...everyday is mineThe life of Pedro José Lobo

Title: ...every day is mine - The life of Pedro José LoboAuthor: Marco LoboEditor: International Institute of MacauDesign: ABM Design & ComunicaçãoPictures courtesy by: Marco LoboCollection: Suma OrientalCirculation: 1000 copiesPrinting: Foshan Nanhai Baosheng Packing Factory (Baosheng Printing)ISBN: 978-99965-59-41-9Macau, January 2020With support from

MARCO LOBO1. Pedro J Lobo 1892 - 1965....everyday is mineThe life of Pedro José Lobo

Table of contentsDedication 11List of Images and Photographs 13Acknowledgements 15Foreword 17Introduction 21Chapter 1: Dr. P. J. Lobo — Enigma 25Chapter 2: Timor — The Early Years 29Chapter 3: City of the Name of God 41Chapter 4: Identity Crisis 51Chapter 5: Timor 59Chapter 6: Staying Relevant 63Chapter 7: The Great War 69Chapter 8: An Education in Banking and Finance 73Chapter 9: The Japanese and Macau 77Chapter 10: The War and Refugees 81Chapter 11: Companhia Cooperativa de Macau (CCM) 97Chapter 12: Economic Management 107Chapter 13: Characters and Assassination 115Chapter 14: The British Army Aid Group — BAAG 125Chapter 15: The Border Gate Incident of 1952 139Chapter 16: The Macao Air Transport Company — MATCO 149Chapter 17: Vila Verde Radio and the Macau Cultural Circle 167Chapter 18: Macau’s Goldfinger 179Chapter 19: Modernizing Macau — Tourism and Gambling 185Chapter 20: Family 189Chapter 21: At the End 199Chapter 22: Accolades 203Appendix 1: Background on the historical links between Macau and Japan 209Appendix 2: Timeline of major events that occurred during P. J. Lobo’s life 219Endnotes 225

To the People of Macau

List of photographs1. Pedro J. Lobo 1892 – 19652. Map of the island of Timor3. Map illustrating the positions of Macau and Timor4. Group photograph showing Pedro Lobo, family members and clergy5. Pedro Lobo in Coloane with St. Joseph’s priests6. Pedro Lobo’s home at Praia Grande7. P. J. Lobo and Ho Yin 19468. P. J. Lobo with Sir Lindsay Tasman Ride and friends9. Pedro Lobo and Roque Choi delivering Letter of Apology 195210. MATCO plane (PBY)11. MATCO insignia12. Cathay Founder and Pedro Lobo13. Cathay Pacific — MATCO Advertisement14. MATCO Advertisement15. MATCO Gold Shipment16. Miss Macao Hijacking story17. Pedro Lobo conducting his orchestra18. Cover of Mosaico Magazine September 1950 (MCML)19. A poster advertising Vila Verde Radio20. The Vila Verde Orchestra, pictured on the steps of Vila Verde 195321. A swimming pool party at Vila Verde22. Branca Helena Hyndman Lobo 1895 – 193223. Rogério Hyndman Lobo and Margaret Choa Wedding 7th April 194724. Pedro J. Lobo and granddaughter Maria Margarida Lobo da Conceição ‘Rita’, 195125. Pedro’s and Branca’s tomb in Hong Kong’s Catholic Cemetery in Happy Valley26. Award from Louis Mountbatten 1945

15...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José LoboAcknowledgementsThis book would not have been written without the support of the International Institute of Macau (IIM). Specifically, I must thank secretary-general of the IIM, Rufino Ramos for his pro-fessionalism. I rudely awakened Cesar Guillen-Nuñez from his restful retirement in Colombia to write the foreword — but who better than a man who knows Macau and its history so intimately?I am thankful for the help provided by Tokyo-based writer and musician, John Gribble. Unleashing his machete-like pen to my manuscript, his erudite counsel helped shape this book into its current format.I relied heavily on the memories of my siblings: my sister Branca Elena Lobo Gibbons shared her recollections and dis-cussed my assumptions from the beginning to its completion. My sisters Maria Isabel Lobo Morrison and Marilyn Anne Lobo Si-mon, and brother Alfredo Paulo Lobo helped me greatly with his-torical searches through family archives and artifacts. Thank you for getting your hands dirty. And of course, the stories our father Rogério told us all, along with his audio and video recordings, al-lowed me a firm grasp of time and place.Cousin Maria Margarida Lobo da Conceição, ‘Rita’, was very helpful with photographs and stories. Hyndman cousins Fran-cesca Loftis and Isabella Palmer supplied me with anecdotes and family records which helped establish a timeline for part of this memoir. Elizabeth Ryde, granddaughter of Lindsay Tasman Ride, very kindly provided several documents from Sir Lindsey’s collection of BAAG memoranda.

16Marco LoboDear friend John Lai drove me by automobile down memory lane in Macau and shed light on a few of Pedro’s mysteries. Ana Catarina Leite, who shares my enthusiasm for old Macau, sup-plied me with documents and insights which added depth to my research. Jim Silva’s memories and writings were essential to my understanding of the conditions during the WWII years and the refugee situation. Francisco da Roza was generous with his time as well as his knowledge of the Border Gate Incident, providing his eye-witness account of the fighting that took place in 1952.There are many writers of books and scholarly articles which helped me compile this book. Most are cited in the endnotes, but it would be remiss of me not to mention Geoffrey C Gunn, who along with co-authors of the book Wartime Macau — Under the Japanese Shadow, armed me with an appreciation of Portugal and Macau’s political context vis-à-vis Japan. Additionally, John Pownall Reeve’s memoir The Lone Flag supplied not only inspira-tion, but also details of the conditions during his years in Macau. The title of this book, ...every day is mine, is the last line of a short poem by Fernando Pessoa. The entire poem is reproduced at the start of the ‘Introduction’.

17...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José LoboForewordCesar Guillen-Nuñez Macau, geographically a small city but historically vast and complex, has produced a good number of quite remarkable men and women since its foundation by the Portuguese in 1557 or thereabouts. The great appeal of this once culturally and ethni-cally diverse territory is largely due to its Portuguese and Chinese heritage. The latter has deep roots in Guangzhou (Canton), with a vigorous cultural offshoot originating in Fujian province. Equal-ly fascinating are the racial mixtures characteristic of Portuguese and Spanish colonization. Portuguese colonizers married Chi-nese and sometimes Japanese women. The colonized peoples from Southeast Asia and India also arrived in the Portuguese colony and intermarried with others. All of which produced its own dis-tinctive culture. The figure of Dr. Pedro José Lobo, which forms the main subject of this engaging book, is an outcome of this vi-brant historical and cultural environment. P. J. Lobo emerges from the pages of Macau’s history as one of those individuals that were defined by and who in turn defined their age. In important yet controversial aspects he personifies the city before, during and immediately after WWII. His was a Macau that was still considered a far-flung Portuguese enclave in South-ern China, one where the rich Japan trade had famously prospered

18Marco Lobocenturies before and from where the centuries-old Jesuit Japan mission had flourished. But in his days Edo-culture Japan had morphed into a horrifying and deadly enemy mainly interested in imperial domination. One of the more surprising facts about P. J. Lobo’s remarkable life is the fact that he was of Timorese, not Macanese, origin, evidence of Portuguese cultural diversity still surviving in Macau in the mid. twentieth-century. But of all his biographical details, without much doubt the most astonishing was his skill in navigating and actually prospering in the perilous wa-ters of WWII. Although the means and methods of his enrich-ment are still a matter of some controversy—among other import-ant and lucrative high government offices, he was in charge of the Macau government’s opium concession—historians have seldom questioned his crucial role in steering the beleaguered city away from a dangerous clash with the Japanese Empire through subtle negotiations, in saving its citizens from near starvation, or put into doubt his service to the city as President of the Leal Senado (Ma-cau’s city council) and for which he became an honorary Macanese citizen, or as a philanthropist benefitting the social and cultur-al life of the city. In his final years, still a “cultural Portuguese”, Dr. Lobo became the patriarch of a notable family in Hong Kong, where he passed away. Because of P. J. Lobo’s significance for the modern history of Macau a fascination with his dynamic personality emerged among historians, journalists and other writers during his lifetime and has continued more than a hundred years after he first arrived in Macau. His exuberance was such that it even roused the curiosity of creative writers, but academia usually takes a more dispassion-ate look at history and its protagonists. Many reputable historians have looked soberly and objectively at the Japanese occupation of Hong Kong, at Macau’s status as open city during WWII, at the corruption endemic even in the uppermost echelons of Macau’s

19...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José Lobogovernment and its business world—a society in which P. J. Lobo moved and in which he had to survive. They have also looked at the import of his role in shaping the destiny of the city during and after this tragic period.Researches and texts on these subjects include the 1979-81 writings of Father, later Monsignor Manuel Teixeira (1912-2003), as well as more recent studies by Dr. Sonny Lo Shiu Hing and Dr. Rogério Miguel Puga. These writings have contributed in no small way to our understanding of Macau’s history during the second half of the 20th century and of PJ Lobo’s place in it. Sonny Lo’s innovative research, for example, has cast new light on Dr. Lobo’s pioneering role as a model for later Macanese strongmen. But their arguments concerning him are unfortunately usually limited in scope. One thinks, for instance, of the prolific writings of Fr. Manuel Teixeira, which discuss P. J. Lobo more memora-bly only in sections of his enquiry into the toponymy of Macau’s colourful streets. For the above reasons the present book and Marco Lobo’s ef-forts are the more laudable and valuable, especially as the author is the grandson of P. J. Lobo. This is particularly so because the Macau in which P. J. Lobo survived and thrived is now gone, including the Green House, a complex that included his house, office and the radio station he founded—a site now dominated by supermarkets and shops at the junction of Rua de Francisco Xavier Pereira and Avenida do Ouvidor Arriaga. Of his original mansion built next to Macau’s Government Headquarters facing the historic Praia Grande only the colour green survives like an echo of the past. Without overstating the obvious, Marco Lobo has a very natural desire and a greater motivation to go further and dig deeper, to provide more comprehensive arguments and facts with which to enlighten and entertain us in this intriguing and much needed biography.

20Marco LoboDr. César Guillén-Nuñez is a former researcher for the Macau Ricci Institute. An art historian and author he studied in London, Munich and Madrid. He is known as the foremost authority on some of Macau’s landmarks, including the Church of Saint Paul. He was born in Panama and lived in Hong Kong in the 1970’s, working for the Hong Kong Museum of Art as Assistant Cura-tor of Historic Paintings and Contemporary Hong Kong Art. He then joined the Macao Museum of Art, then known as the Luis de Camões Museum, in the Casa Gardens. He currently makes his home in Colombia.

21...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José LoboIntroductionIf after I die, people want to write my biography, there is nothing simpler. They only need two dates: the date of my birth and the date of my death. Between one and another, every day is mine.Fernando PessoaI have always cherished this poem, one of the first to come to mind when thinking about how Pedro J. Lobo lived his life. It was a life he loved, in a place he treasured, that brought him fame, fortune and some might even say a certain degree of notoriety. As the poem says, I do believe that he owned each and every day, not in a selfish sense, but of accepting and taking responsibility and acting in ways that he thought were for the best. He lived life fully with a wide group of friends and a large family that adored him. It has been said that there is sometimes more honesty in writ-ing fiction than in non-fiction — that a writer of non-fiction ob-scures reality through intentional omission — painting a picture of places and characters that fit a writer’s viewpoint, but do not always reflect the whole truth. I hope this is not the case in my telling of the story of Pedro J. Lobo. The project has allowed me a deeper examination of my grandfather’s life as well as the

22Marco Loboopportunity to chronologically catalogue the events of his time, and to form a deeper affection for Macau and its people. If there are omissions, they are not for the sake of obfuscation, but that certain events did not contribute materially to the story of P. J. Lobo’s life. As suggested in the foreword by Dr. Guillen-Nuñez, Macau went through many phases in the last five centuries, swaying be-tween exuberance and tumult and in between those, it rested in periods of the doldrums. In examining the events, I have attempt-ed to do so through Pedro’s eyes and of those people around him. Each incident already significant when taken alone was often am-plified by successive events. Perhaps no era proved as continually tumultuous as the years of Pedro’s time in Macau. In the first half of the 20th Century the enclave jolted from one incident to anoth-er, striving for its survival against internal as well as the external forces that threatened its very existence.

25...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José LoboChapter 1Dr. P. J. Lobo — EnigmaSome want to believe that British author Ian Fleming, known for his series of James Bond stories drew inspiration for his novel ‘Goldfinger’ from a meeting with Pedro J. Lobo. True, they did meet at the end of 1959 when Fleming went on a journey around-the-world, visiting 13 cities. Seven of those cities were in Asia, including Hong Kong and Macau. His series of essays were originally published in Britain’s Sunday Times and later compiled into a book and released in 1963 as Thrilling Cities.1 In the author’s notes Fleming wrote that he had certainly got into the way of looking at people and places and things through a thriller-writer’s eyes. That is exactly how Fleming viewed his meeting with Pedro.Details of their encounter will be covered in a later chapter, but at this time I wish to draw attention to a remark that Mr. Fleming made after their meeting. Towards the end of the essay, Fleming wrote: What had I learned of Dr. Lobo, the gold king whose name is whis-pered with awe throughout the East? Absolutely nothing at all! 2Fleming departed completely oblivious to the historical signifi-cance of the small enigmatic man with whom he had spent the day.

26Marco Lobo§Most of Pedro Lobo’s deeds were completed well before I was born or when I was too young to even know about them. I knew him only as a loving grandfather, not as a businessman or politi-cian, or as many referred to him as, the ‘real Governor of Macau’ — the man who guided Macau through some of its darkest times and then later did his best to encourage its society towards cul-tural activities and to develop the enclave as a tourist destination. As a family, we jealously guarded Pedro’s reputation and leg-acy. My father Rogério, Pedro’s son had moved to Hong Kong in 1947, to manage P. J. Lobo & Co., and settled there after mar-rying my mother Margaret Choa, the 11th child of a Chinese fa-ther, Choa Po Sien, and Eurasian mother, Maria Felicie Belilios. Though we maintained a connection with Macau and had a home there, our relationship with the place grew more tenuous as the years passed and our family settled into Hong Kong life — Macau being the place to get away to for short holidays, to enjoy the food, the peace and quiet and to visit our Avô (grandfather). I had been asked several times to write about the life of P. J. Lobo. Stories about him being Asia’s Goldfinger and ‘bribing the Japanese with wine’, had long captured peoples’ imaginations. And there were others that described him in more pernicious terms, one author describing him as the gangster music-lover.3 At least the second part of that is right! As with many myths there are oftentimes elements of truth. The origins of some of these will be covered in ensuing chapters.Believing the task of separating fact from fiction too daunting, initially I didn’t want to take on the responsibility. More impor-tantly, there was the issue of safeguarding Pedro’s legacy, some-thing we as a family believed we owed. In March of 2018, I attended the Macau Literary Festival. It came as a surprise to me how frequently the name Pedro Lobo came

27...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José Loboup and that I was formally introduced as his grandson. During that brief visit to Macau I was asked again whether I would take on the task of writing a book about him. I realized then that the legacy that we thought belonged to our family in fact belongs equally to the people of Macau.In writing this memoir, I have relied heavily on the collective memory of the extended Lobo and Hyndman families. They have provided me with their recollections and anecdotes, along with private family documents, oral history and personal letters.This memoir covers Pedro’s entire life, from birth in 1892 to his death in 1965, a span of 73 years. It traces the significant events that occurred in or had an effect on Macau and, to a less-er degree, Timor, his birthplace. In the two longer sections, one covers the events occurring after the fall of Hong Kong to the Japanese, when Macau was under virtual occupation by the Im-perial Japanese Army. The other deals with the period after the Second World War and the challenges Macau faced with the rise of Communism in China. I have tried to give the reader a feel for the man, Pedro José Lobo and have written about aspects of his private, family, and community life.

