Posts Tagged ‘East Asia’

On the streets of Hong Kong in 1938

Hong Kong in 1938 was smaller in scale, more human, much poorer and more unjust

Bali ruined, again

A photo I took in Ubud in 1989 shows the changes on Monkey Forest Road

Warrior-gymnasts in Tonkin, Vietnam, 1909

French overlords in colonial-era Vietnam make the locals do ridiculous things


Lijiang, China as it used to be

One of the world’s most exquisite towns, now lost, captured on video the very year I first saw it

Li Xiaodong’s modest, radical architecture

The New York Times misses why a small library in rural China represents a great hope for the country

Japanese doll village

The Japanese village alive with dolls

An imaginative response to the end of rural life in Japan


Hand-drawn ryokan map, Kyoto, Japan, 1990

How inexpertly drawn kanji led me out of Asia to the Middle East and Europe

An ex-Googler pokes China in the eye

An insider explains why tech companies can’t win in China and what it costs them to try

The ‘unexpected’ China slowdown was entirely foreseeable

Analysts profess surprise at the China slowdown that I saw out the car window in Fujian a year ago


Vietnam Chante revolutionary songs, Paris, France, c1967

Employing everything from martial chants to opera in support of revolution in Vietnam

Cultures of Independence, Phnom Penh, Cambodia, 2007

A scrap book, of sorts, of a cool, modernizing Cambodia in the 1960s that few realize ever existed

The China boom is over. That could be good

Will young Chinese respond to slower economic growth by going into the arts? Or politics?


Goodbye, Earthlings

Kim Jong-il departs for some distant galaxy of coiffed hairdos and Politburo-issue safari suits

The last moment in history to see the tulou

The future is grim for China’s unique, centuries-old communal housing

More evidence the China building boom is ending

But here are the astounding numbers on what they’ve built


Chocolat Pupier Asian cultures album, France, 1936

A 1936 collectible album for children, embedded with the politics of its age

Macau’s architectural legacy

A schizophrenic policy of sacrificing new land to preserve old buildings

Newsreel: ’67 War and party balloons for Red China

Newsreels declare: US neutral in ’67 War in the Middle East and Red China fears party balloons


What wartime propaganda looked like

How atrocities radicalize moderates and create social unity

Letter from Japan the day WWII ended

My grandfather’s firsthand account of the destruction of Japanese cities

An art opening at Experimenta in Hong Kong

Unusually for Hong Kong, something unexpected might happen


The great China infrastructure build-out is almost over

China’s building boom has been going on for 20 years; a recent visit to Fujian shows that’s ending.

Little Red Book by Mao Tse-tung, second edition, 1967

The rare second edition of Mao’s famous book, with a foreword by Lin Biao before he fell from grace

Chemistry notebook, People’s Republic of China, 1976

A 1976 notebook found in Xiamen begins with Maoist political slogans and ends with chemistry notes