RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1963 https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/4m90m091v September 27th October 16th Show of three documentary films made by Mr. Hugh Gibb for B.B.C. Television: "Rituals of Rice" (colour) describes rice growing in Japan and old Shinto practices associated with transplanting and harvest festivals. "Zen" (black and white) is the first film to be made in a Zen Buddhist monastery in Japan. Permission was granted only after several months of negotiation and then the film had to be shot in one morning. "Dance and Drama" (colour) won the Gran Premio award for T.V. documentaries at the Bergamo Film Festival in 1961 and describes the evolution of dance and drama in Japan including the Kagura, the traditional village drama, and abridged performances of puppet plays, Noh and Kabuki theatre. Three further films made by Mr. Hugh Gibb: "The Dyaks" tells the story of the communal life and customs of the Sarawak "Long Houses." "Birds' Nest Soup" was made in the Great Cave of Niah in Sarawak, where edible birds' nests are collected from the walls and ceilings to prepare one of the most expensive delicacies in the world. "Turtle Island" takes place on a small island off the coast of Sarawak where as many as one hundred turtles come in the course of one night to dig their nests and lay their eggs. The film tells the story of the cumbersome process and of the scientific work on these edible turtles, the collection and sale of whose eggs is a considerable industry. The lectures in January and February by Professor S. H. Hansford on "Some Problems of Ancient Chinese Jades and Bronzes" and by Mr. R. D. Bromhall on "Underwater Photography in Eastern Seas" will be included in the Report for the coming year. ================================================================================ RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1971 https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/z029vt43g 56 HONG KONG EDITOR miles away round yon corner to the South! I ran down there for a day, to recruit, last week, and there, one walks by permission of these Celestial exclusives ashore, viz. on an island, called (I don't exactly know why) - Dane's Island. It is about 3 miles in circumference, and has a triple-peaked hill on it about as high as Arthur's Seat in Edin[burgh] which I mounted; and you can understand the titillating pleasure I derived from discovering a resemblance the most remarkable between the view from this hill and that from Ehrenbreitstein on the Rhine! The absence of a fine City and bridge was all (quite enough, you will say!) and was compensated by a river-reach (in like situation, i.e. immediately below you) occupied for the length of two miles with full 50 gallant Ships of 1500 tons and downwards. The rest of the view the character of the country -- the distribution[?] of the water the mountainous horizon-bore a great resemblance to that on the Rhine + persons Society here is at the very lowest intellectual ebb-and is thus unencumbered by that pretension and affectation which the half-educated and half-literary disgust you with..... whether they infest the walks of literature, science, art, or anything else. We are so far, therefore, much to be envied. I discover however ominous indications in certain editorial labours of certain here who actually arrange the types for two weekly newspapers imagine if you can, what a Canton Newspaper ought to be! Apart though from what seems, and of course is, mere banter in this - we are as a community perhaps the least enlightened, the least informed, and the most vain, and the most unamiable in our intercourse together, that ever existed of its size. An American missionary who conducts our "Monthly Repository” excellently well-is a marked but almost solitary exception. The rest of us, unless there be some "singular few" who like myself think of all this in secret and are unknown, are to a Man engrossed in business — Oh most dreadfully engrossed — it beats every bondage of lucre I ever beheld; mammon rules not only in the office, but at the dinner-table, and no doubt over the sleepers' dreams; not a moment of life spared to one hearty thought of any other topic that might interest liberal Englishmen and, more shocking than all, not a moment of the 24 hours (I desire not to speak uncharitably and therefore only deplore what I fear to be generally not untrue) given to the consideration ================================================================================ RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1984 https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/5h73wh572 335 which it served. Some reasons for Lugang's decline include the silting of the port's shallow