29...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José LoboChapter 2Timor — The Early YearsPedro’s story began in East Timor, an island like a rough-hewn knife. The eastern part forms the knife’s blade, the cutting edge fashioned by chipping away its side to form a long, rug-ged coastline of beaches and cliffs. Except for the eastern half of Timor where Portugal had established Portuguese Timor, the Dutch dominated much of the Indonesian islands. The western half of Timor, the knife’s handle, was known as Dutch Timor until 1949 when it became Indonesian Timor. Throughout the 64 years that Pedro lived in Macau he was often referred to as being from Timor. This identity appears in many published references about his life. It is something that of-ten perplexed us as his family since we always considered him Macanese through and through. But he never rejected the asso-ciation with his place of birth and continued to maintain rela-tionships there. However, he passionately embraced Macau as his true home and considered himself as a Portuguese citizen of Ma-cau. Pedro knew Timor from the inside and had the opportunity also to observe it from the outside. As a child and young man, from the outside he saw aspects of the way colonially adminis-tered Timor and the fractured and suppressive policies that gave him pause for reflection. Later, after gaining an understanding of how the machinery of commerce and politics worked in Macau,

30Marco LoboPedro made choices when he was in the position to do so that benefitted all of Macau residents, not only those that advanced its colonial overlords.Initially drawn to Timor for its abundant sandalwood, the Portuguese introduced crops such as maize and coffee. They also introduced a tax system whereby tolls could be paid through la-bour or a portion of the native farmers’ crops. In places where the Portuguese ruled, governance was often cruel and exploit-ative. Investments in health and education and building of in-frastructure were minimal. Sandalwood, the main interest that drew Portugal to Timor in the 16th century, remained the main export crop for the next four centuries. However, the Portuguese harvested the sandalwood at such enormous volume that pro-duction in the early 1900’s declined from 900,000 kg to a mere 20,000 kg in 1926.4 An export moratorium had to be put in place to allow stocks to regenerate.5 In later years, with East Timor under Indonesian occupation, illegal logging continued with san-dalwood nearly becoming extinct. The island’s mountainous wil-derness was then and still is covered in thick forest. Its forbidding terrain is one of the reasons why during Portugal’s four centuries of colonial rule, the hinterland was barely explored. To this day traveling outside of the capital Dili over land remains difficult due to a lack of decent roads.667 Kilometers to the east of Dili, on the northern shoreline, is the village of Manatuto. This is where Pedro Lobo was born on January 12th, 1892 to Ana and Francisco das Neves Lobo. Portu-guese citizenship was granted as a part of colonial policy to men who assimilated Portuguese language, literacy, and religion — and this is how Pedro’s parents, though very much Timor natives, and Pedro himself, came to be Portuguese citizens. In a publica-tion entitled Timor-Leste in the World, writer and lecturer Gud-mund Jannisa, explains it like this:

31...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José LoboThe Colonial Act, as we have seen, set up two cat-egories of people, the indígenas (unassimilated natives) and the não-indígenas (whites, mestiços and assimilados). To gain the status of an assimilado, including Portu-guese citizenship, a Timorese had to be eighteen years old, prove his ability to speak Portuguese, earn suffi-cient income for himself and his family, prove he was of ‘good character’ and demonstrate that he ‘possessed those qualities necessary for the exercise of the public and private rights of a Portuguese citizen.’ He must also not have refused military service. The wife and children of an assimilado could acquire citizenship if they spoke Portuguese and could demonstrate their ‘good charac-ter’. The assimilado could travel without permission, did not have to pay the head tax, was exempted from con-tract labour, and could vote in elections for the Por-tuguese National Assembly and the local Legislative CouncilPedro was a small child. Even as an adult he only reached a height of about five feet, two inches below the average height of current-day East Timorese men.7Manatuto’s villagers survived as fishermen and as tamarind farmers. Some eked out an existence working the region’s salt flats, and it is from these humble beginnings that Pedro originated.He wasn’t long in Manatuto. His parents wanted a better fu-ture for him. They also worried about another mouth to feed. So, they entrusted his care to one more capable of providing the child with a good home and an education. That is how Belarmino Lobo came to be Pedro’s father. It has been suggested that this kind of adoption was not uncommon at the time, and that it occurs almost exclusively among close relatives.8 It is not known how Ana and

32Marco LoboFrancisco das Neves Lobo were related to Belarmino. The child was brought to the Belarmino Lobo home shortly after birth, but it was sometime later before Pedro was formally adopted. As the story is told in our family, Belarmino and Pedro, as a little boy, went to the registry in Dili. Upon arrival Pedro walked in first. The registrar, seeing the little native boy alone asked, “Who are you and who are your parents?”Belarmino was following close behind and replied, “None of that. Please put down the following if you’re doing your work: ‘This boy is my son, his name is Pedro José Lobo, born 12th Janu-ary 1892, son of Belarmino Lobo.” 2. Map of the island of Timor showing East Timor and the area that was formerly Dutch Timor on the West, now Indonesia, simply identified as Timor.Source: CartoGIS Services, College of Asia and the Pacific, The Australian National University.https://asiapacific.anu.edu.au/mapsonline/base-maps/timor-leste-districts

33...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José LoboBoy on the CrocodileA Timorese origin myth tells the story of a boy riding a croc-odile across the sea.9There was once a small crocodile that lived in a swamp of shallow, stagnant water — there was little food to sustain him Though he was tired of the place, he had nowhere else to live. It was the crocodile’s great dream however, to grow to a phenomenal size.Only that great dream sustained Crocodile over thousands of years. The dream had him talking to himself, asking and answering his own questions.“I’m sick of this place,” he would say. “There’s nothing to eat.”“Patience, patience,” Crocodile would reply to himself.Crocodile became weaker, as his spirits sank, and he hardly had the strength to lift his head out of the murky water.“I must get out of here and look for a better place,” he finally said. With great effort he clawed himself out of the swampy hole. Soon, Croc-odile was crawling across parched earth with the sun scorching his back. He stopped and lay still, preparing to breathe his last breath.Out of nowhere came a small boy. Boy took pity on the crocodile and dragged him to the ocean and pushed him in. Soon Crocodile was filling himself with fish and swimming happily in his large new home.One day, Boy went down to the beach and saw the well-fed Croco-dile basking on the sand. “You look better,” Boy said.“It’s all because you took pity on me,” replied Crocodile. “I’d like to repay your kindness. Would you like to come with me across the sea?”“That’s what I’ve always wanted,” Boy said. And so, Boy climbed onto Crocodile’s back and they set off across the vast ocean. They went on and on, eating fish and enjoying the beauty of the sea and sky, never resting, until one day when Crocodile grew tired. “My time is over, but my dream is not”, Crocodile said.

34Marco LoboCrocodile began to get larger. Keeping his original shape, he grew and grew until he turned into an island covered with hills, forests and rivers.And that is why Timor is shaped like a crocodile. In some ways Pedro Lobo’s life mirrors that of the boy in the story. Pedro, the child who helps the dying crocodile and then wants to see the world, all the while riding on an animal that could just as easily turn him into its next meal. It seems that he lived his life like that, taking risks and making decisions that of-ten put him directly in harm’s way.Belarmino Lobo, a Bombay-trained medical doctor was origi-nally from Goa. By the time of Pedro’s birth, he had been in East Timor for over a decade and had risen to the position of a depu-ty of the Dili Council and was later appointed to its presidency. To call East Timor’s capital Dili modern would be an overstate-ment, but compared to the tiny village of Manatuto, the country’s capital city, having a sizable population, was relatively developed. Portugal’s empire-building had for centuries followed a pattern of building coastal fortifications to defend its trading routes, church-es to spread the Catholic faith and government administration to oversee its business activities. Little had been done in terms of building the country’s infrastructure since Dominican friars es-tablished a presence on the island in 1556. The British explorer Alfred Wallace explained the situation like this in 1869.10The Portuguese government in Timor is a most miser-able one. Nobody seems to care the least about the improve-ment of the country, and at this time, after three hundred years of occupation, there has not been a mile of road made beyond the town, and there is not a solitary European res-ident anywhere in the interior.’ As for Dili, it was ‘a most

35...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José Lobomiserable place compared with even the poorest of the Dutch towns… and there is no sign of cultivation or civilisation round about it.In spite of the paucity of the colony’s condition, or perhaps because of it, Belarmino did well for himself. Apart from serving several terms in the Dili Council, as the medical doctor in charge of Dili’s main hospital he was given more or less a free hand by the governor. As head of the Municipal Council he introduced piped water to the city, put in place proper street-planning and erected several public buildings that included a hospital as well as a public garden. These improvements instigated a period of transition for Dili from far-flung settlement to a version of a more modern town which from around 1900, began to take shape.11 Still, there are reports as late as 1919 that showed that by modern day standards, Dili was far behind. Six decades after Alfred Wallace’s report, we have this account in The N T Times,12 written by an Australian who had visited the island:The interior of the island is almost wholly undeveloped in a modern sense. There are one or two fairly large coffee plantations, but beyond these there are only small native industries. Cost of living is atrociously high. There is no ho-tel in Dili, and you would have to make your own living arrangements. Even this would be difficult.Belarmino also ran a small museum, supposedly more of a hob-by than anything else, but at that time it would have been thrilling if not frightening place for young Pedro, with its collection of native artifacts and weapons. Perhaps there were even shrunken heads, since headhunting continued in Timor during colonial times, a practice which some say was even encouraged by the Portuguese.

36Marco LoboThe Portuguese military’s poor resources of in this distant corner of the empire meant that local irregular troops were often used. There were bands of Timorese headhunters under the command of Por-tuguese military officers. Under the colonial justice system, rebels were punished, and this system gave the headhunters opportunities to use their gruesome techniques against their enemies whose vil-lages they plundered and took the residents as slaves.13Pedro was silent about his birth parents, but his son Rogério related that Pedro once said they were Portuguese Mestiza, a na-tive Timorese ethnic group containing traces of Papuan, Chinese, and Dutch. It was only much later that we came to know a little more about them while searching through old documents.Pedro was very fortunate to have had the care and education provided by his adoptive father, and yet life in late 19th century Timor provided its challenges. It isn’t known if Belarmino had other adopted or natural children, whether there were rivalries be-tween them or if as an only child he was doted over. Undoubtedly, life in Timor would have presented some hardships —not know-ing life could be any different, it would have just been accepted, and although he might have been happier without difficulties, I suspect that he would have been more ordinary.Knowing adversity from an early age gave him the strength to get through the tough times he was to experience in later years. Confronted by obstacles, he understood that there would be a way forward. He witnessed how an outsider, his own father Belarmino from Goa, had been able to advance himself in society by achiev-ing the position of President of Dili’s City Council and having a road named after him in Dili: Rua Belarmino Lobo. Anything was possible — an attitude that served him well and later allowed him to aspire to and achieve the most senior position in Macau’s City Council, conceivably he might have wondered if there would be a street named after him in Macau. The cycle of public ser-

37...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José Lobovice would be repeated again in the next generation when his son Rogério would represent the people of Hong Kong in its Legisla-tive and Executive Councils.In numerous photographs, Pedro is pictured alongside friends and business partners. He is often the smallest of them, in many cases shorter than many of the women. I have often thought about how his diminutive stature affected the way he lived and behaved. Naturally, nobody is immune from fear, but might I speculate that those endowed with stronger, larger physiques are perhaps less worried by physical danger? Moving beyond that, there is the no-tion that taller men are the ones who achieve higher positions and even that they are seen as more trustworthy and make better leaders. What of one who encounters a person smaller than them-selves — does the physical difference allow a sense of superiority? I would argue yes, adding that his smaller stature had a disarming effect that in many significant circumstances he enjoyed as part of a negotiation repertoire, putting adversaries at ease. Thus, there must have been a point in time when he went from being a cow-ering child, to teaching himself to be brave and to step up to chal-lenges rather than shirk from them, with a clear understanding of the idea that it’s not the size of the dog in the fight, it’s the size of the fight in the dog.Hardships or not, Pedro always felt loved, wanted; any dis-tresses and setbacks of childhood would have been short-lived. He was safe in the knowledge that the world had the capacity to be a wonderful place, something he showed his family every day.It was Belarmino’s charitable work in Dili that he is best re-membered for and it was this work that had a profound influence as to how Pedro would live his life. Throughout Pedro’s short time with Belarmino he learned the importance of altruism from his father, of helping the needy. Coming himself from humble ori-gins, when the time came to provide help, he would not shirk the

38Marco Loboresponsibility. Belarmino is believed to have composed Christian hymns, perhaps the reason that when Pedro had the opportunity to pursue his love of music, he emulated his father’s interest in it.Until 1896, Timor was under the jurisdiction of Macau. Life there was demanding, the conditions primitive. A proper civil gov-ernment wasn’t fully established until 1913. There is no informa-tion about Pedro’s early schooling in Dili, but the assumption is that he studied under Jesuits who had set up schools there. For-tunately, a practice had been established for boys to be sent from Timor to Macau for studies.14 Some Timorese graduates of Macau schools returned to become prominent members of Timor’s intel-lectual class. And so, at the age of nine, Pedro bade farewell to his father and boarded a ship for the journey to Macau, traveling the 2,700 nautical miles in a crossing that took nearly two weeks.3. Map showing the distance between Timor and Macau.In this modern age of travel, it is easy for us to forget the effort it took to travel between these two Portuguese territories. The map above shows East Timor at the bottom right hand corner, and Macau at the top center.

