wasted. I once wrote a couplet in doggerel style for myself and fellow workers:", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1982.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/mk61z420p", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 210810, "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": 161, "title": "RAS-1986", "content_text": "144\n\nA SENSE OF HISTORY (PART I)\n\nCARL SMITH\n\nYING WA HAS LONGEST LINK WITH THE PAST\n\nWhich is Hongkong's oldest school?\n\nThere could be several answers to this question. It depends on how one interprets the word “oldest.”\n\nDoes it mean the school with the longest continuous history, one that has no breaks? Or is it the school with the oldest tradition? What about the school that has gone through several changes of name and administration? Or is it perhaps the school that has the longest links with an educational institution of the past?\n\nA number of Hongkong schools could be candidates for the honour of being oldest, depending on how one interprets their history. Ying Wa Boys College, St Paul's College, St Joseph's, Queen's College, Diocesan Boys, Diocesan Girls, the Confucian school next to the Man Mo Temple on Hollywood Road, all might qualify. In this series we shall set forth the historical basis for each of these schools to lay claim to being the oldest in Hongkong.\n\nThe school, however, which has the longest link with the past is the Ying Wa Boys College. It is to be admitted that the chain has been broken and the name changed.\n\nYing Wa carries on the tradition of the Anglo-Chinese College which was established at Malacca in Malaysia in 1818. In 1843 the school was moved to Hongkong. In 1856 it was closed.\n\nIn 1914, the Chinese congregation associated with the missionary society which was instrumental in founding the Anglo-Chinese College in 1818, opened a middle school for boys called Ying Wa College, the Chinese translation of Anglo-Chinese, thus continuing the tradition.\n\nEditor's note: These articles are reprinted with the author's kind permission from the South China Morning Post. They appeared in a series between 1977 and 1979.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1986.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/jq08c7063", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 211701, "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-1989", "page_number": 116, "title": "RAS-1989", "content_text": "91\n\nnumber of books was quite inadequate and the Japanese, with their usual suspicion of the written or printed word, would not allow any more to be brought in. Sea bathing is now (i.e. since the middle of July) permitted at one beach.\n\nChildren: Schools - a senior and a junior school were established by the Hongkong University authorities and some attempt made to arrange organised recreation for the children; but, there were hardly any toys, games or children's books in the camp, and the children were usually ragging about and getting into mischief. A little ping-pong and badminton apparatus, half a dozen old tennis rackets and a few dozen old balls would have been a boon to children and grown-ups alike, but there was no way of getting them.\n\nGeneral: Various 'shortages' have been mentioned in previous paragraphs, but in point of fact there was a deficiency of nearly everything - beds and bedding, clothing, shoes, toilet materials, brooms and other cleaning materials, plates, cups, dishes, cooking pots, knives, forks and spoons, glass for repairing war-broken windows, tools of all kinds, etc. etc. An \"International Welfare Committee\" formed in Hongkong by sympathisers under the auspices of Dr. Selwyn-Clarke (of whom I shall speak again) was doing a good deal to meet the most urgent needs and sent in cotton dress lengths, sandshoes, handkerchiefs, Chinese toilet paper, tin mugs, washing soap and numerous other articles; but the needs were far in excess of the resources of the Committee. The shortage was particularly serious in regard to clothing and foot-wear. Many people reached the camp with only what they stood up in, few were able to bring much. Clothes and shoes wear out. I remember seeing two ladies wearing shorts made of Australian flour bags and one girl in a frock made from the ticking of a mattress. Many people were going barefooted, others were wearing sandals made from gunny bags or home-made wooden pattens. The footwear situation was about July slightly—but only slightly relieved by the receipt from the Welfare Committee of some shoe leather, with which amateur cobblers did their best to effect repair.\n\nLetters: One of the worst features of the camp was the lack of communication with the outside world. We were allowed (in 6 months) to send one short telegram and two short letters, but the messages which I sent (to Mr. Le Rougetel) were never delivered. A few people got letters from Shanghai but this was exceptional. Internees were not allowed to write even to friends in Hongkong except (and even this was a very", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1989.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/8336pm92h", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 212905, "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-1992", "page_number": 214, "title": "RAS-1992", "content_text": "199\n\nGROWING UP IN CHINA:\n\nLECTURE TO THE ROYAL ASIATIC SOCIETY, HONG KONG BRANCH, 14 MAY, 1993\n\nDENIS BRAY\n\nIt is quite a challenge to compose a talk on the first 13 years of your life when there are practically no books to consult and friends from those days are scattered or gone. To the challenge is added an audience much more knowledgeable than I on the history of the area. I think I can only get away with it because nobody can check on much that I have to say. As I do not speak Putonghua or write Pinyin I am going to stick to spellings for place names used in the thirties and Cantonese for local names.\n\nThere are some references. There are three books of reference on the China Inland Mission School at Chefoo. Two are written by students who went there long before I did. They are Mrs Jean Moore and Dr. Gren Wedderburn. A full history of the school from start to finish has been written by Gordon Martin who was classics teacher when I was there and who was one of the longest serving teachers the school had. I am sure that the Methodist Missionary Society in London has copious records on the mission in Fatshan and South China.