harbour, integration of its hinterland into the island-wide economy — largely accomplished by the construction of the west coast railroad, and the limitation of the Fujian (Fukien) trade after the Japanese occupation of Taiwan in 1895. Deglopper concludes that the decline of Lugang after the mid-nineteenth century is not an isolated phenomenon but must be understood through the port's relationship to the rest of Taiwan and to Fujian. This is a good descriptive presentation of Lugang. Chapter 9 by Yi-rong Ann Hsu, Clifton W. Pannell, and James O. Wheeler applies statistical methods to analyze the development of Taiwan's transportation network both in terms of network connectivity and connectivity of urban centres from 1600 and 1972. The analysis clearly portrays the development of the road and rail systems after 1893. The concluding comments stress the parallel relationship between transport development and economic growth. Another chapter by Ronald Knapp delves into the particulars of a rarer mode of transportation, the push car railway or daisha as it is known in Japanese. The daisha played a significant role in integrating Taiwan's agriculture into the rest of the Japanese empire by providing transport between farms and railway stations. Knapp discusses the relationship of this mode to the development of railroads and roads, again stressing the Taoyuan plain as a case study. In the final chapter, Jack F. Williams discusses the importance of the sugar industry in Taiwan's development from the Dutch period down to 1975 with some predictions about the future. Williams points out the significant transformation in this industry when the Japanese took over the island in 1895. The Nationalist Chinese Taiwan Sugar Corporation is seen as a slightly less exploitative continuation of the Japanese system. Despite the declining role sugar plays in Taiwan's economy, when one considers the company's importance in the lives of the thousands of cane growers and workers and the indirect employment generated in other related industries, the Taiwan Sugar Corporation emerges as the single most important government-owned corporation on the island even today. ================================================================================ RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1986 https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/jq08c7063 133 ger ferry service direct to Hong Kong has already been established, and airports at Haikou and Sanya are being up-graded to international standard for direct air links with Hong Kong. A 50-km railway link will complete the link between Ba Suo, Lintau and Yulin. For energy, an open-cut mine will be developed at Changpo with capital investment of US$ 60 million (Bulletin, May 10, 1983) and the estimated output of 500,000 tonne of coal will be used at power stations at Changpo and Haikou (China Daily, November 25, 1983). The projects which the Hainan authorities would like to proceed as joint ventures with foreign capital are listed in Table 1 (Anon., 1982a). These projects were presented to the Australian Department of Trade as being indicative of the range of the island's ambitions rather than as specific projects to which they Product Location size Comments Cement Dong Fang 1 Mt/a Export through Basuo. Petroleum refinery West Coast 1 Mt/a Based on expectations of offshore oil. Silicon carbide Dong Fang 15000 tpa Based on planned hydro expansion on Changhua River. High quality silica sand. Plate glass Daxian Rebuilding of facilities. Paper Daxian Aluminium 30000 tpa Long-term ambition. Tourism Five potential locations. Tropical agriculture Sugar cane, pineapple, cashews, coffee, cocoa macadamia nuts, beef and dairy cattle. Fish, prawns 27 sites available for fish farms. Page 150 Page 151 ================================================================================ RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1986 https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/jq08c7063 140 D.L. MICHALK China Daily (1983) “Hainan Island draws more foreign interest”, November 25, 1983, published by Xinhua News Agency. Clark, L. (1938) "Among the Big Knot Lois of Hainan", National Geographic Magazine, September issue, pp. 391-418. Dehergne, J. (1940) “Les Origines du Christianisme dans l'ile de Hainan”, Monumenta Serica, 5: 329–348. Dunne, G.H. (1962) “Generation of Giants: The Story of the Jesuits in China in the Last Decade of the Ming Dynasty”, University of Notre Dame Press, Notre Dame, Indiana, U.S.A. Eberhard, W. (1969) A History of China. Fairfax-Cholmeley, E. (1963) "Hainan: Awakening Paradise”, Eastern Horizons, 2: 35-42. Fenzel, G. (1933) "Die Insel Hainan: Eine landeskundliche Skizze, dargestellt auf Grund eigner Reisebeobachtungen und des