Everything tagged: General

Why did the China Products stores vanish after 1997? There was a multi-storey store in Central, another in North Point and several others elsewhere. They all stocked a big variety of goods: clothing, sweets, bales of raw silk plain & coloured. Yet only the North Point Store, greatly reduced in size was there when last I explored HK & Kowloon in November 2007.

Does any Gwulo member remember why they closed? Shops selling luxury items remained, bt not the China Products stores,

There is a collection of 70 postcards on the website of The New York Public Library/Digital Collections, all from the early 20th century.

Hi there - We lived in HK in the late 80s where we bought this poster/pic. Sadly it was destroyed by fire many years later. I'm now in the hunt for a replacement, and I have a friend visiting HK in Sept. If anyone sees it for sale in a shop, I would be grateful if they could pass on the info to me, and I'll see if my friend can pick it up. Regards to all.  JG

I had the privilege of recently visiting my grandfather's grave - HKVDC Corporal E. Shuster - at the Yokohama War Cemetery. 

Having contacted the CGWC, I was told that most graves - such as my grandfather's - do contain the actual remains of the POWs, so I am wondering how was it possible to identify them? Did the Japanese actually bury and identify the POWs at the time?

Any help would be very much appreciated.

Ana Shuster

There are a total of 165 trams operating in Hong Kong, numbered from 1 to 175. Most trams keep the same number throughout their life, but there have been several cases where the tram's number was changed. The exact reasons can be difficult to trace, but they include trams given a new number for a role in a film, and others that were changed to leave behind a bad reputation. 

Friends of East Asia lecture on Saturday 20th July at 2:30 pm in London - all are welcome. 

Village Scholars and their Book Collections: Yung Sze-chiu, 1874-1944

Details of venue etc. are at the end of these notes.

Hi,

I'm writing my memoir which includes the year I spent as a grad student at the Stanford Language Center  in Taibei studying Mandarin, 1985-86, followed by solo travel in China.. One memorable trip was a ferry ride from Shanghai to HK in July 1986 which was interrupted by Typhoon Peggy.  In my notes the ship was named 海興號 Hai-xing-hao. I'd appreciate a suggestion on how to translate that into English.

A hulk is a ship that is afloat, but incapable of going to sea. Hulks served different purposes:

The Shanghai Evening Post and Mercury came out with a New York City edition from 1943 onwards.

Caution: Information presented may not always be accurate due to wartime restrictions and time delays.

But for those looking for lost family members and information of events in Hong Kong, China and other parts of Asia, the news was a welcome bonus.

Gerald Warner was the American Consul in Kobe, Japan the day Pearl Harbour was bombed. 

The war diary starts from 8 December 1941 in Kobe until 25-28 August 1942 after the repatriation ship, "Gripsholm" had docked in Jersey City, United States. The Asama Maru picked up internees from Hong Kong on 29 June 1942. Some familiar names from the American contingent in Hong Kong are mentioned during interactions with Warner on board the Asama Maru/Gripsholm.