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China Books
All About Shanghai and Clubs & AssociationsPosted by Alice Xin Liu on Sunday, March 22, 2009 at 8:30 PM
 If you can't imagine what life in Shanghai was like from 1934 － 1935 for the 40,000 mostly American foreigners living there, this guidebook, All About Shanghai and Environs could give you a window, available again from Earnshaw Books. For example, the Cathay Hotel was the elegant dining place of choice rather than M on the Bund, and a photocopy of a map from the time shows a relatively small circle labeling an area called the "Chinese City".  On the right, the Shanghai Times Printing Press promises to print all kinds of correspondence letters, or invitations for social affairs. Harkening back to a day when e-mails and text messages hadn't taken over social networking completely. Descriptions of excursions from Shanghai include to Hangchow (and the "Hangchow Bore"), Soochow, Wusih, and of interest, "Nanking". The entry on Nanking reads,
 Old Shanghai Clubs & Associations, also available from Earnshaw Books, is by Nenad Djordjevic. The author held the role of Consul-Gerant of Serbia in Shanghai from around 2006. Since that time, his interest in Chinese and expatriate clubs of the city became an obsession, manifested in this book. Focused on "the rich life of foreigners in Shanghai from the 1840s to the 1950s", the associations and clubs listed are indexed by street and also alphabetically. Like other lists, there are few pictures and illustrations. But this makes it look academic and probably great for specific research, and a CD-Rom accompanies the book. |
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Comments on All About Shanghai and Clubs & Associations
Yes, Shanghai will forever be trapped in that 1930s time warp that all lao wai think is so romantic and alluring about the city. So much so that all the young Chinese now have bought into it as well.
Let's all go out and rent a POS, overpriced, dilapidated French concession home, refurbish it and painstakingly decorate it with Victorlas, Tiffany lamps and a coolie Chinaman in the corner a la "Empire of the Sun".
LoveChinaLongTime: I think that's part of the idea - to show that everything that is happening now in China has happened before. Next we'll start seeing communist protests, nationalization of private property, etc. etc.
It is Nenad, not Nehad, and, it is Đorđević, not Djordjevic.
Dear koma, I grant you it is Nenad, which I have changed, but my copy of the book definitely says Djordjevic, so I'm sticking to it.
Dear Alice,
You are quite right. "Djordjevic" is written on front page. That doesn't changes the fact that his surname is Đorđević. It is possible that print house hadn't had proper characters to print his surname correctly. "Đ" is substituted with "Dj", which is allowed in Serbian Latin script. "Ć" is bigger problem, as no substitute is defined. In that case "Ć" or "Č" is often substituted with "C". It can be found all over the web that "Ć" is substituted with "C" even by Serbia born speakers, due lack of knowledge on computer use. It is common error.
If you don't believe to me, you can call General Consulate of Serbia in Shanghai.
Koma: How about Nemanja Vidic?
Thanks, koma. We'll keep your clarification in the comments, but go with the title as printed on the cover for the post, for the convenience of people searching for the book.
Joel, you welcome. It just needed some clarification. For us, from Serbia, it is very sad to see our names wrongly written. I'm aware that Danwei must go with name as written on cover.
It's a lovely time warp, LoveChinaLongTime. Shanghainese are proud of it, too. Give me Haipai over Jingpai any day. Here's our review:link