The Dragon and the Crown

Hong Kong University Press 14/F Hing Wai Centre 7 Tin Wan Praya Road Aberdeen Hong Kong © Hong Kong University Press 2009 ISBN 978-962-209-955-5 All rights reserved. No portion of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording, or any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher. Secure On-line Ordering http://www.hkupress.org British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library. Printed and bound by Kings Time Printing Press Ltd., in Hong Kong, China Contents Foreword by Robert Nield vii Foreword by Diana Lary and Bernard Luk ix Preface xi Acknowledgements xiii Editorial Conventions xv Genealogical Tables xvi 1 Roots 1 2 Baptism by Fire 29 3 Hong Kong after the War 65 4 Hang Seng Bank 101 5 New China 133 6 Home and Country 169 Appendix I: The Chinese Gold and Silver Exchange Society 189 Appendix II: The Hang Seng Index 191 Appendix III: The Teachings of Chairman Ho 193 Appendix IV: Quotations, Sayings and Slogans in Chinese 195 Glossary 199 Sources 205 Index 211 1 Roots Ancestors My earliest memories of the family house were the four large characters of our household name — Kwan Chung Hao Tong — in sweeping brush strokes. Written in gold on a five-foot-long black wood panel, the characters hung high in the middle of our family hall. Household names traditionally highlighted each family’s values and aspirations, and ours were chung and hao — loyalty to the emperor and filial piety. Our household was thus the “Kwan Family Hall of Loyalty and Filial Piety,” and these words haunted me as I was growing up. Mindful of our family values, I was properly deferential towards my parents and family elders and never got into any trouble — but loyalty to the emperor was another matter. By the time I was born in the British colony of Hong Kong in 1925, China had become a republic and no longer had an emperor; instead, we were to pledge loyalty to the King of England. The symbols of the British monarchy were everywhere: the Royal Crown on the red cylindrical pillar post- boxes and the caps of the policemen patrolling the streets; the Royal Coat of Arms on government documents and posters; the portrait of King George V in school halls and government offices; and “On His Majesty’s Service” stamped on all government envelopes. In reality, however, the British monarchy was far removed from our daily lives. Except for the few who attended English-speaking schools, the vast majority of the local Chinese could hardly understand or speak any English. We interacted with each other daily in areas where the Europeans rarely ventured, so it never occurred to me, my family or any of my friends that we owed loyalty to the King of England. Instead, even though the emperor was gone, we found ourselves remaining loyal to five thousand years of Chinese tradition and history. In police stations, aside from the photo of the King, we could just as easily find the statue of Guan Yu — a Chinese general from the Three Kingdoms 2 The Dragon and the Crown period of the third century who was later deified and given the title of Guandi (Emperor Guan). With a dark red face and a long black beard, Guandi was often depicted carrying a large sword with a long handle in his right hand and a book in his left — a symbol of bravery, righteousness and loyalty. He was also worshipped in many temples, restaurants and shops throughout the colony. Many Chinese families could trace their lineages back hundreds of years. The earliest record of my ancestors was in 1273, the ninth year of the reign of the Southern Song (Sung) Emperor Du Zong, when Kwan Chiu Kong took refuge in Kaukong (Jiujiang) or Nine Rivers, a village in the southern province of Guangdong. The event was described in surprising detail in our family genealogy record — the Shixilu (a record of relations over the generations). During the reign of Emperor Du Zong (1264–74), the Southern Song dynasty was on its dying breath, and the country was ravaged by wars and famine. By 1271, Kublai Khan, the grandson of Genghis Khan, had overrun northern China and crowned himself emperor, thus establishing the Yuan dynasty. When the Mongolian army swept down the country to destroy what was left of the Southern Song dynasty, inhabitants of Anhui, Zhejiang and Jiangxi migrated southward to escape its onslaught. It was reported in the Shixilu that our ancestor Kwan Chiu Kong joined this refugee tide. Leaving his home province of Jiangxi, he wandered south with the refugees, begging for food and shelter along the way. The long trek took him past the border post of Nanxiong to what is