1871 -Fuzhou Church by Thomson

Lately,I seem to have taken on a liking for photographs of ancient days and ancient buildings.

And incidentally I met up with a 75 year old cousin and a second aunt (on my father's side ) for brunch. We got to tell tales and swap gossips. One of the topics covered was my Goo Poh's experiences in Fuzhou City during the Second World War.

Aunt Ling told us about an old European church in Fuzhou City which my grandfather and his brother must have seen. My grandaunt or Goo Poh Yuk Ging had gone to China to seek medical treatment for her ailing husband. Unfortunately he died in China leaving her a widow with three young children. The youngest was just born and she was brought up in China (under the care of another family) until the 60's when my Goo Poh was financially better off and it was politically safe to "redeem this daughter and bring her out to Sibu". That was just before Malaysia was formed.

My own maternal grandmother, Tiong Lien Tie, was stranded there too during the war. As a result she was fondly remembered by all the Sibu Foochow "overseas" students who were also stranded in Fuzhou City at that time.

When they came back to Sibu, they remembered themselves "coming back by the first boat,or the second boat or the third boat" from Fuzhou City . My Goo Poh (sister of my grandfather) came back to Sibu by the First Boat. She had always been grateful to people who visited her in China (she lived in a very remote village).

My mother's second brother brought back his Fuzhou City-born bride after the war. Both of them were teachers of Chinese language and they taught in bukit Lan for the greater part of their lives. They went on to become the illustrious in-laws of timber tycoons. This aunt of ours up to this day speaks Foochow with a very strong Fuzhou City accent.

Here is the photo of the church taken by Thomson and its related history.






'Foochow Church', about 1871



Picture Number:1992-5063_0017
Credit:National Museum of Photography, Film & Television/Science & Society Picture Library

Caption:
A photograph of a European Church in Fuzhou, China, taken by John Thomson [1837-1921] in about 1871, published in 1873 in the book 'Foochow and the River Min'. As part of the unequal treaties following the Opium War of 1839 to 1842 China was forced to accept Christian missionaries. As early as 1847 three American Methodists built the first Protestant church in Fuzhou. They were soon followed by other missionary groups from Britain. Thomson travelled extensively in Fujian province, formerly Fukien, south east China, from late 1870 to early 1871. The book, 'Foochow and the River Min', records his journey up the River Min by boat from Fuzhou to Nanping, a distance of about 160 miles. Thomson was one of the most significant travel photographer-explorers of the nineteenth century. Born in Scotland, he studied chemistry at the University of Edinburgh, before taking up photography in the 1860s. Thomson travelled extensively throughout Asia, documenting the antiquities, landscapes and people of Sri Lanka, Cambodia, Macao and China. In the early 1870s he returned to England where he worked with the journalist Adolphe Smith on a project documenting the life of the urban poor. The resulting book, 'Street Life in London' was published in twelve parts between 1877 and 1878.

In Collection of: National Museum of Photography Film & Television

Transient Languages and Cultures

I would like to share with you a page from a very interesting blog which touches on Foochow as as dialect.

View the source when you are free : http://blogs.usyd.ed.au

Transient Languages & Cultures

Congratulations to Taiwan on saving languages big and small
by Hilario de Sousa
6 February, 2007I was thinking about tone-vowel and consonant sandhis in Fuzhou and I stumbled across this spectacular website from Matsu where they put up their primary school Fuzhou language textbooks with recordings of all the texts (and cutesy background music). There are also audio demonstrations of all the consonants, rhymes and tones. Apparently they are also working on putting up traditional kids stories on their website. All the Chinese characters are glossed with IPA and Zhuyin. (Sorry, no English.)

