After staying at home for a long time, I miss the days of hanging around more and more.
In the old Tianjin Wei, there was no Joy City and no Wanda, but people at that time also had entertainment that modern people could not imagine.
Outside the Hedong Tunnel, this place name is in the hearts of the elderly people in Tianjin, and it is a place of fun juxtaposed with Nanshi, Bird City and Qiandezhuang. Even the "career" of the cross-talk master Ma Sanli also started from outside the tunnel.
In 1935, when I was twenty-two years old, my father abandoned me, and the burden of the family's life fell on me. Soon, Ding "performed" a "night run", and we searched all over Tianjin without knowing its whereabouts. Helplessly, my husband and wife had to take their four-year-old nephew and one-year-old daughter, relocated to Nanshi San, rented a house to live, and I was in Nanshi, Bird Market, Qiandezhuang, and all the places outside the tunnel where cross-talk could be said, early, middle and late, making money and paying off debts.
According to the "Tianjin Tour Chronicle" published in 1936, the area of the old dragon head "outside the tunnel" is only about a few tens of acres. However, in this palm-sized place, there are no less than tens of thousands of people living and floating people. Because of the large population and the proximity to major transportation routes, the entertainment industry is particularly developed.
On the corner outside the tunnel, there is a narrow alley called Xiaoying Market, which has more than a dozen facades inside. At the corner of the alley there is a cinema, a red brick building. There are 3 performances every day, which start at 1:30, 4:30 and 8:00 p.m. There are three types of fares: 16 eldest sons, 14 eldest sons, and 10 eldest sons.
In addition to the cinema, there are three or four theaters, and there is another juggling. This kind of drama garden is almost a style. The light of the theater is not exquisite, accommodating two or three hundred spectators. The large benches used for the seats are all one by one. The stage is made of wooden planks, and there is a set of worn-out tables and chairs on the stage, and the singers stand next to the table, while the rest take turns singing and sit at the back like exhibits. The drummers, stringers and inspectors are all mixed on one stage. But the room was full of spectators.
The things staged in the drama garden can be described as all-encompassing, sometimes adjusting the big drum, jumping, lotus falling, cross-talk, double reed, big drama, etc., most of them are collected by paragraph, and each time it is a big or two big ones. However, after receiving a considerable amount, it is necessary to reset the amount and collect it again, and the daily income is really considerable.
In addition to the theater and the theater, in another large open-air open field, it is like a map of the city of the northern metropolis.
Here there are tea tables, cold food stalls, storytellers, juggling, practicing tricks, singing small songs, watching Western scenery, selling fortune tellers of Zhou Yi's divine lessons, selling bits and pieces, selling spices, and curing diseases.
The performers include Wang Peichen, Hou Yueqiu, and Black Girl; the cross-talk actors include Zhu Xiangchen, Ma Hangyuan, Gao Guiqing, Jiao Shaohai, XiaoLingtong (i.e., Zhao Peiru), Hou Baolin, Guo Qiru, Wu Kuihai (Wei Wenliang's teacher), Ma Delu, Zhou Deshan (i.e., Zhou Toad, Ma Sanli's teacher), Li Shaoqing, Guo Ruilin (Guo Rongqi's father), Cabbage Zhang, Li Jiechen, Liu Yufeng, Li Boxiang, Chen Ziquan, as well as Tianjin's famous cross-talk actor Feng Ziyu, his son Feng Liduo, Feng Lizhang, and the train driver. For many years, li Delin and his apprentice Da Caizi (who later all went to the sea to become actors); others such as Zhao Xiaofu, Jiao Xiuyun, Zhai Qingshan, Song Yuqing (that is, Song Daxiao), Yin Shoushan, Yu Jinfeng, Jiang Ershun, etc. have all come to the outside of the tunnel, they have gone to Mingdi, they have gone to the garden, and they have also gone to Dong Lai xuan.
Most of the audience outside the tunnel came from the following places: Shen Zhuangzi, Wang Zhuangzi, Guo Zhuangzi, Sock Zhuangzi, Yaojiatai, Xiaoguozhuang, Li Gonglou, Fuxingzhuang, Palladium Village, Dawangzhuang, Big and Small Tangjiakou, around Laolongtou, such as Xiangjia Hutong, Special Third District (Old Russian Concession), Special District 2 (Old Austrian Concession), Fish Farm, Dongfuqiao Vegetable Market, Dakou, Grain Store Street, East Freight Yard, Old Italian Concession, as well as the Far East to see the lively, tracking famous corners to appreciate art, viewing and enjoying the big book (long commentary) and so on.
The most interesting are those of the Laxi Ocean view. The Lord's house shouted in a straight voice, and the Western scenery inside was full of nude paintings in disguise and some inexplicable pictures.
Something very simple and monotonous like this, but there are a lot of people there huddled around. Spend one or two big children, sit on a small stool, and look into a small hole to see the deceptive tricks.
There is also a martial arts training field, which is also surrounded by many people, and there are several layers of dense density.
Once, a little girl of four or five years old performed, she stood upside down on a small stool, where she held a large top, holding a tea bowl in one hand on the left and right, and a teacup in her mouth. She held back her breath and blushed her little face. Next to it was a hideous-looking woman, shouting loudly and asking everyone to make up money. She shouted, "Look, what if such a small child flashes his waist?" Which old man and wife put together two hundred sons and let her come down. At the woman's command, after about ten minutes of work, the girl finally had enough of the two hundred eldest sons needed before the girl got off the stool.
Outside the tunnel, there are many fortune tellers. At the same time, these stalls also handle the business of writing letters on behalf of others. Because the cultural quality of the citizens at that time was generally not high, especially many homeless people, who could not read big characters and had to contact their families, this kind of writing letters flourished.
There are also a lot of tea stalls in this place. The tea money is fixed, one large piece for each person. The customers who drink tea are almost all idle people carrying bird cages, and most of these people are drinking tea while playing chess. In addition, there are people who sell rags and take up a lot of land outside the tunnel. There are also several clinics outside the tunnel that treat flower willow disease, and the advertising words are all boasting of "one needle wrapped well", which is similar to the "one needle spirit" posted on the telephone pole on the roadside nowadays.