Pulled rickshaw
Pulled rickshaw | |
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Chinese name | |
Hanyu Pinyin | rénlìchē |
Wade–Giles | jên2-li4-chʻê1 |
Transcriptions | |
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Romanization | rikisha |
A pulled rickshaw (from Japanese jinrikisha (人力車) 'person/human-powered vehicle') is a mode of human-powered transport by which a runner draws a two-wheeled cart which seats one or two people.
In recent times the use of human-powered
Overview
Rickshaws are commonly believed to have been invented in Japan in the 1860s, at the beginning of a period of rapid technical advancement.[2][3] In the 19th century, rickshaw pulling became an inexpensive, popular mode of transportation across Asia.[2]
Peasants who migrated to large Asian cities often worked first as a rickshaw runner.[4][5] It was "the deadliest occupation in the East, [and] the most degrading for human beings to pursue."[5][nb 1]
The rickshaw's popularity in Japan declined by the 1930s with the advent of automated forms of transportation, like automobiles and trains. In China, the rickshaw's popularity began to decline in the 1920s.[4][6] In Singapore, the rickshaw's popularity increased into the 20th century. There were approximately 50,000 rickshaws in 1920 and that number doubled by 1930.[7]
Description
The initial rickshaws rode on iron-shod wooden wheels and the passenger sat on hard, flat seats. In the late 19th century and early 20th century, rubber or pneumatic rubber tires, spring cushions, and backrests improved the passenger's comfort. Other features, such as lights, were also added.[8]
In the city of Shanghai, public rickshaws were painted yellow to differentiate from the private vehicles of the wealthy citizens, which were described as:
... always shiny, were carefully maintained, and sported 'a spotless white upholstered double seat, a clean plaid for one's lap, and a wide protective tarpaulin to protect the passenger (or passengers, since sometimes up to three people rode together) against the rain.[9]
The rickshaws were a convenient means of travel, able to traverse winding, narrow city streets. During
Country overview
Africa
East Africa
In the 1920s, it was used in Bagamoyo and Tanga in Tanzania, and other areas of East Africa for short distances.[10]
Madagascar
Rickshaws, known as pousse-pousse, were introduced by British
Nairobi
Rickshaws operated in Nairobi in the beginning of the 20th century; pullers went on strike there in 1908.[14]
South Africa
Durban is famous for its iconic Zulu rickshaw pullers navigating throughout the city. These colorful characters are famous for their giant, vibrant hats and costumes. They were introduced into Natal by Sir Marshall Campbell in the 1890s.[15]: 299 There were about 2,000 registered men who pulled rickshaws in Durban in 1904; Since displaced by motorised transport, there are approximately 25 rickshaws left who mostly cater to tourists today.[16][17]
Asia
China
In China, from the ancient times and until the 19th century, rich and important people, when traveling overland, were commonly transported in sedan chairs carried by bearers, rather than in wheeled vehicles. This was at least partly explained by road conditions.[18] [19] It is thought that it was from China (or East Asia in general) that sedan chair (a.k.a. "palanquin") designs were introduced into Western Europe in the 17th century. [20] However, wheeled carts for one or two passengers, pushed (rather than pulled, like a proper rikshaw) by human servant, were attested as well. [21]
In the 19th century, wheelbarrow is the most popular transportation for commoners. In the spring of 1873, the French merchant Menard introduced rickshaw from Japan. The original name is "Jinrikisha", meaning "man-power-vehicle" in Japanese. Most of the rickshaws were owned by foreign investors at the beginning, but in around the 1900s, rickshaws were owned mostly by Chinese companies. The official name for rickshaw is "renliche", meaning "man-power-vehicle" in Chinese, but it is more commonly called "dongyangche", meaning "east-foreign-vehicle", or "huangbaoche" in Shanghai, meaning "yellow carriage for rent."[22][23][24]
Rickshaw transportation was an important element in urban development in 20th century China, as a mode of transportation, source of employment and facilitation of migration for workers. According to author David Strand:
Sixty thousand men took as many as a half million fares a day in a city of slightly more than one million. Sociologist Li Jinghan estimated that one out of six males in the city between the ages of sixteen and fifty was a puller. Rickshaw men and their dependents made up almost 20 percent of Beijing's population.[25]
Most manual rickshaws – seen by many
Shanghai