http://www.chinaweblaw.com/matsu/index.htm


Fuzhou (Foochow/ Fuchow/ Hokchiew) is an Eastern Min language spoken primarily in Fuzhou, the capital of Fujian province. Overseas, the Fuzhou language is alive and kicking in places like Sibu in Sarawak. In Mainland China, Fuzhou has got to be the most endangered metropolitan Southern Sinitic language (despite there being at least 6 million people in greater Fuzhou; languages with even millions of speakers can be endangered: e.g. this post cut-and-pasted from China News Service mentions that few youngsters in Fuzhou can converse in Fuzhou:
http://groups.google.com.au/group/greenhome/browse_thread/thread/c82289de5139a026/36250ac51dfaaee3?lnk=st&q=%E7%A6%8F%E5%B7%9E&rnum=8&hl=zh-TW#36250ac51dfaaee3
and this post laments the non-transmission of traditional Fuzhou lullabies:
http://www.hdzxw.com/hdpeople/minqing/200701/237009.html)

Schools are taught in Mandarin (like most other places in Mainland China), and it seems that most Fuzhou people have rather low esteem for the Fuzhou language. I have read reports of non-immigrants born as early as 1970s who cannot speak Fuzhou, and primary school kids scolding their parents for not speaking Mandarin at home. The Fujian Government has promised to do something about the decline in use of the Fuzhou language, but so far the promises remain just promises.

Across the Taiwan Strait from Fuzhou is Taiwan; Taiwanese Aborigines speak various Austronesian languages, and the ‘native’ Chinese population traditionally speak Southern Min (‘Taiwanese’) or Hakka. The language policy of Taiwan in the 1950s was ultra-repressive. The Chinese Nationalist Government lost Mainland China to the Communists in 1949; they 'retreated' to Taiwan, and was determined to re-conquer Mainland China. For this reason the Nationalist Government was eager to supplant a 'Chinese' identity to the Taiwanese people, and this involves everyone speaking Mandarin. (Similar to how a 'French' or 'Japanese' identity involve everyone speaking the same language.) The first thing the Nationalist government did when they ‘retreated’ to Taiwan was to wipe languages other than Mandarin out of the public domain. The use of native languages — and the selling of Taiwanese Cuisine, amongst other local things — were suppressed. Teachers used ‘dialect tags’ to humiliate students who spoke non-Mandarin languages at school (similar to how the Japanese government used hougen-fuda ‘dialect tags’ to wipe-out the Ryukyuan languages). The use of languages other than Mandarin at schools was banned until the 1990s in Taiwan.

The Taiwanese Government gradually realised that there is no hope of re-conquering Mainland China. Since the 1990s, the government has become more and more interested in building an identity distinct from that of Mainland China. The language policy in Taiwan has become more and more ‘localised’, so localised that it is now compulsory (?) to learn a ‘native’ Sinitic or Austronesian language at school (all the other subjects, including 'Chinese', are taught in Mandarin). After the Nationalist Government ‘retreated’ to Taiwan in 1949, the Nationalist Government managed to keep three groups of islands just off the coast of Mainland China, and one of these is the Matsu Islands, just east of Fuzhou. Because local languages have to be taught in schools, (theoretically) the Taiwanese Government has to create a complete curriculum even for the smallest local language, and this includes the Fuzhou language, spoken by less than 10,000 people on Matsu which is less than 20 km from Mainland China but more than 260 km away from Taiwan. (A language with less than 10,000 speakers is a very small language by Chinese standards; there are curricula for the larger Austronesian languages, but I don’t know whether there are curricula for the moribund ones.)

What pleasantly surprised me when I looked at the Taiwanese Fuzhou language textbooks was that it is actually Spoken-Fuzhou which is being taught to kids. In the Cantonese world, ‘Chinese’ classes are most usually taught in Cantonese, but what they teach is actually Modern Written Chinese (i.e. written Mandarin) pronounced in Cantonese, rather than spoken Cantonese. The writing of spoken Cantonese is the biggest no-no in schools, and written Cantonese is still stigmatised in the Cantonese world. (For example, to get an office job in Hong Kong you have to have competence in written English and written Mandarin; if you fill in your job application form using written Cantonese, you are unlikely to get the job.) In comparison, the Taiwanese Government is so determined at ‘localising’ the education language policy that they teach kids that Chinese characters can be used to write Sinitic languages other than Mandarin, and non-Mandarin Sinitic languages are not subordinate and not inferior to Mandarin. For this I congratulate the Taiwanese Government.


Comments
Compulsory teaching of an Austronesian or native Sinitic language?
If only the Australian government had as much respect for indigenous culture.

