ADVENTURE FOUND

Evening Post, Volume CXXI, Issue 4, 6 January 1936, Page 13

ADVENTURE FOUND

UNUSUAL EASTERN ROADS

JEWELS FOR "A SONG"

Among the passengers who returned to Sydney by the Tanda on December 19 was Mrs. Margery Pulsford, of Wollstonecraft, who, five months ago, gave up her home chores, put her sons and daughters to school, and went seeking adventure through unusual roads in the East. What Mrs. Pulsford expected to find was colourful life—what she did find was a revolution in Bankok, and in China militarism run riot (states the "Sydney Morning Herald").

At Bankok Mrs. Pulsford arrived amidst turbulence in the city. Street riots and shootings were the order of the day. One day she dined with a; Siamese, and learned that the next day he had been shot in street riots. The cause of the revolution was heavy taxes imposed by the Government, which the people considered were spent on a lavish court instead of on the country. The immediate result had been to impoverish the court and households of the concubines, who had no money to buy food and pay their staffs of servants. Consequently Bankok had become a glorious hunting-ground for collectors of rare jewels, for the women, had ben forced to'sell their lovely jewels, and many of these were to be picked up for "a song" in what was generally spoken of as the thieves' market or the open market for tourist trade. Sweetmeats made by the highlyskilled chefs of the concubines' households were also to be bought for a small price, and the money raised in this way helped to provide food for the households.

Mrs. Pulsford travelled extensively through Sourabaya, China, and Japan. She has been 'very much impressed with the fact that the Far East is a news centre of the world. "We in Australia," she said, "though only as far removed from Europe by sea as Shanghai, have in comparison but a fraction of news other than local. The wireless news sheet published on the ship contained varied world news until we got into Australian waters, when we dropped the world like a lump of lead. Some days we heard nothing of China, though it is making history as fast as any other country in the world."

One purpose of Mrs. Pulsford's visit was to study Eastern jewellery art. But she was bitterly disappointed in the lack of ideas and the poverty of thought in detail other than in museum pieces.

"Descended from an ancient civilisation, the Koreans, who still retain many of their early customs, are among the most interesting races in the world," said Miss M. L. Alexander, of the Australian Presbyterian Mission, Korea, who was another arrival by the Tanda. Miss Alexander is on furlough.