The photo shows the Tai Choi Yuen towards the hillside off the part of Peak Road which has the Nam Tam Wan area on the coastal side. Name of this area is the Lung Tsai Chuen, or Dragon Son Village in Chinese.
This valley is so encircled by the hills and forested villages so it was a perfect hot spot to grow many kinds of vegetable almost the entire year. There were couples of wells of fresh water abundantly enough for the farmers needs. The mosaic of different vegetations was a special feeling to enjoy, even though your nose wound disagree!
We saw peaceful stream running through the valley bottom but children would best enjoy the beating currents on those rainy days. Not sure of their activities in the picture, they might want to collect earthworm for pet bird, frog for meal supplement, tapole and small fish for hobby aquarium, or on the rainy day it's time to launch the paper boats or tiny rafts they made from hobbytime.
I still remember there was a big woodpecker nested over the tree on the photo's right in the 1950s. Its family in this vicinity made lots of noise on the dried trunk of a dead tree ( electricuted by lightning). There were many different birds around the area, such as Chinese Bulbul, Crested Bulbul, Magpie, Pigeon, Raven, Wild Dove, Sparrow, Big Eagle, Yellow Eye,....and more.
The central part of the valley stood the Silver Star Primary School. Part of its open field was obtained by reclaimation over a big water pond used by farming before. The founder was Mr. Y L Yeung. During the day and off the class time, he loved to play, or really broadcast, very loudly through his school PA system, many Marching Band Music all the times, and we did enjoy it very much too. Maybe, for the sake of his students, It was his way to counter-react to the huge noise problem due to the daily and frequent deafening, ear-piercing sound from those low-flying jetliners slowly passing above near the school.
The area was about hundred meters east of the Flight Path on the CC NDB route in those good old days.
Brian resting in valley on Cheung Chau, by Andrew Suddaby
This photograph was taken on the same day as the one showing the school children - and most probably in the same valley.
In December 2006, I tried to find the place where the children had been working in the field and I had a sudden feeling that I was standing very close to where I had photographed my pal, Brian in 1958. I think that the concrete seat was actuallyjust in front of the tree furthest away on the right of this lower photograph. It's good to knbow that my photograph of the school children brought back some happy memories for you. Best wishes, Andrew
If my first guess were wrong, there would be another location of fair similarity.
The smaller candidate is the Nam Zer Tong Valley near Tung Wan. Nam Zer is the name of a commom snake in Chinese. Tong is area having a water pond or small farming lake. It was very close to the Island Power House, the Police Station ( which is on the small hill ) and the St.John Hospital ( which separates from the beach ) and just about a minute's walk to the Tung Wan beach. The Peak Road also starts from this neighborhood.
You might have to figure it out which is more probable from your memory.
To my knowledge, the other picture still looks like a view of 1958's Tai Choi Yuen. In the early 1960s a paved new road was constructed by the walled property and zig-zaged upward to the Peak Road at Lan Villa. That is quite consistent with the second photo. If my first guess sounds OK with you, then consider the San Bean Road ( or San Bin Rd...or Hillside Rd) from Google map for the location of the Happy Children in that picture!
I think almost all the farming landscapes on CC were replaced by overcrowded houses. I visited the area in 1999 and all is new to me. I know the old is forever gone.
The case is slightly different for Nam Zer Tong. It seems there is at least a smaller portion remained as a green belt of grass field and trees or a village park to match up the Civic Sport Centre nearby (ie next to the Hospital).
Feel better? Again thank you for sharing the photos!!
The location of Nam Zer Tong mentioned by Tung would be around the present day Cheung Chau Sports Centre, behind the Hospital and within walking distance of the beach, as well as the Warwick Hotel.
I have had a good look at two of the on-line maps showing Cheung Chau and think that both the 1958 photographs were taken in a valley that was somewhere between Hill Side Road (then a path) and the Cheung Chau Peak Road. In 1958, I only visited Cheung Chau once or twice and visited that particular valley only once but I don't think that it was very close to where the Warwick hotel or the beach are, being more towards the centre of the southern part of the island. I've marked a ring round the likely area on the maps saved on my computer but am not sure whether it is permissible to,put them onto thevGwulo site! A problem for me is that I cannot locate on the maps the Chinese place names you both mention.
