Scriptures for Life

Case studies from contemporary Asia on the intersection of nature and urban spaces. Two processes are currently unfolding in diverse patterns across contemporary Asian cities: the displacement of nature in urban spaces, as well as the reimagining of nature's place in the urban sphere. The rapid urbanization of Asia has provoked contentious debates and novel schemes about the role of nature in cities. Contributors to this volume gather case studies from across Asia to address projects of urban greening and other models for the integration of nature in urban life. The book also illustrates how the intersection of urban growth and urban nature is a sector rich with fresh ideas about urban planning, governance, and social life as debates and efforts to recover nature in the city provoke moral and ethical evaluations of the human ecology of city life.

The translation elucidates the complex metaphors, mythological and historical figures, and nomenclature of the Daoist tradition in thoughtfully rendered English.The Daoist Liturgy of the Most High for Daily Recitation (Taishang xuanmen gongke jing 太上玄門功課經) is performed in Daoist temples every morning and evening. The ritual aims at a perfected state for self-cultivation and serves as a religious prayer for universal salvation from sufferings and calamities in the world. The liturgical performance includes the recitation of texts from a broad spectrum of Daoist traditions, including scriptures, chants, divine proclamations, litany of repentance, incantations, and hymns, which offers major insights into the living Daoist beliefs and ritual traditions in contemporary Chinese communities.This complete, meticulous English translation, based primarily on an extant Chinese edition from 1906, is presented in a bilingual format with the original Chinese text, accompanied by annotations, and a w

Simply keeping the mind clear and calm was, for many post-Tang Daoists, the path to eternal life and freedom. Through sheer serenity, practitioners believed they could attain immunity to hunger, eliminate sexual function, suspend breath and pulse, engage in astral travel, and command spirits and natural forces.In his meticulously researched study, Stephen Eskildsen examines how this perspective informed Daoist internal alchemists after the Tang dynasty (618–907), including prominent representatives of the Quanzhen tradition in the north and the Nanzong in the south. Drawing on a wide array of textual sources, he analyzes the teachings of figures like Qiu Chuji (1143–1227), Yin Zhiping (1169–1251), Zhang Boduan (ca. 984–1082), Bai Yuchan (1194– 1229), Li Daochun (fl. 1288–1292), Yu Yan (ca. 1253–1314), and Wu Shouyang (1574–after 1641), among others. These adepts emphasized passive, straightforward methods that they believed gave rise to spontaneous psychic, sensory, and physiological p

Told through a little girl’s keen and often amused observation, AN INCH OF TIME gives a truthful, pleasant picture of daily life in Hong Kong in the post-war years. This first-hand account of the kind of home and school education received by many middle-class local Hong Kong children decades ago contains reminiscences about aspects of life-style, customs and traditions – both eastern and western – which average Hongkongers lived by in the 1940s and ‘50s. This memoir is set in a specific locality, the Happy Valley district of Hong Kong Island, home for over a century to the famous Jockey Club race-course.

A world-leading expert on Myanmar assesses the ongoing popular uprising against the military junta that deposed Aung San Suu Kyi.Myanmar’s generals didn’t expect the nation to rise up against the coup they staged in February 2021. But after decades of stifling, direct military rule, the Burmese people had become used to another way of life during the relative openness of 2011–21. The army has been unable to suppress anti-coup protests as it did in 1962 and 1988; and, three years after sending tanks into Yangon, Naypyitaw and other cities, the army has yet to establish a functioning administration.For the first time since the 1970s, armed resistance is not confined to traditionally strife-torn frontier areas, where ethnic insurgents like the Karen National Union and Kachin Independence Army have been active for decades—it has spread to the majority-Burmese heartland, in the shape of the People’s Defence Forces. But the anti-junta forces are insufficiently well-equipped to defeat the muc

Widely respected and beloved as one of Hong Kong’s most original painters, Gaylord Chan (1925-2020) had a dynamic career that traversed cultural epochs and the boundaries of media. He made his first serious foray into painting only at the age of 42 after enrolling in an extra-mural studies art course organised by the University of Hong Kong in 1968. Chan’s late start, however, did not at all limit his potential. While he worked as an engineer for Cable & Wireless by day, Chan continued to experiment and refine his creative practice. The artist eventually developed a unique abstract language of bold colours and rustic forms that reflects on the simple wonders of daily life, science and metaphysics, and the contemporary human condition. Referencing an evocative painting by Chan from the 1990s, Never End: The Art and Life of Gaylord Chan, presented by Asia Society Hong Kong Center, is a tribute to the late master and his invaluable artistic legacy. It explores the development of Chan’

