Friday, December 2, 2011

3661. Wan Chain Environmental Resource Center


The old Wan Chai Post Office, which was listed as a declared monument in 1990, serves as the Enviromental Protection Department Resource Centre.

Opened in 1913, the building features the original overhanging bevel eves and the counters. A Chinese couplet hung in the entrance facing Queen's Road East says: "If we foul our world that sustains us, what then shall we eat? Scorn hygiene that protects life, where then shall we live?"

The building services include a reference library, a touch-screen environmental information system and a specially designed toilet!

Tsuen Wan Environmental Resource Centre is housed in Old House, Hoi Pa Village (海壩村古屋), in Tak Wah Park, Tak Wah Street, Tsuen Wan, Hong Kong.

The Old House, is originally one of the houses of former Hoi Pa Village (海壩村), a Hakka mixed-lineage village. It was built by Mr. Yau Yuen-cheung (1865–1937), a village scholar of Hoi Pa Village. The old house was built with rammed earth, green bricks, green tiles and timber. It is a fine example of traditional southern Chinese village architecture.
The village house, together with the adjacent areas, has now been developed into the Tak Wah Park.
After the Antiquities and Monuments Office had given approval to convert the historical village house into an environment resource centre, the revonation work was done. The Centre was opened in December 1997. It is a joint venture of the Environmental Protection Department and the Conservancy Association. It has been a declared monument since 1986.

There is a library, a computer room, an AV room, an exhibition area and Green Home Exhibition Area.
A Chinese plaque says Eco Place and a Chinese couplet says Happy are people in this house environed by green trees; Freely birds fly around this place surrounded by bamboo are hanged at the entrance of the Centre.

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