As you have both said, things have changed greatly on Cheung Chau and my memory, while very good, is not precise enough to be certain about somewhere that I passed only once when it was simply a part of a stroll round a less touristy part - but I am reasonably sure that the picture of Brian on the seat and the one taken in 2006 were taken within a few feet of each other, and that they too were very near the place where the children were working. If you can go there you could use the 2006 photograph as a fixing point - if you can find that place!
best wishes and happy memories Andrew (in England)
Google Maps still use some local names in English. If Hillside Road is concerned it is very close to Tai Choi Yuen Road. I guess those street names may be the only link of the locations mentioned.
Somehow, I've just deleted a long answer to you! I'll try to repeat it. Yes, I see that on some of the Internet maps, both English and Chinese names are shown, although the Chinese ones are sometimes in Chinese writing. I suyppose that I could try to copy them and paste them into the language translator on Google - but is it worth it?
I think that between us we have more or less identified the apporoximate location of those three photographs that I took in 1958. However, here is a suggestion. If you can copy my images, old and recent, and go to Cheung Chau you should be able to find a local who might be knowledgeable about things. On my expeditions between about 2003 and 2006 to take 'now' photogaphs to show the same places as I photographed in 1958, I took copies of the old ones with me, I used to approach the oldest person around, whom I hoped might be a local, and show them the appropriate photographs. Even though I always smiled in a friendly way I somwetimes got the impression that they thought I was about to attack them. I was usually aware that I was in roughly the right place. Most times, several other people would gather round and there would be a big debate in Cantonese about it all, with arms waving all over the place, shaking and nodding of heads and eventually some sort of agreement. Unfortunately, my Cantonese is limited to Jo San, Jo Tau and M Goi (excuse the crude approximation). Somebody would emerge who would do some translating and I nearly always had success. The only exception was in Yeun Long where a really old lady told me, through a 'street market inspector' that the river scenes that I had photographed somewhere between Yuen Long and Kam Tin or thereabouts would be totally unrecognisable as the river had been straightened and lined with concrete. I think that, once they'd got over the shock of being approached by a gweilo, people were quite pleased to see something of the old Hong Kong and I always gave them the old copies if they wanted them. Thewy probably thought that I was quite mad going all the way from England to Hong Kong just to do that.
Sorry Richard, my visits to Cheung Chau were always just for a day and I neither saw nor heard any fauna on the island. I guess that I was usually too busy taking phortographs of places, things and, when allowed, of people. In 1958 most adults out of the city centre did not want to be photographed and I tried to respect that. Children were quite different and would clamour to have their pictures taken. I always tried to reward them with a few coins, sweets or fruit such as bananas. If you did that nowadays they'd arrest you, which just shows how sad a world we are living in now.
Anyway, intrigued by your comment, I looked Cheung Chau fauna up on Google. The only snakes that I have ever seen in the whole of Hong Kong were:
1957/8 a cobra skeleton draped on a barbed wire fence at the top of the Little Sai Wan camp road junction with the Cape Collinson Road.
1957/8 a very dead but beautifully coloured python that some small children found brushing against their legs in the shallows at Shek O beach. The life guard rushed down grabbed it and, I guess, took it home for his tea. No doubt thos toddlers acquired an instant phoebia about snakes.
1957/8 a black and white krait that slithered across the path on the way down from the Temple oif 10,000 Buddhas in Shatin.
c2004 I saw a lovely little baby python on the path down at the Point at Little Sai Wan / Siu Sai Wan. I took a photo of it, showed the snake to two ladies and one of them promptly ground it into the concrete as they departed gleefully up the path. Is this what slaying the dragon is all about?
The same year, I think, I was scrambling up a narrow and rough path between our sunbathing rocks there and the Cape Collinson lighthouse path when a large centipede trundled across it. I took its photograph - not realising that it would have given me a nasty bite if I'd tried to put it into a more easily photographed place.
