China's dear old third city
My stay in the Tianjin Astor's Sun Yat-sen suite was memorable even before a chunk of paint and plaster fell off the bathroom ceiling. I did not complain. It would have seemed churlish, like telling off an elderly relative for having a hole in his sweater. The slightly askew angles and loose tiles of the Astor, one of China's most venerable hotels, were after all part of its appeal. And I could have stayed in the garish 1980s extension if I had wanted secure ceilings.
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On reflection, the Astor Hotel seemed a perfect place to start to uncover the under-appreciated appeal of Tianjin. Visitors to both must be ready to look past the inelegant modernity of recent development. And if the Astor floors are a little creaky at times, there is also a rundown air to many of the most interesting corners of China's third city.
Indeed, Tianjin has rich rewards for forbearing tourists. Beyond the grimy public squares and billboard-choked shopping streets lies a city whose charms include a cornucopia of Chinese snacks and a treasure trove of international architecture.
The roots of Tianjin's architectural legacy date back, like the Astor, to the years after the Opium Wars that opened China to western imperialism in the mid 19th century. As the port gateway to Beijing, Tianjin had long been a strategic prize and battles were fought and treaties signed there. Peace brought a wave of Europeans who built banks, offices and homes in concession districts that by the early decades of the 20th century had turned the city into northern China's answer to Shanghai.
Communist revolution in 1949 largely killed Tianjin's economy but the resulting neglect meant that much of its European inheritance survived. Today the city is a living museum to a variety of construction styles, offering a range that reflects the varied tastes of mainly concession officials and individual investors.
A good way to enjoy the result is to take the undemanding walk from Tianjin's train station to the Astor along the city's old commercial artery, now known in communist fashion as Jiefang Dao, or "liberation road".
I am no architect but the variety of form and decoration to be found along the way was a feast even to my untutored eyes. Experts say Jiefang Dao still boasts buildings in the Beaux Arts style as well as art deco, jazz moderne and German Rundbogenstil. In recent years, city planners have started to take note of the importance of the street's history, installing floodlights and plaques on some of its more impressive buildings.
But there is still a melancholy romance to be found in the avenue's sense of unfulfilled early promise. Mansions moulder in subdivided neglect, doors and halls still adorned with their tarnished original brass furnishings. Some pillared banks, built to be outposts of a global financial network, are dusty shells. Others have had their original names covered by the signs of a new generation of state-owned Chinese banks and are growing new outsized concrete-and-glass extensions and ATMs.
Areas elsewhere in the city are as richly endowed. Strolling around the college district I found a red-brick street that looked like it could have been in London except for the Chinese traffic and the colonial bungalows and Italian-style flats up a side street.
Then it was back to the Astor for tea in the Sun Yat-sen suite, a set of corner rooms overlooking an old British clubhouse (now home to Communist party officials) and the former Victoria Park. Sun, who founded the Chinese republic in 1911, stayed at the Astor in 1924 as he fought to protect his creation from warlords and rivals. And, even though the suite furniture and fittings are now mainly replicas, his rooms are a fine place to ponder the vagaries of modern Chinese history.
Soon I was ready for another stroll - this time around the old wing of the Astor itself. The building is heavenfor nostalgics and brass plaque aficionados; every corridor has ahost of old photographs of Tianjinand commemorative notices recording anecdotes about the hotel and itsguests.
There is much to record - in the later decades of the 19th century and the early part of the 20th, Tianjin was a hotbed of commercial activity and political intrigue. Manchu ministers carved out lucrative alliances with western businessmen and the Astor, which was established in 1863, was at the heart of events. During the 1900 Boxer Rebellion, foreigners found refuge in the hotel's basement as the nationalist rebels shelled the floors above and its stores were raided for bags of rice to shore up defensive barricades. It was in Tianjin that Pu Yi, China's last emperor, took refuge after his expulsion from the Forbidden City and he often visited the Astor to dance tangos with his empress.
The hotel's post-revolutionary history is less rich as commercial Tianjin faded in Beijing's political shadow, although Astor staff are happy to show guests around the rooms used in the 1950s by the Panchen Lama, one of Tibet's most senior clerics, and which are now kept as a Buddhist shrine.
Perhaps it was the influence of the shrine but, that night, I found myself dining next to a trio of Buddha heads at the wacky but delightful Huayun museum, a multi-storey restaurant that features a fine range of statuary from all periods of Chinese history along with wooden screens, bronze bells and other antiquarian trinkets.
Friends assured me that Tianjin has many more such pleasures to be discovered so I left the next day determined to return. Hopefully I will be able to stay at the Astor again next time - if the ceilings hold up.