Shanghai's rickshaw industry began in 1874 with 1,000 rickshaws imported from Japan. By 1914 there were 9,718 vehicles. The pullers were a large group of the city's working poor: 100,000 men pulled rickshaws by the early 1940s, up from 62,000 in the mid-1920s.[29]
In contrary to coolies in Beijing, those in Shanghai mostly come from rural areas out of the city. With the destitution of their land, they poured into the city with their family. As the number of coolies rose up sharply, however, the number of rickshaw remained at 20,000 in Shanghai. Except private coolies, those for public work had to take turns, and thus their average income diminished to $9 per month. Therefore, many coolies worked in the factory and ran the rickshaw after work. However, many coolies were optimistic about life. They were satisfied about their income and dreamed of purchasing their own rickshaws and sending their kids to schools.[30] Due to this low income, many coolies would not give customers a clear idea of standard price and thus charge higher at any chance they had. In response to this phenomenon, hotels would provide the distance to various streets and the price charged.[31][32]
Hong Kong
Rickshaws were first imported to Hong Kong from Japan in 1880. They were a popular form of transport for many years, peaking at more than 3,000 in the 1920s. However, their popularity waned after World War II. No new licenses for rickshaws have been issued since 1975, and only a few old men—three as of 2017[33]—still hold a license. It is reported that only one of them still offer rickshaw rides on The Peak, mainly for tourists.[34]
India
Around 1880, rickshaws appeared in India, first in Simla.[35] At the turn of the century it was introduced in Kolkata (Calcutta), India and in 1914 was a conveyance for hire.[2]
Service availability
Though most cities offer auto rickshaw service, hand-pulled rickshaws do exist in some areas, such as Kolkata,[36] "the last bastion of human powered tana rickshaws".[37][nb 2] According to Trillin, most Kolkata rickshaws serve people "just a notch above poor" who tend to travel short distances. However, in a recent article by Hyrapiet and Greiner,[41] the authors found that rickshaws also transport middle-class residents who use their services out of convenience and for short-distance trips to the local marketplace. Rickshaws are used to transport goods, shoppers, and school children.[nb 3] It is also used as a "24-hour ambulance service."[39] Also according to Hyrapiet and Greiner, rickshaw pullers have acted as peer-educators for the Calcutta Samaritans providing critical information on HIV/AIDS because of their access to marginalized groups within Kolkata's red light districts.
Rickshaws are the most effective means of transportation through the flooded streets of the monsoon season.[37] When Kolkata floods rickshaw business increases and prices rise.[42][nb 4]
The pullers live a life of poverty and many sleep under rickshaws.
Motor vehicles are banned in the Eco-sensitive zone area of Matheran, India, a tourist hill station near Mumbai so man-pulled rickshaws are still one of the major forms of transport there.[43]
Legislation
In August 2005, the Communist government of
Indonesia
Pulled rickshaws used to be in Indonesia a long time ago. Nowadays, they are replaced by Delman (the horse-drawn carriage) and Becak (cycle rickshaw/pedicab).
Japan
There are several theories about the invention of the rickshaw. Japan historian Seidensticker wrote of the theories:
Though the origins of the rickshaw are not entirely clear, they seem to be Japanese, and of Tokyo specifically. The most widely accepted theory offers the name of three inventors, and gives 1869 as the date of invention.[7]
Starting in 1870, the Tokyo government issued a permission for Izumi Yosuke, Takayama Kosuke, and Suzuki Tokujiro to build and sell rickshaws.[46] By 1872, they became the main mode of transportation in Japan, with about 40,000 rickshaws in service.[6]
The rickshaw's popularity in Japan declined by the 1930s with the advent of automated forms of transportation, like automobiles and trains. After World War II, when gasoline and automobiles were scarce, they made a temporary come-back. The rickshaw tradition has stayed alive in Kyoto and Tokyo's geisha districts[4][6] only for tourists as well as in other tourist places. The tradition completely disappeared once, but a few people revived jinrikisha (human-powered rickshaws) for tourists in the 1970s-1980s[47][48] and the rickshaws became popular as a tourism resource in the 2000s.[49][50][51] The modern rickshaw men are a kind of tourist guide, who take their clients to some tourist spots and explain about them.[52] Many of them are part-time working students and athletes who like running or exchanging cultures.
