Pearl River Blog

A few customers have expressed curiosity about one of our best-selling folk art products–joss paper, also known as tea paper. Its iridescent coloring and delicate texture make the paper a unique decorative item or wrapping, and folks seem to love buying it in batches for their creative projects. But many probably don’t know that before the modern world picked up on it as a cheap but lively craft material, joss paper was a sacrificial offering to the gods.

Historically, people have burned joss paper in funeral or ancestral worship ceremonies to symbolize money. (That might seem a bit excessive compared to austere Western funeral rites, but it’s actually a pretty practical way of paying tribute frugally, and solves the problem of adjusting for inflation in the eternal afterlife.)

According to the reference site China Style, joss paper has a colorful history, dating back to feudal times.

Feudal China was backward in many ways. Most laboring people toiled year after year without enough to eat and wear. The farmers longed for a bumper harvest, the handicraftsmen hoped to have a brisk market, the fishermen prayed for a large catch, the silkworm raisers wished for a cocoon boom. Everyone wanted a healthy and prosperous family free from being bullied and oppressed by local corrupt officials. These hopes and desires were vividly expressed in a unique folk art form popularly known as zhi ma (paper joss, or paper horse, or paper-horse print) . Zhi ma was also called jia ma (first-rate horse). It was printed with the images of deities, gods and immortals created by the ancient people, which they worshiped and prayed to for blessings and happiness. paper joss was produced by carving the outline in relief of the god’s image on a woodblock and then printing it in ink lines on colored paper . The prints were then burned as offerings and sacrifices. A historical study has shown that the paper horse or paper- horse print was originally printed with the additional image of a horse on which the god was said to ascend to heaven. thus, from the song Dynasty (960-1279 ) on, paper joss was known primarily as paper horse. The emergence of paper joss was closely connected with totems in ancient China.

According to historical records, most people in ancient China used to wear and hang up paper charms to celebrate festivals. For instance, on the first five days of lunar May, people put up the “Five- thunder Amulet” and wore small paper charms. On the fifteenth day of lunar August, they offered sacrifices to the moon. in the meantime, the print workshops put moonlight prints on the market for sale. They featured a full moon with a Buddha seated on a lotus base and, nearby, a little rabbit standing on its hind legs grinding medicinal herbs in a mortar. These prints ranged in size from a square cun (3. 3 cm) to a square zhang (3.3m)4. On the twenty-fourth day of lunar December, people used to feed fodder to the Kitchen God’s horse, believing that the venerable god would ascend to heaven on it. And on the twenty-fifth, people burned joss-sticks to greet the jade Emperor, who would descend from heaven to inspect worldly affairs.

Nowadays, joss paper has largely lost its traditional sacred role, but it’s still apparently pretty useful for worldly affairs, minus the divine oversight.

How have you used joss paper? If you’ve got a fun craft project or another interesting application for the stuff, let us know by posting a comment.

The New York Times recently unearthed some gems at Pearl River via Simon Doonan, creative director of Barney’s New York. A consummate shopper and trend-watcher, he browsed Pearl River and other NYC staple stores in search of gifts for “quirky friends”–whom he siphons into three major types: “the flighty, exotic gypsy; the super-confident socialite; and the on-the-edge existentialist.”

Pearl River happens to be a good match for all three. Eyeing a white porcelain stool, he notes, “The socialite loves chinoiserie.” For the gypsy, a brass Buddha head serves as a good “faux spirituality” fix. He selects a brass gong as a transcendental dinner bell for the existentialist.

And if Pearl River is the place to find gifts for quirky friends, it might also be the place to find quirky friends themselves. We didn’t know who Doonan was before he showed up at our store, but apparently, he couldn’t be missed by our discerning shoppers. The Times reported that during his visit, “a gray-haired woman ran over to him, and squealed, ‘You’re Simon Doonan! I watch you on TV!’”

Photo: Ruth Fremson/The New York Times

There was a brief scare at Pearl River today, but a higher power seems to have intervened. Some of our loyal shoppers may have noticed a mounted poster that we place outside the entrance, beside our stairwell, promoting our home section on the second floor. It’s not much of an advertisement–just a simple panel displaying Pearl River’s signature Buddha statue, inviting people to visit the upper level (and give his belly a lucky rub). But since you never know what might happen after hours in this city, for safekeeping, we store the sign inside each night at the base of the steps.

This morning, our employees arrived to find the our Buddha welcome sign gone. It had vanished without a trace. We were puzzled, to say the least, at how such an auspicious (and monetarily worthless) display item could have suddenly disappeared.