On many occasions when I have been trying to find old pill boxes, etc., I have brushed through bamboo thickets and other thick vegetation often filming as I went and I now wonder how close I might inadvertently have come to becoming well-acquainted with a bamboo snake - but fortunately, as I was always alone in some quite remote places, it never happened.
Boys running around the outback on CC island of my time must understand the fun of hunting and keeping some harmless Spider. This tiny spider never construct any web at all. It scouts on everywhere, indoor & outdoor, on trees, shrubs, or house furniture like your desk. They are like tiny lonewolfs, maybe in search of flea or other tiny bugs.
People consider they are the good and harmless, kids think they are so friendly and pet-able too!
Kids of age 5 to 8 years old would like to bring their spider pets to school and do all kinds of creative shows or fight. They keep them each in a tiny envelop made out of a leaf. The spider is about 0.5 to 1.0 cm long, and color in all black, white and black, biege or brown. It has no visible hair but very clean to touch. It never bite people at all.
Thanks Tung and Andrew for recalling our younger days. This photo reminds me of the creek below the old Clear Water Bay Road about a mintue's walk below Good Hope School. While the scenic settings were different, their countryside atmosphere gave us children joy and opportunity to explore.
At about the age of the tall boy in this photo, I sometimes hiked to Kowloon Reservoir to look for fighting spiders. They, a loner, made their home a foot or two above ground by pulling together two leaves with their silk, and this made their location easy to spot. Some are "Old Poke" (lo-dok - loose translation) because they use their two front arms to spear at their opponent. When two of them meet, they fight as if they want to hug each other. Another kind is the "Red Kid" named for their body colour. To catch them, I wrapped around the folded leaves with an opened flat tin box and next closed the lid.
And yes, we kept them in separate homes made of thorny leaves. A fight took a few seconds and the loser quickly ran away so injuries were infrequent. I set them free in our balcony garden after a few days. Looking back, such were our boyish thinking and fun, but pity the poor little creacture who lost his natural home, and freedom albeit temporarily. Regards, Peter
I will try to look around next time I'm Cheung Chau.
If you tweet maybe you should consider looking up a certain Mr Raymond Lowe out there. I have mentioned this bloke here before. He grew up in Chaung Chau (like Tung). His family was the decendents of the missionary Lowe's who stay and still ived there. Just googled Mr Lowe and found he is now with http://www.wlmedia.com/
If he replies and asks who refer you to him maybe you just tell him that it was by one of those suckers who actually paid a hundred bucks for a piece of software weitted by him called 'Scraps' back in the 1980's, and was a participant in the English Echo in local Fidonet 3:700/725.
Just checked Google Maps. Surprise! Some volunteers had been walking around hte island with Google's backpack and had recorded most of the walkable streets and lanes.
You might like walk around virtually using Google Map or Google Earth by way of Street View. The image was captured in 2013.
and those really like to study about this CC Valley picture.
From my memory I can assure that this is the Tai Choi Yuen---Big Vegetable Estate in direct translation----of 1958 as given.
The single outstanding evidence is the buildings on the Peak Road. There were two tiny images can be barely seen far back behind the valley bungalow in the left. The taller one is the top portion of a three level dormitory of the Alliance Bible Seminary. It was the only huge building overlooking the eastend of TCY. The other house was on the Peak Road too. Over there one can take piano lessons from, or the next door.
Case closed!
As for the second picture, I think Brian was near the edge of a school playground which was open for football and basket ball as well. This was the only school offering tuition-free and book supply-free to the lucky kids who wins the entrance draw.
( What a cool gambler's dream to an innocent kid! ....get in school & get everything free, can't get in & nothing for you! )
Well done Tung. It's amazing what detail a keen eye can discover in photographs. Your description fits very well with my half remembered memory of where Brian and I were. My only small doubt is about whether we were near the edge of a school playground. We were definitely on a path, and that is why I felt that I was in the correct place when I took the third photograph in 2006 or whenever, but of course that path might very well have run alongside a playground in 1958. I have spent today in a small volunteer museum in the old school building in the village where I spent my childhood in England and have been doing a similar exercise of identifying people and places for the volunteer staff who needed help with things from my memories of the 1940s and 1950s. Hidtory of this type is a fascinating thing.