\n\nI Was Born\n\nI did not start life in China but in Hong Kong — at the Matilda Hospital in fact. My father was working in the Methodist Mission in Fatshan at the time, running Wah Ying School. This school was founded in 1913 near to a hospital, also run by the mission, which was founded in 1881. The hospital, now known officially as the Number One People's Hospital, but spoken of as the Chun Do Yi Yuen, or Methodist Hospital, celebrated its 111th anniversary last year. The school, now known as the Number One Middle School but spoken of still as Wah Ying, will celebrate its 90th anniversary in December this year.\n\nJanuary 1926 towards the end of the General Strike, when all Chinese were urged to boycott any form of service for foreigners, was accompanied by incidents of unrest in China and in Hong Kong itself. It was no time for a pregnant woman to remain in China unless it was...", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1992.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/qf85tx75x", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 213359, "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": 181, "title": "RAS-1994", "content_text": "164\n\nover HK$4 million to do a Territory-wide survey of historical buildings almost a year ago, work has yet to start partly because they are unable to line up enough qualified people to lead the survey (the Heritage Museum will be flying in scholars to help with its exhibitions - one a Canadian anthropologist who has been doing work in Hong Kong on and off since the 1960s, and the other an English design historian who returned to teach in the UK four years ago).\n\nThere are simply not enough bodies! The same 10 historians or so are burdened with research projects; advising the museums and AMO, advising radio and television programmes, exhibitions, even film; being interviewed by local and international newspapers; adjudicating photo competitions and students' projects; designing teaching materials for secondary schools; besides doing a full-time job of teaching and administration! Although a number of postgraduate students have written on Hong Kong history for their degree, many became secondary school teachers, civil servants, joined the private sectors, even the museum system as administrators, rather than pursue a career in research.\n\nThe problem is, unlike England for example, there is no army of amateur local historians (or local history societies) who study their own parish, church, village, street... as a hobby. In Hong Kong, local history is much more a consumer item than a participatory item. Despite the increased participation in projects by school and university students in the last decade or so, there is little sustained effort after the project is completed, few taking the initiative to continue research as a hobby. Thus, the main burden still falls upon those few scholars, every one of whom is spread desperately thin. There is a yawning gap, and what is missing is what we might call 'middle management' - budding scholars who can take on a project independently, without the supervision of a more senior scholar.\n\nOne worries also that the glamour of the marketplace might lure scholars away from serious scholarship. Why bother with painstaking collection and analysis of materials, criticism of text and interpretation of data when all one has to do is tell a good story to sell books? How does one strike a balance between pursuing serious research, which is almost by definition esoteric and exclusive, and serving the public?\n\nThere is another minor problem: items for research are now becoming much more difficult to come by. One effect of the growing popularity of...", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1994.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/zk522640g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 214714, "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-1999", "page_number": 129, "title": "RAS-1999", "content_text": "93\n\ntold the Editor:\n\n'Villagers are out to \"screw\" Government.'\n\nOne Scottish, retired, senior civil servant and his Chinese wife who was herself at one time a government servant, both level-headed people, agreed between them it was 90 per cent money and 10 per cent belief in feng shui. Some other Chinese government servants take a similar view.\n\n'Perhaps some of the older Tang Clan members really believe in tun fu', a Chinese, past District Officer who is outwardly quite westernised but inwardly still very Chinese, told the Author. 'But not the younger ones.\n\nSome young people do believe, nevertheless. And for those that do not it does not mean to say that, as they grow older, their views will not change. Such people, in middle age or when they are elderly, sometimes become the most enthusiastic proponents of traditional values.\n\n'A woman who did not believe in feng shui nearly died', the Author was once informed. 'After recovering she became convinced', the informer continued (Waters; 1997, 63).\n\nIt has been argued by Wong Siu-lun that most Hong Kong Chinese are westernised only in a superficial sense (Evans; 1997, 3, 7). Inwardly, they are very Chinese. To a large number traditions and festivals are important. There were, however, few young people at the Pat Heung tun fu ceremony as it was a weekday and pupils had to go to school. The ceremony was, nevertheless, well attended by adults. There are, of course, other reasons for attending. In some cases villagers were expected to be there by others. In any case people could meet old friends and chat. They might even get invited to a lunch at government expense.\n\nNot everyone agrees believing is all a question of money. James Hayes, a past District Officer in the New Territories, wrote (Hayes; 1998):\n\nsome European civil engineers and contractors' staff stated their belief (to me) that it was all hooey ...'", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1999.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/s178b887x", "rank": 0 } ]