now the province of Guangdong. He then travelled down the North River (Bei Jiang) on a wooden raft, uncertain of where he was headed, until the raft was finally damaged on the river’s lower reaches and he had to wade ashore to look for shelter. Our ancestor Chiu Kong eventually settled in Kaukong, a village in the middle of the Pearl River Delta where the North River merges with the West River (Xi Jiang) and the East River (Dong Jiang) to flow onwards to the South China Sea as the Pearl River (Zhu Jiang). Here, where the soil was rich, the climate wet and mild, and the crisscrossing waterways teemed with fish, our ancestor finally found a place which could support him and the many generations of his descendents. Within a few years of our ancestor Chiu Kong’s journey, Kublai Khan’s armies swept into the Southern Song capital of Hangzhou in Zhejiang province in 1276 and captured Emperor Du Zong’s successor Gong Di. This would have dealt a final blow to the long-decaying dynasty, except that Gong Di’s two younger brothers escaped and fled south with their entourage. The older brother was crowned Emperor Duan Zong, but did not live long and was succeeded by his younger brother Ping Di in 1278. By then the Mongolian armies were closing in so, refusing to surrender, Ping Di’s loyal official carried him on his back and jumped off a cliff into the South China Sea. Roots 3 The tragic fates of the young emperors would have been just another footnote in the tomes of Chinese history, except for one unexpected legacy. While in exile, Duan Zong built a temporary palace on top of a small hill near the west bank of what is now Kowloon Bay in Hong Kong. Over the centuries, the palace collapsed but a boulder remained on the spot, on which later generations engraved and painted three large characters in bold red: Sung Wong Toi — the terrace of the Song Emperor. Although the Japanese occupied Hong Kong during World War II and levelled the hill to make way for the extension of the former Kai Tak Airport, a block of the boulder bearing the three characters remained intact. In 1945, the colonial government built a small garden around this remaining block, which now rests on a low granite platform framed and shaded by trees at the far end of the garden. The three characters are faded but remain clear-cut and visible. Near the entrance to the garden stands a pair of six-foot-high steles depicting the story of the young emperors in Chinese and English. Apartments, grocery stores and garages now thrive across the street and double-decker buses, taxis and minivans careen around the corner, but within the stillness of the garden the solid block is imperturbable — a silent witness to Hong Kong’s distant past and its early ties to imperial China. My family would not move to Hong Kong until the turn of the twentieth century, by which time China had witnessed the passing of four imperial dynasties: Southern Song, Yuan, Ming and Qing (Ch’ing). My grandfather Kwan Yik Po, who gave us our household name, belonged to the nineteenth generation of our ancestor Chiu Kong’s descendants in Kaukong. Born in the ninth year of the reign of Emperor Xian Feng of the Qing dynasty (1859), Grandfather aspired to join the imperial government, like others of means and learning at the time. Serving in the imperial government had been the most prestigious and sought-after career path in China over the centuries. To qualify, all candidates needed to pass numerous stringent examinations. Testing the candidates on a vast range of Chinese classical thoughts and writings, these examinations were administered at various levels: twice every three years in the county, once every three years at the provincial capital, and finally once every three years at the imperial capital. Only those who advanced to the highest level successfully were admitted to the imperial government service. Tall and robust, with a red face like Guandi and famously outgoing, Grandfather was fond of learning from an early age and showed talents for writing and literature. Kaukong village elders had high hopes of him securing a post in the imperial government and he diligently studied the classics for many years, but success in the examinations eluded him. Then, in 1898, Emperor Guang Xu introduced the Hundred Days’ Reform in an effort to resuscitate a rapidly decaying dynasty. As part of his attempts to 4 The Dragon and the Crown institute a modern education system and introduce mathematics and science into the curriculum, he abolished the traditional examination system.

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