It's my pleausre to join searching a successful clue. It must be meaningful to each of us if we're all feeling some comfort by sharing a simple common picture memory.
By the way I do expect that one day some ones who might have good old photos of any low-flying airplanes passing over Cheung Chau along the CC NDB aerial navigational flight path, would willing to share those with us at gwulo.
OK, the school & the playground we talked about is along the southside of the School Rd which is like a ladder street having many, many, many steps linked up the Peak Road at its top. Except at the top and the very bottom the school took up most of the land by this side of the School Road and its big playground was fairly visible to most of the TCY valley area. And because this school is owned by a powerful landlord or society of his clanship, I speculate that no one will be able to change the land use at all. ( Even though the school is not in active use now.) So I'm not so sure of the access to public nor the network of the alleys there.
However the overgrowns and the cluster of monster houses nearby may seriously blocking off the original open view being shown in the second photo, that's my guessing now.
I always consider my childhood life in Cheung Chau a very blessed experience with lots of good memory on places and people that helps to give comfort and strength everyday even for now during the covid pandemic.
In the past I have shared some stories and helps solving some othes puzzles. The most I would like to share however is the happy feeling that is only because Cheung Chau is well protected by the ocean. And there should be a lovely melody deep in peoples heart as we remember CC everytime.
Please show me more old days CC photos!! Hopefully I could one day compose the lovely melody about this cheerful island.
Comments
Old Cheung Chau's biggest Farmers Valley---Tai Choi Yuen
Hello folks,
The photo shows the Tai Choi Yuen towards the hillside off the part of Peak Road which has the Nam Tam Wan area on the coastal side. Name of this area is the Lung Tsai Chuen, or Dragon Son Village in Chinese.
This valley is so encircled by the hills and forested villages so it was a perfect hot spot to grow many kinds of vegetable almost the entire year. There were couples of wells of fresh water abundantly enough for the farmers needs. The mosaic of different vegetations was a special feeling to enjoy, even though your nose wound disagree!
We saw peaceful stream running through the valley bottom but children would best enjoy the beating currents on those rainy days. Not sure of their activities in the picture, they might want to collect earthworm for pet bird, frog for meal supplement, tapole and small fish for hobby aquarium, or on the rainy day it's time to launch the paper boats or tiny rafts they made from hobbytime.
I still remember there was a big woodpecker nested over the tree on the photo's right in the 1950s. Its family in this vicinity made lots of noise on the dried trunk of a dead tree ( electricuted by lightning). There were many different birds around the area, such as Chinese Bulbul, Crested Bulbul, Magpie, Pigeon, Raven, Wild Dove, Sparrow, Big Eagle, Yellow Eye,....and more.
The central part of the valley stood the Silver Star Primary School. Part of its open field was obtained by reclaimation over a big water pond used by farming before. The founder was Mr. Y L Yeung. During the day and off the class time, he loved to play, or really broadcast, very loudly through his school PA system, many Marching Band Music all the times, and we did enjoy it very much too. Maybe, for the sake of his students, It was his way to counter-react to the huge noise problem due to the daily and frequent deafening, ear-piercing sound from those low-flying jetliners slowly passing above near the school.
The area was about hundred meters east of the Flight Path on the CC NDB route in those good old days.
What a nice photo!!
Thanks!
Tung
Brian resting in valley on
This photograph was taken on the same day as the one showing the school children - and most probably in the same valley.
In December 2006, I tried to find the place where the children had been working in the field and I had a sudden feeling that I was standing very close to where I had photographed my pal, Brian in 1958. I think that the concrete seat was actuallyjust in front of the tree furthest away on the right of this lower photograph. It's good to knbow that my photograph of the school children brought back some happy memories for you. Best wishes, Andrew
Where is the present day location of those Children?
Hi Andrew,
If my first guess were wrong, there would be another location of fair similarity.
The smaller candidate is the Nam Zer Tong Valley near Tung Wan. Nam Zer is the name of a commom snake in Chinese. Tong is area having a water pond or small farming lake. It was very close to the Island Power House, the Police Station ( which is on the small hill ) and the St.John Hospital ( which separates from the beach ) and just about a minute's walk to the Tung Wan beach. The Peak Road also starts from this neighborhood.