A quick look at our surveillance camera footage revealed the Buddha’s fate: at 3:30am last night, two young males with backpacks entered the stairwell lobby (after discovering that our upstairs neighbors had left the door ajar). They bolted up the steps, no doubt in pursuit of some durable goods to start their Memorial Day shopping early. But alas, they were thwarted by locked doors at every turn.

Perhaps out of frustration, spite, or just the heat of the moment, the would-be crooks refused to leave empty handed, and stole off with the one thing they could take: the sign.

But this urban parable has a happy ending. Around noon, an employee spotted the rotund figure, cherubic as ever, beaming from amidst a trash heap on the corner of Grand Street and Crosby–a bit rumpled but still intact. Apparently, the value of immortality and supreme inner peace had not registered highly with the thieves, and they had decided to discard the spiritual icon.

We’ve been in business since the days when New York City was a much crazier place, but this is a first. And perhaps the Buddha’s repatriation attests to the gentler path the city has embarked on in recent years.

A stroke of fate? A sudden moral impulse? Good karma? Or just some fumbling burglars looking to dump some weight? We here at Pearl River like to think that what goes around comes around, and good things have a way of finding their way back to their master. We’re delighted our laughing Buddha has returned to sit out the rest of eternity in his rightful home. We hope the kidnappers, too, will also one day find their own path to redemption.

As Myanmar and China struggle to recover from calamity, a more insidious disaster is also taking its toll on some of Asia’s most vulnerable populations. The global food crisis is weakening agricultural systems and wreaking havoc on communities. Please go to this link to give some free rice to people in need–and improve your vocabulary at the same time! The word game was developed by an enterprising individual, showing that a single person can have an impact, however modest, on problems that are engulfing the globe.

http://www.freerice.com/index.php

As you probably already know, two disasters have befallen Asia recently: the devastating cyclone in Myanmar, and the enormous earthquake that has besieged Sichuan Province in China. We urge you to contribute to the relief efforts in any way you can. Please visit the Red Cross/Red Crescent website to learn how you can assist in the aid effort.

Here are some resources for tracking the disaster relief efforts:

Xinhua coverage of the Sichuan quake and its aftermath.

New York Times on the toll of Cyclone Nargis in Myanmar.

With the environment on everyone’s mind, one of our rites of spring in 2008 is making Pearl River a little greener. If you’re an old customer, you may associate our store with abundance, chaos, stuff all over the place–the beautiful cacophony of urban consumerism. But while the shopping experience is as rich as ever, we’re still aiming to make it a bit easier on the earth by trimming waste. Here are ways we hope to make Pearl River more eco-friendly, with your help:

• Greener soap: Our beloved Bee & Flower bath bars are known for their elaborate decorative packaging. But we recognize that eco-minded consumers may be concerned about the multiple-layer wrapping. We are working on a new package design that will minimize the materials used so that you can enjoy our luxurious vegetable-based soaps with the piece of mind that comes from saving a few trees and helping preserve the bees and flowers of tomorrow. And we also now carry novelty soaps that make a point out of using minimal packaging and recycled materials. Check out our new products in the beauty aide section.
• New reusable shopping bags: In the near future, Pearl River’s classic gold-and-red shopping bags will be going green. We are planning to provide shoppers with reusable, cloth-based Pearl River bags, which you can use not just to tote your Pearl River goods, but also to carry just about anything. Our customers will be using less plastic, and we’ll be proud to have our customers show off our unique logo against an earth-conscious background.

While all these greening projects are in the works, Pearl River currently offers a few little things that can make for a more sustainable shopping experience.

• Green your tea: Brew tea the traditional way, using loose tea leaves rather than individual bags, which use more material and contribute to paper waste. (Not to mention, the best tea often comes only in loose form. Ask us for suggestions.) If you’re not an expert “leaf-spitter” as many Chinese tea-addicts are, we carry tea balls and strainers made of various materials. These allow you to steep leaves while keeping them out of the water, and unlike an individually wrapped bag, you can wash and reuse it. And our selection of premium organic teas bring you the fragrant purity of natural cultivation.
• Dry yourself in style: We carry a variety of terrycloth hand towels that cut down dramatically on paper-towel use in your home. Try our adorable hand towel holders as a stylish and delightfully convenient item to hang on your kitchen wall.
• Make your own Chinese apparel: Our textile section might not seem like an environmental initiative, but if you’re thinking of buying brocade clothing, you’ll be surprised at how much you save–and how much cuter you’ll look–by designing your own using our brocade cloth, sold by the yard. When you create apparel from raw materials purchased locally, you eliminate the need for machine manufacturing, cut down on shipping costs, and if you work with a local tailor, you help nurture local businesses as well. And you have a one-of-a-kind jacket or blouse that no factory could ever replicate. A high-fashion way to shrink your carbon footprint!
• Use and reuse our all-purpose bags: In countries where reusing is not a matter of environmental trendiness but necessity, the plaid nylon bag is the ultimate symbol of thrift. Be lean and green by using one of our handy cloth or nylon bags to do your shopping at Pearl River (and everywhere else).

