Shanghai Street View: More War Stores

Call me jaded, but I’m getting just a bit tired of all the recent attention given to the Shanghai Jewish refugee story in the run-up to the 70th anniversary of the end of World War 2 in Asia. I got my latest dose of the story just this past week, when I read about a new local musical based on a story that saw more than 20,000 European Jews take refuge in Shanghai during the war.

I read about that just days after another international media friend asked me for a contact at the official Jewish Refugees Museum in the Hongkong District, seeking some wartime photos for their own story on the topic. I contacted a friend at the museum, who told me they were getting flooded with similar requests due to the war anniversary.
The Jewish refugee story is a natural choice for this kind of war commemoration, as it has many “feel good” elements, including overcoming hardship, and friendship between Chinese and foreigners. I’ve even written about the story twice myself, once for Shanghai Daily and also for a Chinese news website, as the war anniversary approaches.

But surely a city with the size and history of Shanghai should have some other interesting wartime stories that would be suitable for re-telling to mark the upcoming anniversary, which China will celebrated with a public holiday on September 3.

That’s when I remembered the British science fiction writer J.G. Ballard, who was living with his family in Shanghai when he was captured by the Japanese in 1941 and forced to live in a war camp for 4 years. Ballard wrote about his experiences in his famous fictionalized memoir “Empire of the Sun”, which was made into a striking movie of the same name by Steve Spielberg in 1987.

Scenes from the movie were actually shot in China, making it one of the first-of-its-kind for a modern Western film, alongside the other 1987 China classic “The Last Emperor” about the final Qing Dynasty emperor Pu Yi. But whereas I remember “Last Emperor” being widely screened in China after its release in the 1980s, “Empire of the Sun” never got much attention, perhaps because it was set in Shanghai and centered on foreigners rather than Chinese.

A friend had told me that a walking tour existed for many of the places from Ballard’s memoir, which prompted me into action in my search for new war stories. I found plenty of references on the Internet to Shanghai places from his childhood, though I couldn’t find a specific tour. So instead I assembled my own walk to his childhood home, school and the war camp where he spent 4 years just outside the city.

Schooling at Huangpu Church

The first stop on my trip took me to his school in a church that still exists at 219 Jiujiang Lu near the city center. That was followed by a trip to his home in Xuhui District at 508 Panyu Lu, and finally to Shanghai High School on Baise Lu in suburban Xuhui where Ballard spent his 4 years at the Lunghwa prison camp with around 1,800 other foreigners.

Unlike the Jewish refugee museum, which has gotten strong support from the Hongkou and Israeli governments, there appeared to be little if any similar support for the sites associated with Ballard, who died in 2009. The church building where he went to school was in good condition but closed to the public, and his childhood home has been converted into a restaurant that was also closed when I visited in the early afternoon.

Neither of those buildings had any signs or other markers indicating their connection to Ballard’s past. Shanghai High School is also closed to the public, though I read online that several buildings from the war era still exist on the campus, and that a small museum also exists in remembrance of the site’s darker role during the war.

Ballard’s life lacks some of the elements of the Jewish refugee story, which is perhaps why it’s not nearly as popular. He was living a privileged life in Shanghai as the son of a British merchant before he became a prisoner, unlike the Jews who were often penniless when they arrived in the city. “Empire of the Sun” also lacks many stories of wartime friendship between Chinese and westerners that are prominently featured at the refugee museum.

Still, it does seem like there should be room for more stories of remembrance from Shanghai’s vibrant foreign community as we approach the 70th anniversary of the end of the war, and Ballard’s certainly seems worthy of such status. At the end of the day, Shanghai is filled with fascinating and inspiring stories of wartime endurance and defiance involving both the local Chinese and foreign communities, and more of those deserve to be put on display as we approach this important anniversary.