You might have to figure it out which is more probable from your memory.
To my knowledge, the other picture still looks like a view of 1958's Tai Choi Yuen. In the early 1960s a paved new road was constructed by the walled property and zig-zaged upward to the Peak Road at Lan Villa. That is quite consistent with the second photo. If my first guess sounds OK with you, then consider the San Bean Road ( or San Bin Rd...or Hillside Rd) from Google map for the location of the Happy Children in that picture!
I think almost all the farming landscapes on CC were replaced by overcrowded houses. I visited the area in 1999 and all is new to me. I know the old is forever gone.
The case is slightly different for Nam Zer Tong. It seems there is at least a smaller portion remained as a green belt of grass field and trees or a village park to match up the Civic Sport Centre nearby (ie next to the Hospital).
Feel better? Again thank you for sharing the photos!!
Warm regards
Tung
Re: Location of Nam Zer Tong
Hi There,
The location of Nam Zer Tong mentioned by Tung would be around the present day Cheung Chau Sports Centre, behind the Hospital and within walking distance of the beach, as well as the Warwick Hotel.
T
Cheung Chau photographs
Hello again,
I have had a good look at two of the on-line maps showing Cheung Chau and think that both the 1958 photographs were taken in a valley that was somewhere between Hill Side Road (then a path) and the Cheung Chau Peak Road. In 1958, I only visited Cheung Chau once or twice and visited that particular valley only once but I don't think that it was very close to where the Warwick hotel or the beach are, being more towards the centre of the southern part of the island. I've marked a ring round the likely area on the maps saved on my computer but am not sure whether it is permissible to,put them onto thevGwulo site! A problem for me is that I cannot locate on the maps the Chinese place names you both mention.
As you have both said, things have changed greatly on Cheung Chau and my memory, while very good, is not precise enough to be certain about somewhere that I passed only once when it was simply a part of a stroll round a less touristy part - but I am reasonably sure that the picture of Brian on the seat and the one taken in 2006 were taken within a few feet of each other, and that they too were very near the place where the children were working. If you can go there you could use the 2006 photograph as a fixing point - if you can find that place!
best wishes and happy memories Andrew (in England)
Re: Local Names
Hi Andrew,
Google Maps still use some local names in English. If Hillside Road is concerned it is very close to Tai Choi Yuen Road. I guess those street names may be the only link of the locations mentioned.
T
Unusual wildlife on Cheung Chau
Do you remember any stories of very rare or unexpected fauna whilst youwere on Cheung Chau?
Hello T
Hello T
Somehow, I've just deleted a long answer to you! I'll try to repeat it. Yes, I see that on some of the Internet maps, both English and Chinese names are shown, although the Chinese ones are sometimes in Chinese writing. I suyppose that I could try to copy them and paste them into the language translator on Google - but is it worth it?
I think that between us we have more or less identified the apporoximate location of those three photographs that I took in 1958. However, here is a suggestion. If you can copy my images, old and recent, and go to Cheung Chau you should be able to find a local who might be knowledgeable about things. On my expeditions between about 2003 and 2006 to take 'now' photogaphs to show the same places as I photographed in 1958, I took copies of the old ones with me, I used to approach the oldest person around, whom I hoped might be a local, and show them the appropriate photographs. Even though I always smiled in a friendly way I somwetimes got the impression that they thought I was about to attack them. I was usually aware that I was in roughly the right place. Most times, several other people would gather round and there would be a big debate in Cantonese about it all, with arms waving all over the place, shaking and nodding of heads and eventually some sort of agreement. Unfortunately, my Cantonese is limited to Jo San, Jo Tau and M Goi (excuse the crude approximation). Somebody would emerge who would do some translating and I nearly always had success. The only exception was in Yeun Long where a really old lady told me, through a 'street market inspector' that the river scenes that I had photographed somewhere between Yuen Long and Kam Tin or thereabouts would be totally unrecognisable as the river had been straightened and lined with concrete. I think that, once they'd got over the shock of being approached by a gweilo, people were quite pleased to see something of the old Hong Kong and I always gave them the old copies if they wanted them. Thewy probably thought that I was quite mad going all the way from England to Hong Kong just to do that.