41...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José LoboChapter 3City of the Name of GodOf my eyes, why is it you do not remain?You who like the crystalline waterOf a spring flow on into never again!...Or into the dark lake that marks the terminalOf your course, silent among the rushes,And the vague anguishing fear begins to swell,- Why leave without me, why not take me as well?An excerpt from the poem ‘Images that flicker across the retinas’15 by Camilo Pessanha When Pedro arrived in Macau in 1901, Camillo Pessanha was employed in the colony as a judge. The symbolist poet and lawyer16 was a respected teacher as well as an influential figure in the cul-tural and political world of Macau. He acted as an advisor to sev-eral of the colony’s governors. He lived in Macau from 1894 until his death in 1926. For the final decade of Pessanha’s life, Pedro worked for the BNU, the Banco Nacional Ultramarino. Perhaps Pedro associated with Pessanha and that the poet inspired him to appreciate and promote cultural activities in Macau. Imagine the excitement of any nine-year-old at the first sight of a new home; anticipation would have built up over the journey,

42Marco Lobothe inquisitive child would have asked questions about the new place and soaked in every bit of information, adding it to what he already knew. He and his shipmates would have gazed down at the sea, at its perceptible change in color from the clear blue wa-ters of the Bandar Sea to one brownish and heavy with silt as the vessel sailed northwards crossing the Pearl River Delta — a sail-ing route known by sandalwood traders for centuries. And then, the thrill of actually sighting Macau for the first time; its outer harbour dotted with freighters and Chinese junks, the sweeping shoreline of the Praia Grande of the City of the Name of God.17 A handwritten message on a postcard of the era reads: Doesn’t this look attractive? It is a lovely place with good roads flowers, trees, and public gardens. It’s Portuguese territory by concession.18 And yet, as attractive as it was, advancements in technology and the acceptance of new ideas tended to move at a snail’s pace in old Macau. Certainly, economics played an important role in early or later adoption of technologies, but stoic conservatism also pervaded parts of Macau society. Here is an example of that atti-tude by way of a comments submitted to Hong Kong Portuguese weekly O Porvir of 3rd August 1901.In a city such as Macau, at the mercy of frequent ty-phoons and governed at night by a tranquility which is al-most parochial, and where the lights-out call of the garrison troops might be said to hold for the rest of the population, electric illumination would be a superfluous luxury were it not also a hazard; and, in full knowledge that it does not command the necessary resources for other pressing improve-ments, it would be most profligate of the Authorities to in-

43...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José Lobotroduce extravagant illumination of the thoroughfares, at 10 or 11 o’clock after nightfall, for the benefit of a few loafers and tardy gamesters...We find that Macau would therefore be better served by gas illumination, which is cheaper and could be put to both public and domestic use. To all this, we stand firm in our support for the continuation of oil-fired illumination, not merely because it is more economical, but also because there is leeway for improvement, which, with obvious advantages, would bring it onto a par with gas and even with electricity.Pedro was enrolled in the Seminary of St. Joseph, which by the time of his arrival in had been in operation for 173 years. The institution played an integral role in Catholic missions into China and Japan, with academic curriculum that rivaled those of uni-versities of the time. By his own account, he enjoyed his school years and benefitted greatly from the excellent teachers that pre-pared him for a future full of challenges. It was in the seminary that he further developed a love of music, providing him with an education in musical composition, something that would play an important part in his later life. Compared to Dili at the turn of the century, to Pedro’s eyes Macau would have been a place of wonder. The small territory had a population of about 70 thousand, only about a quarter of Hong Kong’s at the time. Naturally, the vast majority of residents were Chinese with those who considered themselves Portuguese num-bering a couple of thousand at best, including military personnel. Automobiles were a rarity in Macau. There were only four cars during the first years after Pedro’s arrival, and these would have possibly been the first cars Pedro would have ever seen.19It was not until 1919 that Macau even had its first public buses, and the early models were merely trucks fitted with wooden seats.20

44Marco LoboThe name St. Joseph’s evokes images of a beautiful church, but it was in 1758, thirty years after the Jesuit seminary was es-tablished that the church opened its doors.21 It is not commonly known that the seminary came into existence as the result of a donation of three small houses by a Macau merchant. In its three century-long history, it went in and out of Jesuit administration several times as the religious order faced periods of persecution, finally returning to Jesuit hands several years before Pedro’s ar-rival in Macau. He remained at the seminary until 1908 and then stayed on in Macau, taking a course in accountancy.Macau was in constant political turmoil throughout Pedro’s life. Hardly a year went by without some level of unrest. Wit-nessing the events first hand as they unfolded gave young Pedro profound insights into how the colony worked: its leadership, fi-nances, its friends and its foes. Portugal had only been granted occupation rights over Macau in 1887. The Treaty of Peking was considered by the Chinese as one of the ‘unequal treaties’ forced upon China under threat of military force. China had to swallow the bitter pill and reluctant-ly accept another foreign power on her doorstep. The Portuguese and Chinese communities of Macau lived quite separate lives.Portuguese citizens held all senior official roles in the civil ser-vice, military, and even the press. Only about three kilometers long from the Inner Harbour to the Portas do Cerco, (the barrier gate separating Macau from mainland China). The peninsula was di-vided into Portuguese and Chinese districts; Portuguese lived and worked in an area of around three-square kilometers, limited to the colony’s central area around the churches. Those areas were desig-nated as parishes which still exist today, and Macau’s fortifications. It is no secret that colonial society had its own social hier-archy, with those born in Portugal being at the top. Portuguese

45...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José Lobofrom Portugal filled all the important roles. There existed during the 1930’s in Portugal (as in Germany), a serious study of eugen-ics. A position originating with academics at the University of Coimbra, the goal was to establish the evolutionary superiority of the Portuguese in relation to non-European races.22 The idea was put forward that the Portuguese colonial empire was a crucial asset for the institutionalization of eugenics. One of the main pro-ponents of this idea, Eusébio Tamagnini, postulated the colonies could serve as an alternative territory for the ‘fixation of popu-lation’s excess in the continent’, but only if eugenic policies that targeted the Portuguese settlers were to be implemented. In his view, only if ‘intelligent individuals, with strong character and he-redity capacities recognized’ were sent out to the empire could the ‘problem of miscegenation’ be stopped and the perpetuation of the Portuguese ‘superior race’ assured. Nevertheless, 1930 was quite a year for those living in Macau as well as other Portuguese territo-ries; it saw the establishment of the Estado Novo and a colonial act which sought to assimilate Portugal’s overseas territories into one system. Pedro regarded this positively. Until then, the local Por-tuguese, though citizens of Portugal, were not attributed the level of respect as afforded to citizens from the motherland.The local-born Portuguese of Macau and other colonies estab-lished hierarchies of their own. Speaking ‘correct’ Portuguese and being a devout Catholic were the two most important character-istics to be at the top. Furthermore, within Macau’s Portuguese Community a hierarchy existed delineated by the various parishes of Macau, areas that were largely determined by a family’s afflu-ence and, in many cases, its form of livelihood. St. Lawrence, the most ‘elite’ parish, was where Pedro eventually settled. The others were St. Lazarus, St. Anthony and the Cathedral parish. (Taipa and Colane had their own parishes). Rogério Lobo told of how

46Marco Lobohe had been mocked by other lads of the St. Lawrence parish for playing with kids from less affluent ones like St. Anthony, where the police and army families lived.23 A family friend, one of Pe-dro’s neighbors at Praia Grande who grew up in the St. Law-rence Parish, talked disparagingly of ‘those people down the road’ speaking patois instead of proper Portuguese.In the early 1900’s Macau entered a period of economic stag-nation. The activities that had made her a lustrous jewel in Por-tugal’s crown had faded away. Her importance as a trading center had been severely undermined by the establishment of the new British colony of Hong Kong. The nefarious but lucrative busi-ness of coolie shipping had come to an end. Many of the success-ful British traders who had made Macau their base on China’s doorstep had homes in Macau where their families stayed while they traded in Canton. But when Hong Kong was ceded to Great Britain and a full-fledged colony was established there, many of those traders left with their families. However, declining Portu-guese influence in Asia and the rise of Hong Kong can only partly explain Macau’s decline. It also suffered from natural handicaps - the minuscule size of its territory and the lack of a good natural harbour, as well as a lack of modern facilities – were also import-ant contributing factors.Gambling had been legal in Macau since 1847 and brought in significant revenue through licensing of the Pacapio Lottery and Fantan concessions. But this was before gambling took on the much more important role it has in today’s economy. It was even before Macau was known for firecrackers and matches. Neverthe-less, the colonial administration was adequately financed, largely due to its control of the opium trade.It is often forgotten that at the turn of the century Macau did not yet have its own currency. When Pedro arrived in Macau in 1901, most monetary transactions were done with various kinds

47...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José Loboof copper or silver coins or with Chinese promissory notes called pangtans. It wasn’t until the Banco Nacional Ultramarino (BNU) was established in Macau a year after Pedro’s arrival, that a more stable monetary system was established, and that the Macau Pa-taca was formally introduced. Still, it took another three decades before the Macau Pataca became indexed to the Portuguese Es-cudo in 1935. This followed the British Government’s decision to link the Hong Kong Dollar to the British Pound. There will be more to say about the pataca later and the important role it played in Macau’s economic stability. Witnessing these changes first-hand while still at school left strong impressions on the fu-ture economic chief of Macau.The political environment of Macau during Pedro’s teenage years was beset by a series of noteworthy issues. Of prime im-portance was Macau’s relationship with China, in particular the matter of Macau’s borders — a nagging problem that had yet to be resolved throughout numerous administrations. The border was not clearly delineated, and this had an unsettling effect on the daily lives of Macau’s population, who depended on China as its major source of food and water.Then, in successive years, first Portugal and then China both declared independence from centuries-old dynastic rule. Though the relationship with China was worrisome, Pedro was fortunate to have escaped from Timor to the relative security of Macau. From safety he observed the violence of Timor, with great worry for his father’s well-being. As with Macau, most of Timor’s Portuguese governors spent no more than two or three years in the colony. Sometimes they spent just a few months. An exception to this brevity was the ten-ure of José Celestino da Silva. He served in Timor for 14 years, ar-riving in 1894 and leaving in 1908. During that period time he was well-known to Pedro’s father Belarmino who served as President of

48Marco Lobothe Dili City Council. It was under this governor’s administration that Belarmino was able to carry out his modernization plans. Having served King Dom Carlos I, Governor da Silva had connections to the Portuguese monarchy. Through this connec-tion he gained access to modern weapons: machine guns, gre-nades and even the support of a naval gunboat which could be deployed from Macau.24 The governor conducted over 20 military campaigns during his tenure in Timor. Nevertheless, rebellions by local chiefs continued. In fact, the Portuguese only had about 200 Portuguese soldiers and an additional 1,500 local recruits from Dili. The governor relied heavily on the support of local chiefs who at various times raised as many as ten thousand men to fight on the Portuguese side. Despite Governor da Silva’s military cam-paigns, the situation was to get much worse and deteriorated for another five years after his departure.4. Pedro, family and the Catholic Church.This picture taken in 1962 by the swimming pool at Vila Verde when Pedro was 70 years old, is ev-idence of the importance of family and faith in Pedro’s life. Here, two of Pedro’s daughters, Olivia Maria da Conceição and Natércia da Silva, are pictured with their children and the children of his son Pedro Hyndman Lobo.

49...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José Lobo5. Pedro with Jesuits on Coloane.Throughout his life, Pedro remained a supporter of the Catholic Church and its charities. Here he is pictured in 1958 in Coloane with Jesuits, where he donated towards the construction of the building of a retreat house for the priests of St. Joseph’s Seminary.

51...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José LoboChapter 4Identity CrisisThose who were born and raised in a colony, particularly one so far from the motherland as Macau, a place so influenced by the confluence of cultures, will understand the effort that comes with developing a sense of identity. One must accept and establish a connection with the mother country, and then cling to it through-out life as a matter of principle. For many local-born inhabitants of Macau, those who identified as Portuguese, far-away Portugal was a concept, an ideal. To those buying into the ideal, ‘Portu-guese-ness’ had to be learned — everything from language, his-tory, culture, and even religion. After all, one could not be a good Portuguese unless they were baptized as Catholics. Then how should one feel when there is a sea change in the mother country, a seismic shift in one of the country’s fundamental tenets? Such a change occurred when Pedro was 18 years old, coming with the abolition of the Portuguese monarchy.On October 5th, 1910, Portugal’s monarchy was overthrown and replaced by the Portuguese Republic. Political revolutions can sometimes be slow and peaceful. There was ‘People Power’, the non-violent revolution that restored democracy in the Philippines and ended Ferdinand Marcos’s 21-year rule. There are other ex-amples of non-violent revolutions, but they are not common. Short and bloody ones are the more common way governments are over-

52Marco Lobothrown. In Portugal’s case, it was short and bloody variety, though reasons for it were long in the making. As far back as 1891, there had been a failed anti-monarchy revolution in Portugal over a na-tionalist humiliation by the British involving Portugal’s African colonies. Portugal’s capitulation left lingering feelings against the monarchy’s weak response.Portugal’s Republican Party was another factor that fueled dissent. It offered up a panacea to the public — one that would fix all the misfortunes of the nation, promising to rise it to its former grandeur. It did so by fundamentally emphasizing the principles of nationalism and colonialism. The perfect storm continued to build when in 1908, King Dom Carlos I and his eldest son and heir-ap-parent, Luís Filipe were assassinated in Lisbon after a hunting trip. After the assassination of his father, 18-year old Dom Man-uel II ascended the throne. Due to his youth and the tragic way in which he reached the throne, the young king initially received sympathy from the public. But despite a temporary calm, the po-litical climate continued to descend into chaos, resulting in the country having seven different governments in a two-year period.In the summer of 1910, rumors circulated like wildfire around Lisbon of an imminent coup d’état. Indeed, the rumors were be-lieved by the government to be true and it ordered all the garrison troops of the city to be on alert. But with about two thousand soldiers and sailors deserting to join the opposition, the military was reluctant to enter combat with their former comrades. The Republic was proclaimed on the morning of October 5th in Lisbon from the balcony of the Paços do Concelho.That news of the change in government reached Macau five days later by telegram shows how really far away Macau was. The distance was not only physical but in the minds of the leaders in the motherland, even though the Republican Party had touted the im-portance of colonialism as one of its main guiding principles. There

53...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José Lobowas speculation at the time that Lisbon was hesitant to report the news, as those newly in power were not completely confident that the new republic would endure. Macau’s importance rose and fell in Lisbon depending on the value it brought to the empire. During this time, it was at a low point, though unlike some of Portugal’s other colonies, it was still able to pay its own way.With Portuguese citizens of Macau having established their own sense of identity, for the most part they were quite indifferent to news of the new republic.25Other than from formal portraits and history books, Macau was far from really knowing about Portugal’s royal family. It had no direct experience of an incompetent and corrupt monarchy, nor did it receive any material benefit from it. Macau pretty much governed itself and was economically self-sufficient. Its politics were not about partisanship, but about striving for a balance with China and other trading partners. One then can understand its indifference and how news of the political change was met with little more than mild curiosity and a shrug of the shoulders.Nevertheless, Portugal’s overseas expansion and the establish-ment of its colonies were the results of actions taken by the King-dom of Portugal. This ascribed a level of reverence that supported the identity of the Portuguese of Macau. Even if the transition to republicanism did not materially affect Macau’s citizens, in the minds of those who called themselves Portuguese, there would have been a psychological one. Pedro took great pride in being Portuguese, as did many others in Macau. In his home were pic-tures of heroic deeds performed by the great explorers. One worth noting was an Azulejos, glazed ceramic tilework, depicting Ada-mastor, the mythological giant created by the Luís de Camões in Os Lusíadas. The character symbolized the forces of nature that Portuguese navigators had to overcome during their voyages of discovery. Christianity too was a driving force and visitors to his

54Marco Lobohome were reminded of his religious devotion by a somber art-work of Judgement Day casting a dark mood over his sitting room.Since the earliest days of its settlement as a trading post, Macau had acted with a high-level of independence, establishing a Senate consisted of key traders of the time without the autho-rization of Goa, Portugal’s power-base in Asia.26 Although cap-tains major and, later, governors exercised a degree of control, these leaders were transients. The captains major were Portu-guese Government appointees responsible for the lucrative Ja-pan trade. Macau’s Senate took every opportunity to maintain its sense of independence by managing the day-to-day activities of the territory. Thus, for the first decades of its existence, the run-ning of Macau was left for the most part to the people who lived there, a tradition of local independence that would continue for the next four centuries.Governors of Macau came and went with a frequency that never allowed deeper insights into the colony. This was true of Eduardo Augusto Marques, Macau’s 95th governor. He had to make a hasty departure due to the change in Portugal’s govern-ment — after all, he was an appointment of the monarchy. He had been in office for just 209 days. Unlike nearby Hong Kong where governors served between four to six years, Macau’s gover-nors normally served just two to three years, never long enough to learn about China or to make substantive improvements to the lives and well-being of the Chinese and Portuguese citizens. Of-ten, the governors were talented and well-connected politicians and military officials. Certainly, many were adept at building roads and bridges, even at crushing rebellions, but could expe-rience in Angola be applied to Macau? How could it be so when even Timor and Macau were so different? Observing these goings on, it was quite evident to Pedro that no matter how clever or tal-ented these governors were as military commanders, or how well

55...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José Lobothey performed as colonial leaders in other parts of the empire, the short stints and lack of continuity invariably created a power vac-uum at the top. The gap had to be filled by people that understood that trust was built on longevity. Someone was needed at the top who understood Macau and its gigantic neighbor China, someone who would stay in place and work for its people.Governor Marques left a month after the republic was formed and was replaced by a new governor in December of 1910. Though the local Portuguese were apathetic to the change, the uncertain-ty of how Macau would be administered caused many Chinese to flee, not knowing how they would be treated by the new regime. This outflow caused some distress in the local economy but even-tually, as things stabilized, Macau’s Chinese residents returned.The new governor, Álvaro de Melo Machado was a naval of-ficer. His name may be familiar due to a street being named after him. He stayed two years but the only notable accomplishment during his term was establishing the Boy Scouts of Macau. Nev-ertheless, something else of much greater significance did occur during his term. In 1911, China went through its own revolution when the Qing Dynasty was overthrown after two and a half cen-turies of rule, and the Republic of China came into being.One might think of a revolution as an organized, coordinated series of events that culminates in an epoch-changing confron-tation. It was in the case of Portugal when the coup d’état or-ganized by the Portuguese Republican Party brought down the centuries-old monarchy. Unlike that situation, in which change happened relatively quickly, in China warring parties had already been in conflict for decades. Even after the official declaration of a republic in 1912, the unstable situation in China lasted for a pro-longed period, involving a highly complex set of circumstances. For Macau this meant having to survive the effects of its colos-sal neighbor embroiled in a civil war between two governments,

56Marco Loboone in neighboring Guangdong, the other based in Beijing in the north. Hostilities in Guangzhou were a real threat to peace in Macau. The civil war fought between warlords would continue until 1928.Life went on in Macau albeit with a heightened sense of alarm during those turbulent years. Macau’s population endured crisis after crisis, hoping for the best. Living through such momentous changes while Pedro was still in his late teens had the effect of normalizing bad news. One thing, however, became crystal clear to him. Macau’s survival and prosperity depended on how valu-able she was to any would-be invaders as an independent territory. Pedro understood that for Macau to survive, it had to be ‘useful’ and he did everything he could to ensure that to the people that mattered, an independent Macau would be seen as useful. So im-portant was this concept to him that the opening paragraph of a book he wrote27 states:The Province of Macau, due to its geographical position and, above all, to the high (standard) and relevant services rendered to the maintenance of our sovereignty and to the cause of the evangelization and diffusion of the Sciences and Arts, in these confines of the Orient, holds a prominent place in national politics and economics.