Posted by: Jangari | February 6, 2007 02:49 PM

I am a Foochow (Fuzhou aka North or Eastern Min language). I was born in Malaysia and fortunately because I was born in a community where spoken Foochow was alive (funnily enough much more alive than it is in Fuzhou, Fujian province in China). However Fuzhou/ Foochow is always regarded as inferior to Mandarin even by its native speakers. This is more evident amongst the younger generation who underwent Chinese (Mandarin) School Systems.

The Matsu initiative in Taiwan is commendable and I had been to the Foochow language website. Although the accent is somewhat different to the one I am used to, I could immediately recognise the similarity and the many features it shares with the Foochow I know. There are so many Foochow idioms that are not satisfactorily represented by contemporary Chinese writing based on Mandarin-grammar of the North.

If drastic actions are not taken, I fear Foochow language heritage will disappear eventually although it will be a very gradual process.

Foochow kids in Malaysia and Taiwan should not be made to feel their language is inferior to that of Mandarin and Mandarinization policy of China and Singapore should be carried out with care and thoughtfulness. I believe every so-called Chinese Regional Dialect has a right to exist and to be preserved for posterity apart from Mandarin.

It saddens me a lot that Foochow-speaking individuals make the conscious efforts of not wanting to converse in Foochow. This attitude should change!

Posted by: Oliver Loi | January 28, 2008 09:14 AM




The Authors
Amanda Harris
Aidan Wilson
Hilario de Sousa
Ian Smith
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James McElvenny
Linda Barwick (PARADISEC)
Tom Honeyman
Vi King Lim (PARADISEC)
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About the Blog
The Transient Building, symbolising the impermanence of language, houses both the Linguistics Department at Sydney University and PARADISEC, a digital archive for endangered Pacific languages and music.

Indigenous Language SPEAK A forum for linguists, language speakers, educators and any other interested people to discuss any issues regarding language loss, language research, and fieldwork methodology within indigenous communities.



PARADISEC The Pacific And Regional Archive for Digital Sources in Endangered Cultures


SOURCE :
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The views expressed on this blog are those of the respective authors and not those of the University of Sydney.

Reliving the First Foochow Pioneers' Planting of Rice in Sibu

Sept 7th 2008. I had the opportunity to start planting organic hill rice with my friends (Chemical Engineer husband and Accountant wife) in Sg. Rait. The two have acquired this wonderful piece of land a few years ago and would like to start planting rice this year before going into oil palm in the future. They thought that I should be part of their rice planting team. I have been over the moon by the invitation.

I have been acquiring the Iban traditional terminology regarding the ancient ways of padi or rice planting from them and other friends. This morning I was introduced to NUGAL and several other terms.

Early in the morning,when the skies were still dark by an impending storm we moved towards the farm land which has been already cleared a month ago. We saw the burnt logs and the soggy ground ready to receive the seeds. The rain came down in a small drizzle. But the awakening earth was giving out its warm moist air to create a misty humid though refreshing little world.

A small ikan keli was caught in one of the streams by T and we thought that it was a good omen which augured a pleasant and hopeful planting. A boy was sent back to the base to prepare the fresh fish to be cooked in banana leaves and aluminium foil over the fire which had already been started.

Two ladies had started cooking lunch at the base. A pig had already been slaughtered as a token of gratitude to those who have come to nugal. This is an age old practice - the pig is so symbolic in the Iban culture.



The small offering is called BERDERA which would consist of anything actually but this one consisted of feathers (taken from the chicken already slaughtered for its blood) and which would be later eat for lunch,rice leaves of vegetables as a "gift" for the "spiritual owner" of the land on which the rice would be grown.

Nugal is an ancient Iban practice to start the padi planting season off. T and another man paid tribute to the spirits of nature asking for protection and forgiveness that he was making an indent into the environment. It was also an opportunity for the farmers to say a prayer for a peaceful season and a bountiful harvest. The peace offering was made and we started to dig holes and put seeds into the holes.

No machinery was used for the seeding. Just plenty of helpful hands and the bending of backs.







