jeanne boden

hong kong

 

star ferry

One of the charms of Hong Kong is that the old tram on Hong Kong Island and the old Star Ferry between Hong Kong Island and Kowloon are still in use. 

 

make hong kong bigger

Hong Kong Island is packed with high rise buildings. A meter of ground is like a meter of gold. A good reason to extend the Island a little bit. At the spot where the Star Ferry leaves Hong Kong Island to go to Kowloon, an extra piece of land is being created - an extra piece of gold for Hong Kong! 

white tiles - blue windows

After China opened up the most popular style of building was this: concrete buildings with white tiles on the outside and blue windows. They could be seen all over China. Many of them are gone by now but this one in Guangzhou reminded me of former times. 

taiping logo

The logo of Taiping Life insurance is a sublime example of the way Chinese characters melt into the design of the logo. Take a good look at the pine tree and you will see the character tai 太 at the top of the tree and the character 平 at the bottom. On top of that the pine tree is a symbol of long life.

cosmic symbols and chinese characters upside down

What looks like an ordinary door at first sight carries a lot of symbols if we look a bit deeper. 

The design on the door reflects the traditional view of the cosmos, with square earth and round heaven. This pattern is very popular in design in China. 

Next to the door we see the Chinese character for Spring '春', upside down. Around Chinese New Year people paste Chinese characters for 'good fortune' or 'Spring' on red paper on the door to obtain a lot of good luck in the coming year. The Chinese character is pasted upside down because 'upside down' or ‘dao' '倒' in the same pronunciation 'dao' '到' also means 'to arrive'. Pasting the character upside down thus means 'good fortune arrives'.  

 

advertising beauties

 

advertising beauties

 

98th year of the republic of china

The poster behind the gods shows the moon calendar from which people can read their 'luck' during the '98th year of the Republic of China'. 

Taiwan uses a particular system of counting the years that starts with the establishment of the 'Republic of China' in 1911. In 2009 it was the '98th year of the Republic'. This poster is an example from a temple in Taiwan, but also in business Taiwan uses this way of counting years, as of course opposed to the 'People's Republic of China'. 
 

Quite complex all these calendars!

The People's Republic of China uses the Gregorian calendar and the traditional moon calendar. 

Taiwan uses the Gregorian calendar, the traditional moon calendar plus it's own system starting in 1911.

temple roof in tainan