Have you ever wondered...

[David Jamieson]

Where a particular province in China is? What is the difference between Henan and Hunan.

Where are these provinces located in China?

Well, I've been working on a project and I am still in the process of getting more and more information. But I thought you posters here might like to take a little tour of China's provinces and maybe learn a thing or two.

If you want to send me information about a place in China, I will try to fit it in with the map.

The map is a Flash map with clickable provinces. You will see the name of the province in Pinyin and it's location will light up as you click it. There is also a small bit of informational text to accompany the map.

So, send me your info about what province your kung fu comes from and I would like to make the map a Kung Fu style map by province.

It's located through the entrance page to my site at:
http://www.davidjamieson.com/kunglek

The link is just under the Buddha and the Moon it is called "New China Map"

Try it out, contribute some info by mailing me through the contact link in the Links page or by mailing through from my profile here on the forum.

peace

[dezhen2001]

i had a quick look Kung Lek - good luck with it :) I hope you can build up some good information on the various systems and regions :)

i would like to see it again when it's done...

david

[mantis108]

Hi Kung Lek,

Nice map

Basically, the provinces are nominated according to the prominant landmarks in China, namely the mountains, rivers and lakes.

Shang - Tai Shang which is the highest mountain on the east coast. East of the mountain is Dong and west is Xi. So Shangdong province is east of the mantain and Shangxi is located on the west side of the mountain.

He - Yellow River which runs from west to east coast. So North of Yellow River is He bei (north) province and south of Yellow River is He nan (south)

These four provinces were also what was considered the core of middle kingdom (China) - craddle of civilization. ;) Everywhere else are barbarian territories. That inclues Liang Guang (Guangdong and Guangxi)

Jiang - Yangzi River or Long River further south to the Yellow River and kind of running parallel to it.

Hu - Tai Wu (the great lake) north is Hubei and south is Hunan.

the last river region is the pearl river. Liang Guang (south of the pearl river? ) is with in this river region. Hong Kong is the southern tip of Guangdong.

If you look at the map carefully and you can see the 5 largest ethnic groups is spread out almost exactly like the 5 stars on the PRC's flag. Han in the middle (the biggest star). Manchurians (Helong Jiang), Mongolians (Monguo) , Muslims (Xinjian), and (Tibet) Tibettans are the smaller stars and formed the half moon formation like they are located on the map.

Most of the older styles came from Hebei Henan and Shangdong Shangxi where a lot of battles (for furtile lands and materials) were fought. Some of them came from where conflicts were found with the invaders. Forigners from the outskirts land (northwest) and Japanese south eastern coast.

Hope this help

Mantis108

[dezhen2001]

thanks for the info Mantis108 that was great :)

david

[mantis108]

Hi Dezhen2001,

You are welcome. :) Glad you like the info. It is of note that there is a very interesting correlation between Chinese geography and martial arts. BTW, the primodial moduel of the 8 Trigrams in I Ching is also loosely based on the Chinese geography. In other words, certain concepts in mapping (pun intended) the 8 Trigrams were based on knowledge (obtained from observations) of the landscape.

I believe what Kung Lek is trying to put together would help CMA study in terms of seeing the viens of evolution. Far too long have the CMA communities been blindfolded in the MA creationism. Personally, I believe in MA evolution.

Mantis108

[ZhouJiaQuan]

im about to show you all my huge ignorance, but **** these dialects kill me. ok guandong = canton right? i mean i think so but i never know for sure, haha. im fairly positive it is but want to be 100%.
and where the hell is macau and kowloon - in hong kong but aint that a city? or is it jsut the name of an island - in which there is also a city named HK?

ok thats enough of muy dumb questions for now

thanks

[Stone Monkey]

Hong Kong was a British Colony that was returned to Chinese control in 1997. It is actually 236 different islands (many uninhabited) plus a part of the mainland bordering the Chinese province of Guangdong. Hong Kong Island (the district called "Central") is what most people think of when they think of HK.
Kowloon (peninsula) is on the mainland - about 10 minutes across the harbour on a ferry. The name is derived from the Cantonese 'kau' meaning nine, and 'loong', meaning dragon. The story goes that the last Sung dynasty emperor saw eight peaks on the peninsula and so there must be eight dragons there. He was reminded that, as emperor, he was the ninth dragon...
Macau is about an hour's hydrofoil ride southwest of HK. It is a Portuguese colony and a popular Asian gambling destination. Great beaches.

Hope that helps. :cool:

[ZhouJiaQuan]

yep, that helps alot, much thanks :)

[David Jamieson]

in common speech, hong kong is "xianggang" and macao is "aomen".

They are there on the map. The map uses common speech for place names instead of cantonese.

peace