59...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José LoboChapter 5TimorThrough the years spent in Macau, Pedro had come to think of himself as a Macanese. Although he still had ties to Timor and made periodic visits, he had little intention of returning and making a life there after his schooling. News of violent uprisings in Timor were well-known, a fact made clear by the presence of a gunboat ready to support Dili whenever required. If Macau lacked enthusiasm for the republican revolution in Portugal, news of it was bewildering for East Timor’s population.A telegram was received in Dili on October 7th with the news of the overthrow of the monarchy. It was confirmed by the out-going governor later that month when he formally proclaimed the republic. The ouster of the Portuguese monarchy baffled many native Timorese. They had been encouraged to adopt and venerate the royal regalia, going as far integrating it into their sacred symbols and using it as part of the royal insignia of their own native chiefs. Now Portuguese officials had the job of ex-plaining why the royal emblems had to be replaced, upending the centuries-long efforts of persuading native tribes to accept Portuguese monarchs as their ultimate rulers.The native revolts in Timor grew ever more violent. Anger truly boiled over in 1906, when an unstable economy at home drove the Portuguese to take larger amounts from its colonies. In

60Marco LoboTimor, this came in the form of a capitation, or head tax, a highly unpopular move that required all heads of native households to pay the colonial government an annual sum.28Opposition to the tax grew. Several local Timorese king-doms led by a powerful chief called Dom Boaventura formed an alliance and revolted against the Portuguese.29 In February 1912, native rebels attacked Dili. Killing and burning as they went, the insurgents stormed into Government House. They at-tacked soldiers and their officers, and several Portuguese were even decapitated. Reinforcements had to be brought in from Mozambique and a gunboat from Macau the Pátria was brought in to help quell the rebellion. It is estimated that the war and repression may have killed up to 25,000 Timorese — 5 percent of the colonial population.30One of the villages was attacked while the native queen and an assembly of native chiefs was in session. Then the gunboat landed infantry that encircled and attacked the native forces, cap-turing and killing many of them. The bombardment and assault are said to have killed 1,000 natives. The Portuguese troops even-tually pushed the rebels into ever smaller territories. Once again, Portugal’s superior weaponry — artillery, ma-chine guns, grenades and the deployment of the gunboat Pátria to shell coastal areas — won the day. Due to their shortage of guns, the Timorese natives preferred hit-and-run guerilla tac-tics and avoided open close combat with the well-armed Por-tuguese. From the record of weapons captured from the native forces we can get an idea of their martial disadvantage. They re-lied on spears more than guns. They suffered from a shortage of gun powder and of the weapons seized there were 36 rifles, 590 flintlocks and 495 swords.31In the final battle in July of 1912 one that sealed the fate of the Timorese rebels, the Times of London reported that over 3,000

61...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José LoboTimorese were killed or wounded and another 4,000 captured. On the Portuguese side, 289 were killed and 600 wounded.This final battle marked the completion of East Timor’s paci-fication and from then on, the native states were extinct. This brief description of events provides the background for a better under-standing of why a full functioning civil government wasn’t estab-lished until 1913, more than a decade after Pedro had left for his schooling in Macau. The unrest and violence in Timor played a determining factor in his decision not to return there. His final visit is believed to have been in 1920. The circumstances of this trip will be explained in a later chapter.

63...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José LoboChapter 6Staying RelevantMacau’s precarious position, surrounded and dependent on China for its food and water continued to worry its residents. Chi-na still claimed the island of Lapa, which was Macau’s source of fresh water. And the next challenge was to come — the Great War.At the start of the First World War in 1914, Portugal re-mained neutral, not siding with any of the belligerent alliances. The people of Macau were ecstatic, knowing that if Portugal were to take sides, little Macau would be in great danger from any na-tion in the region that saw it as the enemy. Also fortunate for Macau, China did not immediately enter the fight. Macau’s neu-trality did not last long. Britain, Portugal’s oldest ally was deeply involved in the fight. Residents of Macau also were aware that Portuguese and German troops had clashed in Angola. So, it was no surprise when Portugal officially announced it would enter the war on 9th March 1916. Portugal’s entry into the war had little effect on the daily lives of Macanese. The most imminent threats to Macau were Chi-nese warlords that controlled different parts of southern China. Though declared a republic, Chinese government control did not extend throughout the country, and particularly, to a region as far from Beijing as Guangdong. Macau was already being used as a hiding place by criminal gangs, pirates and people wanted by

64Marco Lobothe Chinese authorities. With so few soldiers stationed in Macau it might have even been the subject of a takeover by a strongly armed gang. As a measure to bolster general defenses, a volunteer corps, the Macau Volunteer Corps, was established in Macau. Men with ‘sufficient stamina’ were invited to join in the call for volunteers. This resulted in one hundred and ten men aged be-tween 17 and 45 joining.At first hearing this, a cynic might think ‘better than nothing I suppose’, given the strength of forces stacked up against the lit-tle territory. But the Volunteer Corps was very positively viewed at the time, raising morale in Macau when everyone knew the enclave was indefensible due to its penetrable topography. Over time the corps grew to a force of over four hundred. Although they never went into battle, they were well-known for attractive march-pasts and band concerts.The way Pedro interacted with society in general was as what we now call a networker. Never shy to make new acquaintances, he built a wide range of relationships that crossed boundaries of race, culture and social status. Even as a young man, twenty-two years old at the start of the Great War, he had his ears and eyes open. As an employee of the Banco Nacional Ultramarino (BNU) he had access to financial information from which to form his own ideas about the colony’s financial management. Flush with money from its opium business and Chinese lottery, Macau was the only one of Portugal’s overseas territories able to provide for itself and have a considerable financial surplus. Knowing this, Lisbon re-quested a loan from Macau of 120,000 escudos (270,000 patacas) to fund war efforts in Angola and Mozambique. The loan was vehemently opposed by the Leal Senado, but in secret, the local bank manager transferred the funds anyway. Although a loan, the funds were never repaid.

65...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José LoboMacau had an important role played in the political mach-inations of Portugal and China at the time of the two-year rule of José Carlos da Maia, Governor of Macau from 1914 to 1916. If Portugal’s representative made big political waves in Macau, it might have resulted in China engulfing the little territory. Macau placed emphasis on communicating with the powers of neighbor-ing Guangdong Province which provided it with most of what it needed. But Lisbon spoke to Beijing, a situation that sometimes led to misunderstandings. It is just as well that for the most part Ma-cau’s citizens greeted the idea of the Republican Revolution with indifference. With civil war raging in China, it wouldn’t have been prudent for Macau to have taken sides, particularly as the outcome of the struggle in China was a Communist victory and relegation of Kuomintang, (the KMT) and its followers to the island of Formosa.Governor da Maia had been a stalwart supporter of Portu-gal’s republican movement and an important member of the Por-tuguese government. A controversial figure and one many would call divisive, the governor’s time in Macau coincided with a pe-riod when Sun Yat Sen, the “Father of Modern China”, was in the colony along with others who used Macau as a confidential base. Now two republican revolutionaries with their movements in their infancies were in a position to meet.33In the run-up to the Portuguese revolution in 1910, Carlos da Maia was a senior naval officer and one of the main figures within the revolutionary network. He coordinated directly with instiga-tors of the revolt as well as passed information as to the navy’s revolutionary network, going as far as ensuring the support of the Portuguese Navy during the revolt. In particular, da Maia ordered the navy to launch an artillery attack in order to drive the King out of the city of Lisbon.The two years he spent in Macau afforded Carlos da Maia the ideal opportunity to interact with Sun Yat Sen’s local supporters.

66Marco LoboOver the ensuing decades these people formed the core group of the (KMT). Also, in Macau at the time was Sun Mei, Sun Yat Sen’s brother, a wealthy businessman who had strong connections with Chinese secret societies, to which he introduced his broth-er. So firm was Carlos da Maia’s support that Carlos da Maia received a personal letter from Sun Yat Sen in French, thanking him personally for helping the China’s Republican Cause. It is not known what specific ways Carlos da Maia helped Sun.The Governor was ordered back to Lisbon in 1916. It was so sudden that a replacement did not arrive in Macau for another two years. The governor’s official reason for returning to Portugal was to clarify actions that needed to be taken regarding Macau’s harbour. At issue was funding for the project. The money was held as a reserve by the BNU and the Hong Kong and Shanghai Bank of which a part of it had already been diverted to support Portugal’s African colonies. In fact, though the harbour issue was of high importance, it had already been discussed over a long pe-riod and this reason, though possible, seemed implausible.Carlos da Maia’s journey to Portugal would have taken about a month. Starting in Shanghai, the route the RMS Empress of Russia, a Royal Mail Steamship of the Canadian Pacific Lines, stopped in ports in Japan and Canada before crossing from New York to London and finally to Lisbon. There are suggestions that da Maia used his time in Shanghai to meet with people close to the Chinese Republican Movement, perhaps with Sun’s family. But there are no official reports to support this idea. Whether Portugal’s official position was to support China’s fledgling repub-lican movement or not, it certainly was Carlos da Maia’s intention to do so.Over the period he served as governor, the people of Macau watched da Maia try to carry out reforms. Perhaps the most local-ly controversial was his attempt to dissolve the Leal Senado. The

67...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José LoboLeal Senado survived. Another, which might have destroyed Ma-cau forever, was the decision to take control of the disputed island of Lapa by force, thinking that China’s instability might offer the opportunity and that it would finally set to rest the question of Macau’s borders.In April 1916, Macau was stunned by gunfire coming from Lapa Island. Some houses were hit, and shots were fired in the area where the gunboat Pátria was moored. The gunfire was the result of fighting between different factions trying to take control of South China. Now the conflict had reached Macau.Governor da Maia decided to send an Army officer with twen-ty policemen to Lapa in order to assert Portuguese sovereignty. The Chinese responded by sending 100 soldiers to Lapa and another military force to the Chinese side of the Portas do Cerco, forcing an end to the mission, with Macau’s forces having to retreat.Carlos da Maia’s story ends in tragedy. Although he suffered setbacks due to the actions taken in Macau, his career eventual-ly recovered. He became Minister of the Navy and of the Col-onies. However, in October 1921 he was brutally murdered in Lisbon along with several others during what is known as the ‘Bloody Night’.

69...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José LoboChapter 7The Great WarIn 1917, China finally entered the war on the same side as Portugal and against Germany. China already had harboured strong anti-German feelings since 1897. Germany had used the murder of two German missionaries as a reason to attack Qingd-ao, effectively turning it into a German colony. They were run out by the Japanese in 1915. The Chinese declaration was symbolic. In truth she had al-ready provided support to her anti-German allies. Starting in late 1916, China began shipping thousands of men to Britain, France and Russia. Those laborers would repair tanks, assemble artillery shells, transport supplies and munitions, and help to literally re-shape the war’s battle sites.In March of 1917, Macau was astonished by an incredible news story. A Reuters news cable reported ‘Macao Sold — Pur-chased by Japan’.

70Marco LoboMACAO SOLD PURCHASED BY JAPAN.Newspaper column in ‘The Sun’ (New Zealand) dated March 20, 1917.The false claim was followed up a few days later by denials printed in newspapers in New Zealand. One can imagine the shock waves that the news caused. The person that planted the false story was never revealed. But most agreed with the follow-up news report that it was likely disinformation spread to sow discord amongst the Allies.

71...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José LoboAN OFFICIAL DENIAL. ENEMY INTRIGUE.Denial by the Portuguese Government, dated March 30, 1917.

73...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José LoboChapter 8An Education in Banking and FinanceUntil this stage in his life, Pedro’s experiences living in Macau seemed to have been just a series of misfortunes, what in Ma-cau sometimes were referred to as ‘incidents’. Though there were many, and more to come, for the most part, Macau remained a pleasant place to live.Those dreamy images painted by George Chinnery and later by George Smirnoff captured the true beauty and tranquility of the little enclave. Work life did not take on the level of importance it has in modern times. For modern-day visitors to Macau, it is almost impossible to imagine the peaceful lives residents of the colony lived a century ago — an existence that revolved around faith and family.There had been limited communication between Pedro in Macau and his father in Timor. But after living in Timor for three decades, Belarmino had stated his intention to return home to Goa. Pedro chose to stay in Macau after leaving school, initial-ly earning a living as a mathematics teacher at the Escola Com-mercial Pedro Nolasco. Pedro continued his education by taking a course in account-ing. In his early 20’s he was offered a job at the Banco Nacion-al Ultramarino, the BNU. This life-altering opportunity came through the introduction and recommendations of two influen-

74Marco Lobotial clergymen, D. Jose da Costa Nunes, Bishop of Macau, and D. Antonio Maia, the rector of the St. Joseph Seminary. These men strongly believed in Pedro’s abilities and encouraged him to remain in Macau.After a couple of decades of operation, the BNU had built a solid foundation and a reputation to match. It had in effect be-come Macau’s central bank after taking over all the government’s cash. In those days its offices were in a grand old house on Rua da Praia Grande. It remained there until the new building was erect-ed in 1926. The bank was a perfect place to learn about managing the finances of Macau. Administration of the Pacapio Lottery and fantan licensing gave Pedro an understanding of the gaming business. Little did he know how important that learning would be for his future role. The bank played an important part in Macau society and had a role in keeping the government funded, with loans to pub-lic institutions such as the Leal Senado (Loyal Senate) Pedro used the opportunity not only to just learn. Along the way he built firm relationships with its management by taking his re-sponsibilities seriously and developing a deep respect for the role the BNU played.