Grandmother of Jemut (Enek Jemut) is slight in size with the body a Caucasian model would envy (she is by nature extremely slim and a size 6) and has been a farmer for all her life. Planting rice is very much a part of her every day chores. She goes in her natural and as a- matter- of- fact way of putting or rather shooting the seeds accurately in the holes already prepared for her. Very close to nature she does not ever say that life is a burden. It is a life to be celebrated with joy and one must be close to mother earth. She enveloped me into her space even though I am from another culture. I like her philosophy of life.

When fellow villagers or friends gather together to put the seeds into the soil it is called BERBENIH in the Iban language. The women are particularly skilled in holding the seeds between the fingers and shooting the seeds into the holes already poked by the men. So in a way the men would walk ahead of the women and the planting goes on, at times ever so silently.



The seeds are traditional species which have been carefully selected by T and his wife. Such a selection is important to ensure a good crop and harvest next year. We prayed that all factors ,including God the Almighty ,will be in favour of our planting.







This gathering of friends and fellow villagers to help would with the seeding is called BERDUROK- and the work is done in rotation. A group would start with friend A's farm and the following week Friend A would go with the group to Friend B's farm until every member's farm is seeded. No one would attempt to refuse to help another. The social shame of unwillingness to help will be carried for generations. This is BERDUROK, a communal affair from ages ago. One for all and all for one. And in this way the Iban farming culture has been sustained healthily for ages.


As I stood watching the fire smouldering in the light rain I was reminded of the tough life that my grandfather had when he first came to Sarawak. Did all the Foochow pioneers help each other in this way when they first landed in Sibu or did they work in small family units or did the man and wife work on the land as a pair or was it just the man only? I know for a fact that 40 years later most of the women worked on the land themselves with help from their children which was the case of my aunts and cousins.

By mid day I was already wet from the rain and my feet had been caked by the soggy mud. I had fallen into a puddle as the ground was slippery being an urban woman not used to farming from scratch. Farming has never been easy. I could feel that my mud caked hair was in need of shampooing and sweat was flowing furiously down my back. It was a good thing that the sun was not its usual strength by mid day. Hunger pangs were long forgotten as we breathed in the smoke and the misty air.

We just needed water!!

Jokes were cracked to make the work lighter towards the end of the morning and work was nearly accomplished. Anecdotes were related as the women made sure that all holes were filled with the seeds tenderly. With each throwing of seeds a prayer was sent up to heaven for a blessing that the harvest would be plentiful in a world where food supply was in crisis. We were not allowed to comment unnecessarily on the forthcoming crop. In case the gods are jealous.

These are the first leaves of a pumpkin plant already growing. To me nature has been kind and is already telling us that there is still plenty of hope for those of us who are willing to work the soil. I am looking forward to eating my favourite vegetable,pumpkin, soon.





It must have been tough for my grandfather and his brother to plant their first rice in Sibu with all the other pioneers when the Foochows first arrived .They had to acclimatise themselves to the hot equatorial climes. Besides they had to fight against malaria,other fevers,insects and mosquitoes,and unfathomable secrets of the new land. They could have been terrified of the local natives who luckily were more friendly than not.

It was a not- to- be -missed -opportunity for me to be able to relive this experience,sharing this significant day with my friends. Thank you for this hands-on experience. And I shall be praying for a bountiful harvest.

Stay tuned for the next step of rice growing.

Flash Lights or Torch Lights

pen light used by doctors and scientists.


A nice torch light for outdoor use : for lighting and for defence.

Typical heavy duty flashlight.
 

Photo taken of a Pasar Malam Stall selling cheap flashlights made in China.

What is the history of flashlight like?

In 1898, Joshua Lionel Cowen invented a decorative lighting fixture for potted plants which consisted of a metal tube housing a light bulb and a dry cell battery. It failed commercially, and so Cowen sold his company and patents to Conrad Hubert that same year and turned his attention to building and selling model trains. Hubert renamed Cowen's company the American Electrical Novelty & Manufacturing Company and, recognizing the true potential of Cowen's invention, hired David Misell to produce a tubular flashlight for portable use.