Malaysia
Rickshaws were a common mode of transport in urban areas of Malaysia in the 19th and early 20th centuries until gradually replaced by cycle rickshaws.[citation needed]
Pakistan
Pulled and cycle rickshaw (qinqi) have been banned in
Philippines
The pulled rickshaw never gained acceptance in the Philippines. Americans tried to introduce it to
Singapore
Singapore had received its first rickshaws in 1880 and soon after they were prolific, making a "noticeable change in the traffic on Singapore's streets."[2] Bullock carts and gharries were used prior to the introduction of rickshaws.[5]
Many of the poorest individuals in Singapore in the late nineteenth century were poor, unskilled people of Chinese ancestry. Sometimes called
Rickshaws popularity increased into the 20th century. There were approximately 50,000 rickshaws in 1920 and that number doubled by 1930.[7] In or after the 1920s a union was formed, called the Rickshaw Association, to protect the welfare of rickshaw workers.[58]
North America
United States
From A History of the Los Angeles City Market (1930-1950), pulled rickshaws were operated in Los Angeles by high school teenagers during that time period.[59][60]
Canada
Foot-driven rickshaws have enjoyed several decades of popularity in
Rickshaws are a popular mode of transportation in downtown
Books, films, television, music and modern art
- An early The Phantom Rickshaw (1885). In it a young Englishman has a romance aboard a ship bound for India. He ends the affair and becomes engaged to another woman, causing his original love to die of a broken heart. After that, on excursions around the city of Simla, he frequently sees the ghost of the deceased driving around in her yellow-panelled rickshaw, though nobody else seems to notice the phenomenon.[64]
- The 1936 novel Rickshaw Boy is a novel by the Chinese author Lao She about the life of a fictional Beijing rickshaw man. The English version Rickshaw Boy became a U.S. bestseller in 1945. It was an unauthorized translation that added a happy ending to the story. In 1982, the original version was made into a film of the same title.[65]
- In the 1940s, Eddy Howard recorded a song called The Rickety Rickshaw Man.[66]
- The 1958 Japanese movie Muhomatsu no issho (Rickshaw Man) by Hiroshi Inagaki tells the story of a Matsugoro, a rickshaw man who becomes a surrogate father to the child of a recently widowed woman.
- The 1953 .
- In the 1992 film City of Joy (whose title refers to Kolkata), Om Puriplays a rickshaw puller, revealing the economic and emotional hardship that these underpaid workers face on a day-to-day basis.
- In Pearl S. Buck's 1931 novel The Good Earth, hero Wang Lung leaves his land to travel southward during a drought. He ends up in the city of Kiangsu (Jiangsu), where he becomes a rickshaw puller in order to support his family.[67]
- In the 1998 Seinfeld episode "The Bookstore", Kramer and Newman decide to start a rickshaw business with homeless people being trained to carry passengers.
See also
Rickshaws
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Other human powered transport
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Notes
- coolies performed rickshaw pulling. Other hard or demeaning jobs included being night soil cleaners and dock workers.[5]
- Muslim pullers often share housing.[39]Some pullers sleep in the streets in their rickshaws. As of 2008, many of the Kolkata rickshaw pullers originate from Bihar, considered to be one of the poorest states in India.[39][40]
- ^ Trillin added that pullers told him that children enrolled in schools were the "steadiest" customers. Many middle-class families contract with rickshaw pullers to transport their children; a rickshaw puller who transports children becomes a "family retainer."[39]
- ^ A Kolkata writer told Trillin, "When it rains, even the governor takes rickshaws."[42]
- National Geographic stated in a 2008 article that the city government has not decided how rickshaw drivers would be rehabilitated, nor has it settled on a date regarding when the government would decide. Trillin added that many high West Bengal officials made statements saying that rickshaws would be banned from 1976 to 2008.[1]
- ^ 80% of rickshaw pullers were addicted to opium and many gambled and purchased the services of whores. These activities locked them into a state of poverty, but the remaining group of pullers might be able to improve their lot over time and "strike into new lines of business as the opportunities arose." Rickshaw pullers could become repairers or owners of rickshaws or bicycles.[56][57]
References
- ^ National Geographic. Vol. 213, no. 4. p. 104. Archived from the originalon 19 March 2008.
- ^ ISBN 997169266X.
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- ^ ISBN 9971691868.
- ^ a b c "Japanese rickshaw". Powerhouse Museum. Retrieved 11 April 2013.
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- ^ Romita Hanuman. "Zulu Rickshaws". Durban.gov.za. Archived from the original on 19 May 2010. Retrieved 2 July 2010.
- ISBN 1740599705.
- ^ Murray, Hugh (1836), An Historical and Descriptive Account of China: Its Ancient and Modern History ..., vol. 1, Oliver & Boyd, pp. 344–345
- ^ Staunton, Sir George (1797), An Historical Account of the Embassy to the Emperor of China, Undertaken by Order of the King of Great Britain: Including the Manners & Customs of the Inhabitants & Preceded by an Account of the Causes of the Embassy & Voyage to China. Abridged Principally from the Papers of Earl Macartney..., J. Stockdale, pp. 279–280
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- ^ Colby, Fred Myron (1888), "Locomotion in the Olden Time", Granite Monthly: A New Hampshire Magazine, 11: 64
- ^ ISBN 997169266X.
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- ^ David Strand. Rickshaw Beijing: City People and Politics in the 1920. p. 21.
- ISBN 0520215648.
- ISSN 0458-3035. Retrieved 11 July 2018.