Best wishes and happy hunting. Andrew
Cheung Chau fauna
Hello Richard,
Sorry Richard, my visits to Cheung Chau were always just for a day and I neither saw nor heard any fauna on the island. I guess that I was usually too busy taking phortographs of places, things and, when allowed, of people. In 1958 most adults out of the city centre did not want to be photographed and I tried to respect that. Children were quite different and would clamour to have their pictures taken. I always tried to reward them with a few coins, sweets or fruit such as bananas. If you did that nowadays they'd arrest you, which just shows how sad a world we are living in now.
Anyway, intrigued by your comment, I looked Cheung Chau fauna up on Google. The only snakes that I have ever seen in the whole of Hong Kong were:
1957/8 a cobra skeleton draped on a barbed wire fence at the top of the Little Sai Wan camp road junction with the Cape Collinson Road.
1957/8 a very dead but beautifully coloured python that some small children found brushing against their legs in the shallows at Shek O beach. The life guard rushed down grabbed it and, I guess, took it home for his tea. No doubt thos toddlers acquired an instant phoebia about snakes.
1957/8 a black and white krait that slithered across the path on the way down from the Temple oif 10,000 Buddhas in Shatin.
c2004 I saw a lovely little baby python on the path down at the Point at Little Sai Wan / Siu Sai Wan. I took a photo of it, showed the snake to two ladies and one of them promptly ground it into the concrete as they departed gleefully up the path. Is this what slaying the dragon is all about?
The same year, I think, I was scrambling up a narrow and rough path between our sunbathing rocks there and the Cape Collinson lighthouse path when a large centipede trundled across it. I took its photograph - not realising that it would have given me a nasty bite if I'd tried to put it into a more easily photographed place.
On many occasions when I have been trying to find old pill boxes, etc., I have brushed through bamboo thickets and other thick vegetation often filming as I went and I now wonder how close I might inadvertently have come to becoming well-acquainted with a bamboo snake - but fortunately, as I was always alone in some quite remote places, it never happened.
Sorry, I cannot offer any real help.
best wishes. Andrew
The popular harmless spider
Hello Richard,
I almost forgot this one......
Boys running around the outback on CC island of my time must understand the fun of hunting and keeping some harmless Spider. This tiny spider never construct any web at all. It scouts on everywhere, indoor & outdoor, on trees, shrubs, or house furniture like your desk. They are like tiny lonewolfs, maybe in search of flea or other tiny bugs.
People consider they are the good and harmless, kids think they are so friendly and pet-able too!
Kids of age 5 to 8 years old would like to bring their spider pets to school and do all kinds of creative shows or fight. They keep them each in a tiny envelop made out of a leaf. The spider is about 0.5 to 1.0 cm long, and color in all black, white and black, biege or brown. It has no visible hair but very clean to touch. It never bite people at all.
And they are free to go after few days fun!!
Tung
Fighting Spiders
Thanks Tung and Andrew for recalling our younger days. This photo reminds me of the creek below the old Clear Water Bay Road about a mintue's walk below Good Hope School. While the scenic settings were different, their countryside atmosphere gave us children joy and opportunity to explore.
At about the age of the tall boy in this photo, I sometimes hiked to Kowloon Reservoir to look for fighting spiders. They, a loner, made their home a foot or two above ground by pulling together two leaves with their silk, and this made their location easy to spot. Some are "Old Poke" (lo-dok - loose translation) because they use their two front arms to spear at their opponent. When two of them meet, they fight as if they want to hug each other. Another kind is the "Red Kid" named for their body colour. To catch them, I wrapped around the folded leaves with an opened flat tin box and next closed the lid.
And yes, we kept them in separate homes made of thorny leaves. A fight took a few seconds and the loser quickly ran away so injuries were infrequent. I set them free in our balcony garden after a few days. Looking back, such were our boyish thinking and fun, but pity the poor little creacture who lost his natural home, and freedom albeit temporarily. Regards, Peter
Re: Cheung Chau then and now
Hi Andrew,
I will try to look around next time I'm Cheung Chau.
