[ { "id": 208296, "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": 20, "title": "RAS-1978", "content_text": "4\n\nHong Kong Museum of History invited members to the screening of three Korean films at the City Hall. The films concerned the art and archeology of important sites in Korea. In September we were again concerned with Hong Kong History when Dr. Alan Birch, Reader in History at Hong Kong University, spoke on Hong Kong 1937-45: Conquest and Liberation.\n\nAlso in September Dr. Marilyn Grayburn, lecturer in Indian Archeology, University of Cleveland Museum, spoke on 5,000 years of the Indus Valley Civilization, and in October Mr. Lawrence Tam, Curator of the Hong Kong Museum of Art, and himself also an artist of repute and teacher of Chinese Art History, spoke on the Shek Wan Pottery of Kwangtung Province in connection with an exhibition current at the City Hall Museum.\n\nIn December Mr. Henri Vetch, a long standing member of the Society, spoke of his experiences in Peking where he worked as publisher between 1920-1951, when he was imprisoned for three years by the Communists. In January an interesting talk was given by Dr. Wen Hsiang-lai, a neurologist and neurosurgeon as well as authority on acupuncture. He spoke of his recent experiments at the Tung Wah Hospital in the use of electrical stimulation using acupuncture points and needles in connection with drug addiction. And finally Dr. William Parish gave a talk in February on \"Status and Power in Kwangtung Villages under the People's Republic.\" Dr. Parish is associate professor of Sociology at the University of Chicago.\n\nBoth local excursions and overseas trips are a regular feature of our activities and in December Dr. James Hayes arranged a visit to Tsuen Wan where he talked about local temples, rural organization and traditional inter-village feuding. The Society is continuing its programme of cultural tours abroad with a ten-day visit to Kashmir and Kathmandu starting later this week. The trip has been arranged by Dr. Brian Shaw. Where possible we deal directly with hoteliers and pass on group discounts and commissions directly to members travelling. Your Council has been investigating the feasibility of mounting future tours to Afghanistan; the Mohenjo-daro, Harappa, Taxila sites; Ladakh Darjeeling, Sikkim and Bhutan; Dr. Shaw will again be looking into this possibility. Dr. Leigh Wright is also looking at the possibility of a tour to the old Straits Settlements. Now that the Chinese authorities are encouraging travel with.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1978.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/8g84t8593", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 208562, "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-1979", "page_number": 19, "title": "RAS-1979", "content_text": "which drew a great deal of stimulating discussion: Leadership and Ideas in Singapore since 1945. Altogether then, there were twelve lectures during the year.\n\nExcursions\n\nDuring June, Dr. James Hayes, the very busy Town Manager of Tsuen Wan, and editor of your Journal, organised an excursion to his district. During preparatory work for the redevelopment of Northern Tsuen Wan various religious institutions came to the notice of his department, which was also able to discover more information about others. The group attending the excursion visited a Buddhist monastery, where they had a vegetarian lunch; another religious establishment for the so-called \"Three religions\"; the Holy Mother Yiu temple, in a squatter area; and a temple to a sect established to help opium addicts and which has branches also in Singapore. Another local excursion is planned for March 29 to Macao, with the help of Dr. Leigh Wright of your Council. It plans to take in visits to places not on the usual itinerary of tourist visits, such as the Theatro Pedro V. There will be a Portuguese lunch and information on the places visited will be given by Father Texeira who has helped us on past occasions. I would like to take this opportunity of thanking him for his generous help to the Society. This visit should be a 'must' for those who like old architecture, churches, cobblestone streets as well as archives and libraries.\n\nExcursions to neighbouring territories and states also remain an important part of the Society's activities each year. Some twenty-two members visited Kashmir and Kathmandu (with an unscheduled but very interesting overnight stop at Amritsar) during last Easter, under the leadership of your Hon. Secretary, Dr. Brian Shaw; and it was possible to make a refund to each participant of over two hundred dollars as a result of various economies. A further group of twenty will be leaving this Easter for Darjeeling and Sikkim; and in July a smaller number will go to Ladakh (“Little Tibet”). Some members expressed interest in proposed visits to Central Java and to sites in Thailand, but the numbers were not sufficient to make the trips feasible last year.\n\nOur requests to Peking concerning visits to cultural sites in Central China have unfortunately not yet received a favourable response, but our efforts will continue during the coming year. For\n\nix", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1979.