【 Memory of the Sea 】 "Cat Street" Past Life: Like Water, Coming to Fangbang Middle Road | Fangbang | Cat Street
Recently, a "Bund Cat Street" exhibition during the 2023 Bund Art Season has made Fangbang Middle Road a popular check-in spot. Starting from the ancient stage, on Fangbang Middle Road, an old street several hundred meters away, various cute cat images are painted on the exterior walls and then posted on various social media platforms.
Huangpu District has formulated a plan for the entire old city and its surrounding areas, and proposed a planning scheme that revolves around the old city, with a structure of "one axis, three centers, and multiple clusters". One axis is the public activity belt from Fangbang Road to Dijin Road. In the past, Fangbang Middle Road was indeed the "central axis" of the old city. It is adjacent to the Chenghuang Temple to the north and the former county government office to the south. Since its birth, it has been a thoroughfare market.
Its existence witnessed the prosperity of Shanghai: during the Yuan Dynasty, the sand shipping industry, which involved the transportation of grain by sea, connected the north-south routes and the Yangtze River, inland rivers, and ocean routes, promoting the prosperity of trade and banking in the Shanghai region. Starting from the Ming Dynasty, people built city walls in old city walls to combat coastal Japanese invasion. After the Qing Dynasty, a large number of guilds and offices established themselves in the old city walls to promote local friendship and help each other, and a series of private residences and gardens emerged. Inside and outside the East Gate, the South Gate, around the Chenghuang Temple, Hongqiaotou, Honglanqiao, Songxue Street, and the area along the river from Shiliupu to the South Wharf, there are many streets and alleys, many shops, and a dense population, forming a prosperous situation of "one city with fireworks and half southeast".
Photo by Wei Bin
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Now, not far from the intersection of Renmin Road and Zhonghua Road to the west end of Fangbang Middle Road, you can still see a prominent building wall with a sealed gate and blue and white alternating colors. This several story courtyard was the main campus of Jingwen Women's Primary and Secondary School before 1949, and later became the main campus of Fangbang Middle Road Third Primary School. There used to be two private primary schools in the vicinity: Nurturing Primary School and Shangde Primary School.
When I was in elementary school, this was a hospital located in the Xiaobeimen Street area, where there were several famous traditional Chinese medicine practitioners. One summer in the 1970s, a resident suddenly collapsed while digging an air raid shelter, and my mother was seriously injured. It was under the careful diagnosis and treatment of a doctor surnamed Yan at the local hospital that she recovered from her injuries. Shortly after the hospital in Xiaobeimen Street was cancelled, the original site became the Yu Garden Street Police Station.
The new campus of Shanghai Experimental Primary School, diagonally opposite now, used to be a large area of old-fashioned alleys. The old site of Shanghai Experimental Primary School is located on Luxiangyuan Road. Its predecessor was the famous Shanghai Municipal Wanzhu Primary School founded in 1911. Scientist Zhou Peiyuan and famous painter Chen Qiucao were both students of Wanzhu Primary School.
A few more steps east will reveal the former site of the Nanshi Library. The Cixiu Temple opposite was originally the Pear Garden Public Office. Liyuan Mansion is a guild organization in the Shanghai Peking Opera industry, jointly planned and raised funds by renowned actors Xia Yueheng, Pan Yueqiao, and others. It was established in the 31st year of the Guangxu reign of the Qing Dynasty and has a Changsheng Association, which specializes in supporting impoverished artists. Later, it was renamed the Shanghai Federation of the Performing Arts. The former site of Cixiu Temple was originally located behind the Liyuan Public Office and was also a famous Zen temple in Shanghai. It was founded in 1869 during the Qing Dynasty's Tongzhi period and was later renovated and expanded to include a dojo. The original Liyuan Public Office was integrated with the Zen Temple.
Haishaer photography
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Through today's Henan South Road, you can see the big memorial archway of the old mayor Wang Daohan who inscribed "Old Street of Shanghai".
In the late 1970s, when I was in junior high school, every time there was a long-distance race held in the school, the track was divided by Henan South Road, and I often ran the "half circle race" along Zhonghua Road, Henan South Road, and Renmin Road - the city here naturally referred to the old city wall that had been demolished.
Fangbang Middle Road used to be very lively, running eastward along Fangbang Middle Road until it reached the intersection of Zhonghua Road and Renmin Road, until it reached the Huangpu River on Dongmen Road. There were silver houses, restaurants, restaurants, cotton, silk, embroidery, leather goods, ginseng, medicinal herbs, woodwork, foreign goods, seafood, pickled wax, and various shops of all sizes, including photo shops, calligraphy and painting shops, longevity clothing shops, tobacco and paper shops, all arranged in rows. There are the "Three Auspicions", the "Tong Han Chun" traditional Chinese medicine brand, and numerous guilds and offices, as the poem goes: "Half southeast of the city is bustling with fireworks, with pink walls and red buildings and trees adorned with ginseng. Good wine, soup, and food are often served at night, and lanterns, songs, and dances are the most festive."
When I was young, what attracted me most was the snack shop next to Chenghuang Temple. When I walked into the two sides of the main hall of Chenghuang Temple, I couldn't catch up with all kinds of things. So far, I still feel my lips and teeth are fragrant.
