This gallery contains 31 photos.
Calcutta’s former European Town is a large, sprawling, highly-planned city that occupies much of the southern reaches of Central Kolkata today. At its heart is Fort William, the fortified, walled settlement that the English East India Company established here, along … Continue reading
This gallery contains 35 photos.
Long before Dream Of A City and my fascination with port cities in Asia, I had been enamoured of the art and the architecture of the Middle East, particularly of the cities that sat at the intersections of Islamic and … Continue reading
This gallery contains 11 photos.
So just when I thought I was done with the second China-Korea-Japan leg of my Grand Tour of the East, I find myself in Hakodate, in Japan’s northern-most island of Hokkaido. Hakodate was THE very first treaty port in Japan, … Continue reading
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Here are the highlights of the final Tales of Asia talk, featuring port cities of the British Empire in Southeast Asia: Rangoon, Penang & Singapore. Full talk here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VMnUg2xJv7U
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Here are the highlights of my fourth Tales of Asia talk. Full talk: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=df5t70mbXaA&feature=youtu.be
This gallery contains 1 photo.
The fourth in the Tales of Asia series takes us back to French Indochina in La Belle Epoque. We visit the former capital cities of Saigon (today’s Ho Chi Minh City) and Hanoi – the showpiece cities of the French … Continue reading
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The second in the Tales of Asia series journeys to Jakarta, the capital of the modern nation of Indonesia. For almost 300 years, however, Jakarta was Batavia, one of the oldest port cities in the region, founded by the Dutch in … Continue reading
This gallery contains 13 photos.
So inevitably, I have arrived at the epilogue to Part II of my Grand Tour, on the Treaty Ports and Imperial Cities of China, Korea and Japan. 15 glittering cities of the Far East – Hong Kong, Macao, Canton, Amoy, … Continue reading
This gallery contains 47 photos.
In 1868, the Meiji Emperor, upon ascending to the Chrysanthemum Throne in the Imperial Capital, Kyoto 京都, subdued the Tokugawa Shogunate and abolished shogunates altogether, declaring that from henceforth, political power would once again be restored to the Monarchy. The last time … Continue reading
This gallery contains 19 photos.
Yokohama is the original treaty port in Japan; it was here, in 1854 that the Treaty of Amity was signed between Commodore Perry (of the United States) and Japan, which forced open Japanese ports to European trade. In fact, the … Continue reading
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