[ { "id": 211420, "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": 136, "title": "RAS-1988", "content_text": "112\n\nI remember Uncle as a tall, serious person with rather high cheek bones and a broad, prominent chin, altogether a rather handsome gentleman. He had a soft voice, unexpected of a man his size. He was frugal, conservative and cautious in whatever task he undertook. His wife, née Auyoung, was a tiny woman, with bound feet, exuding energy and efficiency, a true Chinese matriarch. She was born on 14 October 1874 in the village of Ma Tsze To a family of some stature. One of her cousins was well-known in national politics and was connected with the building of the Yet Hon Railroad connecting Canton and Hankow. Toby described his mother as a good woman and a good mother. She was a literate person even though she only had tutoring at home. Because she had experienced poverty at some point before marriage, she was very thrifty herself, but generous with others. She stinted on food for herself to give her children. Toby was very much touched when she sent him off to the United States with a 20 dollar gold coin she had saved for emergencies, and regrets that he did not save it as a permanent reminder of her great love and sacrifice.\n\nThe three boys and four girls in the family attended St. John's and St. Mary's in Shanghai, where they learned English well, as Uncle had hoped. They are:\n\nToby Ting Kin E (18 Feb 1900-); also known as Tung Pai |0f| Helen Moo Ching AA (5 Feb 1902-15 Jan 1974)\n\nCharles Ting Hing (21 Dec 1903-1978)\n\nGeorgette Moo Yung\n\nMoo Yun\n\nTing Cheong\n\nL\n\n(3 Apr 1909-25 Jun 1979); also known as Tung Sui 同瑞\n\nMoo Sau 慕修(1919-).\n\nNo doubt very bright, after two years at St. John's, Toby was admitted by competitive examination to Tsinghua University in Peking at the age of 16. Tsinghua was founded with Boxer Indemnity money the United States had returned to China to prepare Chinese students for further studies in the American universities. Toby became interested in fisheries and selected the University of Washington after Tsinghua in 1920. He earned a B.S. degree in 1923 in Fisheries but he felt the need to study other aspects of the field not available in Washington. After two semesters", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1988.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/ft84gb83q", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 214974, "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-2000", "page_number": 70, "title": "RAS-2000", "content_text": "26\n\nfrom the hill, in the town.\n\nIn that particular place on the Chinese provincial railroad construction, Han Suyin's baby elder brother, Gabriel (Sea Orchid), died simply because he was Eurasian. The French doctor working for the Belgian railroad-building company was engaged basically to look after the European employees' and their families' health, and these patients could see him at any time in his house on the hilltop. For Chinese and Eurasians he was available exclusively in his morning clinic, not meant for Europeans. Sea Orchid was most unlucky to get suddenly and seriously ill at a wrong time of the day, late in the evening, and his Belgian mother - obviously scared of the worst - took him immediately, although against the company's regulations, to the hilltop doctor's house. She was not even let in by the doctor's French wife and this shattering episode is described in detail in Chapter Nineteen of The Crippled Tree. The most dramatic part of the dialogue between the sick baby's mother and the doctor's French wife is cited below:\n\n“But my child is dying, he has convulsions. Madame, for the love of God, let me see the doctor.”\n\n“Certainly not, Madame. Don't shout like that, it is ridiculous. There is nothing wrong with your child, only teething. The doctor cannot see you.”\n\n“My baby is dying, my baby is dying,” screamed Mama, striking the door more violently, hurling her weight against it.\n\n“Get out, you and your filthy halfcast brat, get out of my house,” shouted the French woman upstairs. Then Mama heard a man's voice, and again the woman's: “I forbid you to go. Do you hear, Pierre? I forbid it. I will not have you kill yourself for the sake of a halfcast throwndown.” The next morning Sea Orchid was dead.\n\nHan Suyin was born to Roman Catholicism, owing to her deeply religious Belgian mother. Surprisingly enough, even Catholicism seemed split on racial grounds in that surrealistic land of Old China. In Chapter Twenty-Seven of The Crippled Tree, Han Suyin recollects her early memories of attending a Chinese Catholic school, attached to the Peking's Chinese Catholic Church (also known as East Church, or", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2000.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/nk328168n", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 215948, "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-2002", "page_number": 247, "title": "RAS-2002", "content_text": "181\n\nSignificantly, this party was the only escape group without a regular military officer in their midst, and to have a Chinese to organise their escape and travel with them. All three Europeans were academics, without experience of up-to-date, modern military thinking. Moreover, given the nature of colonial society, they were used to being treated with deference. It would not have occurred to them to question why the Chinese along their escape route had been so helpful, or why they were met by Europeans in this very remote area, still bandit country, where few ventured, who were not only expecting them, but 'who were quite conversant with the route back to Kowloon and were assistants to FW Kendall, another member of the same organisation whose address... was c/o Col Chauvin, British Embassy, Chung King.'\n\nLt DF Davies, formerly a Lecturer in Physics, solemnly advised that he understood 'Col LT Ride of our party was to attempt some sort of underground railroad back to the Camp...(and) if they could be persuaded and/or allowed to carry out this work, I would suggest that the Cloak and Dagger Group be approached.' Since the Cloak and Dagger Boys they met were Z Force, this was in fact one of the jobs they had long been trained for.\n\nThe trip from Hong Kong had been stressful, not least because a commanding officer had told Ride in no uncertain terms before departure that he should be court-martialled on arrival in Chongqing for deserting his troops. From Lt Davies' report, we know that the group had talked with Z Force members about their organisation. Grimsdale was later to refer to Ride blaming Kendall as a 'complete failure' for delaying his departure from Kukong, then a safe town with Chinese Army presence. Ride himself makes no mention, describing the men later as mere escapees with the Chan Chak group.\n\nWhile still in Kukong, after meeting MacEwan and Talan, the group met Col Chauvin and Dr Wan Wan Yik Shin, a doctor who had served both in the Chinese Army and in the British RAMC. It was at this stage that Ride appears to have outlined his proposals to set up an elaborate escape and evasion organisation. By the time he arrived in Chongqing a few days later, he had formulated an elaborate proposal. Operational details were sketchy, to be left to others to sort out, naming Dr Wan and General Yu Mo Han, commander of Chinese forces in the area. On one point he was unequivocally adamant: that 'the section should be under the command of Lt Col Ride.' It was an absolutely essential prerequisite that the British authorities provide him with a letter confirming his", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2002.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/mp4901278", "rank": 0 } ]