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/2801w5938", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 208563, "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-1979", "page_number": 20, "title": "RAS-1979", "content_text": "the future we hope it may be possible to organise a small group to visit cultural sites in Thailand (e.g. Chiangmai, Pimai, Sukhothai and Ban Chiang). December might be particularly convenient in view of the projected Hong Kong-Chiangmai direct service by Thai International from April 1. Another small group may be able to visit South Korea at Easter 1980, in cooperation with the Korean Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society. Plans for these visits have to be made many months in advance and many members have found it necessary in the past to withdraw after initial arrangements have been made. Some sixteen members, for example, withdrew from the proposed Darjeeling-Sikkim visit after payment of deposits which were fully refunded. But this entailed a substantial amount of rearrangement of aircraft, hotels, ground transport, and so forth. Although recent and forthcoming excursions are arranged on a 'break even' basis for the Society, they are at considerably less cost to participants than for individual travel; and it may be necessary to consider levying some non-refundable service charge in future to protect the Society's financial interests. I would like to thank Dr. Shaw for all the time and effort he has put into these excursion arrangements and I am sure those who have participated would wish me to do so. Janie Thomas of Urbis Planning Design has also offered to include interested members of our Society in a trip she is planning for later this year to Shanghai and Peking. All except our very recently joined members have been circulated with information about her proposals.\n\nPublications\n\nWork continues for our proposed publication of photographs with text of old Hong Kong buildings. Many of the buildings photographed — by members of your Council and friends — have since been demolished. Mr. Tony Rydings has played a very active role in this project together with Mr. Ian Diamond. We are now, so to speak, on the home stretch in this publication project with approximately three-quarters of the text assembled and the photographs in place. We would like also to thank Dr. Solomon Bard, Executive Secretary, Antiquities and Monuments Section, Urban Services Department, for much material assistance with the project.\n\nThe 1977 Journal is now being distributed to all members, and Dr. Hayes has already submitted a draft list of contents for the 1978 issue which promises to have a great deal of interesting and", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1979.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/2801w5938", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 208859, "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": 21, "title": "RAS-1980", "content_text": "been teaching at Wah Yan since 1960. The other was given by myself, and I spoke on “Chinese and Western medicine: compatible or antagonistic?\" My data was gathered during a three-year research project into the medical system of Hong Kong conducted at Hong Kong University's Centre of Asian Studies. In February Mr. Patrick Lau spoke on \"Rural Architecture in Hong Kong\". He is the author of a book on the subject, based on a series of survey studies and published jointly by the Government Information Services and the Hong Kong Tourist Association.\n\nIn February Dr. Norman Ko, Reader in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at the University of Hong Kong, gave a talk on \"Underwater Photography and some Observations of Marine Life in Hong Kong\". Finally, in March, there were two talks: one given by Mr. Nigel Cameron, a well-known locally-based historian and art critic, and author of many books and essays, on \"The K'ang-Hsi Emperor (1662-1722)\". The other was given by Professor Winston Wan Lo on the work of his late father, Lo Hsiang-lin, who was Professor of Chinese at the University of Hong Kong. Winston Lo is himself a professor of History at Florida State University. Future talks are in the process of being arranged, and you will already have received advanced notice of two, possibly three talks for April.\n\nTours Abroad\n\nIn April 1979 Dr. Shaw led a trip to Darjeeling and Sikkim, and in July another to Srinagar and Ladakh or “Little Tibet\". Members on the latter trip were particularly fortunate in that, by a harsh 3 a.m. start, they were able to witness and record the most interesting part of the final day's ceremonies in the annual masked dance festival at Hemis Monastery near Leh. Our Society is, of course, a non-profit-making organization, and Dr. Shaw was able to make a refund of $240 to each participant on the Sikkim trip, although a nominal loss was made on that to Srinagar and Ladakh. At the end of this week, a group of 19 members will leave for the Kingdom of Bhutan, the last of the forbidden kingdoms opening its doors to a select group of visitors. Again, they will be led by Dr. Shaw. In the absence of any response from China International Travel Service in Peking concerning our proposals for visits to China by groups of members of the Society, no further representations were made during the past year. Members will, of course, know they can now, as individuals, join a number of tours operating from Hong Kong.