vorhandenen Schrifttums", Mitteilungen der geographischen Gesellschaft Munchen, 26: 73-221. Fusson, C.G. (1929) "The Peoples of Kwang-tung: Their Origin, Migrations and Present Distribution”, Lingnan Science Journal, 7: 5-21. Gao, Da-Xian (1981) “The Li People of Hainan Island”, China Reconstructs, 10: 59-65. Henry, B.C. (1886) Lingnam: Travels in the Interior of China, S.W. Partridge & Co, London. Hollingworth, C. (1982) “Letter from Hainan”, Far Eastern Economic Review, April issue, p 78. Iskoldsky, V. (1958) "The Development of Agriculture on the Island of Hainan”, Sovetskoe kitaevedenie, 2: 117-123. Kirk, D. (1965) "Unknown Hainan", Far Eastern Economic Review... ================================================================================ RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1990 https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/d79206299 G. Knapp, The Chinese House: Craft Symbol, and the Folk Tradition (Hong Kong, Oxford University Press, 1990). Knapp does not cover the paintings and stucco work that were a marked feature of the Kwangtung architectural style. For examples of this fine traditional decorative work, see Rural Architecture in Hong Kong (Hong Kong, Government Information Services Department, 1979). In the Hakka villages of the Tsuen Wan district, this "animal" was always a unicorn. In Cantonese villages the lion was usual. However, their purpose and motivation was clearly the same. Informants said there were differences in the dance performances of lions and unicorns; unicorns "crept, bobbed and weaved", whereas lions would "stand up and prance". The musical accompaniment, drums and gongs, was the same, and previously firecrackers had been an indispensable part of any performance by lions or unicorns. Hugh Baker mentions that the Liaos of Sheung Shui were known throughout the New Territories for their unicorn dance team. See the interesting information given in his Sheung Shui, A Chinese Lineage Village (London, Frank Cass & Co., Ltd., 1968), p. 193. See my "Notes on Temples and Shrines on Hong Kong Island" in Journal of the Hong Kong Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society, Vol. 27 (1987), p. 287. Monlin Chiang, Tides from the West (New Haven, Yale University Press, 1947), p. 9. John Francis Davis, The Chinese, A General Description of the Empire of China and its Inhabitants (London, Charles Knight, 1836) Vol. 2, pp. 29-30. From the memorial tablet to Mr. Chan Wing-on, Chairman of the Tsuen Wan Rural Committee and Chairman of the 18th Term, New Territories Heung Yee Kuk 1950-52, at the Wing On Pavilion, Fu Yung Shan, Tsuen Wan. Mr. Chan died on 15 October 1956; see Annual Departmental Reports, District Commissioner, New Territories, (1953-54 para. 56, and 1956-57 para. 119). From a “Short History of Yeung Uk Village" (in Chinese), published at the time of the village resiting in 1965 and written by Yeung's eldest grandson, Mr Yeung Cho-ling. According to the commemorative tablet, the grave was repaired on a lucky day in the middle month of the autumn season in the 10th year of Kuang Hsu, that is in September-October 1884. 1736; but in fact the ping-san year is the 1st year of Ch'ien Lung's long reign. There was probably another, less altruistic factor at work here too: since it was believed that the graves of good people have a beneficial effect on the fortunes of their family for generations to come. It is implicit in this case that the good influences of the grave were not yet spent. For a more recent example from Tsing Yi Island, see my Rural Communities, op. cit., p. 143. Contents more than values, I suggest? Wolfram Eberhard, Cantonese Ballads (Munich State Library Collection) (Taipei, The Orient Cultural Service, 1972), p.2. R. David Arkush, "Orthodoxy and heterodoxy in Twentieth-Century Chinese Peasant Proverbs" at pp. 310-335 of Kwang-Ching Liu (ed.) Orthodoxy in Late Imperial China (Berkeley, University of California Press, 1990). Helen Kwok and Mini Chan, Fossils From a Rural Past, A Study of Extant Cantonese Children's Songs (Hong Kong, Hong Kong University Press, 1990), pp. 17, 29. Lucien Bianco, Origins of the Chinese Revolution, 1915-1949, (Stanford, Stanford University Press, 1971), successively pp.126, 94-95. ================================================================================ RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1992 https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/qf85tx75x 60 for many years. Neither refer to Wm Mesny, though Sam Couling in 1917 in his Encyclopaedia Sinica does run to a short paragraph describing in very round terms, the then still living Mesny. NOTE Tcheng Ki-tong. I have been unable to find the date of publication of his first edition of Les Chinois, Peints