After all, the Communists in China eliminated this mode of transport soon after assuming power more than half a century ago, criticizing it as primitive and demeaning.
- ^ Cernetig, Miro (20 October 1999). "China's Rickshaws Bring Back Bad Memories". The New York Times. Retrieved 11 July 2018.
But this test-run of rickshaws in China's capital, after a ban of more than 40 years, is widely seen as retrograde. For many Chinese, the rickshaw remains a symbol of feudalism's "coolie culture" and one of the evils of capitalism that was supposed to have been expunged forever from Communist China.
- ISBN 0520215648.
- ISBN 0520215648.
- ^ Darwent, Charles Ewart. Shanghai; a handbook for travellers and residents to the chief objects of interest in and around the foreign settlements and native city. Shanghai, Hongkong: Kelly and Walsh [date of publication not identified].
- ^ Hongs & Homes, 1928: A complete directory of Shanghai. Shanghai: Millington, Ltd., 1929.
- ^ [1] Vehicle Licensing during - 2008-2017
- ^ 被遺忘的公交 The Forgotten Transportation: Rickshaw ride in Hong Kong
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- ^ ISBN 978-1741793192.
- National Geographic. Vol. 213, no. 4. pp. 101–104. Archived from the originalon 19 March 2008.
- ^ National Geographic. Vol. 213, no. 4. p. 100. Archived from the originalon 19 March 2008.
- National Geographic. Vol. 213, no. 4. p. 96. Archived from the originalon 19 March 2008.
- S2CID 143034771.
- ^ National Geographic. Vol. 213, no. 4. p. 101. Archived from the originalon 19 March 2008.
- ^ Admin. "Matheran: Smallest, peaceful & vehicle-free hill station". India Post.
- ^ WebIndia, 2005.
- National Geographic. Vol. 213, no. 4. p. 97. Archived from the originalon 19 March 2008.
- ISBN 978-1456424756.
- ^ Jinrikisha in Kamakura Youfuu-tei
- ^ Jinrikisha in Hidatakayama Gokurak-sha
- ^ 3-Day Model Trip Day1 / Kakunodate - Lake Tazawa-ko - Morioka Japan National Tourism Organization, 31 January 2002
- ^ 京都観光 Archived 16 June 2015 at the Wayback Machine ISFJ政策フォーラム2009発表論文 12 – 13 December 2009
- ^ Rickshaw TV Show "Sekai Tsukai Densetsu" 2002-2003
- ^ Hataraku Ikemen JoshiFuji Channel 2013/04/29
- ^ Bradsheer, Harry S. (4 November 1959). "Pakistan To Ban Rickshaws". Lakeland Ledger. p. 4. Retrieved 3 December 2018.
- .
- ^ Suryadinata (1992). p. 39.
- ^ ISBN 1860113095.
- ^ Leo Suryadinata (1992). (same). pp. 39–40.
- ^ Suryadinata (1992). p. 45.
- ^ Tara Fickle. "A History of The Los Angeles City Market: 1930-1950". Chinese Historical Society of Southern California (previously published: Gum Saan Journal, Volume 32, No. 1, 2010). Archived from the original on 20 December 2014. Retrieved 12 April 2013.
- ISBN 1101126876.
- ^ "Halifax Rickshaw Tours". 2013. Archived from the original on 11 August 2014. Retrieved 19 July 2013.
- ISBN 0470044578.
- ^ "Downtown Ottawa Rickshaw Tours". Ottawa Rickshaws. Archived from the original on 19 April 2013. Retrieved 13 April 2013.
- ^ "The Phantom Rickshaw". Online Literature. Retrieved 13 April 2013.
- ISBN 9780061436925.
- ^ "Most Played Juke Box Records". The Billboard. Vol. 59, no. 4. Nielsen Business Media, Inc. 25 January 1947. p. 24.
- ISBN 0743272935.
Further reading
- Bandyopadhyay, Subir (1990). Calcutta cycle-rickshaw pullers: a sociological study. Minerva Associates Publications. ISBN 8185195277.
- Fung, Chi Ming (2005). Reluctant Heroes: Richshaw Pullers in Hong Kong And Canton, 1874-1954. Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland. Hong Kong University Press. ISBN 9622097340.
- Indian Institute of Economics (1962). A socio-economic survey of rickshaw drivers in Hyderabad City area. A.P.
- Mulhall, Priscilla (2010). Solar-assisted Electric Auto Rickshaw Three Wheeler. Illinois Institute of Technology.
- Warren, James Francis (2003). Rickshaw Coolie: A People's History of Singapore, 1880-1940. NUS Press. ISBN 997169266X.
External links
- New International Encyclopedia. 1905. .