They donated some models to the New York City police, who responded favorably to it.[1] These early flashlights ran on zinc-carbon batteries, which were poor at providing sustained currents; they would run down after a while and needed to rest before being usable again.[2] Since these early flashlights also used energy-inefficient carbon filament bulbs, this happened rather quickly, and consequently they could only be used in brief flashes, hence the popular name flashlight.

Source : Wikipedia.

Here's riddle we used to get as students many years ago.....Students loved riddles in the past. I do not know if today's students still like to crack their heads to get an answer for a riddle like this.

Four members of a band are walking to a night concert. They decide to take a shortcut, but must cross a bridge. Luckily they have one flashlight. Because of the varying size of their instruments, it takes each member a different amount of time to cross the bridge - it takes the first person one minute, the second person two minutes, the third person five minutes and the fourth person ten minutes. They must cross the bridge in pairs, travelling at the slower speed so if the one minute person went with the ten minute person, it would take a total of ten minutes. Since there is only one flashlight, one person must come back across the bridge, then another pair can cross. They only have 17 minutes to cross the bridge and still get to the concert on time. What order should they cross to get everyone across and get to the concert?

Scroll down for the answer at the bottom.

In those long ago days in Sibu and especially in the villages we all had to have a flash light each. My grandmother had one and she kept it very well under her pillow and she would take it wherever she went. When she visited us in Sibu she would also bring the flashlight in her basket. And we loved to play with her flashlight. But of course we also would help her buy batteries. She usually used Eveready batteries.

We needed flashlights when we went tapping rubber in the early hours of the morning if we did not use the carbide lamps or kerosene lamps. Hence a flashlight was often considered a thing of comfort to us. We would not be afraid when we had this life saver.

For us when we were older and living in town, we would use flashlights to read under our blanket as our mother would want us to sleep early and not waste electricity. We had a lot of fun under the bed also and pretended that we were hiding from bandits.

Later flashlights we learned that we could use them to send signals to save lives. Doctors used them to check our throats. But most important of all when we went camping flashlights were important for our various activities. So as Girl Guides and Boys Scouts most of us made full use of our own flashlights. It was always delightful when a Girl Guide brought along her father's huge torch light and we would bask under the special huge light in the outdoors. We felt comforted and secure whether it was in outside the tent or inside the tent. How wonderful it was to have light!

Today with such frequent blackouts it is good to have a few flashlights handy. Candles are of course our mainstay at times like these. But a flashlight in the car and in house is a must, even today.

What are your memories of using flashlights?




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answer: First, the one minute person and the two minute person must cross the bridge, for a total of two minutes. Then the one minute person should come back with flashlight - total of three minutes. The five minute person and the ten minute person cross together next, making the total thirteen minutes. Now the two minute person goes back and (total now fifteen minutes) and gets the one minute person and they cross together bringing the total to seventeen minutes.

Bridge Over Lembangan River on the Igan Side

 

This is the other end and less famous part of the Lembangan River which separated the Island of Sibu from the mainland. The Lembangan River used to be deep and wide, big enough for the Chinese junks to sail through in the 1900's. On the western side of the island of Sibu is the famous 360 mile-long, Rejang River which is now getting shallower by the day. The other end of this Lembangan River is what we now call Pulau Babi,a much written part and famous and also infamous for various social and economic activities.

When I was young I used to buy pineapples and bananas sold by the fishermen and farmers who came by their beautiful boats here as I lived just a stone throw away. In the evenings these boat men would park their boats in this river and sold their goods on the bridge. The small kerosene lights inside the boats at night gave us the shivers. We told each other ghost stories as we cycled home with our pineapples and bananas. The road is still called Bridge Road.

On the left of the photo were Malay houses of Kampong Datu, some of them belonging to my school mates like Onn SuutAbang Ibrahim, Yusuf Ibrahim and Hasnah Salleh. Now these houses are all gone because of urban development and the Malay Kampong has moved to Kampong Nangka. My friends have left town too for positions in other parts of Malaysia.

The landmark building along Kampong Datu Road is the Paramount Hotel.

In the distance you can see the Sanyan Building and the huge open park and RH Hotel.

Sibu has changed a lot and has a total image makeover. Sometimes I think it is a place in China.