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A Front Row Seat for the Cultural Revolution: Stockholm Syndrome in Tientsin (part 4)

by Beverley
January 29th, 2013

Chapter Three
STOCKHOLM SYNDROME IN TIENTSIN
Part Four

Then came the moment we’d all dreamed of — Comrade Sung had arranged for us to go to the local antique store, state owned of course.  Knowing nothing about Chinese porcelain at the time, I picked up one piece after another and tried to ask my antique dealer friends with great expertise if they were worth the high prices being asked.  No one took the time to answer me.  Their hunt was on.  Finally I gave up and sat on a small chair in a corner watching my frenzied companions shop.

I became aware of an elderly man across the room watching me.  He stood there in his blue Mao suit, his hands tucked into opposite sleeves in the style of aristocrats in pre-liberation China.  He just kept watching me.  So I watched him.  Slowly one hand came out of the sleeve and it appeared he was signaling me to follow him.  With nothing else to do, I did.

I followed him up a narrow, dangerously in need of repair, old wooden staircase lighted by a single bulb on the second floor. Arriving there without incident I realized that this kind old man had brought me into Tientsin’s Aladdin’s cave of antiques.  What they were fighting over downstairs was Walmart while I was upstairs in Cartier.  The walls were hung with ancient scrolls and calligraphy.  Heaped in piles wherever you looked were rolls of ancient scrolls edged and bound in beautiful old silks.  Somehow my new friend had understood I knew about paintings but had no knowledge of porcelains.  Or was he just kind?

He let me wander, and unroll, and feast my eyes.  Then when he could hear business was being concluded downstairs, he went to a shelf and pulled out a silk-covered portfolio and handed it to me.  He pointed to the portfolio, then to my purse, then to me.  In other words, buy it!  Peeking inside I discovered 12 beautiful very valuable old gauche paintings of Lohans (religious men) in representative legends pertaining to their particular titles.

Cautiously edging back down the aged staircase, gripping my treasure, I reentered the room and realized no one had noticed my absence.  No one noticed the silken portfolio I presented at the desk where the clerk worked with abacus figuring how much I owed for the 12 paintings, the equivalent of $48 US for all.  Another clerk brought a basin of hot water so we could wash off the ancient dust from the antiques we’d been handling.

However, it turned out Jayne, Marge and I didn’t have the proper Chinese currency to pay for our purchases so we were rushed into the minibus which sped off through a totally unfamiliar area of Tientsin to the main branch of the Bank of China.  It was a huge old building, of British design, and we guessed it had once housed a British bank.  Everything was frighteningly quite inside the high ceilinged building where great numbers of young Chinese worked silently at the long rows of desks.  No typewriters clicked.  There were no computers, no calculators.  No phones rang.  There was no light chatter between co-workers.  Only the sound of beads sliding up and down the abacus could be heard in that vast room.

I studied the European detailing of the church-like structure as our guide led us over to a counter where foreign money transactions were handled.  “Which of you ladies is Mrs. Jackson?” the stern man behind the counter queried in heavily accented English.

Chills traversed my spine.  An unknown building in an unknown part of town.  Our visit was totally unplanned.  Of course, this was China during the Cultural Revolution.  There were spies everywhere.  Our every move was known and recorded.

I acknowledged my identity fearing the worst as my fellow travelers distanced themselves as far as possible from me.

“You lost your gloves this morning Mrs. Jackson,” he announced.  I checked my coat pockets and purse and he was right.  “You will find them with the attendant on the fifth floor of Tientsin Hotel Number One when you return there.”  And I did.

It wasn’t until our group began to go separate ways some days later in Peking that I had the joy of showing my treasure when we all played a sort of show and tell after dinner.  As I took out each of the 12 beautiful paintings of Lohans there was silence.  I wished that the kind old man from the antique shop could have been there to share my triumph. [… and so ends chapter 3. Next week we start chapter 4, “The Bug in the Light Fixture Couldn’t Fly “]

Chapter 1: Part 1  Part 2
Chapter 2: Part 1  Part 2  Part 3
Chapter 3: Part 1  Part 2  Part 3  Part 4
Chapter 4: Part 1
Chapter 5: Part 1  Part 2  Part 3
Chapter 6: Part 1  Part 2  Part 3
Chapter 7: Part 1
Chapter 8: Part 1  Part 2
Chapter 9: Part 1  Part 2
Chapter 10: Part 1
Chapter 11: Part 1  Part 2
Chapter 12: Part 1
Chapter 13: Part 1

By The Way
This blog was started to sell my new book and I keep going off on other topics. Please do check out The Beautiful Lady Was A Palace Eunuch at Amazon.com
Acknowledgement:
Kathleen Fetner, Technical Advisor and Friend
Categories Books, Uncategorized

There Are A Lot Of Dragons Around My House

by Beverley
January 20th, 2012

I found this 1920’s lamp in a funny little antique store in Edinburgh, Scotland in early 1980’s. Without thinking I pulled the old dangerously frayed electric cord out and left it in the Caldonia Hotel waste basket. Once home I took it to the lamp repair shop for a new cord. A week later they called me admitting defeat. “There is no way to get a cord back through there Mrs Jackson.”