77...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José LoboChapter 9The Japanese and MacauThe Japanese Imperial Army virtually occupied Macau during the Second World War. They had been perceived as a threat to Macau for decades, but their presence was most strong-ly felt in 1941 when the enclave became entirely dependent on the Japanese who controlled all access to food and trade. It is worth a brief look at the five-century long history between Japan and Macau to better understand the deep and complex relation-ship they share.Until 1853, Japan had closed itself off from the rest of the world for more than two centuries. Under sakoku, an isolationist foreign policy that means ‘closed country’, contact and trade with non-Japanese was severely restricted. Japanese were kept from leaving their country and most foreigners were barred. There were however, exceptions to these restrictions. Trade with Chi-na continued with the Chinese allowed a trading and residential area in Nagasaki. Also in Nagasaki, the Dutch, the only Euro-peans present, were permitted to establish a factory on the island of Dejima.Prior to the Sakoku edicts, foreign trade had flourished with large numbers of foreign traders visiting Japan and Japanese mis-sions had been sent as far afield as Mexico. It was during this period of unrestrained flow of not only goods but of ideas that

78Marco LoboChristianity was introduced to Japan, first in the mid 1500’s by Portuguese Catholics, and later by increasing numbers of Portu-guese and Spanish missionaries, the most famous of them being the Jesuit Francis Xavier who arrived in 1549.Within a few years, tens of thousands of Japanese including some feudal lords had converted to Christianity with an estimated 300,000 converts at its peak. One of the biggest concerns of the sho-gun, the military dictator of Japan, was that of loyalty and whether allegiance to the shogun or the pope would take precedence.The shogunate began to persecute Christians as a deterrence and by 1635, Sakoku went into effect. The Dutch and English were treated less harshly due to their non-religious attitudes. It could be said that it was largely due to Portuguese influence that Japan locked itself away from the world for 220 years.As can be seen from the Japanese edict below, Macau was already well-known as the place from which Catholic missions were launched.A version of the 1636 Seclusion Edict:No Japanese ship nor any native of Japan, shall pre-sume to go out of the country; whoever acts contrary to this, shall die, and the ship with the crew and goods aboard shall be sequestered until further orders. All persons who return from abroad shall be put to death. Whoever discovers a Christian priest shall have a reward of 400 to 500 sheets of silver and for every Christian in proportion. All Namban (Portuguese and Spanish) who propagate the doctrine of the Catholics, or bear this scandalous name, shall be imprisoned in the Onra, or common jail of the town.

79...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José LoboThe whole race of the Portuguese with their moth-ers, nurses and whatever belongs to them, shall be ban-ished to Macao. Whoever presumes to bring a letter from abroad, or to return after he hath been banished, shall die with his family; also, whoever presumes to intercede for him, shall be put to death. No nobleman nor any soldier shall be suffered to purchase anything from the foreigner.A more in-depth look at Macau’s historical ties with Japan can be found in Appendix 1, in the rear section of this book.

81...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José LoboChapter 10War and RefugeesThe sense of danger heightened in Macau in February 1942. Just weeks after the fall of Hong Kong, the Japanese Army invad-ed Portuguese Timor. That Timor, Pedro’s birthplace was under Japanese occupation with its entire Portuguese administration under arrest, weighed heavily on Pedro’s mind. By 1942 he had been the chief of Macau’s Economic Services for nearly a decade. More than ever, Macau was a chess-piece in the delicate balance of Portuguese-Japanese relations.The Dutch had sided with the Allies but was occupied by Nazi Germany and in no position to defend West Timor on its own. Fearing that the Japanese would attack them as part of their push through Asia, they sought help from Australia. Australia, less than 700 kilometers away agreed to provide aircraft and troops to defend Timor. Following the Japanese attacks on Pearl Harbor and Hong Kong, combined Dutch and Australian forces totaling about 1,400 men prepared to defend Dutch Timor. The Allied position was hardened further after the Japanese attacked the northern Australian city of Darwin, sinking Ameri-can ships in the harbor, raising fears of more attacks on Australia and losing Timor.

82Marco LoboRequests for Portugal to get involved in defending the island were rejected due to its neutral stance. The Dutch-Australian force subsequently also occupied Portuguese Timor to protect its flank from a Japanese attack.In February 1942, the Imperial Japanese Army began its inva-sion of both Portuguese and Dutch Timor and was soon in con-trol of much of the island. Greatly outnumbered, the Australians eventually withdrew. The Japanese took control of much of the island and held it for the next three years.Diplomatically, this put even more strain on the delicate bal-ance between Japan and Portugal. The Japanese still needed Lis-bon’s neutrality for its intelligence gathering, and Macau was re-quired as a neutral zone to access supplies and use as a spy base.Pedro believed that if the Japanese were to be appeased, al-lowed to ‘do their thing’ in order to keep Macau safe, then he was certainly going to do own his thing, clandestinely of course. In nearby Hong Kong, the Japanese were everywhere. The British colony was under martial law. At any moment, Macau could share the same fate, this despite its neutral status, now that Timor was occupied, and a Japanese consular presence had been established in Macau the year before.Macau’s wartime population had grown to three times its original size from the start of the outbreak of hostilities. Much work needed to be done to feed Macau’s mounting population.Though the influence Japan had on Macau was substantial and to a large extent they controlled the goings on of the little enclave, there were other important players on the scene. Macau was infil-trated by clusters of spies and agents serving different belligerent groups, including the Chinese Nationalists, Chinese Communists, and the British Army Aid Group (BAAG). Apart from these were the triads working for various parties as well as smaller groups or in-dividuals that acted for personal gain such as small-time smugglers.

83...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José LoboIt is worth noting some historical context in terms of the Japanese military’s interest in Macau. As previously mentioned, relations between Portugal and Japan go back as far as the six-teenth century. After a successful start with Portuguese intro-ducing and selling guns to Japan, and successfully trading highly sought-after Chinese goods, things got rather bitter. First with the abhorrent practice of Japanese slave trading by Portuguese merchants35 and then eventually being completely banned from Japan for spreading Christianity. Macau was recognized as a training location from which to send Catholic missionaries to Japan and other Asia countries. Many of Japan’s exiled Chris-tians went to Macau and worked as artisans, building St. Paul’s Church, now in ruins. It was clear from the attention Japan was giving Macau that they had their eyes fixed on the territory. Their intentions to dom-inate, if not to take over outright, was shown in approaches and demands made almost every year beginning in the 1920’s.When Pedro began working for the Macau Government in 1927 at the age of 35, his first major role was to take over the ad-ministration of the opium business. It would remain an important part of Macau’s finances for the next two decades. The governor at the time was Artur Tamagnini de Sousa Barbosa. He would serve as Governor three times. He first arrived in Macau as a baby in 1882 when his father, Artur Tamagnini de Abreu da Mota Bar-bosa was the Inspector of the Treasury. He attended St. Joseph’s Seminary and the Macao High School until the age of 19 and returned to Portugal with his family in 1900. Pedro only arrived in Macau the following year. In 1926, it was Governor Barbo-sa’s second time to serve in Macau. His first appointment was in 1918 following José Carlos da Maia’s hasty departure and served as governor that time for merely 10 months. On this second ap-pointment, Barbosa served for over four years.

84Marco LoboIn 1929, Japan requested and was given fishing rights in Ma-cau waters. Japan had become one of the world’s largest fishing nations. Its local fish stocks were being depleted and it had to actively acquire rights further afield. Macau, being so close, was a natural choice.36The Japanese also had their eyes on Timor around the same time. A semi-government organization called the Nan’yō Kōhatsu K.K., also known the South Seas Development Company, with the secret sponsorship of the Imperial Japanese Navy, began to invest heavily in Timor. It formed a joint-venture with Timor’s main plantation company and by the mid-1930’s effectively con-trolled Timor’s imports and exports. Japan’s moves towards com-plete domination of the Asian region were becoming clearer. Fierce fighting was going on in Northern China between the Communists and the Kuomintang. Naturally Macau’s population was frightened that the fighting would move south and involve Guangdong Province. After all, Canton had been where the Kuo-mintang had come into being. They could see that Japan had be-gun to make moves in China. In 1931, Japan invaded Manchuria.That same year, a Japanese gunboat sailed into Macau’s harbor and dropped anchor. Macau had been the home of Sun Yat Sen, the first provisional president of the Republic of China, the first leader of the Kuomintang, and a defender of Manchuria as part of China. Now deceased, his successor Chiang Kai Shek affirmed the rights of jurisdiction of Macau by Portugal. The Japanese had manufactured an incident as an excuse to invade Manchuria. Per-haps this was the same game they were trying to play with Macau. In any case the authorities were very careful not to provoke them. The gunboat’s presence was more than merely a show of force. It was a threat. A while later, the gunboat sailed away without in-cident, but everyone knew then that there would be more trouble with the Japanese.

85...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José LoboCoinciding with the Japanese gunboat threat, to reassure the people of Macau and to reaffirm the colonial policy, a famil-iar face returned to Macau. Joaquim Anselmo de Mata Oliveira came back, this time as governor. A capable naval officer and statesman, before returning to Macau he served as Chief Minis-ter of the Portuguese Navy. In 1910, when based in Macau as a First Lieutenant, he led an attack against a pirate gang on Coloane Island. They were scantily dressed but well-armed men and women who attacked cargo ships and coastal communities with ferocity. This group had made its base on Coloane and taken a several dozen local villagers hostage.The gunboat Macao, with a contingent of ground troops and police, the pirate lair was first bombarded, then attacked by land. After heavy fighting the pirates were defeated. Those not killed or who did not escape later faced trial. A monument to the victory over the pirates stands near the Chapel of St. Francis Xavier on Coloane. The gunboat, Macao did more than just protect the citizens with her weapons, as you will read later, and Joaquim Anselmo de Mata Oliveira would return to Macau for a third time.Working for the Macau government allowed Pedro to make a wide range of acquaintances and exposed him to many oppor-tunities. He had been with the government for just four years when he was asked to be Portugal’s representative to an inter-national economic conference in Bangkok. It was then he truly realized that he would not be held back on account of race. Por-tugal was indeed treating its colonies as equals.Continuing its Asian expansion activities, Japan made several more attempts to take over various aspects of Macau’s economy, such as trying to control its water supply. These attempts were thwarted. But Japan continued to maintain a very strong interest

86Marco Loboin Macau, valuing its strategic location as well as its trading net-work. Fears intensified in 1936 when the Japanese declared their alliance with the Axis powers Germany and Italy. To many west-ern scholars, the start of the Second World War was marked by Germany’s invasion of Poland. But to those living in the Asian region it began when Japan invaded Manchuria. From then on, Japan and China were involved in a full-scale war. The Soviets, too, were involved in skirmishes with Japanese troops along the Manchuria-Mongolia border.In 1937 there were a number of incidents involving the Jap-anese that raised tensions. The Japanese were constantly testing Macau’s border both on the Chinese side of the Portas do Cerco, where they harassed anyone coming or going, as well as on the Chinese islands nearest to Macau. Again, Macau did its best to act with restraint, knowing that the Japanese might use any ex-cuse as a reason for attack or invasion.Though they were expecting it, Macau’s worst fears were re-alized when Guangzhou fell to the Japanese in 1938. It had been under bombardment for the past year. This meant with the Japa-nese in control of South China, Macao’s source of food was under threat. Exacerbating the situation, a mass exodus of Chinese from Guangdong began flooding into Macau to escape the fighting.The situation worsened with the declaration of war by the United Kingdom against Germany. This meant that Hong Kong, their important trading partner, had now been drawn into the conflict against Japan and the Axis powers. Though the An-glo-Portuguese Alliance remained intact, Macau rejoiced when Portugal declared its neutrality. The colony had been in this posi-tion before during the First World War, but this time the stakes were much higher. The dangers were nearer and more powerful.Hong Kong was experiencing its own problems with an influx of refugees streaming down from the fighting in China. At first

87...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José Lobothe number of refugees entering Macau from Hong Kong was small. All this soon changed. On 8th December 1941, the day after the attack on Pearl Harbour, the Japanese Army invaded Hong Kong. Though British Hong Kong had not been officially at war with Japan, it had been bracing for an attack and had prepared its defenses as best it could. But its fortifications proved completely inadequate against the overwhelming force of the Imperial Japa-nese Army. Winston Churchill, Britain’s wartime Prime Minis-ter, was opposed to providing Hong Kong with a robust defense.37 The colony did its best with what it had, about 14,000 troops, many of whom were volunteers, to defend against an invading force six times its size, well-trained and equipped, and already battle-hardened by years of war in China.The Japanese assault force fought its way down through the New Territories. In less than a week it had set up gun positions across the harbor from Hong Kong Island. On 15th December, the Japanese began to bombard the northern shore of Hong Kong Island. When the Japanese demands of surrender were denied, on the evening of 18th December, they swarmed across the harbor, and came ashore on the island’s north-east. By the afternoon of Christmas Day, 1941, it had become clear that it would be im-possible to hold them off. The Governor of Hong Kong, Sir Mark Aitchison Young, along with other officials of the British colony, went to the third floor of the Peninsula Hong Kong Hotel where the Japanese were headquartered and surrendered. Margaret Choa, the girl who was to marry Pedro’s son Rogério and become Pedro’s daughter-in-law, witnessed the Japanese as-sault on Hong Kong Island and later spoke of her experience. As I walked home from church one morning, I heard big blasts that sounded like bombs. We didn’t know what it was but when we got home to our house on Broadwood Road

88Marco Lobowe went out onto our veranda from where we could see all the way to the harbor and across to Kaitak Airport. We saw airplanes flying past and bombing Kaitak.When the Japanese arrived on the Kowloon side, they began shelling Hong Kong. I remember going into our gar-den with my brother Andrew from where we looked up watching shells whizzing past into the hillside, foolishly not understanding the extent of what was going on and not realizing the danger we were in. From our veranda, we watched the Japanese crossing the harbor. From where we were, they looked like ants streaming across. A few days lat-er, the British showed up and took possession of our house. We were given just a few minutes to throw a few things into bags before we were forced to leave.With the disruption of food supplies there was starvation in Hong Kong — the Japanese occupiers at one point even tried to use the Happy Valley Race Course to grow rice. To reduce the number of hungry mouths, the Japanese began a policy of forced repatriation. Chinese without jobs were told to leave for China. Many others who were not considered to be a threat to the Axis powers countries, people referred to as ‘third nationals’, were free to go. During the course of the Japanese occupation of Hong Kong, its population shrank from 1.6 million to about 600,000. The Macau Government let it be known that the Hong Kong Macanese were welcome in Macau, that best efforts would be made to care for them when they arrived. Many others who were not of the Portuguese community went too. Macau’s population of about 200,000 swelled to three times that size between 1937 and 1944. Margaret Choa was amongst them. She and some of her family members went to Macau and stayed with her older sis-ter in a small apartment.

89...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José LoboAbout two months after the fall of Hong Kong, the Macau government chartered a boat and brought over from Hong Kong as many of the local Portuguese as it could carry. There would be a second evacuation a few months later. One might ask why some Portuguese decided to stay. One of the main reasons given was that several hundred Hong Kong Portuguese had fought as vol-unteers for the British Army and were interned by the Japanese. Their family members stayed on to try to provide food for their loved ones. Eventually they too left for Macau when conditions deteriorated further. Family friend, Frederic (Jim) Silva wrote in his memoir ‘Rem-iniscences of a Wartime Refugee’38 of how he recalls the evacua-tion by boat to Macau.Huge crowds with masses of belongings, stacked high ap-peared on the sea wall where the steamer was tied up. Despite the regulations on what could or could not be brought on this trip, the area was nevertheless engulfed by masses of prohib-ited personal effects. In some cases, it seemed that there were attempts to transfer entire households onto the steamer. Cart-loads of stuff were rolled up alongside the ship by hired coolies.Some were fortunate enough to have friends or relatives take them in, others who could afford it rented their own accommo-dation. For this group a small monthly stipend of 30 Patacas was given to each person as well as some basic rations. Even with this support, if ne was to find private housing in Macau, another per-sonal source of money was needed. A great number of people were unable to afford it and were housed in refugee centers. Schools, private clubs, hotels, houses and even a ship were converted into refugee centers. In spite of the hardships faced by all those dis-placed people, somehow it worked out.

