新浪微博
腾讯微博
微信
QQ空间
QQ好友
手机阅读分享话题

Chongqing News

Scenes of Chongqing 90 years ago

2019-01-09 14:29:03

Working people

Sedan chairs on a busy road

Crowded wharf

Stilted buildings

Chaotianmen 

CHONGQING (CQNEWS) -- What did Chongqing look like 90 years ago?

An old video made by foreigners recreated the bustling scenes of Chongqing, for example, crowded boats berthing at Chaotianmen Wharf, layered stilted buildings built along the river, stone stairs crowded with sedan chairs and a child staring at the camera at the old gate of Chaotianmen.

Scenes of old Chongqing were presented to the public through the video less than 2 minutes.

Black and white silent film

To reproduce old cityscape of Chongqing 90 years ago

This documentary video made by foreigners is a black and white silent film, which is called Towering City – Chongqing, China.

The photographer started the video with the sentence “About 2,000 miles of the upper reaches of Yangtze River...”

Then a scene of Chaotianmen and Yuzhong Peninsula shot from the river was showed. Viewed from afar, boats in all size were berthing at the Chaotianmen Wharf. The Yuzhong Peninsula was carpeted with stilted buildings built along the mountains.

The walls of Chaotianmen can be seen at a high altitude. The semicircular walls firmly guard Yuzhong Peninsula behind.

“Chongqing is the city that architects forgot to remove the scaffolds and columns after finishing the construction.”

Stilted buildings were described like this by the photographer in this video.

All the stilted buildings were rooted in the steep cliff. A narrow mountain passage only for one person lay under the stilted buildings, on which people walked leisurely.

“In fact, columns were the main property in the city. Local ‘taxi drivers’ used them to make money.”

The sedan chair carried by two persons occupied most space of the screen. On the stone stairs of the wharf, the sedan chair bearers carried the sedan chairs back and forth. And sometimes it caused a jam due to too many sedan chairs on the road.

“Passengers will be charged until the sedan chair arrives at a corner.”

At the end of the video, the camera focused on the old gate of Chongqing. People carried all kinds of goods from the gate. Next to the gate, a local child was staring at the camera curiously.

Old video cherished by people born in the 1980s

To help more young people understand history

This video is one of the hundreds of videos collected by 33-year-old Pu Wei. It is the only video related to old Chongqing in all his collections.

“I have many old videos about Beijing, Shanghai and even Chengdu. But I just found the only one related to Chongqing.” As a native of Chongqing, he felt regretful when mentioning this special video.

He has devoted himself in collecting old videos for 5 years. His hobby was evoked by an old video about the Taierzhuang Campaign. “In the video, the anti-Japanese soldiers smashed into the enemy ranks. They kept on fighting even their heads wrapped with thick gauze bandages. After the war, Chinese soldiers sang and danced joyously on the battle fields. They faced all the difficulties optimistically. I was touched by all the scenes in the video deeply. So from then on, a thought to collect old videos occurred to me.” 

“I hope more young people will see these precious videos,” said Pu Wei. He hopes more people born in the 1990s and the 2000s can understand the history from these old videos directly. (Translated by Mao Qiao, Fathom Language Limited)

Editor:Jiang Yiwei