par Eux-meme; however, in the preface to the English seventh edition of Bits of China by Tcheng, published in English in London in 1890, Tcheng writes 'The friendly welcome accorded by the English Public to my Chinese Painted by Themselves has encouraged me to publish this translation of my last work, (from the French Les Plaisirs en Chine).' Mesny publishing this book crit as late as 1905 suggests an ulterior motive, perhaps no more than an instinctive urge to highlight yet again his tireless and tenacious claim to recognition as the foreign authority on things Chinese. Appendix B Chronology as claimed by William Mesny [Extracted from details within the Miscellanies] 9 October 1842 1847 Mesny born in Jersey ? 1850 1850-1854 1854 1860 December 1861 February 1861 1861-1862 1862 February March April 1862 May 1862 Dame School National School St Anne's, Alderney Left school Worked at brick making, stone cutting with a smithy and on Channel Island fortifications. He also worked in blasting and as an architect's assistant. Left home, went to sea and sailed to Africa, Australia and the Americas Arrived on the China coast and disembarked at Shanghai Left Shanghai for Hong Kong Romantic interlude with Huang family in Hong Kong where he bore the name of Huang Chin-fu 3rd Turnkey Hong Kong Gaol Returned to Shanghai aboard the SS Aden Travelled up the Yangtze and arrived at Hankow Master of the Hat Liang-wang on the Yangtze based in Shanghai, running the Taiping blockade: Wounded and captured by Imperial Chinese gunboats at Kuan Yin Shan on the Yangtze Rescued by the gunboat HMS Banterer and secured the release of Page 75 Page 76 ================================================================================ RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1992 https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/qf85tx75x 149 A PEEK BACKWARDS INTO THE JEWISH COMMUNITY OF SHANGHAI* (This paper is dedicated to the memory of the late Mr Hans Diestel) WEI PEH TI Introduction Jewish traders were among the first foreigners to come to work and live in Shanghai when the port was first opened to foreign trade in November 1843. Despite the important role a number of these Jewish residents played in Shanghai as well as in international commerce at that time and for a century to follow, scholars are just beginning to focus their attention on this community. David Kranzler's dissertation at Yeshiva University in New York on the Jewish refugees from Europe who arrived at Shanghai after 1938, Japanese, Nazis and Jews: the Jewish Refugee Community at Shanghai, is the only generally known work that has been published in English.1 Vilhelm Meyer was a Danish Jew who started a small trading house in Shanghai importing goods from his native Denmark at the beginning of the century, and who eventually sold the company, by then a commercial and industrial conglomerate of 1,800 employees, to General Electric in 1935. His life and work is being researched by his grandson, Christopher Bo Bramsen.2 Bramsen, however, is writing a personal biography of his grandfather, emphasizing his work in Shanghai as a Dane, not a treatise on a Jewish individual in Shanghai. On the other hand, two doctoral dissertations on the Sephardic community are being undertaken at this time, one at the London School of Economics, and one at the University of London. *The suggestion for a paper on the Jewish community in Shanghai was first made in 1987 by Dr Jewish Diestel and Mrs Paula Sandfelder when the Jewish Historical Society and the Jewish Recreation Club of Hong Kong invited me to give the first Ezekiel Abraham Memorial Lecture. Subsequently, I have given similar talks to the student body of the Chapin School and at Temple Emmanuel in New York City, as well as to Jewish groups on Long Island. I am grateful to my many friends for showing interest in the subject, and am especially flattered to be consulted by otherwise intelligent scholars who wish to work on the subject of the Shanghai Jews seriously. I would like to thank the Jewish Library in Hong Kong for letting me consult their collections; my appreciation also goes to the Rev Carl Smith for generously sharing his numerous index cards and his encyclopaedic knowledge. ================================================================================ RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1994 https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/zk522640g Visits: Yin Tin Tsa, Sai Kung for annual Roman Catholic Church festival 1994 16 April Po For Island 1 May 16 July 20 September 21 September 5 November 26 November 3 December 10 December Ma Po Marshes with shump supper (repeated in September) Tai Hang Fire Dragon Dance Monkey God Festival at Sau Mau Ping Swire Institute of