VERA MAGPIE explores the gap between childhood fantasies of adult life and the stark reality of life in a women's prison. The eponymous narrator, Vera Magpie herself, is serving time for the murder of her three husbands, including Larry, a good man whom she loved, but doomed to die at Vera's hands because she has acquired a taste for murder. In prison, Vera experiences the reality that here are politics and a pecking order, just as in society at large, but here also she finds redemption through literature. Like many women who kill, Vera is a product of her own flawed past. But aspects of this past also count towards her early release from prison, as her new female lawyer successfully argues Battered Women’s Syndrome as a defence.-------------------------------------------------“Vera Magpie depicts pure life, nothing has been included or excluded, only human attitudes, psychology and behaviours have been condensed.”—Muhammad Shanazar “A knockout. This book is a little gem.”—J

This book, Chiang Yee and His Circle: Chinese Artistic and Intellectual Life in Britain, 1930–1950, celebrates the life and work of Chiang Yee (1903–1977), a Chinese writer, poet, and painter who made his home in London, England during the 1930s and 1940s. It examines Chiang’s relationship with his circle of friends and colleagues in the English capital, and assesses the work he produced during his sojourn there. This edited volume, with contributions from eleven distinguished scholars, tells a story of a Chinese intellectual community in London that up to now has been largely overlooked. It portrays a dynamic picture of the London-based émigré life during the years that led up to the war and during the conflict that was the catalyst for many of them moving on. In addition, the book broadens our understanding of cultural interactions between China and the West in Hampstead, one of the most vibrant artistic communities in London.

More Than 1001 Days and Nights of Hong Kong Internment is the wartime journal of Sir Chaloner Grenville Alabaster, former attorney-general of Hong Kong and one of the three highest-ranking British officials during the Japanese occupation. He was imprisoned by the Japanese at the Stanley Internment Camp from 1941 to 1945. During his internment, he managed to keep a diary of his life in the camp in small notebooks and hid them until his release in 1945. He then wrote his wartime journal on the basis of these notes. The journal records his day-to-day experiences of the fall of Hong Kong, his time at Stanley, and his eventual release. Some of the most fascinating extracts cover the three months immediately after the fall of Hong Kong and when Alabaster and his colleagues were imprisoned in Prince’s Building in Central and before they were sent to the camp, a period little covered in previous publications. Hence, the book is an important primary source for understanding the daily operation

This book explains the key aspects of executing an international IPO. Packed with useful tips, it reviews rules and market practices from the US to Europe, the Middle East, and the Asia-Pacific region. Real-life case studies are used to illustrate all aspects of conducting an IPO, including documentation, valuation, as well as marketing issues.This new edition has been the subject of a complete and detailed revision, including new information pertaining to market developments. Some topics, such as spin-off offerings, SPACs, listing requirements, and due diligence have also been further expanded while some 15 additional IPOs have been included as examples to illustrate various aspects of new offerings.It is most suitable for entrepreneurs, chief executives, and CFOs of companies about to be floated, investor relations professionals, family offices, private equity, hedge fund and institutional investors, and finance students. It will also be of interest to market practitioners such as in

In Hong Kong’s Last English Bishop, Philip L. Wickeri explores the life and times of John Gilbert Hindley Baker, who served as Bishop of the Anglican Diocese of Hong Kong and Macao from 1966 to 1981. Baker lived through exciting times, as a missionary in wartime and revolutionary China, as a priest in America during the early years of the Cold War, and as a mission leader in the Church of England when churches in many parts of the world were becoming independent, before returning to Hong Kong where he was elected bishop. He was a faithful correspondent and a prolific writer throughout his life, offering a personal commentary on the churches and the societies in which he lived. Wickeri has made extensive use of Baker’s writings and other archival materials to provide a vivid picture of his life and work. Bishop Baker was instrumental in working for reconciliation after the 1967 riots, expanding the work of the diocese, and engaging Hong Kong with the wider world. In 1971, he opened a ne

The University Museum and Art Gallery collaborates with Chen Xi on the exhibition Chen Xi: So We Remember. This catalogue accompanies the exhibition. The paintings illustrate important events that have shaped our modern world. The artist created this series of contemporary images to commemorate, to document and to provoke thought. The show presents her preliminary pen and watercolour drawings along with the finished oil paintings. Meticulous in her research and true to both the documented incident and the domestic details, Chen Xi creates historical paintings for our present and future generations. Her method directly relates to contemporary life and to a society that is informed and influenced by modern-day media. Interestingly, the painter does not simply depict a historic event, but frames within a TV screen each episode of her sequential and international narrative. By presenting the paintings within the TV’s glass, they become screen shots linked to a specific moment in time and s

As the longest serving and the most influential bishop of Hong Kong, Bishop R. O. Hall (何明華會督) played a crucial role in the reconstruction of the Anglican Church and Hong Kong after WWII. Born in England, the bishop committed his life to building bridges: between China and England; between Hong Kong workers and company management; between the government and the Hong Kong people; and between the Hong Kong people he loved and the Divine he worshipped. His single-mindedness in pursuing and translating the social theology of F. D. Maurice into practical terms resulted in his enormous contributions to the development of social welfare, low-cost housing, and education in postwar Hong Kong and helped spur its economic and social evolution into a global city. Based on primary archival and private materials, this book shows that Bishop Hall, whole-hearted in pursuit of his goals for Hong Kong through “love-in-action,” was also multifaceted.

