Bizarre Tales of Tianjin: Folklore Stories

An oral history of old Tianjin, a heartfelt look back at the everyday world that has vanished.

I return to my hometown and travel through the old lanes of Nanshi, the Haihe ferry crossings, the alleys around the Drum Tower, and the nearby countryside, seeking out elderly people the passage of time has left behind. Elder Chen witnessed the rules of territory among Nanshi's communal kitchens and won back a poor man's life through a battle of wits. For four generations, Elder Zhou's family worked the boats, their canal-hauling chants echoing over the waves of the Haihe. Grandma Han looked after her tenement courtyard for sixty years, and a bowl of dumplings shared by the neighbors warmed half the alley. Master Qiu hid his family's incense-making recipe in a tree hollow, guarding it for more than a decade until the day it could see the light again.

They were porters, barbers, paper-hangers, and pawnshop owners; widows who mended clothes, peddlers who walked the streets, and paper-cutting artists at temple fairs. They had little schooling and knew no grand principles, yet over a lifetime they embodied eight words: justice, trust, warmth, respect, affection, and steadfastness.

One hundred and ten chapters, six old objects, and the oral histories of more than forty elders. The gong rings out, the mooring ropes hold fast, the bricks retain their marks, and the warmth of daily life never dies.

This is a book about the rules people lived by, and a book about the human heart. Everything that bulldozers cannot level and time cannot wash away lives within these pages.