Gu Ling Street

Ran out without reloading the battery into my digital camera this afternoon which was a mistake. Went with Taro down to Gu Ling Street where there is a traditional craftsman who builds paper effigies burned at funerals and temple festivals. Using bamboo sticks, plastic strips, plant-based glue, and colored paper, he and the staff of this small shop fashion incredible arrangements that are burned for hundreds of dollars. Among the creations are sizeable paper cars (faux Mercedes Benz -the variety large enough for a small child to tool around in) and a custom made airplane with metallic paper forming the outer shell. These effigies are all for the dead, and burned with them are spirit figures of a male and female deity who lead the way for the dead to the underworld. The paper house structures are as tall as ten feet in height, with elaborate windows and opening doors. One model also had a functional light bulb, which is burned with the whole set. It was hypnotic watching the craftsmen chip away at the wooden sticks with a dull, flat iron tool which he would then lash together with plastic strips dipped in a big glob of white mucusy glue which he kept on his left hand, in the space between his thumb and forefinger. Today is the building of frames. Tomorrow, after 7 p.m., the workers will put the paper architectures on the frames.

Gu Ling Street is also lined with crazy used bookstores - not like the one at Grandma Nitti's or on YongKang with shelves and sections. These bookstores are storefronts filled with books stacked to the ceiling and bundled together with rope. Chinese titles are among English and European titles and the dense wall of stacked books goes back 10-20 feet deep. A narrow walkway is left open between the major stacks, large enough for a thin man to walk through and say what are you looking for. When you peer into it, there is nothing but the darkness of an alleyway. Taro asked about a book about a monster that was popular in his boyhood in Japan. The monster is half shrimp, half cicada. Alas, they did not have it - not that you could search the collection. I am doubtful that there is an inventory system for these sorts of stores. But Taro drew us a very good rendering in his notebook of the monster.

Also on Guling Street are stamp and coin shops for collectors and we also came across the Gu Ling Experimental Theatre, a performance space housed in a Japanese era building that was formerly a police station. We got a short tour of the place - in the main black box theatre area was a low bar on the wall which has been painted black to match the walls. The bar was formerly used to cuff prisoners to. Behind the performance space was the area that used to be the prison cells - small, caged structures, painted white, probably quite good for storage now but which had a very creepy feel to them. They are apparently used for installation and performance spaces. On the top floor of the theater was a very nice cafe and dance space.

This whole neighborhood is a stone's throw from the botanical garden and historical museum on Nanhai, which is just around the corner.