Marine Science, Cape D'Aguilar Tung Lung Island HK Zoological and Botanical Gardens Exhibition of Contemporary Chinese Oil Paintings - Fung Ping Shan Museum, HK University 17 December Shing Mun Redoubt 1995 18 February Sai Ying Pun Guided Walk 4 March Lei Yue Mun Headland Visits outside Hong Kong: 1994 October 1995 North Vietnam March Temples of South Taiwan Of course we must also thank all those who took time to lecture to us and let me read out a list of those Lectures: 1994 15 April Great Monuments of India. Dr. Shobita Punja 13 May 20 May 17 June Turbans and Traders HK's Indian Communities Ms Barbara-Sue White To the Farthest Port of the Rich East Salem's China Trade and the East India Marine Society Mr William Sargent Pregnancy and Childbirth in Hong Kong Ms Diana Martin ================================================================================ RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1995 https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/95941j25g 64 which this path ended was naturally called by this same name. But among the Hakkas, the Island of Hong Kong or rather this northern portion of it, is to the present day called by the same name "Kwantailou" (Eitel, 1895, P.134) As early as 1841, a shoreline road was planned in the northern part of the Hong Kong Island. It was pegged out by the Chinese labourers and made to connect Sai Ying Pun to East Point, a distance of nearly four miles. It was finished in early 1842 and was named Queen's Road. The road was so cut as to leave generally enough space between it and water and at a safe height above sea-level for the erection of godowns. The possession and occupation of the Island in the first instance was largely due to military reasons, especially as the Chinese mainland was so near at hand. There were two Chinese forts on the tip of Kowloon peninsula. Military establishments were therefore quickly set up on the northern coast in order to prevent the Chinese from recapturing Hong Kong. In the early days of February 1841, the navy had already laid claim to Navy Bay (Belcher's Creek) lying due east of the bluff then known as Belcher's Point and was already running up store houses on the sloping foreshore. The Army had established two camps on the northern shore, one on Cantonment Hill (later known as the Victoria Barracks and the Seven-and-six Penny Hill) and other at Sai Ying Pun, on the long slope which now carries on its shoulders the Hong Kong University and at its foot, the old Reformatory Building (Sayer, 1937, P. 99) and above the present Pokfulam Road. On the site in Third Street where the St. Louis School now stands was a small battery, called the West Point Battery or Elliot's Battery. (A similar battery, East Point Battery or Pottinger's Battery was mounted on the site of Wellington Barracks) The barracks at that time were of a more or less makeshift nature. Owing to unstable political situation, it was said that Lord Saltoun, then Commander-in-Chief, would not take upon himself to erect permanent and suitable barracks and officer quarters for the troops. The soldiers were encamped in flimsy structures of bamboo, cane, palm leaves and canvas. The so-called barracks at Sai Ying Pun were ================================================================================ RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1997 https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/wp98g7579 15-16 November 1997 14-15 March 1998 Visit to Huizhou (Waichau), Guangdong Province, Messrs Peter Rull, Phillip Bruce and Dr Joseph Ting. Visit to Bocca Tigris, Drs Anthony Stu and Joseph Ting. Visits within Hong Kong 1997 20 April 14 May 14 June 19 July Field Trip to Champion-Calibre Trees on Hong Kong Island and in Kowloon, Professor C.Y. Jim. One day visit to Macau for Drunken Dragon Dance und Tum Kung Festival, Mr Geoffrey Roper From Beijing to Versailles, Hong Kong Museum of Art Guided Gallery Visit. Hong Kong Horse Racing Museum and Hong Kong Cemetery, Happy Valley, Reverend Carl Smith and Professor C.Y. Jim. 16 September Wo Hang to see hot air balloons, Dr Patrick Hase. 27 September Chek Lap Kok Airport and Tung Chung, Mr Phillip Bruce. 19 October History through Maps- map exhibition at Museum of History, Mr S.C. Tam 22 November University of Hong Kong Museum and Library, Mr Y.C. Wan. 6 December Walking tour of Shalotung, Mr Edward Stokes. xxiii ================================================================================ RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1997 https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/wp98g7579 11 government would not surrender responsibility for, say, Immigration or Inland Revenue; but that other duties were either less clear-cut or simply so expensive as only to be borne by Government - this did not mean that they were not of great interest and concern to local residents. The report proposed that local authorities must be consulted, and enabled to make their views known, on the adequacy of Government’s arrangements or proposals for police and fire-service 'cover', medical, housing and educational facilities (which must silently stretch to financing policy), town-planning and development plans, and public transport. 