Shanghai, China - Jewish Heritage Tour (Day 1 - Thursday, March 8)

When we were in Shanghai 6 1/2 years ago we told our Viking Chinese guide that we'd like to make time to visit the old Jewish quarter.  He responded that it didn't exist any more -- that nothing remained.  We accepted this, only to learn after we returned home that this information was wrong.  Well, on this trip Viking offered as one of its excursion options in Shanghai a Jewish Heritage Tour and, of course, we signed up for it.

During the period 1933-1941 more than 20,000 Jews from Germany, Austria, Czechoslovakia, Poland and a few other Eastern European countries who were able to leave their homelands but were turned away by most other countries were permitted to enter China and take up residence in Shanghai.  They lived in one of the zones that, by agreement, were open to foreigners and developed their own community within a community.  Other Jews were already living in Shanghai, mostly those who had left Russia at the turn of the century.  Even after the Japanese took over this part of China, these refugee Jews were permitted to stay, even though they were confined in ghetto-like fashion to their neighborhood.  At the end of WWII, and particularly after the Communists defeated the Nationalists in China's civil war that followed, all but a few of the Shanghai Jews left China.  Today about 2,000 Jews -- mostly teachers, engineers, doctors and other professionals, live in Shanghai as a result of fairly recent immigration.

During the time that refugee Russian and German-related Jews were living in Shanghai, they practiced their religion, build a Jewish cultural community, started their own newspaper, enjoyed Jewish theater, and the like.  Two synagogues were built, one called the Ohel Moshe Synagogue and the other the Ohel Rachel Synagogue, the latter built by Sir Jacob Elias Sassoon in memory of his late wife Rachel.   Life wasn't easy for them, but at least they escaped the persecution that prompted them to migrate to Shanghai.

Our tour left from the pier at 9 in the morning.  Our first stop was what is now the Huo Shan Park, which is right in the middle of the old Jewish quarter.  On our way to that stop I couldn't resist photographing clusters of bicycles that appeared here and there.

 

When we got to the park, our guide related much of the history of refugee Jewish life in that neighborhood.  As he was talking, some Chinese women were doing morning exercises.  (Remember, you can enlarge any photograph by clicking on it.)

   

He pointed out that the building directly across the street from the park was the headquarters at the time of the American Joint Distribution Committee, a vital source of support to the refugee community.

 

We walked from the park up and down streets that were among those occupied by the refugee Jews.  Our guide pointed out that even now most of the rooms and apartments in these residential buildings don't have plumbing and that residents, now as then, use chamber pots.  He noted that these units are occupied mostly by old people and that young people refuse to live in this kind of housing.  As the photos indicate, everything but the kitchen sink, including meat, was hanging out windows at every level.

               

As we were walking along one of these streets, we came upon signage identifying the building where President Jimmy Carter's Secretary of the Treasury, Michael Blumenthal, once lived as one of the refugees.

  

We eventually arrived at the former Ohel Moshe Synagogue, which is now the Shanghai Jewish Refugees Museum.  The museum consists of the original synagogue and two newer outbuildings that house various exhibits depicting Jewish life in the Shanghai ghetto.  The State of Israel donated the ark cover and a torah inside (which can be seen through glass from one side).

           

The names of all of the Jewish refugees appear, in alphabetical order, in an engraving on a long wall in the yard of the synagogue.  There are many Cohns and Cohens among them.  Janis also found the name of a phychologist for whom she worked in Portland years ago who had told her that he once was a refugee living in Shanghai.

  

On our bus ride back to the ship we passed the Ohel Rachel Synagogue (which we could not see behind a wall, except for a portion of its roof).

Our guide also pointed out to us a building, now a music conservatory, that had once been a Jewish club.

In the afternoon, after lunch, Janis and I walked along Nanjing Road, a major shopping street, where we stopped at an Apple store to update our iPhones and iPads.

  

After that we had lunch at a restaurant across the street recommended by one of the Apple techies.

 

A portion of Nanjing Road has been turned into a pedestrian mall, which makes for very pleasant walking and browsing.

     

On Thursday evening we attended the christening of our ship, the Viking Sun, which is the fourth in a planned series of 16 identical ocean going vessels to be built.  I'll blog about that tomorrow.