If you tweet maybe you should consider looking up a certain Mr Raymond Lowe out there. I have mentioned this bloke here before. He grew up in Chaung Chau (like Tung). His family was the decendents of the missionary Lowe's who stay and still ived there. Just googled Mr Lowe and found he is now with http://www.wlmedia.com/
If he replies and asks who refer you to him maybe you just tell him that it was by one of those suckers who actually paid a hundred bucks for a piece of software weitted by him called 'Scraps' back in the 1980's, and was a participant in the English Echo in local Fidonet 3:700/725.
T
Re: Cheung Chau then and now
Hi Andrew,
Just checked Google Maps. Surprise! Some volunteers had been walking around hte island with Google's backpack and had recorded most of the walkable streets and lanes.
You might like walk around virtually using Google Map or Google Earth by way of Street View. The image was captured in 2013.
The area is now full of houses though.
T
A forensic look at the first valley photo
Good day to Andrew
and those really like to study about this CC Valley picture.
From my memory I can assure that this is the Tai Choi Yuen---Big Vegetable Estate in direct translation----of 1958 as given.
The single outstanding evidence is the buildings on the Peak Road. There were two tiny images can be barely seen far back behind the valley bungalow in the left. The taller one is the top portion of a three level dormitory of the Alliance Bible Seminary. It was the only huge building overlooking the eastend of TCY. The other house was on the Peak Road too. Over there one can take piano lessons from, or the next door.
Case closed!
As for the second picture, I think Brian was near the edge of a school playground which was open for football and basket ball as well. This was the only school offering tuition-free and book supply-free to the lucky kids who wins the entrance draw.
( What a cool gambler's dream to an innocent kid! ....get in school & get everything free, can't get in & nothing for you! )
Tung
Well done Tung. It's amazing
Well done Tung. It's amazing what detail a keen eye can discover in photographs. Your description fits very well with my half remembered memory of where Brian and I were. My only small doubt is about whether we were near the edge of a school playground. We were definitely on a path, and that is why I felt that I was in the correct place when I took the third photograph in 2006 or whenever, but of course that path might very well have run alongside a playground in 1958. I have spent today in a small volunteer museum in the old school building in the village where I spent my childhood in England and have been doing a similar exercise of identifying people and places for the volunteer staff who needed help with things from my memories of the 1940s and 1950s. Hidtory of this type is a fascinating thing.
best wishes, Andrew
About the second TCY picture location
Hi Andrew,
It's my pleausre to join searching a successful clue. It must be meaningful to each of us if we're all feeling some comfort by sharing a simple common picture memory.
By the way I do expect that one day some ones who might have good old photos of any low-flying airplanes passing over Cheung Chau along the CC NDB aerial navigational flight path, would willing to share those with us at gwulo.
OK, the school & the playground we talked about is along the southside of the School Rd which is like a ladder street having many, many, many steps linked up the Peak Road at its top. Except at the top and the very bottom the school took up most of the land by this side of the School Road and its big playground was fairly visible to most of the TCY valley area. And because this school is owned by a powerful landlord or society of his clanship, I speculate that no one will be able to change the land use at all. ( Even though the school is not in active use now.) So I'm not so sure of the access to public nor the network of the alleys there.
However the overgrowns and the cluster of monster houses nearby may seriously blocking off the original open view being shown in the second photo, that's my guessing now.
So I am delighted with the old photos!
Tung
Call for more 1960s CC photos
Hi folks,
I always consider my childhood life in Cheung Chau a very blessed experience with lots of good memory on places and people that helps to give comfort and strength everyday even for now during the covid pandemic.
In the past I have shared some stories and helps solving some othes puzzles. The most I would like to share however is the happy feeling that is only because Cheung Chau is well protected by the ocean. And there should be a lovely melody deep in peoples heart as we remember CC everytime.
Please show me more old days CC photos!! Hopefully I could one day compose the lovely melody about this cheerful island.
Best Regards
Tung