In the early 1990s, before the completion of the reconstruction and expansion project of the Yu Garden Tourist Mall, I accompanied Mr. Su Yuanlei, the president of the City Couplet Association, to visit Yu Garden several times. Old Su was seriously ill at that time, but he tried his best to organize, draw up, invite, and inscribe the plaque, couplets, and content of the ancient buildings in the mall imitating the Ming and Qing dynasties: "Huabao Tower" is the "Yuebin Tower" written by Mr. Zhou Gucheng and Qian Juntao... The gold lettered signboard of "Bi tone Soul Tower" on the road to the old school yard, the vigorous and elegant cursive script, that is, Old Su wrote for the Yu Garden, is the last word.
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The Little East Gate is the Baodai Gate. Back then, this big city gate was not at the intersection of the East Gate, but at the intersection of Fangbang. The Dongmen Street outside the Baodai Gate is adjacent to the prosperous the 16 Pu. Once you enter the Baodai Gate, you will enter Shanghai City. Today, as soon as I walked into the intersection of Fangbang, I still saw Baodai Lane. In the past, there were fishery offices, egg industry offices, sericulture offices and fruit offices in Baodai Lane, which was also a gathering place for porters at the 16 Pu.
The location of today's "Bund Cat Street" is close to Baodai Lane, adjacent to Xuanhu Terrace. People who are not familiar with the old city may think that this carved beams and painted rafters and antique stage standing on the street are old antiques. In fact, this is a new building built in 1999. At that time, in cooperation with the expansion of Yu Garden Mall, Fangbang Middle Road was opened as "Shanghai Old Street", and this antique stage was built.
Xu Guangqi's character is Xuanhu, and Xuanhu Terrace is built at the intersection of Guangqi Road, Huacao Lane, and Fangbang Middle Road. And Guangqi Road was originally named Laoxianqian Street, and was renamed Xianji Road in 1912. At that time, the Shanghai Municipal Government was ordered to erect a large stone archway at the entrance of Xianqian Street, which the common people used to call "Ge Lao Fang Street". Later, it was renamed Guangqi Road in memory of Xu Guangqi.
The construction of Xuanhu Terrace was to hold various promotional activities. In fact, before Xuanhu Terrace, this place was already a very bustling market. Passing through the "Four Archways" and "Famous Doctors Hall", heading east to the "Tong Hanchun" section at the intersection of Fangbang Middle Road and Renmin Road, within the current "Bund Cat Street" area, there are rows of merchants and shops of various sizes on both sides of the road, bustling with traffic and bustling with the sound of the market.
Haishaer photography
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On the day I recently checked in on the "Bund Cat Street", I stopped by the Shanghai Five Fragrant Bean Store and wanted to buy two bags of my favorite Five Fragrant Beans. However, I found that the old shop facing the Huxin Pavilion had been demolished and said it had moved to another location.
I suddenly remembered that there used to be an animal store near here. When I was a child, I often came alone to see the various small animals displayed and sold here. My father once told me that two years before my birth, there was a zoo next to the Osmanthus Hall. There were squirrels, rabbits, monkeys, pythons, cats, dogs, and leopards on display, and tickets were charged 5 cents. Later, I asked several seniors, and they all said that there was indeed a zoo in the Old Town God Temple. They said it was a "garden", but actually they put animals in indoor cages for tourists to watch. The animal store I used to go to when I was young should be the location of the Old Town God Temple Zoo.
Mr. Fu Xiangyuan mentioned in his "Annals of the Spring Festival" that before August 13th, there was a "Shanghai Municipal Zoo" on Wenmiao Road, not far from Fangbang Middle Road. It was the earliest zoo in Shanghai, with over a hundred species of birds, including lions, tigers, bears, leopards, wolves, foxes, elephants, civets, kangaroos, muntjac deer, camels, wild boars, peacocks, crocodiles, pythons, and more. Established in the early 1930s, it once caused a sensation in Shanghai Beach. After the outbreak of the Battle of Songhu, the Japanese army's flames of war also spread to the area around the Confucian Temple in Nanshi. The French Concession's Public Administration Bureau received the animals, and the "Shanghai Municipal Zoo" no longer existed.
Now, after the start of the collection work in the reconstruction plan of the Great Yu Garden area, the pace of residents' relocation has accelerated, and the middle road of Fangbang was once deserted. If it weren't for the appearance of dozens of adorable "big cats" that make people stop, the Xuan Hu Tai with upturned eaves would appear even more lonely.
I still remember when I was a child, my parents came to Shanghai and were helpless, with only one distant relative living on Ma Street near Fangbang Middle Road. On the first day of the Lunar New Year, my father always takes me to his doorstep to put a bunch of sugarcane. At that time, we were living in financial difficulties and couldn't afford more expensive gifts. All we had was a sugarcane that our relatives could open the door and see on the first morning of the New Year, symbolizing the prosperity of life. Nowadays, my father has passed away for nearly half a century, and Ma Street no longer exists. Every time I pass by here, there is still a sweet taste in my heart.
