<P>Dear Dr. Siu-Leung Lee and friends at Hakka Forum</P>
<P>Having returned from a trip to Yongding ¥Ã©w¡@in South-west Fujian near the Guangdong border, I would like to make a report on the earth-houses or tulous
¤g¼Ó. </P><P>I was fortunate to acquire a book in Singapore on the Hakkas called "
«È®a¤H: The Hakkas", and I now realise that there are in fact two groups of Hakka architecture, namely the tulou houses for the Hakka commoners and the houses for the Hakka dignitaries. The tulous are of square shape¡@¤è§Î¤g¼Ó¡@or round shape ¶ê§Î¤g¼Ó. The houses for the dignitaries and court officials, located mainly in Guangdong, are of three types, the three hall houses¡@¤T°ó«Î , the circled dragon houses¡@³òÀs«Î¡@and the five phoenix houses¡@¤»ñ¼Ó.</P><P>
I am as fascinated as Siu-Leung in trying to look for this mysterious 5-phoenix house as I have not seen it in any book. Initially, I thought it is related to the dragon house, but the dragon house is an extended structure complex of the three-hall houses. The three-hall houses have three tiered halls or units. If the owner was influential, he had a semi-circular pond in front, and surrounded his side and back with five or more tiers of houses of his clansmen or supporters. In contrast, the 5-phoenix houses must have belonged to very high ranking officials for there are no existing such houses mentioned. </P><P>As for my Yongding trip, the tulous are all clustered around the Fujian-Guangdong border. The square tulous are not as spectacular as the round houses, which are really fortresses housing three to five hundred people. The residents are actually communal, with the walls of the fortress made up of their vertical housing units joined together in a square or circle. They share everything. The water supply come from wells, two or more, located inside the central enclosure, so in times of siege by the enemies, they can withstand some period of confinement. However, they now have piped water from external sources. The toilet facilities are communal and located in the central court-yard. The residents keep fowls and pigs within, so from a modern hygienic view, many of the younger ones have migrated out.</P>
<P>Each family's vertical unit is made up of the ground floor for cooking, second floor for storage and third and fourth floors for living. The various floors are not interconnected by stairs from within, because they share common stair-ways, about ten vertical units to each stair-case. The Hakka elders who accompanied me around the oldest round-house said all Hakkas are of the same family, so they do not differentiate between the various family members and hence privacy is not that important. Thus, the Hakkas were the first "communalists" (?communists), without the help of Marx or Mao.</P>
<P>The most famous round house is the Cheng Qi Lou ¡@
©Ó±Ò¼Ó, with a history of over three hundred years, corresponding to its construction during the reign of Kangxi. The newer one called Zheng Cheng Lou ¡@®¶¦¨¼Ó¡@¡@¡@ was constructed with the bagua idea. I have been told that there is a TV soap series shown in Singapore and Malaysia on Hakka families, with flashback to the tulou houses in China. </P><P>One important aspect of the round house is the ability to withstand earth-quakes, apparently quite common at the Fujian-Guangdong area. There is a round house with a crack in the wall from an earthquake, but following a subsequent earth-quake, the gap was sealed up naturally!!! From the scientific angle, a round ring-like structure surely can withstand earth-quake better than a square one, whose corners will be subjected to a greater shaking force. In a ringed structure, the force is spread round and round. Also, always carry with you a road map and an atlas of China, as the taxi drivers are not very versatile with map reading and mainly rely on asking road-siders where to go. You can buy maps and detailed atlases for fixed prices anywhere in China, even in expensive shopping centers or at the airport.</P>
<P>The earth-coatings externally are difficult to catch fire, so there is a security against fire arrows. The tiles are also not likely to catch fire. Hence, the inflammable wooden structures can only be seen from the inside opened central compound, so the greatest danger to fire is only when the enemy has broken in. This is extremely difficult as there is only one door, which is heavy and strong, and easily defensible.</P>
<P>If you are going to see the tulous, wait for another six months, as the main road to Yongding via Longyan Às©¥¡@(Dragon Precipice) from Xiamen is under massive repair and will take a full day to arrive. A short-cut as taken by me using country and bumpy roads from Xiamen via Nanjing¡@«n¹t (Southern Calm), Chuanchang ²î³õ(Boat Yard) and Shuyang ®Ñ¬v(Book Ocean/Foreign), will make your taxi-driver distressed as the vehicle will be a bone-shaker in no time. There are more Hakka houses from Yongding on the way to Jiaoling and Meixian. </P>
<P>As for Siu-Leung's early interest and pre-occupation with the PingFang houses ¡@¡@¡@¥©Ð, I will be most happy if he can post one with the help of the Hakka community. The Hakka ¡@¡@ book I bought only mentioned five structures, viz. square tulou, round tulou, three tier hall house, dragon house and five phoenix house. This sixth type of house, which seems to be common in Siu-Leung's ancestral village, should also be documented.</P>
<P>BTW, I am not a Hakka, but simply fascinated with the role the Hakkas have played in Chinese history, their culture and their architecture.</P>
<P>Tin-Kay Goh</P>