American women have lived in Hong Kong, and in neighboring Macao, for nearly two centuries. Many were changed by their encounter with Chinese life and British colonialism. Their openness to new experi

The 3,000-year-old Yi’Jing – Book of Changes, the oldest and most influential of the Chinese classics, is unquestionably one of the most important books in world literature. The central concept of the Yi’Jing is “Heaven and Humanity as One”. It delineates the principles behind how man can live in harmony with nature by emulating the precepts of heaven and earth. This idea became the cornerstone of China’s traditional culture, the root source of all branches of knowledge and the most unique feature of Chinese civilization. From its original text of about 4,900 characters emerged the two main pillars of Chinese philosophy – Confucianism and Taoism.Although it began life as a book of oracles, and still remains a remarkable tool for divination, the Yi’Jing has evolved over the long years of Chinese history into primarily a book of wisdom. For more than 25 centuries Chinese emperors, statesmen and scholars have consulted the book as a standard resource on matters ranging from statecraft, wa

The 3,000-year-old Yi’Jing – Book of Changes, the oldest and most influential of the Chinese classics, is unquestionably one of the most important books in world literature. The central concept of the Yi’Jing is “Heaven and Humanity as One”. It delineates the principles behind how man can live in harmony with nature by emulating the precepts of heaven and earth. This idea became the cornerstone of China’s traditional culture, the root source of all branches of knowledge and the most unique feature of Chinese civilization. From its original text of about 4,900 characters emerged the two main pillars of Chinese philosophy – Confucianism and Taoism. Although it began life as a book of oracles, and still remains a remarkable tool for divination, the Yi’Jing has evolved over the long years of Chinese history into primarily a book of wisdom. For more than 25 centuries Chinese emperors, statesmen and scholars have consulted the book as a standard resource on matt

AFTER... the colonial era... the return to Chinese sovereignty... the Asian economic crisis... the property slump... SARS... half a million people marching for demo

Carl Crow arrived in Shanghai in 1911 and made the city his home for the next quarter of a century, working there as a journalist, newspaper proprietor, and groundbreaking adman. He also did stints as

Macau in the 1820s and 1830s was the centre of life for foreigners trading with China through the only permitted gateway of Canton. To this European enclave on the China coast in 1829 came Harriett Lo

Macau in the 1820s and 1830s was the centre of life for foreigners trading with China through the only permitted gateway of Canton. To this European enclave on the China coast in 1829 came Harriett Lo

Sir David Akers-Jones (Zhong Yat-kit) has been a major figure in the life and government of Hong Kong for many years. In this book he writes with a light and distinctive touch about his life, focusing

This year (2025), on the 50th anniversary of my public service starting as an Administrative Officer in the Hong Kong Government and morphing into a politician, after many twists and turns, I am pleased to publish the ninth edition of my series of books entitled “Regina’s English Works for You”.The articles collected in this year’s “Regina’s English Works for You 9” fall under three broad areas: “Hong Kong’s Recovery and Resurgence” after our re-opening in early 2023, “Opportunities in the Greater Bay Area”, and “Emerging Rivalry between the East and the West”. The articles are a reflection of the global trends reshaping the world and life in Hong Kong. I hope readers can glean from these pieces some insight about the way the world is heading, and how we should position ourselves in a world transformed by “changes unseen in a hundred years”.I hope you will enjoy reading these fairly short and readable pieces and, in the process, learn one or two new things about mastering the English l

This is probably the first book dedicated to the life and times of the doctors who have shaped the medical development of Hong Kong. It is a fascinating story of how the pioneers transformed a city with primitive medical services into what it is today—a city with advanced medical facilities as in any major Western city.—Dr. Mak Wai-pingChairman (Executive Committee) and Board of DirectorsHong Kong Museum of Medical Science Society The development of Western medicine in Hong Kong to its current sophisticated state over more than 150 years is a fascinating story. And this book tells the above history from a special perspective—the personalities responsible for this remarkable achievement. These individuals, spanning over a period of over 150 years, comprised doctors in government public medical and health services who advocated new initiatives and laid the infrastructure; those who established health policies, and moved the health system forward; the medical educators who train

"The best thing about dreaming is that you don’t really need to wait for it to come true,just go through life imaging it, hoping it, wanting it.Quite free.Quite happy.Isn’t that good enough?"