Maritime Museum (Haiwai Jiaotong Shi Bowuguan)
Donghu Lu
About
The Maritime Museum, east of the library on Dong Hu Lu, used to be one of the most interesting museums in China, especially for anybody who already has a penchant for the sea. Unfortunately ongoing budgets for these places never match the sums put aside for construction and the result is often rapid deterioration. The first floor displays the sort of ranting xenophobia that is par for the course in most Chinese museums, with exhibits that explain how Taiwan was "recovered from the greedy grasp of Dutch invaders" and how Quanzhou was infested with Japanese pirates, spitefully described as "pygmy bandits." The real gems are on the second floor: a priceless collection of hundreds of intricate scale models representing the whole of China's seafaring history. Each ship was handmade by master craftsman Chen Yanhong, and the level of detail is extraordinary. Highlights include imperial warships, caterpillar-like articulated vessels, and battleships that conceal secret launches. The English labels are better than you might expect, although, as so often seems to be the case, the authors claim to the Chinese invented anything worth inventing long before the West. In this particular field, this includes anchors, rudders, watertight compartments, paddlewheels, and even catamarans. Despite this pomposity, the construction of the models is of excellent quality and nobody leaves unimpressed. Unfortunately, much of the money for repairs, cleaning, and maintenance has been siphoned away to support other local museums, and many of the now-dusty exhibits are damaged, masts snapped by overenthusiastic visitors and sails ripped by grabbing youngsters. Back on the first floor directly below the seafaring exhibit visitors will find a collection of carved stonework, dating from the peak of Quanzhou's heyday. The displays are a lot less accessible for the casual visitor than the model ships but their significance is attested to by the fact that UNESCO funds are being used to help save these historical artifacts. Some of the inscriptions are carved in Syriac script, the written form of Aramaic, the language that was supposedly spoken by Jesus. During my visit, the stones were being examined in detail by academics from Cambridge in England and Macquarie in Australia. Five hundred years ago, this place was already a magnet for travelers of the world. Even though he ended up on the other side of the world, Columbus risked everything to find this already mythical city that had been made famous long before in the seven voyages of Sinbad, the tales of Marco Polo, and maybe even the mystical Christendom of Prester John.
