Vignettes of the World
With excitement I rose early on the second day in Launceston. We were heading to the Cradle Mountain, and I wondered if I would come close to anything like an adventure. My bent for history has guided my research on Tasmania, particularly Port Arthur. As …
Launceston presented a first impression quite unlike what I imagined. I thought we were still at the suburbs when the airport bus dropped us off at the Batman Fawkner. I then realized that large swathes of residential areas surrounded the City of Launceston, seamlessly blended …
The convicts could have never imagined Tasmania today. But then again, even with the wonderfully preserved historic sites, we can hardly imagine Tasmania back then.
On our arrival in Launceston we checked into the Batman Fawkner Inn. I had not known that the Batman Fawkner Inn was itself a historic relic. The owner John Pascoe Fawkner built the Batman Fawkner Inn, formerly known as the Cornwall, in 1824. John Fawkner was the son of a convict. He and his family accompanied his father’s transportation to Australia, and ended up settling down in Hobart, Van Diemen’s Land (Tasmania) in 1804.
Fawkner experienced some difficulties in his early life. He received lashings and a sentence of hard labor for an offense. He then made his way to Launceston. There Fawkner gradually developed successful businesses in hotel, coaching services, newspaper publishing, sawyering and horticultural nursery. In 1835, he sailed to the southern coast of the mainland looking for a new settlement. He moored in Port Philip, in what is now Melbourne. Thereafter he also discovered the Yarra River.
On the other hand, John Batman was born in Australia and he started out as a grazer in Tasmania. When the land of Tasmania no longer yielded the pastures he needed for his livestock, he looked to the southern coast of the mainland for another settlement.
Also in 1835, he sailed to Port Philip. Although historians contested this account, it became known that he signed a treaty with the Wurundjeri Aboriginals to acquire land for his own settlement. Some would say that this was the first (and only) documented account of the European settlers negotiating for occupancy of Aboriginal lands. Batman died, however, in 1839, and that left Fawkner to rise and become the earliest preeminent citizen of Victoria.
Fawkner and Batman negotiated some of the settlement arrangements in Melbourne at the Cornwall in 1835. The hostel proudly displays this fact at its reception area, “A meeting held here resulted in the foundation of the City of Melbourne.”
The Batman Fawkner Inn remains the oldest hotel that is trading at its original site in Launceston. The site acquired its current name in tribute to both Batman and Fawkner in 1981. Now it markets itself as a budget accommodation. Finally, just a fun point to note, the Inn is said to be haunted as well.
Works Cited:
Cornwall Hotel, The Companion to Tasmanian History.
Foundation of Melbourne, Wikipedia.
History Behind the Haunted – Batman Fawkner Inn.
Perhaps many travelers would agree with me on this. When one explores a new destination, there is that inkling in the heart, a soft voice inside wondering: could I live here? The older that I get, the more it is that I look at the …
The epicureans of the world know that there are eight great styles in Chinese cuisine. These great styles are categorized according to the geographical regions in China. Each of these eight styles differs in its cooking methods, selection of ingredients, the use of spices, and …
“Are there cameras here? Quickly!”
I was sitting in the backseat, watching the cab driver communicate with another driver on the phone. He was desperately trying to find his way to the airport bus stop. I felt bad, because my destination was actually the airport hotel. My flight was the next morning and there was no hurry at all. The nervousness was contagious, however. I decided to hush and let him do his job.
“Alright, am I turning here or what? Are there cameras at this intersection?”
The two drivers were speaking in a dialect. I could make out the general message of what they were saying. Judging from the context, I did not think it was the dialect of Nanjing. This driver was markedly different from the old Nanjing that picked me up on my arrival three days ago. Clearly, he did not know his way in Nanjing.
I estimated that he has delayed the journey for five to eight minutes longer than it should have been. The afternoon traffic of Nanjing did not help either. He was very nervous throughout, clearly a result of the surveillance. Any wrong turn could cost him a ticket.
Soon enough, I recognized the back corner of Nanjing station, where the airport bus picked up its passengers. Yet I was overjoyed. The nervous driver made a wrong turn to a through-way that seemed to lead to a tunnel. That would have led him to another part of the town. He was about 20 meters into this through-way when he realized he has made a wrong turn.
The driver at the other end of the line told him to simply back out from where he was. Before he even asked, the other driver said, “don’t worry now, there are no cameras there. Just calmly back your way out to where you made the turn.
This ride cost ￥25 instead of the ￥40 that I paid on my arrival. That confirmed my suspicion that I was ripped off on my first day here. Before I left, I asked the nervous driver what dialect he was speaking. He said it was Henan.