'Mandatory' executive functions which should be devolved to all local authorities would include: Public Health Control and provision of cleansing & sanitary services; latrines, bath & wash houses, laundries, labourers' lines, swimming pools, offensive trades & markets, hawking, ventilation, overcrowding, advertisements, slaughter houses, cemeteries & mortuaries. Licensing & control of restaurants, tea-houses & cooked food stalls. Notification of infectious diseases and public vaccination. Other Licensing Liquor, barber shops, bars, billiard saloons, bowling alleys, cinemas, dance halls, mahjong shops, money-lenders, pawnbrokers, skating rinks & table tennis saloons. Housing Management of Government low-cost housing estates. Other Weights & Measures & naming of streets. At first sight this miscellany hardly seemed of major public interest, apart from housing management and sanitation, and certainly no more likely to inspire civic consciousness than did the Urban Council which already had these powers in Victoria and Kowloon (its unofficial membership doubled as the Housing Authority.) However the supplementary list of 'permissive' functions which councils could undertake within laid-down standards promised much more delegation of visible powers from central social service Departments. Under Public ================================================================================ RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1998 https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/1g05n0794 231 mainly inhabited by Chinese, which circumstance already speaks sufficiently for itself, but eastwards the city is spreading rapidly, with magnificent houses being built; in the two years following my first visit marked progress has been made. Further towards the east a magnificent road leads to a beautiful valley, through which flows a small stream. They say this was the only place that was inhabited prior to the occupation of the island by the English. The Chinese (man) who had a farm here and who had cultivated the valley, called it Happy Valley, a name by which it is still known today. Nowadays alongside the excellently cultivated fields other fields are gradually being sown for great harvests in the future. We too planted a few seeds brought here from afar. The name of the valley accords with its choice as the site for the cemetery. What first particularly strikes one in Hong Kong and other trading towns of China is the almost total absence of horses; they are replaced by Chinese. It is too hot to walk on foot and hence improper for a decent gentleman, let alone a lady: on my walks I never met a lady on foot. Each household usually has one covered litter, like a carriage body without wheels, and several open ones, consisting of light bamboo armchairs with two poles attached: in the true sense - a portechaise. Two Chinese are harnessed to both the former and the latter, which obviously works out cheaper than horses, but from the moral point of view they are debased to the level of animals and are no better than any slave. On more than one occasion a poor coolie (porter) received a beating from a passing dandy for not moving out of the way in time or simply because the latter wanted to make use of his cane. It seems that crying out against slavery, or preaching equality, is much easier. During my stay here a small scene took place on 'Queen's Road.' The main role was played by a young officer of the frigate HM Nanking. It seems that the young man, being in high spirits, decided to eat some fruit from the basket of a hawker and the Chinese, not appreciating the joke, demanded payment and not receiving it grabbed the gentleman by the coat. Apparently, this insult to his attire was too much to take, even if the citizen of the Celestial Empire was right, and that is why HM Mr. Officer dealt the 'peasant' a mighty blow, which cut his face. Several peace-loving citizens, who didn't share the hero's warlike spirit, happened to be present and insisted that he be taken to the police, which was indeed done in spite of the loud protestations of his friends. The ================================================================================ RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1998 https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/1g05n0794 