We welcome your suggestions on how to make Pearl River greener. Feel free to send your ideas to pearlriver[at]pearlriver.com.

And if you’re curious about what our country of origin is doing in terms of greenness, you can read the latest China environmental news here.

As usual, Pearl River is turning heads as the source for high fashion on a low budget.

Lately, we’ve gotten a lot of attention for our nylon plaid bags. The bag’s exact origins are ambiguous, but they seem to have been popularized by people in developing nations, who use them lug around just about anything, from clothes to groceries. The robust, irreverently loud tote is sturdily constructed of nylon weave and built to withstand all sorts trauma–what one would expect from the tumultuous societies where folks rely on them for everyday shopping needs and occasionally long-distance transport. Apparently, Luis Vuitton spotted the bag somewhere–perhaps tumbling down an airport luggage carousel, a huddled mass in humble pursuit of the American dream–and he thought it was cute enough to warrant an insanely high-priced version stamped with his designer logo.

Though we originally thought it was just a Chinese thing (the bags a familiar staple in street markets both in Chinatown and on the mainland), we recently discovered that the all-purpose sacks are a familiar form of portage on another edge of the globe. Media exposure on Mr. Vuitton’s couture radar led us to a celebrated analog in Ghana, where the bag is known as “Ghana Must Go.”

Blogger Koranteng Ofosu-Amaah noted that the bag is a genuine world traveler and has garnered an array of colorful monikers to match. Quoting Georgia Poppelwell in his analysis of the sociocultural significance of the universal carry-all:

in Trinidad I’ve heard those bags called “Guyanese Samsonite.” We learnt that in Germany, per contra, they are known as “Tuekenkoffer” or Turkish suitcase. In Boston I’ve heard them referenced as Chinatown totes, and called Bangladeshi bags in England, presumably after the 1970s influx of Bangladeshi immigrants.

However, the Chinese connection is indisputable: the plaid pattern was sported in Western China thousands of years ago by the muslim Uyghurs of Xinjiang. And in modern times, it is only fitting that this product of globalization is Made in China.

Ofosu-Amaah describes Vuitton’s appropriation of Ghana Must Go as “high-profile plagiarism.” On the other hand, he concedes–and we agree–that in today’s world of mass migration, fluid borders and cultural miscegenation, there is hardly room to try to lay claim to something as basic as a shopping bag, and more than enough room for a little aesthetic piracy. In our little nook of the universe, at least, that continual mixing and matching is what makes New York City so great and a big part of what Pearl River is all about.

But from a consumer’s standpoint, we advise you not to be seduced by the fashion elite’s rendition of a low-brow treasure. Instead, democratize your bag collection by fetching the real deal at our store for just a few bucks–that’s a value that the masses can appreciate.

Efficient, eco-friendly and economical… the world’s most perfect shopping bag?

Tune in to Channel 4 on Tuesday, March 25. Pearl River will be featured on NBC’s morning show, Today in New York. The show starts at 5am and will highlight Pearl River as one of New York’s best shopping bargains. If you’re not a morning person, check out the show’s website for online broadcasts. (Or just pop over to the store any time to experience the real thing!)

In April, Pearl River will bring you a live music with two very different and very special artists. Flutist Kenneth Chia, violinist/violist Youming Chen and cellist Alice Huang Chen will perform classical renditions of traditional Chinese songs. Saburo Oghai, Naboko Miyazaki and Yoko (Lairo) Nakahashi will play Japanese contemporary folk, featuring the sanshin, an Okinawan string instrument with roots in China, akin to the Western lute.

The performances will be held on the second floor, in the tranquil atmosphere of our new home section, on Saturday and Sunday, April 26 and 27, from 4:00pm to 6:00pm. Admission is free.

Please join us for this very special concert series, and keep checking our website for future cultural events at Pearl River.

Pearl River is getting ready to revamp our web presence to give our customers a unique online shopping experience. We’d like to hear from you on how we can improve our site to make it more user-friendly and interesting. Tell us what you’d like to see on the website in terms of product selection, the ordering process, and cultural features. Email us at pearlriver[at]pearlriver.com