90Marco LoboFor those people who did not have anyone to take them in, the accommodations ranged from individual houses to clubs, hotels and school buildings. There was even a ship permanently moored, used as refugee accommodation.39 The main refugee centers were:The Tung Hui: the ship mentioned above, nicknamed the HulkEscola Luso Chinesa: a Chinese school with many classroomsThe Armazém No.2: a Chinese school near the São Lourenco PlazaClube de Macau: an old clubhouse that had a theater and stageBela Vista Hotel: a well-known hotel set up on a hillThe São Paulo: a set of houses near the ruins of St. PaulPraia Grande: several adjoining houses on the waterfrontRua Formosa: a few small houses on a narrow streetClube de Sargentos: a club on Rua do CampoCamp No. 3: behind the Central HotelWith the Japanese in Guangdong and the fall of Hong Kong, the level of anxiety in Macau was high. People thought that any day now, it could be their turn to have to run. The Japanese pres-

91...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José Loboence was felt and heard as they bombed the areas just outside of Macau. A great friend of Pedro’s and another graduate of St. Jo-seph’s Seminary, the historian and scholar Monsignor Manuel Teixeira told a story the exemplifies Pedro’s diplomatic skills — the story being the genesis of the tale of bribing the Japanese with wine.During the Pacific War, after having advanced across Southern China, Macau appeared as easy prey for the Jap-anese hordes.One night we began to hear the unbearable noise of Japanese cannon fire that had earlier blasted Hong Kong. The artillery which was based across the border in Zhong-shan began to bombard Lapa Island, day and night. It was impossible for anyone to sleep and the city was overcome by fear.Pedro boldly decided to attempt a personal meeting with the commander of the Japanese troops. He got into his car and drove to the Portas do Cerco where identifying himself, he asked to see the senior officer. As the officer approached, in a demonstration of oriental diplomacy and courtesy, Pedro greeted him with a friend-ly smile. “We are very tired of these bombings,” Pedro said, “Macau has nothing to do with this war, and besides, we are friends!”The officer replied in annoyance, bristling at Pedro’s audacity, to which Pedro responded, “I have come in friendship and offer you a box of excellent Port Wine along with an invitation for you to have dinner with me tonight in Macau.”It’s not difficult to imagine the effect a good meal and many glasses of fine wine would have had on a man who had survived many weeks on field rations.

92Marco LoboIt was this bold action and others like it that probably saved Macau at that time, and Pedro continued his efforts to maintain the direct relationship with the Japanese who by then preferred to deal with him rather than the governor. Pedro would some-times confide to friends, making comments such as, “I do so much that he doesn’t even know about,” referring to Governor Gabriel Maurício Teixeira. From the time of his arrival in Macau in 1901 up to this period, Pedro had seen 19 governors come and go.Pedro felt it his responsibility to take in as many people as he could into his own home, in addition to his six children, several of his in-laws from the Hyndman family came to live in his house on the Praia Grande next to the Governor’s Mansion. There was plenty of room in the large building that ran the entire depth of the block. 6. Praia Grande Home.The building on the right: Pedro’s house on Praia Grande from the 1930’s through the 1950’s before a new home, Vila Verde, was built. The large building had its own water well and stretched the entire block to the street behind. The white building on the left housed the guards at night for the Governor’s Mansion which was to the left of it.

93...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José LoboAs was described by Jim Silva, the refugees brought as much as they could. Naturally, much of it was money and valuables, but there were also important items such as the ones described to by one of my Hyndman cousins.My mom’s sisters were asked to carry boxes by relatives who worked for the Hong Kong and Shanghai Bank from Hong Kong Island to Kowloon for safe keeping. They didn’t know what was in the boxes, just that they were something important to do with the bank. When they got to the ferry, they decided to skip the long first-class line where the Jap-anese were searching everyone and chose to go to the lower deck where the line was shorter. When they got to the Kow-loon side, they opened up the boxes to see what was inside. The boxes contained important securities belonging to the bank, critical for the survival of the bank after the war. They were so lucky to have decided on going to the low-er decks. The lower part of the ferry was full of prostitutes and other women that the Japanese soldiers had recruited for ‘entertainment’ purposes.Those and other documents were later brought to Macau by the Hyndman family and kept in Pedro’s safe for the duration of the war, as Isabella Hyndman explained:Mum, (Katy Hyndman) at Pedro’s insistence finally agreed to leave Hong Kong. Right before the Japanese in-vasion, Uncle Lobo had offered to get our whole family Por-tuguese passports so we could escape — somehow, he knew what was to come. Daddy (George Palmer) who was with the HKVDC (Hong Kong Volunteer Defense Corps) didn’t want to leave his unit and was subsequently interned. One

94Marco Loboof our relatives, Uncle Soares (F.X. Soares – Chief Clerk of the bank) asked mum to carry some important Hong Kong and Shanghai Bank documents with her to Macau for safe-keeping. Those papers were kept at Uncle Lobo’s place until after the Japanese surrender and our return to Hong Kong on October 31, 1945Before the start of hostilities, the economy of Macau had been robust, with annual income of about 9 million Patacas. In 1937 it began to decline and by 1942 it had dropped to less than 7 mil-lion. That is not to say that the government did not do its best to provide for the refugees. In fact, the Governor made the decision to direct all revenue arising from gambling taxes towards helping refugees. Nevertheless, food was always in short supply and often of poor quality, leading to many cases of malnutrition and disease.The Macau Government appointed the charity Santa Casa da Misericórdia to be in charge of administering the refugee centers. In turn the Santa Casa appointed chiefs to be in charge of each refugee center. The chief would be one of the center’s residents and be in charge of the basic running of the place, assigning kitchen and cleaning duties and providing security. Being a chief was a thankless task that meant having to endure countless complaints and manage disputes between residents.EducationPedro felt strongly that whereas food and shelter were im-portant, equally important was to provide education for the Hong Kong youth whose schooling was interrupted by war. In 1943, he arranged for five Irish Jesuits who had been teaching at Hong Kong’s Wah Yan College to be sent to Macau. The Japanese did not object to the presence of foreign priests, since Ireland had de-

95...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José Loboclared neutrality. The Jesuits established a curriculum similar to what had been taught in Hong Kong. The intention was that at the end of the war the students could go back to their old schools without significant interruption to their education. The Colégio San Luiz Gonzaga was established to provide ed-ucation in English. Pedro secured premises on the Praia Grande. The school eventually taught about two hundred students of dif-ferent ethnic backgrounds. In addition to teaching a regular school curriculum of mathematics and science, taught also business skills such as accounting and invited guest lecturers to talk about careers. The school continued until the end of the war.Jim Silva, one of the school’s students, wrote the following to me in a letter:Pedro invited all students to a couple of tea parties at the prestigious Hotel Central. He gave us poor schoolboys some simple clothing, which we all lacked. He gave parties for us and encouraged us to study and do well scholastically.Another student of the Colégio San Luiz Gonzaga, Nelson Sousa who went on to establish a successful career, become man-aging director of Dodwell & Co., one of Hong Kong’s leading trading companies. He said that he would never forget the kind-ness shown to him and the other boys in Macau, recalling that Pedro even went as far as providing the growing lads with badly needed shoes.Education for girls was provided by the Canossian Sisters, who had established a school in Macau in 1939. It is still in oper-ation today as Sacred Heart Canossian College.

97...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José LoboChapter 11Companhia Cooperativa de Macau (CCM)In October of 1940, Gabriel Maurício Teixeira arrived in Macau to take up his position as the governor. Governor Artur Tamagnini de Sousa Barbosa, who had been serving a third term as governor, died while in office of cerebral ischemia. Teixeira had been Governor of Cabo Delgado District of Mozambique prior to being assigned to Macau. Knowing of the difficulties Macau faced, he was reluctant to take on the role. Upon being assigned, he is reported to have said:Anyway, it is service, and service is not argued: it is fulfilled.Up to that time in Macau’s history, Governor Teixeira’s seven years in Macau from 1940 to 1947 was the second longest term of any governor. In spite of occasionally keeping Governor Teixeira in the dark over certain matters, perhaps for his own good, Pedro had a close working relationship with the governor.Teixeira might not have been that long in Macau if circum-stances had allowed a departure. Nevertheless, his political skills proved extremely effective during that difficult period. When the Second World War ended, the Chinese insisted that Teixeira be

98Marco Loboremoved from Macau. Some accused him of collaborating with the Japanese. Governor Teixeira had been under tremendous pressure from the Japanese. They forced many demands on him, such as or-dering him to recognize Japanese authority in South China. This was something he did to keep Macau safe from outright occupa-tion. Not even a year into his position, Fukui, the Japanese Consul, believing that Macau was wavering in its neutrality and favored the Allies, made a series of demands. In essence, the demands, in the form of a letter to the governor were to stop ‘smuggling’ and to cease the transit of goods through Macau to Chinese Nationalist forces, to take action to forbid all anti-Japanese propaganda in both Portuguese and Chinese, and to provide the Japanese with full de-tails of shipping activities, including their cargo manifests.It was an ultimatum that threatened severe sanctions against Macau if their conditions were not met. The way it played out es-tablished a framework of how the two sides would handle future negotiations. Teixeira consulted Lisbon over the demands, and it was during these ‘negotiations’ with the Japanese that Teixeira raised the issue of food shortages being affected by such harsh re-strictions. The Japanese saw an opportunity in immersing them-selves and controlling this vital area of food resources. It was then put to Pedro to organize it.Governor Teixeira responded in writing to the Japanese, ac-cepting the conditions in formal diplomatic language. Teixeira’s response did not address the specific demands but says:I have the satisfaction to communicate with you my ac-ceptance to the proposals that accompanied your official letter dated August 27th, and in accordance with the interpretation, as provided in the afore-said Memorandum. I will be obliged if, besides informing your Government of the acceptance given to your proposals, you shall kindly impress the honest spirit of

99...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José Loboco-operation which animates me, which being certainly recip-rocated by the Japanese authorities, will make our relations to be carried on in an atmosphere of mutual understanding and respect, thus strengthening the traditional friendship between our two countries.40Pedro understood that the task of feeding thousands of hun-gry people in Macau would require a focused and ongoing effort. For how long, was anyone’s guess. War had been raging in China for some time, but the attack on Pearl Harbour and invasion of Hong Kong, and now Macau under threat suggested a protract-ed conflict. He saw that a separate mechanism was needed, apart from the Macau Government, that also involved the Japanese. It required finances, access to food resources in China, and an in-frastructure that could transport, store, guard and distribute food. The result was the formation of a company called the Companhia Cooperativa de Macau, the CCM (Macau Cooperative Compa-ny). This company was a partnership between three parties: the Macau Government, a group of private individual investors, and the Japanese army. The CCM’s role was to procure food and cover the expenses of the Santa Casa da Misericórdia. Headed by Pedro as the chief of Macau’s Economics Services, it soon became the largest business operating in Macau.The Japanese officer put in charge of the CCM partnership was Colonel Sawa Eisaku, head of military intelligence. Having this position elevated his authority beyond his official rank. Al-though it was a risky having a Japanese officer in such a powerful position with the ability to make decisions that controlled the fate of Macau, it was the right decision, given the grip that Japan had on much of China. Sawa was responsible for a great deal of in-trigue and misery, yet having him as a partner in this enterprise added security to the efforts to secure food.

100Marco LoboOne of the CCM’s private investors was Sir Robert Ho Tung, one of Hong Kong’s wealthiest businessmen. When he learned that the CCM needed someone to act as a broker for the company, he introduced Stanley Ho his grandnephew to Pedro. Stanley was just 21 years old at the time. He had been a volun-teer in Hong Kong, working with the air-raid wardens. When Hong Kong fell to the Japanese he escaped to Macau, where Sir Robert and several other members of his family had gone right before the Japanese attack. Pedro saw at once that Stanley was quick-witted and intelligent and offered him the position as the company’s sec-retary. Pedro’s son Rogério, just 19 at the time, worked closely with Stanley and they became lifelong friends.As in all situations, blessed or cursed, there will be some that blindly accept their circumstances and others that make the best of them. One of these people who made the best of things was Stanley Ho. He understood the meanings of fortune, chance, and luck. He had the ability to pay attention to the small things often overlooked by others and to see new opportunities. He knew also that ‘luck’ came from taking a chance, an action, and that noth-ing would happen if one just sat around and did nothing. Stanley used his skills as a shrewd negotiator to barter on behalf of the CCM, but he traded on his own account and quickly became very wealthy. Of those days, he said:In those days, if you had money, you could enjoy the best kind of cigarettes, American, British, right up to the end of the war. If you had money, you could carry on using mo-torcars and motorbikes all through the war — gasoline was available. And you could have excellent food — if you had the money. I had big parties almost every night. Bird’s nests, roast pork... 41

101...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José LoboOnce again, the idea of ‘luck’ came into play for young Stan-ley. As it happened, one day Colonel Sawa asked Governor Teix-eira if he could introduce someone to teach him English. Gover-nor Teixeira suggested that Stanley Ho might be a good choice. A British Hong Kong citizen, newly arrived, the grandnephew of Sir Robert Ho Tung, he would be a safe choice. Stanley could be trusted, Teixeira said. Sawa accepted the governor’s suggestion and for a year, Stanley taught the Japanese officer. Again, in Stan-ley’s own words:All the Japanese soldiers in Special Branch would kneel down to him (Sawa) — and to me, as his teacher. What a great difference! While my relatives, my mother were suffering in Hong Kong, the Japanese gave me excellent treatment.42Through the CCM, anything that the government had that was not urgently needed was used as barter with the Japanese for food supplies from mainland China. Most of the rice was of very poor quality — unpolished and containing sand and small stones that had to be picked out before cooking. Cleaning out the impu-rities from rice was one of the jobs that the refugee center chiefs assigned to the centers’ residents — a highly unpopular chore. That’s when Stanley teamed up with Rogério to go into the rice business. Rogério had been working night shifts at the Macau Electric Company maintaining turbines. Rogério searched the company’s warehouse and found machinery he thought they could use. The two of them rigged up an improvised rice polisher and were soon able to polish rice. It was wonderful for Pedro to see the creativity of young minds, using their skills and working together to solve a problem. Soon enough, they were in the rice business — the only ones in Macau who could polish rice. In those days of dire need anything could be sold, even the broken rice and husks.