So I took it to the best electrical shop in Santa Barbara. They kept working with it a month before giving up. “We’ve tried everything. It is impossible,” they announced.

That evening my close friends Anita and the fine painter Yasu Eguchi were over for dinner. I showed them the lamp and told them the disappointing results. Yasu who loves great challenges asked if he could take it home and try. I said it was hopeless. The experts in town gave up on it.

But the lamp went home with the Eguchis. Two days later Yasu was at the front door smiling broadly holding the lamp which sported a nice new electric cord going through it.

“Yasu how did you do it?” I asked in total amazement.

Laughing all the while he explained. “I caught a live beetle and carefully tied a piece of silk thread to it. Then I pushed it through the hole in the wooden base of the lamp. Meanwhile I had Anita holding a flashlight aimed in the dragons mouth. As the beetle moved up through the curving passage in the wood following the light I attached a thicker piece of string to end of silk thread. Once the beetle crawled out through the dragon’s mouth I took the silk thread off the beetle then laid it carefully in the grass totally unharmed. Next I attached the electric cord to the end of the string and pulled that through.”

Now I have safely wired dragon lamp. And somewhere a heroic beetle is living out it’s life in healthy peace.

Chinese lantern made of blue Cambodian kingfisher feathers

A favorite dragon holds court in the entrance to my living room holding up a very large Chinese lantern made of blue Cambodian kingfisher feathers. Marie and the late Bob Carty found the very special old lantern for me in a Los Angeles antique store over 30 years ago. How to hang my lantern was a problem. A temporary plant hanging “arm” from the nursery was starting to prove not so temporary when Bob called one day to say he was on the way over with a proper black cast iron dragon lantern holder. It was perfect! “Where did you ever find it?” I asked. “I was waiting in Mike’s (Mike Haskell a mutual friend who deals in rare Native American antiques) for him to get off the phone. While I was waiting I was helping him unwrap a shipment of very old Navajo baskets and your Chinese dragon was nestled in one of them.”. We were never able to find the real provenance. Ancient Chinese palace to Navajo reservation in New Mexico to me in Santa Barbara, California. Not a usual route for sure!

Dragon from empress robe with four corner constellation

This dragon embroidered basically with silver foil covered silk thread in a technique called “couching” was one of many dragons on a very rare yellow robe of an empress from my collection. What made this robe so special was: An empress was entitled to wear five of her husband’s 12 symbols on her robes for festivals or religious ceremonies. Those symbols were sun, moon, power, good luck and a three corner constellation. This robe had a sixth symbol, a four corner constellation in addition to the three. Only six other robes with four corner constellations are known in the world. My robe is now in the collection of a Chinese collector and has been on display in the Hong Kong Museum.

Theatrical dragon robe

This is a dragon from a theatrical robe in my collection. We know it’s a theatrical garment because it has exaggerated eyes and also if it showed the sides would be closed by ties instead of buttons, easier for quick changes.

An early 20th century flag of China

Chinese flag

There are four rather harmless looking carved wooden dragons on the pair of standing lanterns in my dining room.

Dragons on the dining room table

Here is the dragon’s head from the satin table cloth in my dining room.

The bronze bowl holding apples on my dining room table weighs a ton! The handles are frightening dragons with very sharp scales. The table cloth it sits on has two dragons whose heads are more or less hidden by the bowl.

1920’s Chinese cut velvet chair cover

The four dragons seen here are playing around on a lovely pair of 1920’s Chinese cut velvet chair covers. These chair covers found popularity in early 20th century movie star mansions in Hollywood where every Steinway piano was draped with a heavily fringed “Spanish” shawl which were all made in China. Think Norma Desmond/Gloria Swanson’s home in “Sunset Boulevard”!

The Chinese cut velvet chair covers showing the phoenix

Since they hang in a narrow hallway it is difficult to photograph full length. But here you can see the very grand Phoenix bird they frolic with. And adding to delight with these dragons they are coral color, a great favorite of mine.

Rank badge for imperial prince, son of the emperor of China

This is a delightful small embroidered picture of children with a giant dragon doing the dragon dance for some celebration

This is a carved wood fragment, probably late 18th century of the head of a dragon. The inserted eye is a very fine example of Peking glass done in several colors. Some of early red paint remains in the mouth and nostril area. It most likely was originally attached to a long carved dragon.

By The Way
This blog was started to sell my new book and I keep going off on other topics. Please do check out The Beautiful Lady Was A Palace Eunuch at Amazon.com
Acknowledgement:
Kathleen Fetner, Technical Advisor and Friend
Categories My Life

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