Trevorw said:
Holts Wharf was on Salisbury Road, Kowloon - turn left off Nathan Road and it was about 350 yards on the right. Was in HK about five years ago and it had vanished! Replaced by high rises on reclaimed land!
Blue Flue and Glen Line used to discharge there and homeward bound load from junks at anchor. That's another mystery, what's happened to all the junks in HK?
Good watering holes in Kowloon - can't remember the names, but The President Hotel, Nathan Road, Kowloon was one, the Red Dragon, Nathan Road was another. For good food, also in Kowloon, was Jimmy's Kitchen.
Does anyone remember Mary Tam Choy - a tailoress who made the best uniforms you could lay your hands on?!
YES, I do! I first went alongside Holt's Wharf in the GLENFINLAS sometime in March 1946 and one of the first people I met coming on board was Tam King and her two younger sisters, Tam Choi and Tam Chen. The one referred to by Cheddarnibbles as Mary Tam Choy I am sure was, in fact, Tam Chen. She was the youngest and in 1946 was 16 years old.
Would it surprise you to know that she visited me here in Cornwall on the 27th May, 1994! Well. she did, in the company of her daughter Rita (Cheng Wing Ling).
This came about from my having heard that one of the sisters had died, and in order to discover which one I wrote, condolences to be forwarded, to Harry Lee, the taylor. He replied, saying that he was out of touch with that family but he would try to contact. I heard nothing for several months until one morning I took a 'phone call from Hong Kong! Imagine my astonishment at finding myself speaking to Tam Chen.
The reason I had had no response to my letter was on account of her having emigrated, in order to be with her 2 sons & 2 daughters, to the U.S.A. and it was only on account of a return visit to Hong Kong that she then received my letter. Sadly, both her sisters and her husband, Jackie Cheng, taylor, had died. She then simply amazed me by saying that she and Rita were coming to U.K., could she visit!?!? So she did for 3 whole days and it was wonderful to see such a familiar face again; I recognised her immediately.
I think that the suit was made for you by her husband, Jacky Cheng.
I recently received a most moving letter from her in San Jose (where she lives), telling how much she owed to the ships and their crews. She told me how it had provided a living which began in very hard times (her father had died when she was 4 years old) in 1946. She wrote about how she had made so very many friends, and she had even met her husband on board a Blue Funnel ship. She is getting old now, like so many of us, but keeps reasonably well. She is now a grandmother several times over but still gets around: she has recently been to China for the funeral of her mother-in-law.
Yours, Hugh Ferguson.
