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CHINA IN SAN FRANCISCO

While San Francisco’s Chinese section lias largely gone Occidental, a onetime obscure niche stemming out of Washington street to a dead end has become more Oriental than ever. It used to be Cameron Alley; now. in more sprightly garb, it is called Old Chinatown (writes Tom White from San Francisco to the ‘ New York Times.’

Some months ago to dark and dingy Cameron Alley came a man with an idea. He was Chingwah Lee. He brought masons, carpenters, painters, decorators, Chinese artisans. They wrought a miracle, and now a dozen shops open off here and there, and some are subdivided into two, maybe three, four, or five smaller shops. * They all front on the Street of a Thousand Delights, about 12ft wide. They are Old Chinatown.

Here breathes the spirit of the Fast, the age-old Cantonese East, where nothing is obvious. Even the sections of the double doors are of different widths. Within the air is redolent of China. One shopkeeper dispenses package tea, another silk, another porcelain; every-

thing from jade to rattan, from lovely Chinese jewellery to exotic candy. Hefiesiiment for body and soul is provided, each in its way, by the Blue Willow Tea Room and the Red Gate Theatre. The tea room is true to its name, even to the arched bridge, while the wall is graced with an Bft blue willow design. The theatre spans the centuries from the time when China produced the first “ talking moving picture.” Now, as then, this is done with animated shadows and off-stage dialogue. The art dates back to an ancient emperor, grief-stricken over the passing of his favourite wife, who eased his sorrow by having' the shadowed ‘‘presence” of _her spirit brought before him to whisper sweet reassurances.

More mundane demands of the Old Chinatown visitor are mot in the Temple Garden cocktail lounge and restaurant in a setting typical of Peking. The Pavilion of Seven Maidens is unique; while in the House of Chung, owned and operated by the eminent Chinese surgeon, Dr Margaret Chung, is shown a choice display of Chinese fine art.

A stairway leads down from the Street of n Thousand Delights to the studio of Chingwah Lee. The walls are covered with the works of master craftsmen whose artistry delighted the, eyes of emperors 20 centuries ago. Among the more than 500 pieces are many exquisite examples of the three Ming stages in the development of fine porcelains. Some are almost impossible to duplicate in colouring or mottling. TJostairs. immediately over the, studio, flic picture changes with Oriental inconsistency to one as modern as the morn. Pretty Chinese stenographers bang away at typewriters, pausing only to answer the telephone or chat in university English.

Permanent link to this item

https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/ESD19390819.2.168

Bibliographic details

Evening Star, Issue 23349, 19 August 1939, Page 26

Word Count
455

CHINA IN SAN FRANCISCO Evening Star, Issue 23349, 19 August 1939, Page 26

CHINA IN SAN FRANCISCO Evening Star, Issue 23349, 19 August 1939, Page 26

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