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Taiping Gate: being found after years’ burying

Found at t he junction of t he Baixiang Street and Sifang Street, Taiping Gate was been excavated later. Although the arched gate made up of sto ne strips was well-preserved, it needs renovation urgently. The gate was there before the founding of C hongqing municipality. According to t he Ba County Annals; Taiping Gate consists of the inner city and the barbican. There is a tablet on both inner gate read “Guardian of East Shu” and barbican read “Taiping Gate”. The barbican (part of an ancient Chinese city wall)_is an arch or square shaped defense structure built outside the city gate for the purpose of strengthening to t he defense of a c ity or a pass, actually . The gate we see today is the inner gate. The tablet is missing. Outside the inner gate, there used to b e a b arbican, which consists of east wall, south wall, west wall and inner wall.

The government off ces and the Yamen of Ba County were located near the Taiping Gate. During the War of Re sistance against Japan, many factories and f nancing institutions moved to Chongqing so that the Baixiang Street nearby was f lled with banks and Industrial and commercial organizations.Therefore Baixiang Street became a financial center in wartime. As a result, the area near Taiping Gate was bustling with people.

Wanglongmen: a place of legend

Wanglongmen is an exception among all the 17 old gates in Chongqing, which was named as a gate but actually a dock. Another place called “Longmenhao”, an old toponym that can also stand for Chongqing traditional culture is also frequently heard by the old people since their childhood. Wanglongmen and Longmenhao are standing opposite to the Yangtze River.

The cable car in Wanglongmen also left a deep impression on the old Chongqing people’s mind. Decades ago, the cable car set near the mountain passing through the Yangtze River by mooring rope was the main vehicle in Chongqing. Because of the mountainous landscape and the huge altitude difference, people built Wanglongmen cableway station to solve the problem.

The station was specially used for waiting for and getting on or off the cable car. The cable railroad is paved on a bridge, which was built on the stone steps of t he original dock. The cable railroad is fish-bellied; the two-lane is designed in the middle while the two ends are designed single lane; in this way, the cable cars will split tacks in the middle. It was resounding in Chongqing that the cable car opened to traff c and as a result, many people went to Wanglongmen to “have a try”.

The riverside near the station was prosperous at t hat time, a l arge number of te ahouses and the stands are there for the reception of t he customers. But the cable cars had to stop when floods in summer. Up to the completion of the Yangtze River Passenger Cableway, people taking ferries from Wanglongmen to Longmenhao became less and less, so does the Wanglongmen cableway.

Dongshuimen: the main port connecting Nan’an District

Going down the Datong Street and then walking through a long lane of sto ne steps, here we c ome to t he viaduct connecting Chaotianmen tunnel and Changbin Road. Then, going across the pedestrian path and we arrive at t he crenel of the wall in Dongshuimen. Going down along the stone steps and turning a corner, the Dongshuimen will come into our eyes. In the past, the Dongshuimen, the main port leaving for Nan’an District for shopping and excursion or Yunnan Province and Guizhou Province, was the one of t he most thriving places in Chongqing many years ago. In the Qing Dynasty, the merchants to C hongqing through the waterway almost went ashore at Dongshuimen port.

Walking on the f agging of the Dongshuimen main street, imaging the old days and a b ustling scene will emerge into mind: the merchants in khurta, the off cers sitting on a kind of litter and the workman walking on the street and the sound of the working song and yo-heave-ho never stop. But nowadays, the splendid wall no longer in existence, only a single gate stands among the woods under the new built Dongshuimen Bridge. The existing gate of Dongshuimen is 5 meters high with the ruins of wall and a stone arched wall path.

Huguang Guild: recording immigrant culture

The last stop of the ancient city gate tour is Huguang Guild, which bears a p eriod of o ld Chongqing’s glories. The center street of D ongshuimen, was a p lace centralizing industrial and commerce institutions invested by the officers and merchants in Hunan Province and Guangzhou Province in the Ming and Qing Dynasties. In other words, Huguang Guild is the largest and the most well-preserved old guild buildings in the urban area. Huguang Guild consists of t he former Yu Palace, Guangdong Association and Qi’an Association.

Huguang Guild is a p lace worth visiting, for the whole building is well constructed and delicate carved. It is the representative of the Southern architecture in the Ming and Qing Dynasties and also the largest old guild buildings in China. According to Feng Shui Theory, the interior of the turn of the river is “l(fā)ucky place” while the outside part is “unlucky place”. Dongshuimen area is indeed a lucky place, so the off cers and the merchants choose to build guilds here.

In the late Ming and early Qing Dynasties, the population in Sichuan Province decreased sharply, so the ruler ordered the Hunan people migrant to S ichuan Province, which called“Hunan people and Guangzhou people westwards Sichuan Province” lasted for about a hundred years. As a result, a clump of Huguang guilds emerged as a r esponse. The Huguang Guild was the busiest one among the “Eight Guilds and One Association” at t hat time. Maybe our forefathers were part of the immigrants to Chongqing.

Huguang Guilds will hold Yu, the king’s temple fair for memorizing Yu and praying wealthy and peaceful for the year coming on the 14th of f rst month of Chinese lunar year. Yu Palace was constructed in the 24th year in Emperor Qianlong’s reign with the donation from the rich merchants and the squires of t he early migrants in Hu’nan Province and Hubei Province. Yu Palace, being constructing in the period of Emperor Shunzhi’s reign by the migrants of H unan Province and Guangdong Province when they first came into Sichuan Province. What’s precious about this temple is that the original style has been preserved even after many times renovations and expansions. According to the data available, yellow is the color of royal family, so the tiles of Palace in the capital city are yellow vitreous tiles; green symbolizes the scholar-off cial class, so the ordinary people cannot use it. According to Wu Xing theory, the color black signif es the element of “water”, which overcomes “fire”, therefore most traditional Chinese buildings are roofed with dark green titles. Although the merchants in Shanxi Province are the richest across the county, the tiles of their house are dark green tiles, so does the Yu Palace. What’s more, there are many couplets in the Huguang Guilds ref ecting the hardships of t he Hakkas pioneering on foreign land and their homesickness..