The society was a Chinese quasi-religious, charitable organization, and there are no remnants of its existence in what is now Qingdao Art Gallery and Museum.
The society's only legacy is a complex of three buildings built in classical, Chinese and Islamic styles. At the moment, they contain exhibitions of works by three very different Chinese artists.
For reminiscing breaks over coffee, cold beer or glass of German hock, or a candlelight dinner if you are serious, head back along the shore toward the center of town and the May 4th square and monument, and set back a little from the beach you'll see a former German ambassador's residence.
This is Cafe Roland, roomy but intimate, stylish without being pretentious or expensive, and wonderfully old-fashioned, yet with iPads for menus.
The building featured as Lang Park, the setting for a romantic novel of the same name by Chinese author Zhao Mei, which was later turned into a TV series featuring Chinese-American heartthrob singer Kris Phillips.
That was screened back in the 1990s, but the scenes remain the same. Moonlight across the bay on a warm summer night, a yacht heading back to the marina, lovers, families, artistic, philosophic loners strolling down the boardwalk. You could be in Nice or Nantucket, the idyll is international.
All right, I might be laying it on a little thick, the syrup, but if you're not the imaginative type, there's always the beer.
Contact the writer at robertwillox@chinadaily.com.cn.
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