The Taichung Voice, Probably August 2006

Another one where I don't have the physical magazine, just the text and picture files. 

Notes:

The Wenxin Road Jade Market is long gone. I think it moved to somewhere on Wuchuan West Road, near Liming Road. 

My wife has not gone to either jade market in over a decade, but she still has a nice collection of old cool stuff. 

Zhonggang Road is now "Taiwan Dadao."

I really wanted to buy a PDA back then. LOL. 

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Jaded

Over the last 5000 years, China has turned out some pretty impressive art. My problem is that except for comic books, I don’t know much about art, Chinese or otherwise. My only experience with any kind of art or culture or any of that stuff comes from the fact that for the past seven years, I have made approximately ten thousand weekend trips to the two jade markets in Taichung. Why do I spend so much time at the jade market? It’s simple. My wife makes me go with her. She is obsessed with old jade and old silver jewelry, and can spend hours browsing the tables and stalls at the jade market. To be fair, I can spend hours at Nova looking at new computer hardware that I can’t afford, so I guess we’re even.

There are two jade markets - the old one in that weird building on Gong Yuan Road across from the park, and the big one at the intersection of Wen Hsin Rd. and Zhonggang Road They are about the same to my barbarian eye, but I’ve heard that the Gong Yuan Rd. jade market is the ‘good one’. What would really make a jade market a ‘good one’ would be a jade market that had a place for husbands to sit down and have a beer while the wives browsed. But since there is no such jade market with a pub attached, I have, slowly and inevitably, been forcibly educated in the field of old Chinese silver. And these jade market trips are not just for looking- oh no. For over a decade, one week at a time, my wife has accumulated a chest of silver that would look at home on a pirate ship. I’ve got strange, foreign Chinese silver pieces all over the house and underfoot. Some day when my wife is out of town, I’m going to gather it all up, melt it down, and recast it into a huge silver Viking battleaxe. The I’ll take the battleaxe to the jade market and sell it.

Since we here at the Taichung Voice are all about sharing what we know, what follows are some pictures of sample pieces and some brief descriptions.  

 

Longevity Lock

It’s a lucky lock. Locket. Whatever.

The facts: Called 長命鎖 [Chángmìng suǒ] or 及命鎖  [Jí mìng suǒ] in Chinese, these originated in the Ming dynasty. They are in the shape of the locks used in that era, and were given to children in order to ward off danger and disasters, thereby ensuring a long life for the child. They are usually silver, but sometimes they are made from jade or wood. Often they will be inscribed with Chinese characters like “longevity” or “wealth”, to make it luckier, and the hanging beads will represent even more lucky stuff.

The comments: When I was a young child, a relative gave me a medallion of Saint Francis, which I was supposed to wear for protection. I lost it within the first week. I hope that the Chinese children who wore these longevity locks were more responsible than I was.

 

Silver rings

Amazing detail for a hand crafted piece

The facts: Also originating in the Ming dynasty, the impressed images on silver rings such as these refer to classical Chinese stories. Rings like this were custom ordered and engraved, though modern versions are mass produced. When the rings did not tell some classical story in the engraving, they would show an auspicious animal or character.

The problem: I have never been able to fit any rings I found at the jade market onto my fat fingers. And how many of these silver rings am I going to need to melt down in order to make a battleaxe?

 

Double Happiness Broach

Double Happiness

The facts: This decorative silver piece shows a doubled 喜 ‘xi’ character. ‘Xi’ means happy, but also gets used in Chinese to describe almost anything about a wedding. Pieces like were worn by a bride as a necklace or adorning a bridal headdress. It was also used as a decoration on boxes made from a tortoise shell.

The questions: A box made of a tortoise shell? And what is the deal with tortoises in Chinese culture? There are four important animals in Chinese cosmology and 風水 feng shui: dragon, tiger, bird and… tortoise?

 

Silver buttons

In case you can’t tell, that’s a frog on the left button

The facts: While made of silver, sometimes these antique buttons are painted with a colored enamel coating. Buttons like this were more than just functional articles, they could be worn anywhere as decoration and good luck totems. The actual painted images on the buttons shown are of a frog and a lotus seed. These are auspicious symbols that were thought to make it more likely for a couple to have a son, and were given as wedding gifts accordingly. The non-painted button shows a (male) child, and was thought to have the same lucky, son-bringing properties.  

The gripes: My wife spends our hard-earned money on antique silver buttons. Surely I should be allowed to buy a new PDA. And I’m not an expert on biology or anything, but what is the connection between frogs, lotus seeds and male children?

 

So, after all of my forced visits to the jade market, I’ve finally got the silver stuff sort of figured out. Unfortunately, antique silver jewelry only represents about 10% of everything they sell there. There are also tons of things like jade (obviously), teapots, crystals, imported ethnic clothing, gemstones, and coins. At my current rate of learning, I’ll be knowledgeable about everything at the jade market in fifty more years. So I’d better start wearing about a dozen Longevity locks now.