102Marco LoboAlthough Pedro through his position was able to acquire as much food as his family required, he made it a point to reflect the accessibility of food rations he was able to procure for Macau with thawailability of food in his own home. His son Orlando said:We usually had enough food at home, but there were a few times when my father wasn’t able to bring in to Macau what was needed. During those times at home, we were fed very meagre rations, basically just small portions of rice. He said that we had to endure the hardships that everyone else was facing in Macau and that we wouldn’t eat better than anyone else until more food could be brought in. We grum-bled but understood what he was teaching us.Whereas the Macau Government did its best to look after the Portuguese from Hong Kong and elsewhere, such as those who had been caught up in the fighting in China, there were refu-gees of other nationalities, too. The British Consul John Pownall Reeves did an outstanding job looking after not only the British, but as many others as he could with money supplied by his gov-ernment. Left out were the Chinese who had fled the fighting on the mainland and had no connections in Macau. There were many deaths from starvation and even reports of cannibalism amongst those desperate people, and nothing much could be done for them.There are numerous stories told by people who lived in Macau during that time. Starving families rummaging through piles of rubbish, eating the inedible, fighting over scraps of nothing. See-ing corpses lying in the streets was an everyday occurrence. The closest I ever came to witness such desperation was when I was about five years old, 14 years had passed since the end of the war — it was a time of change in Macau’s economy. Three tradi-tional manufacturing industries, perhaps better referred to hand-

103...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José Loboicrafts had sustained Macau’s economy after the Second World War, they were the making of matches, fire-crackers, and incense. These activities took advantage of Macau’s cheap labor, low im-port tax of the raw materials. Additionally, Macau enjoyed tar-iff preferences granted by the United States.43 These handicrafts had forged Macau’s development which along with fishing were the mainstay of Macau’s working population. However, Macau’s economy experienced a significant downturn in the early 1950s when in 1952, the USA, the largest market for fire-crackers and incense the USA, banned its import from Macau as part of its em-bargo on trade with China following the Korean War, resulting in increased poverty in Macau. I was sitting on a low wall that surrounded our home in Ma-cau Vila Rogi when I heard shouting and a rapid thumping on the street that sounded like drumbeats. A few seconds later, a young man sped past me at full tilt, a flash of black and white rags, his shirt flapping open and the soles of his shoeless feet drumming on the hard pavement. Closing in behind came a mob of pursuers, six or seven of them. Ten meters past me, the mob caught up with the runner. They punched him to the ground, shouting about his stealing food. The mob delivered several hard blows that I could hear from where I sat. Then it was over. I watched as the pursuers left the runner lying in the street and sauntered back in the direc-tion they came from, not paying me any attention at all. The beat-en runner sat up and watched them go around the corner, then he stood. The thought that came to my five-year-old head was that the man must have been awfully hungry.As the war progressed the food situation became more dire. Even with all the efforts, the food supply was never sufficient. The Macau Government was forced into trading anything they could, needed or not, to obtain more supplies through the Japanese. One

104Marco Loboof these actions was to trade the gunboat ‘Macao’ which had an important role in ridding Coloane of pirates. The Japanese had fixed their eyes on the gunboat for some time. Their chance to obtain her came in 1943, when the lack of food in Macau was so severe that they were able to get the ship in exchange for rice. Ten thousand bags of rice, each of sixty kilograms was the asking price. The six hundred tones were equivalent to about a million patacas. The gunboat was thereafter part of the Japanese Navy. Her name was changed to ‘Maiko’. Two years later, at the end of the war, the gunboat was surrendered to the Chinese Army in Guangzhou and renamed ‘Wu Feng’. She would change hands once again in 1949 when captured by the Communists.45

107...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José LoboChapter 12Economic ManagementMacau was fortunate that a talented banker had arrived in 1938 to take over the management of the BNU. Carlos Eugénio de Vasconcelos helped steer Macau through the tough econom-ic conditions of the war years. Born in 1893, Vasconcelos was a career banker, entering the BNU in 1921 and working in various Portuguese colonies. He came to the attention of the bank’s offi-cials while serving in Dili, where his work was highly regarded. He was assigned to head the bank in Macau, serving for eight years until 1946. He witnessed the starving and wrote of it in a report as follows:The streets were infested with beggars, cadavers and ravenousness that assaulted ladies by tearing away their wallets and packages. Rare was the morning when in the Bank’s arches, next to the office, there were no corpses, dis-gusting worm and rot. They died stoically beside food stalls, without a gesture of revolt, without a reaction. The city cem-etery was not enough for so many dead Every day, in barges, they were sent to the island of Taipa, stacked on top of each other. It was a dread, a macabre show, which we have be-come accustomed due to its frequency.

108Marco LoboThere have been cases of anthropophagy (human can-nibalism). For a long time, the Portuguese refrained from buying meat because there were several cases of human meat sales in the Chinese backyards that populated the streets and sold broth bowls, meat, rice cakes, etc. In the beggars’ refuge in the morning were corpses of quartered and missing pieces. Anyway, a horror.46 With a shared understanding of Timor, Pedro and Vasconce-los, both in their mid-forties, worked well together. Along with Governor Teixeira they did their best to solve the problems of food supplies for the refugees. Another big challenge had to be dealt with: the stabilization of Macau’s economy. At this time an-other person who would play a very important role in Macau’s future entered the picture — Ho Yin: businessman, politician and senior leader of the Chinese community in Macau. Ho Yin had been in Hong Kong, then moved to Macau in 1941 following the Japanese invasion. He first established a money changing business and later the Tai Fung Bank.Ho Yin was born in 1908 in Panyu, a small town in Guang-dong 100 kilometers north of Macau. His father owned a grocery small shop there. When Ho was thirteen years old, he worked as an apprentice in another shop in Guangzhou, eventually learning to manage it. At the age of sixteen he became an administrator of a grocer’s shop. In 1930, still just 22 years old he went into the mon-ey changing business, opening a store in Guangzhou. With the invasion of Guangdong by the Japanese in 1938, Ho Yin moved to Hong Kong and continued his business in the British colony. His half-brother, Ho Tim was already in business in Hong Kong and he would later become a director of the Hang Seng Bank.Pedro soon recognized the business acumen of this young man and saw that he could play an important role in providing advice

109...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José Loboon how to stabilize the local economy. Pedro worked closely with Ho Yin throughout his life — they were men who had risen from humble origins and made good. Pedro Lobo, a former mathemat-ics teacher, and Ho Yin, a man who had started his working life as an apprentice in a grocer’s shop in Guangzhou.47Insulating Macau’s economy from the uncertainty encircling it, meant having to stabilize its currency. There were many types of currencies circulating in Macau at the start of the war, including Chinese silver coins, Chinese notes, Hong Kong dollars (British silver trade dollars), Japanese Military Yen, and a kind of Chinese bank certificate called pangtan. Pangtans were issued by local Chi-nese banks, each having its own version. The values of each type of currency fluctuated widely from day to day. Additionally, there were a large number of money changers, a situation which sowed confusion as to what a currency was worth from one day to the next. There was little logic to it and notes of different denomina-tions of the same currency would sometimes fetch different rates at the same money changer. It was concluded that it was necessary eliminate the wide circulation of the many kinds of monies and to replace them with a single currency, the Pataca.Pedro explained the situation for the wide range of currencies in use in his book ‘Bases e Processos da Economia de Macau’.47Considering the ancient currencies that circulated in the province, there were those that served as ‘ instruments of exchange’. It is necessary to understand the reason that led Macau to allow the circulation of these currencies from various countries from the earliest times, reasons that were de facto rather than de jure.In more recent periods, the Tael was adopted as an ex-pression representing the weight of silver for purchase of goods. The Spanish Duro and the Mexican Dollar were long

110Marco Loboand widely circulated and accepted. Additionally, Chinese silver and copper coins were in common use along with the Chinese dollar and the Hong Kong Dollar. The Pataca, the authorized currency, received its name originally from the Spanish Duro, which in Macau was re-ferred to as the pataca. Over time, this name became so root-ed in habit and local use that coins and paper money were so renamed.Although the Macau Pataca became the official currency, with banknotes issued in 1, 5, 50, and 100 denominations, it did not prevent other currencies from circulating. Perhaps the most problematic situation came from the ‘pangtans’, the silver certifi-cates which were widely accepted for private as well as commercial purposes. In most cases these certificates were issued by local Chi-nese banks and money changers without the necessary reserves.The years during the Second World War exacerbated the eco-nomic challenges Macau faced. The Macau Pataca was produced and shipped from London. There were severe shortages with the BNU having to print and issue certificates until the actual banknotes were available.The arrival of great numbers of refugees in Macau created even more chaos. The BNU was unable to manage the long queues requesting cash or wanting to change money. At the end of 1943, the BNU manager sent a telegram to Lisbon expressing his anxi-ety and requesting financial assistance. His cry for help stated that the bank had only $40,000 in bank certificates. He said he feared the disaster of having to suspend payments. Through Pedro, the BNU also obtained $120,000 in small denominations.48 This sum that was able to tide them over until more funds arrived.Essential to reining in the wildly fluctuating currencies was the curtailing of the number of money changers. However, rec-

111...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José Loboognizing that Chinese money-changers still played an important role in the economy, efforts were made to limit their number and not to ban them altogether. It was acknowledged that 150 or so money changers maintained an essential link with the surround-ing territories from which Macau received its supplies. Pedro worked to ban pangtans and with Governor Teixeira’s support, legislation was put into place to achieve this goal. The importance Pedro placed on these efforts were exemplified by the bulletins he kept until his death, marking the margins of those official announcements that dated back to the war years. Those annotated pages date back eighty years. Yellow and deteriorating, they are now in the author’s possession.Pangtangs were officially banned in February 1944. From that time the Macau Pataca was made mandatory for all trans-actions. A local printing company produced Pataca certificates, each one signed by hand by a BNU manager and the Director of the Treasury Services. Chinese silver coins were collected by the government and ex-changed for the equivalent value in banknotes. The effect of this was the automatic establishment of a reserve. From that time on, Macau’s banking system was on solid footing with consistently high reserves.

112Marco Lobo7. P J Lobo and Ho Yin at a party at Vila Verde, Macau 1946.Two of the most influential businessmen in Macau were friends for decades. Ho Yin was an im-portant intermediary between the People’s Republic of China and Portugal. He died in Macau on December 6, 1983. Ho Yin’s son, Edmund Ho served as the first Chief Executive of the Macau Special Administrative Region from 1999 to 2009.

115...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José LoboChapter 13Characters and AssassinationDespite the war going on all around, the very real threats from Chinese warlords, gangs of thugs, and the pressures of food short-ages, compared to the rest of Asia, Macau was at relative peace. It attracted many unusual and intriguing characters. One who left his mark on Macau was George Smirnoff. His given name was Yuri, but everyone knew him simply as George. Yuri Smirnoff left Russia at the beginning of the Bolshevik revolution with his moth-er. They went first to Harbin in China, where he studied architec-ture. In 1937, in reaction to Japanese activity in north China, the family moved to Hong Kong where he was worked as an architect.After the Japanese invasion he was allowed to leave Hong Kong.Arriving in Macau, he and his family first lived at the Bela Vista Hotel which had been converted into a refugee center. Lat-er, he was able to move to a small place at Pátio de Seis Casas. He came to Pedro’s attention initially through his painting of back-drops for performances at the Dom Pedro V Theater. Pedro had also heard his name mentioned by an Irish Jesuit priest who had come over from Hong Kong, Father Albert Clooney. He had pro-vided Smirnoff with a set of paints and brushes. On behalf of the Macau Government Pedro commissioned George to paint a series of watercolors depicting scenes of Macau. Smirnoff didn’t disap-

116Marco Lobopoint. In the way he depicted everyday scenes, he brought to his paintings a real understanding and love for Macau, something he had in common with Pedro.Irene Smirnoff, George’s eldest daughter wrote of their time in Macau:49The year and a half that we spent in Macao during World War Two was probably the most peaceful and re-warding period of George Smirnoff ’s sad life. During that period, we had nothing of any material substance. But our family was intact, the people of Macao were wonderful to us and generously gave all kinds of help and support, and we had food on the table every day.It was a happy time for my father, too, probably the most personally satisfying period in his short life. Dr. Pedro José Lobo, then one of Macao’s leading business and political fig-ures, commissioned him to paint a series of views of the city as it then was. He was free to paint whatever he liked – churches, fortresses, seascapes and street views. By means of Dr. Lobo’s generous patronage, he was released for the first time from immediate financial cares.The British Consul John Pownall Reeves was mentioned earlier. Readers wanting to know more about him and his ex-periences in Macau should read his memoir, ‘The Lone Flag’ in which Reeves describes wartime Macau in great detail. The British Consulate was one of only two consulates open during the war years, the other being the Japanese. Consul Reeves took on the responsibility of not only trying to look after British cit-izens, but those of as many others as he could. Reeves was a hard-working, friendly fellow who mixed well with the locals and met often with Pedro.

117...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José LoboIn his memoir, Reeves wrote of being in constant danger of attack. He was protected by bodyguards that accompanied him everywhere. In his memoir, he joked:One of my house coolies, Ah Yu, was handier with a gun than a mop.50He wrote of an alarming situation involving different factions coming together in what could have been a quite dicey situation:On another occasion I went to see Lobo just as the Japa-nese Consul was leaving. Round the door of the building stood my own bodyguard, the Chungking auxiliaries, the Japanese bodyguard, Portuguese police and one or two others who may have been there to look after Lobo. There would have been a glorious scrap if anyone had made too sudden a movement.51In a story Rogério told about Reeves, he spoke of going drink-ing with the consul who showed him a trick where Reeves would drain his whisky and then appear to eat the empty glass — both shocking and thrilling to the 20-year-old Rogério, who went on the learn a few drinking tricks of his own which he passed on to the author.The Japanese had opened a consulate in Macau in 1941. De-spite it being a center for information gathering, the Japanese consular presence in Macau was seen as a positive development, opening up an official diplomatic channel of communication. The Japanese Consul was Fukui Yasumitsu. He was an En-glish speaker and despite the obvious pressures, Fukui mingled with Macau’s expatriate community with relative ease. There was tension between the convivial Fukui and his military counter-parts, who tried to exert tighter control over the territory.

118Marco LoboBy early 1945, the Allied forces led by the US had done mas-sive damage to Japanese troops in the Pacific. Japan’s sources of fuel and other supplies had been effectively cut off as they lost more territory. By this time their navy and air force had so little left that they had resorted to the use of kamikaze attacks. US forc-es were continuing their mop-up of the Philippines and advancing ever closer to the Japanese mainland. Everyone in Macau knew that the war in Europe was also nearing an end.It came as a shock to Macau residents when on 2nd February 1945, Fukui was gunned down in the street. He was rushed to the hospital but later died of his wounds. It was widely believed that Fukui was killed by his own people because he was seen as being too friendly with the Allies, that the Chinese gunmen had been hired by the Japanese.Rogério, Pedro’s son, said of the incident:52I was there, I saw them digging bullets out of him.I went and asked the doctor — Can I have a look? — because I had to report back to the British. I went in and there was this man, already dead, bullets all over his stom-ach, and the doctors digging into him to get the bullets out.The assassination set off a frenzied period of diplomatic ne-gotiations between Portugal and Japan. Foremost on the minds of people in Macau was whether this was a ploy for Japanese to exert even tighter control over Macau by initiating a diplomatic incident. They had done so in Mukden in 1931 to create an excuse to invade Manchuria.53 These concerns were well-founded if not proven at the time. It was. This was revealed later in a memoir written by Morishima Morito, a well-known Japanese diplomat based in Portugal with contacts at the highest level in Japan.