As I boarded the airport bus, I had in my mind the last impression of Nanjing that uncannily echoed the first. The surveillance cameras in the city clearly had an effect on the everyday lives of its people. I sighed, wondering if the police state would, rather inevitably, extend its reach to Hong Kong.
I could not shake off the feeling that our days of freedom are numbered.
The afternoon heat was waning. I debated whether to see just one more site in the Zhongshan National Park before heading back to the hotel. I felt like I have seen what I wanted to see in terms of history. Yet I told myself to …
Once described as the First Villa of the Far East, the Former Residence of the Chairman of the Republican Government provides an intimate glimpse into the lives of Chiang Kai-shek and his wife Soong Meiling. Nanjing called it fondly as the Soong Meiling Villa, as …
The Ming Filial Tomb (Ming Xiaoling) had historical significance on China’s imperial burial rites. The architecture and formalities of the Ming emperor mausoleums preserved some features of their predecessors. Yet in breaking many new grounds, the Ming Filial Tomb established itself as a milestone development in imperial burials. It became the standard for all imperial burials in the Ming and Qing dynasties for five hundred years after.
In 1381, construction for the Ming Filial Tomb began. In 1398, Zhu Yuanzhang lied in rest here. Construction for all the structures completed in 1413. As the tomb of the founding emperor of Ming Dynasty, this mausoleum is the most extensive out of the nineteen Ming Dynasty imperial tombs. The other Ming tombs are spread in different regions in China, in Jiangsu, Anhui, Beijing and Hubei.
Visitors would go through the key structures on the site by walking straight on the central path. First structure to greet the visitors was the Gate of the Civil and the Military, then the Monument Hall, which was built pursuant to the order of Qing Dynasty’s Kangxi Emperor. Then the Sacrificial Hall housed the memorial tablets of Zhu Yuanzhang, his empress and the concubines. Having passed the Neihong Gate, visitors would soon arrive at the Ming Tower. Finally, one would arrive at the Treasure Mound, where Zhu Yuanzhang was actually buried.
This site presented visitors with an interesting experience. All along the central avenue I was awestruck by the grand structures. At the Ming Tower, there was a thorough exhibition showing visitors the structures and history of all nineteen Ming tombs. I was excited. Would I see something like a terracotta troop at the burial?
I walked down from the Ming Tower and came face-to-face with the burial ground. It was, for the lack of a better word, a pile of bricks. Etched onto the brick wall were the words, “here lies the Ming Taizu (Founding) Emperor.” When I saw that, I exclaimed, “that’s it?” At ground level, I was unable to view fully the circular mound that housed the remains of Zhu Yuanzhang. As such, I did not get a full perspective of the burial ground.
The tree-lined Scared Way had two sections. One featured twelve pairs of stone statues of six different species of animals. Shi Xiang Lu, the stone path that featured real and mystical animals, was named after the elephant, which was the largest animal on the path. The lions symbolized the authority and power of the emperor. The Xiezhi were mythological creatures that symbolized justice and fairness. The camels were animals of the desert, as such it conveyed the marvel at Ming Dynasty’s large territory. The elephants, with its enormous size, symbolized stability. The unicorns symbolized kindness and brought forth auspiciousness. Finally, the horses were the animals of warfare and victory.
The Weng Zhong path featured four civilian officials and four generals. Together the civilians and the generals guarded the dignity of the tomb. They symbolized loyalty. These statues were each carved out of one piece of stone slab. The statues were innovative because they broke with the Tang and Song Dynasties’ convention of lining the sacred way with columns. In these earlier sacred ways the carving were lotus designs on the top of the columns. Furthermore, the location of the Sacred Way was also unconventional. It did not align with the central avenue of the Ming Filial Tomb.
The original Sacred Way that led to the Ming Filial Tomb was very long, stretching all the way outside the Zhongshan Mountain National Park into Nanjing City. The two paths with stone statues captured the Ming Filial Tomb’s glory.
Next to the Sacred Way was the beautiful Sakura Garden. I could not resist its beauty and took a good walk within. Nanjing certainly cared for its gardens. I could tell that there was a careful balance between man-made structures and nature. Pagodas, pavilions and stone bridges stood amidst blooming cherry blossoms, ever so humbly. Some ladies were harvesting tea leaves from the bushes. This area was also the burial site for Sun Quan, an emperor of the Wu Kingdom during the Three Kingdoms Period.
As I passed through the Tablet Tower of Great Merits and exited the Da Jing Gate, I came upon the next site: the Soong Meiling Villa.
Despite having done some research, I made some critical mistakes on this trip. Although I did learn that the museums of China (all over the nation) close on Mondays, I did not know that it includes the Dr. Sun Yatsen Mausoleum. Furthermore, the staff told …