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1980.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/kh04md207", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 215463, "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-2001", "page_number": 240, "title": "RAS-2001", "content_text": "189\n\nBrief apology\n\nDear Reader,\n\nBHUTAN - WHY NOT?\n\nROBERT NIELD\n\nIf you wish to read a learned article about a little-known Himalayan culture, its people, history and religion, you may stop here. Also stop here if you want to add to your already in-depth understanding of the Kingdom of Bhutan. There is not much on the following pages that can be described as \"in depth.\" Moreover, for a general introduction you should read instead the guidebooks that most people seem to refer to, namely the Lonely Planet guide and the Inside Pocket Guide; these were valuable sources of reference during my visit,\n\nWhat does follow is an account of the observations and recollections of one member of the 27-person Royal Asiatic Society study tour of Bhutan, that took place from 8 to 19 February 2002. All aspects of this logistically demanding tour were organised most ably by Dr Brian Shaw and his wife Felicity. I must record here my thanks to Brian for his help in ensuring that at least the factual content of this narrative is not too far off the mark. All other observations are mine alone, and indeed might be at variance with those of other members of the tour.\n\nThe source of the Nile\n\nThe first announcement for the RAS trip to Bhutan appeared in the Society's newsletter in about September 2001. I looked at it and thought that I would think about it. After all, where was it? What was it? Why go there? Sure - I had heard of it and I knew that it was somewhere like Nepal, Assam or Sikkim. The adventurer in me said that I had to go, simply because I had not been there before. So I thought I would do some reading about it - and then decide. Inevitably I did not quite get round to doing the reading. I looked at a few web sites, and found myself side-tracked into some antiquarian book dealers' offerings, imagining what it must have been like to set out to discover the source of the Nile. At least I knew that the Nile did not originate in\n\nPage 240\n\nPage 241", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2001.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/zg651950g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 215631, "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-2001", "page_number": 408, "title": "RAS-2001", "content_text": "359\n\nunusual downward-hanging flowers with nine pure white petals, and rich red stamens, and also found a large specimen of the quite rare Michelia doltsopa, also with rich white, scented flowers. A Metasequoia glyptostroboides gave us one of many chances to benefit from Maggie's knowledge, and showed again how recent so much of our knowledge is. The tree was spotted in 1941 by a forester in Sichuan who, being unable to identify it sent leaves to Beijing. By extraordinary coincidence, a Japanese palaeobotanist was working on three-million-year-old fossils of the same tree, thought to be long extinct, and in 1946 the connection was made between the two. Like the Ginkgo biloba, therefore, this is a fossil survival - and whereas it is struggling to survive in its remote Sichuan valley, thanks to gardens like this it is actually thriving in Britain, and is now widely available. This was a theme we came across in several gardens: British horticulture feeding plants back to their original countries.\n\nHeligan is now one of the best known gardens in Britain, thanks to the televising of its restoration. Its 80 acres had almost disappeared into jungly luxuriance thanks to some 70 years of neglect, and were only \"re-discovered\" in 1990 thanks to a conversation in the pub at St. Ewe between its new owner John Willis, and one Tim Smit (now Director of the Eden Project). The gardens as we see them now are the design commissioned from Thomas Gray by Henry Hawkins Tremayne in 1780, and the last major planting was done before the First World War. Of the 22 gardeners then, all signed up; two thirds were killed, and none returned. The Tremayne family had six houses, and moved to Crone Manor, leaving Heligan tenanted but the gardens neglected, and the rest, as they say, is history.\n\nWe were taken around Heligan by Colin Howlett, whose familiarity with the project since its inception gave us a wonderful insight into its work. Many of the early plantings still visible are the results of Joseph Hooker's 1848-1850 collecting in Sikkim, which were distributed by himself and by Kew almost immediately on his return: 23 of the rhododendrons at Heligan are Hooker plantings, as is the Crinodendron, and the Magnolia campbellii collected by him is now the largest of the magnolias at 60 feet in height. Thanks to the long neglect of the gardens, however, many of the rhododendrons have hybridised, with the result that Heligan now has the job of identifying and naming many new hybrids; this is also true of its camellias.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2001.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/zg651950g", "rank": 0 } ]