Mure Dickie is an FT correspondent in Beijing
天津――鲜为人知的老城魅力
利顺德的天花板
我住在天津利顺德大饭店(Tianjin Astor)孙中山套间的日子值得怀念，即使浴室天花板上曾掉落过一大块油漆和灰泥。
我没有抱怨。这种抱怨似乎较为不敬，就如同嗔怪一位长者毛衣上有个洞一样。身为中国最古老的旅馆之一，利顺德微微倾斜的角度和并不牢固的瓷砖，毕竟都属于其魅力的一部分。如果想要安全的天花板，我完全可以呆在该酒店于20世纪80年代扩建的富丽堂皇的新楼里。
回想一下，如果要充分发掘天津鲜为人知的魅力，利顺德大酒店似乎是一个理想之地。兼为两者而来的游客必须做好准备，忽视一些因近来开发而造成的有碍观瞻的现代风格。如果说利顺德的地板偶尔会有点吱嘎作响的话，从这里还可以捕捉到很多关于这座中国第三大城市最有趣角落的风貌。
事实上，对于宽容的游客而言，天津可给予他们丰厚的回报。除了脏兮兮的公共广场和充斥着广告招牌的购物街，这座城市拥有自己的魅力，比如丰富的中国小吃和国际建筑的珍宝。
欧洲建筑博物馆
像利顺德这样的天津建筑遗产，根源可以追溯到19世纪中期鸦片战争(Opium Wars)结束后的一段时期――那场战争迫使中国向西方帝国主义敞开了大门。作为进入北京的水路门户，战略意义重大的天津一直以来都是兵家必争之地，许多条约也是在那里签订的。20世纪早期，战后的和平引来了一拨欧洲人，他们在租界开银行、盖大楼，并在此安家立业，将这座城市变成了中国北方的“上海”。
1949年的共产主义革命在很大程度上扼杀了天津的经济发展，不过由此而带来的对天津发展的忽略，却意味着天津的欧洲遗产大多得以保全。今天，天津市已成为各式建筑风格的鲜活博物馆，大体反映了当年租界官员和私人投资者各具特色的品位和爱好。
欣赏这一杰作的一个好办法，就是沿着该市古老的商业要道(如今有一个共产主义风格的名字：解放路)，从天津火车站向利顺德方向随便散个步。
我不是建筑师，但沿途发现的建筑风格及装饰的多样性，即使对我这双不具专业素养的眼睛来说，也是一场盛宴。专家称，解放道仍以拥有学院派(Beaux Arts)、艺术装饰、爵士摩登和德国Rundbogenstil等风格的建筑而自豪。近年来，城市规划者开始注意到这条街道历史的重要性，并为一些更具深刻意义的建筑安装泛光灯和装饰板。
然而，人们依然能从这条街道壮志未酬的感觉中找到一种忧郁的浪漫。西式洋楼在人们对细节的忽视中逐渐老去，装饰门厅的黄铜饰品已失去了最初的光泽。一些有廊柱的银行建筑，当初是作为全球金融网络的前沿代表而建的，现在外面积满了尘土。其他银行的原名早已被中国新一代国有银行的标志所覆盖，并增建了混凝土玻璃结构的超大型外延建筑，还增设了自动存取款机。
天津其他地区同样也具有丰富的外来内容。在大学区转悠的时候，我发现一条红砖铺就的街道，它看上去就像在伦敦一样，只是中国式交通和旁边小巷里殖民时期的平房及意大利风格公寓，不免影响了这种“英式”感觉。
天津怀旧
我回到利顺德的孙中山套间里喝茶。这个套间位于饭店建筑的拐角，从中可俯瞰一座古老的英国俱乐部会所(现在住着共产党官员)及从前的维多利亚花园(Victoria Park)。孙中山1911年创建了中华民国。1924年他曾住在利顺德，为保卫革命果实与军阀和政敌斗争。尽管如今该套间的家具和装饰物主要都是复制品，但他住过的房间是人们反思中国现代史变迁的很好去处。
很快我准备再闲逛一番――这次是绕着利顺德古老的侧楼。该建筑物是怀旧人士与铜装饰板迷恋者的天堂。此外，每条游廊都有很多天津的老照片，以及有关该店及住客趣闻轶事的纪念性文字说明。
值得记录的事情很多――在19世纪晚期和20世纪早期，天津曾是商业活动和政治阴谋的温床。满洲部院大臣们开始与西方商人结成利益盟友，而始建于1863年的利顺德正处于各种事件的中心。1900年义和团运动(Boxer Rebellion)时期，当那些民族主义叛乱分子炮轰地面以上的楼层时，外国人把该旅店的地下室当作了避难所，而旅馆仓库里成袋的大米也被抢走，用以搭建防御工事。中国末代皇帝溥仪在被逐出紫禁城后，曾在天津避难，当时他经常前往利顺德，与他的皇后一起跳探戈。
革命结束后，随着商业化的天津在北京的政治阴影下逐渐凋敝，该旅馆的历史也没有从前那么丰富。不过，利顺德员工很乐意带客人参观上世纪50年代西藏最高宗教领袖之一班禅喇嘛(Panchen Lama)住过的房间，目前这些房间作为佛教圣地被保护起来。
也许是由于圣地的影响，那个晚上我梦见自己在古怪但却可爱的花园博物馆用餐，身旁是三位佛教高僧。花园博物馆是一座多楼层饭店，其特色是有着大批中国不同历史时期的雕塑、木制屏风、青铜钟和其它古物饰品。
朋友向我保证，天津还有更多诸如此类的乐趣有待发现，因此我次日离开时，决定还要回来。希望下次我能够再次入住利顺德――如果那里的天花板还能支撑得住的话。
