RALPH IN CHINA
I guess this is the first installment of Ralph in China. The first month, though not without some frustrations, has been interesting, to say the least. I thought that I would give all you a view of the Liaoning University (LU) campus and a brief history.
LU started in 1958 and was a result of combining three other schools of higher education in the province. It consists of 12 colleges and 6 faculties (Colleges of Economic Administration, Business Administration, International Economics, Foreign Languages, Radio, Film and Television, Chemical Science and Engineering, law, Environment and Life Science, Information and Technology, Higher Professional Techniques, Adult Education, Foreign Students; and the Faculties of Chinese Language and Literature, History, Philosophy, Mathematics, Physics, and Korea Studies. There are about 13,000 including a sizable number of foreign students (especially from Korea).
This is the main Administration Building just inside the main gate.
To the
left of this building and around the corner is the Library
The library has 18471 sq meters of space and a staff of 92 including 1 research librarian, 13 associate professors and associate librarians and 43 librarians. Most of the librarians are four year or three-year college graduates. The library has a collection of almost 2,000,000 volumes ranking first in all of the libraries of the universities of Liaoning Province, the 28th among 303 research libraries of the country. The library has 110,000 bound volumes of periodicals (containing 4,500 titles of back numbers of the periodicals in Chinese and foreign languages, 2,200 titles of current numbers of the periodicals, 12 titles of laser-disc databases), 217,000 volumes of foreign books, 1,200,000 volumes of Chinese books. The library has around 7,000 titles of ancient books totaling 160,000 volumes, in which there are 311 books and rare editions totaling 500 volumes, and 20 books of very rare edition. The University library has approximately twenty reference rooms (these are reading and study rooms), which are heavily used by the students.
Presently I have an office in the Network Computing Center which is in the Main Classroom building.
It's in the center of campus.
The Foreign Exchanges Department is the office that takes care of most of my needs. This is where Wang Lei, my English interrupter, has her office.
Just behind the Foreign Exchanges office is the foreign teachers building on the left of the picture.
Just outside my residence is the student dorm area.
I think I mentioned this before but everyone (almost) lives on campus faculty, staff, retired faculty and staff, and students. So you see generational groups everywhere. Also a lot of the faculty and staff's parents worked for the university so there is a long tradition of employment at the same institution. The university is building a new campus with several other schools in Shenyang and I've been invited to help in the technological design of the new library.
Lastly, and this picture doesn't really convey the chaos, this is the main street near campus but not at rush hour.
I've been to two historical sites. Shenyang was the original home of the Qing dynasty (we know them as the Manchu) the last dynasty in China before the revolution of 1912. The founder of the Qing dynasty's tomb is in Shenyang.
The first picture is looking towards the main gate of the tomb which is in a park called Beiling Park.
The second picture is inside the gate looking at the main entrance to the tomb. The first emperor and subsequent emperors held ceremonies at the tomb so there are residence and temples in the complex.
The main temple holds a throne and other ritual relics. The actual tomb is a large mound behind the temple and holds the body of the first emperor and his principle wife.
I also went to the first palace built by the Qing and was their residence before they conquered China and moved the capital to Beijing. This palace is a smaller version of the Forbidden City. Instead of 999 rooms it has 99 rooms. But is setup similar.
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The first picture <insert palace8.jpg> is the first throne room of the emperor. The main entrance <insert palace10.jpg> is rather grand. It sits on a made hill.
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As I said there are 99 rooms but they really are mostly separate buildings so in not particular order the next slides show ceiling details <insert palace17.jpg and palace31.jpg>.
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The next picture <insert palace32.jpg> shows the bright colors reserved for the emperor (red and yellow).
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I've included the next building <insert palace34.jpg> because it was the only green building in the complex and because it is and was a library for the emperor.
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The next picture <insert palace38.jpg>is the interior of this building, you can barely see the books on the second story.
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Lastly, is the area where the emperor reviewed troops and conducted his business <insert palace46.jpg>, the buildings along the side were the offices of his primary officials, primarily military.
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The final pictures show the throne <insert palace43.jpg> and the golden dragons <insert palace45.jpg>.
That's all for this installment. Next time I'll share news about my trip to Beijing, the Lama Temple, the Confucian Temple, and Tsinghua University.
Z]aiji]an
Ralph