323 THE DRUNKEN DRAGON DANCE AND THE TAN GONG (TAM KUNG) FESTIVALS: NOTES ON THE RASKB VISIT TO MACAU, MAY 1997 GEOFFREY ROPER The eighth day of the fourth lunar month is an important date in the Chinese religious calendar. Principally it is Lord Buddha's birthday, and for that reason is soon to become a Hong Kong public holiday. In Macau, on a more local basis, it is also the date of the Drunken Dragon Dance Festival around the markets of central Macau and the Tan Gong (Tam Kung) Festival celebrations in Coloane Village, Coloane Island. It was with these two Festivals mainly in mind that a twenty-strong party from the Hong Kong Branch of the RAS, led by President Dan Waters, set off for Macau early on Wednesday, the 14th May (the date in the 1997 Western calendar). a.m., Preceded by Chinese opera performance the evening before, the initial Drunken Dragon Dance celebrations had already started by 8:30 by the time we arrived at the western end of the former Sao Domingos Market. The dragon heads and tails were being blessed by a Taoist priest outside the adjacent Guan Di (Kwan Tai) Temple and brought to life by the painting of eyes by invited VIPs. A golden flower with a red ribbon was tied around the head of each dancer - representing God's gift of energy for the dancing ahead. The scale of the festivities was somewhat smaller than the previous year, with humbler staging for the sponsors from the Macau Fish Merchants Association and restrictions on the free distribution of rice and vegetables to the public at the first market. The reason was disruption caused by building work, but most importantly, the Dance itself remained unchanged. The dragons, the dancers, and the dance itself are best seen in the illustrations (which were actually photographed by the author at the 1996 celebrations). Accompanied by a loud drumbeat, the group of about twenty male fish porters circled around and took turns in holding the wooden red and gold dragon heads and red and green tails. As ================================================================================ RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-2002 https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/mp4901278 395 so on. I owe this information to our President, Dr. Patrick Hase, who has also referred me to an article on the subject by Professor James L. Watson, "Eating from the Common Pot: Feasting with Equals in Chinese Society", published in Anthropos, Vol. 82, 1987, pp. 389-401. In the course of enquiries (1970s) into foods made at festival time, I came across some interesting facts about the preparation process. This was often laborious. The "cakes" made at the lunar New Year are a case in point. The materials comprised pounded glutinous rice and cane sugar. According to men from two of the former Tsuen Wan villages, sixteen hours were needed to cook the mixture in a very large, deep wok (the Chinese frying pan) in effect for a whole day, from dawn till dusk or later. Cooking in an old-fashioned village stove, fuelled by dried grass or firewood, was essential; since the taste would be different were charcoal or gas to be used. Some of the Sham Tseng elders (also Tsuen Wan District) said that each "cake" might require between 30 to 50 catties of glutinous rice, resulting in very large "cakes". In one household of my acquaintance (originally from Shek Pik on Lantau Island, resited to Tsuen Wan in 1960), it had been usual for them to make four large "cakes" every lunar New Year. These were distributed as goodwill gifts to shops in the market towns of Tai O and Cheung Chau, and the boat people's families in the Shek Pik anchorage - indicative of this household's economic and social ties. People also gave and received portions of such cakes during the customary visiting to mark the arrival of the New Year. The Sham Tseng men had also mentioned a rather curious requirement involved in the preparation of the dumplings made for the fifth day of the fifth lunar month festival, commonly known as the Dragon Boat Festival. The dumplings had to be made with a preparation of wood ash, placed between bamboo leaves, and filtered with water. This watery ash, known as kan shui [the character I was given for 'kan' is that for 'root', but though this sits oddly with the context, I have not been able to find anything more suitable in a dictionary search] had to come from "new" wood, though not necessarily of any particular kind. It was no use trying to filter ash from anything that came to hand, like old boards or drift-wood. Turning to other topics, I had earmarked but subsequently overlooked two interesting items in the course of shaping the chapters. ================================================================================