The Ford of Heaven

Download or read book The Ford of Heaven written by Brian Power and published by C. HURST & CO. PUBLISHERS. This book was released on 2005 with total page 242 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Ford of Heaven, an ancient river port in north-eastern China, gave travellers access to the Celestial City of Peking and the Emperor of Heaven eighty miles to the west. Tientsin, as British settlers called The Ford of Heaven, became a treaty port in 1860 in the wake of the Opium Wars. In the 1920s and 1930s it was occupied by Britain, France, Germany, Russia, America and other foreign powers. This memoir evokes a childhood spent in this strange and exotic place. In contrast to other accounts of lives lived in foreign enclaves, Brian Powers early experiences were shaped not by his parents values but by the loving care and calm spirit of his Chinese amah Y Jieh, who gave him the gift of Chinese and an understanding of her peoples legends and superstitions.