119...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José LoboPortugal’s neutrality made it a magnet for intelligence gath-ering. Morishima wrote of the ease of being able to observe the various diplomats. There was the freedom of simply buying news-papers and reading reports of goings on in war-torn Europe and other regions of the world while sitting at a café. This was a far cry from what was possible in countries at war. Faced with the possibility of an American attack on Hong Kong, Macau was considered as the most suitable bolt-hole for the Japanese. There were numerous Japanese living in Macau and operating various businesses. Many believed them to be fronts for spying activities. The idea was that under the pretext of protecting Japanese nationals, Japanese troops would be sent to Macau, es-sentially taking over the place. The same tactic of using an assas-sination as an excuse to accuse and then escalate the situation into an outright siege had been carried out in Tientsin in 1939. There, using the murder of a Japanese collaborationist, the Japanese Army put a blockade into effect against the British Concession.53Indeed, a blockade was put into place by the Japanese to ex-ert pressure on Macau, but Morishima claims that it was due to his intervention that the blockade was short-lived. He also says that he called for the removal of the Japanese intelligence officer Colonel Sawa Eisaku and for a new Japanese consul to be sent to Macau. He wrote that he regretted the suffering of the Chinese population during the siege due to the lack of foodstuffs, as well as the unnecessary death of Fukui. He went on to say that Fukui was cordial and loyal, a person who got along with everyone and that he had been ‘a victim of this conspiracy’.Meanwhile, mainland Japan was facing its own food shortag-es. Japan’s internal food production declined significantly in the last two years of the Pacific War. Resources were diverted away from things like fertilizers and faming tools for the war effort. Accordingly, farmers had less to produce food with. Compound-

120Marco Loboing the problem, the return of eight million people from Japan’s recently freed colonies added to the demand for food.54 Food sup-plies were so depleted by 1945, that the average Japanese survived at or near starvation level. Average civilian caloric intake in 1945 was 78 percent of the minimum needed for health and physical performance. It is worth noting that some historians suggest that the US Military consciously engaged in efforts to starve Japan into submission. Others say that the conditions were a result of the bombings, during which massive quantities of food were lost. Be-ginning in the spring of 1945, a five-month-long aerial bombard-ment and mining operation saw the near destruction of Japanese coastal shipping, preventing the import of critical raw materials and food. This threw the Japanese population into panic. Those days of scarcity are well-remembered today by the people who lived through it, and the custom of not leaving even a single un-eaten grain of rice in a rice bowl is still taught today.55Japan’s negotiations with Portugal over Fukui’s assassination involved compensation for the consul’s death. They were carried on for some months even as Japan’s military position continued to weaken. By March 1945, American bombers were launch-ing low-level attacks at night using napalm and other incendi-ary bombs. The main target area was a congested part of Tokyo where many of the buildings were made of wood and other com-bustible material. Raging fires during the nights of March 9th and 10th destroyed about a quarter of all the buildings in the city. More than eighty thousand people were killed and nearly a mil-lion were left homeless. The firebombing of Tokyo is believed to have been the most destructive air raid in history. With the sur-render of its Axis partner Germany, and the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki resulting in Japan’s complete surrender, the entire incident of Fukui’s assassination was put aside, never to be raised again.

121...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José LoboIt is ironic that the only serious military action taken against Macau was not by the Japanese but by an Allied power, the United States. I had heard this story told by my father, Rogério. When I was about 10 or 11 years old, I enjoyed putting together plastic model airplanes from model kits. Once when I was assembling one of an American warplane, Rogério came in to my room and seeing the half-built model, immediately said, “That’s a Hellcat”. It surprised me that he knew what kind of plane it was and asked him how he knew. He explained, “During the war, a couple of them fired machine guns at me and your Avô. They destroyed the car, but we got away.”The Americans were doing all they could to starve the Japa-nese of fuel. The Japanese had by early 1945 suffered great losses to their navy and air force and had been beaten in the Philippines. When the Americans discovered that Macau had stores of fuel that could be sold to Japan or exchanged for food, aircraft from the USS Enterprise bombed and strafed the hangar of Macau’s Na-val Aviation Centre on 16 January 1945. Other American air raids were made on targets in Macau on 25th February and again on 11th June 1945.Rogério described the scene of 16th January attack:56 Probably the most dangerous time for me during the war was when the Americans came and bombed the aero-plane depot in Macau. There was a hangar, but it was being used as a store for gasoline and other things we could trade with the Japanese for rice. One morning they came in and zoomed over Macau, something they’d never done before. They zeroed in on the place and — bang! — they hit it. I was with my father, it was seven o’clock in the morning and I said: I’m going down there —because all our stuff ’s there. This is what we were using to trade for rice: gasoline, church

122Marco Lobobells, metal frames, wire, nails, anything we could get our hands on. If you had a big church bell, they’d buy it. I rushed down to see what was going on and the planes turned round and came back. I had my motorbike right at the door of the hangar and my father zoomed up right be-hind me with his car. They didn’t just shoot at the hangar, they shot at the cars, the motorbike, everything. We started running all over the place, we hadn’t bargained on that happening. Then the whole thing went up in flames. I saw my father running away — I’d never seen him running before in his life! — but his car was shot out. Amazing-ly, neither of us was wounded. That same afternoon the Americans came back again, just to have a look at the dam-age, and some of the Macau policemen took out their pea-shooter pistols and tried to fire up at the planes — tak! tak! — absolutely ridiculous.Some people in Macau said they could actually see the En-terprise, the aircraft carrier the Hellcats were sent from, off in the distance. The American fighter airplanes returned in the af-ternoon dropping more bombs in the same area. They killed five people and destroyed, along with its target, the former Maritime Museum of Macau, which was also located in the aviation hangar where fuel was stored.Following a Portuguese government protest over the attack on neutral Macau, in 1950 the United States paid US$20,255,952 to the government of Portugal.Something needs to be said about America’s position towards Portugal during the Second World War. Through some American eyes, Portugal was not seen as neutral at all but rather should have been referred to as a ‘non-belligerent state’.57 Due to a heavy Ger-

123...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José Loboman presence in Portugal and its continued supply of tungsten to Germany, Lisbon was regarded with a degree of suspicion.However, Portugal did have something of value that the Al-lies wanted. Due to the strategic position of the Azores half-way across the Atlantic Ocean, both the Allies and Axis Powers want-ed to establish airbases there. A turning point in the battle for the Atlantic occurred in 1943, when Great Britain was able to obtain leases for air bases in the Azores. This enabled the Allies to cover the Mid-Atlantic and hunt U-boats, thereby protecting convoys. A few months later, British and U.S. military representatives a signed a joint agreement outlining roles and responsibilities for the United States Army Air Forces in the Azores, after which American planes began to arrive immediately. By the end of June 1944 more than 1,900 American aircraft had passed through the Azorean air bases. With these arrangements in place, the American attack on Portuguese Macau appeared all the more unusual.

125...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José LoboChapter 14The British Army Aid Group — BAAGWithin the hive of wartime Macau operated a complex web of spies representing the interests of different sides in the conflict. The Japanese had their Kempeitai, the military police, as well as regular soldiers, Japanese individuals who had set up businesses, and a small army of pro-Japanese local informers. There were the Chinese Nationalists with their gangs of pro-nationalist triads. There were other foreign nationals carrying out the interests of their own countries, such as a German who was suspected of being a Gestapo man. Along with all that was a Macau Police presence. The British had the British Army Aid Group (BAAG). This is what Rogério Lobo was referring to when he said he had to re-port back to the British on the assassination of Fukui. For a better understanding of this clandestine organization, one must know about its founder, Lindsay Tasman Ride. Australian Lindsay Ride was in the Australian Air Force during the First World War. After being injured he left the mil-itary and studied medicine, qualifying as a surgeon. In 1928, Dr. Ride was appointed professor of physiology at The University of Hong Kong. While in Hong Kong, Ride joined the Hong Kong Volunteer Defense Corps” (HKVDC) and commanded the Hong Kong Field Ambulances.

126Marco LoboAfter the Japanese invasion, Ride was interned at Shamshuipo Barracks, used by the Imperial Japanese Army as a POW camp for British, Indian, and Canadian soldiers. Fortunately, after just two weeks he was able to escape. With the help of trusted local men, guerrilla forces who knew secret routes to evade the Japa-nese, he escaped into China. In Chongqing (Chungking), Ride formed BAAG, which operated through the British embassy in Chongqing. Though the aim of the BAAG was to aid in the es-cape of POWs, the organization also gave humanitarian and med-ical assistance to both military and civilians. As an intelligence gathering unit, the BAAG had an efficient and secret network of local runners that brought messages to and from Chongqing and agents in the field. They gathered military, political and economic information on conditions in China, Macau and Hong Kong.In Macau, Pedro was a member of this network, as was his son Rogério. Though there were many who took great risk to serve the BAAG, it would be remiss not to mention two of the bravest: Eddie Gosano and Y.C. Liang.Eddie Gosano had graduated from the University of Hong Kong as a doctor shortly before the Japanese invasion. As a ‘third national’, he was allowed to go to Macau where he worked as a doc-tor attached to the British Consulate. In 1943, Gosano, codenamed Phoenix, was appointed by Ride to head Macau’s BAAG operation.Y.C Liang, codenamed PL, joined the BAAG in 1942. A year later, due to his excellent connections and know-how in set-ting up secret routes in and out of China, he took over the role from Gosano.Lindsay Ride wrote of Y.C. Liang,58 In 1942, the BAAG contacted this man in Macao, and in view of his business connections he was put in charge of an escape and intelligence group there. Early in 1943, he made

127...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José Lobothe dangerous trip out of Macao through enemy territory to Kweilin and set up safe escape routes. At Kweilin he was fully briefed and returned to set up his organisation. Throughout all his service, he was operating under the very noses of the Japanese, and in spite of that he was able to maintain week-ly contacts with our post without loss. Through his channels, over 50 European and 4 American evaders were smuggled out of Macao to safety and important messages passed into Hongkong. In all this work, he not only showed organising ability of a high order, but he displayed outstanding bravery and extreme devotion to our cause.Both Lindsay Ride and Y.C Liang became close friends of Pedro and remained so until his death. After the war, Y.C. or ‘Uncle YC’, as the family knew him, became one of Pedro’s closest business associates.On the 6th and 9th of August, 1945, the United States dropped atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Six days later on 15th August 1945, Emperor Hirohito of Japan officially surrendered. The news was obviously met with jubilation, but the ebullience was short-lived as the threat of a Chinese Nationalist takeover of Hong Kong once again became a real threat to the Portuguese colony. It was one thing if the Chinese were to wrest control of Hong Kong from their defeated enemy, the Japanese, but it would be unthinkable if they were to seize control of a British colony. Chiang Kai-Shek had let it be known59 to both Great Britain and the United States that he planned to be the one to receive the Japanese surrender in Hong Kong. US President Truman would have accepted the idea if the UK’s Prime Minister Atlee had not strongly objected. But at this point, there was no British Gov-ernment representation in Hong Kong. The governor at the time of the Japanese invasion, Mark Young had officially surrendered

128Marco LoboHong Kong and been sent to a series of POW camps in China. The next most senior British official, Colonial Secretary Franklin Gimson, was interned at Stanley Camp.The urgent need to reestablish British control over Hong Kong spurred the UK government into action. It sent a message to the BAAG in Chongqing which was then relayed to Macau. The in-structions were to deliver orders from Macau directly into Gimson’s hands, stating that he should immediately declare British control of the colony. On 17th August, 1945 the message was entrusted to Pedro. He and BAAG’s man Y.C. Liang decided the best way to ensure the message’s safe delivery. It was determined that Y.C. would go with Eddie Gosano and Pedro’s 21-year-old son, Rogério on this secret and dangerous mission to Hong Kong.Due to Japanese activity and the heavily mined seaway be-tween Macau and Hong Kong, four days passed before the trio, dressed as Chinese fishermen, boarded a Chinese fishing junk and headed for Hong Kong under the cover of darkness. Y.C. carried with him the sealed ‘Gimson message’ as well as credentials from the British Consulate. They arrived in Hong Kong the following day, August 22nd.When asked what the atmosphere was like in Hong Kong, Rogério said,60It took forever for us to get there and when we finally did arrive, the Japanese were all over the place, but they were surrendering. We saw the Allied troops coming in, the planes coming in, and we went into the camps. Each of us had sets of instructions to pass on to various people, about what they were going to do now.Y.C. headed directly for Stanley Internment Camp where the civilians were held and went to Gimson’s room where he presented

129...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José Lobohis credentials and the sealed letter. It took some effort on Y.C.’s part to persuade the former colonial secretary to go into immedi-ate action in setting up a civilian administration. Y.C. spent the next hours briefing Gimson and then stayed the night in Stanley Camp. Before leaving, Y.C. gave Gimson several gold coins of his own money to be used to cover expenses. Below, I have repro-duced a version of this encounter between YC Liang and Gimson which shows the frustration felt in trying to get Gimson to take urgent action.61Chronology of Events Related to Stanley Civilian Internment CampDate(s) of events described: Thu, 23 Aug 1945Things have been moving slowly with regard to the British taking over control from the Japanese, but that changes today.Franklin Gimson refuses Selwyn-Clarke’s request to set up an administration, saying he needs the permission of the London Government to take such a decisive step. He sends Arthur May to Macao with a message for London - if they agree to an immediate British take-over they should broad-cast the phrase ‘Hongkong go ahead’ over the radio. How-ever, May first has to find a boat and then to wait out the typhoon of August 24th-25th before it’s safe to set sail and he won’t leave until August 26th. Nevertheless, Gimson uses the fact of his mission to get the camp council to allow him to swear the oath making him Officer Administering the Gov-ernment (OAG), arguing that London will soon hear he’s ready to take over so this crucial step is now urgent.He now has the legal authority to govern Hong Kong but that’s a long way from having the power to do so in reali-

130Marco Loboty. The message sent through Arthur May is optimistic, offer-ing to take immediate control, but this mood doesn’t last long. Later today a British Army Aid Group (BAAG) mission ar-rives from Macao: although May is still in Hong Kong, it coincidentally bears the answer to Gimson’s question.The BAAG team is headed by Y. C. Liang (code name ‘PL’), and comprises Dr. Eddie Gosano (‘Phoenix’), Rogério Lobo and the radio operator Fung Bei. Gosano contacts Sel-wyn-Clarke and is eventually sent to Kowloon to help Dr. Newton restore medical services there. Liang makes a dra-matic appearance in Gimson’s room and passes on a message from the British Government - received by Lindsay Ride (‘Blue’) on August 13th - telling Gimson to leave camp and set up a civilian administration. Liang briefs Gimson and other senior civil servants on conditions in Hong Kong and gives him gold sovereigns to cover immediate expenses. Liang urges Gimson strongly to act immediately, but this pressure - reminiscent of Selwyn-Clarke’s - pushes Gimson in the opposite direction. He gives Liang a reply for London that amounts to a refusal to set up an administra-tion that would not be able to maintain law and order. He does, however, decide that he should move into an office in town as soon as possible and send a message over the radio telling the world he has done so. In other words, his policy is to take symbolic control of Hong Kong before the Chinese or Americans arrive, but without pushing the Japanese au-thorities to stand down - only they can hold off the armed Triads, the desperate looters, the Nationalists, the Commu-nists, renegade Japanese soldiers out to avenge their defeat.Rogério had been on a different mission. Given the dire situa-tion with regards to scarcity of food in Hong Kong, his orders were

131...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José Loboto see Robert Kotewall, the man who had been secretly storing and hiding resources from the Japanese. In his younger days, Kotewall had been in business as the manager of the Hong Kong Mercantile Company and knew all about transport and storage facilities. Kotewall, whose father was Parsi and mother Chinese, was a highly respected citizen. Before the invasion he had served on Hong Kong’s Legislative and Executive Councils. Perhaps he was best known as one of the two men who helped the Hong Kong Government avert a general strike that would have crippled the economy. In 1925, Sikh police under British command fired into a crowd of Chinese demonstrators in Shanghai. Several demonstra-tors were killed, and many were wounded. Then, during another demonstration, more than 50 Chinese protesters were killed and 120 were wounded by foreign troops. In Guangdong, a strike was called for, particularly targeting British Hong Kong. Anti-British leaflets were passed around in the colony and rumors were spread that British officials had plans to poison Hong Kong’s water supply. More than 50,000 Chi-nese fled to Guangdong during the first week of protest, a num-ber which grew to an estimated quarter of a million within an-other month. With Kotewall’s help in calming things down, the strike ended a few months later. Hong Kong’s total trade had fall-en by half during that period and to avert an economic collapse, Kotewall presented a plan for a trade loan of $30 million from the British Government to keep Hong Kong afloat.Kotewall worked alongside the Japanese in trying to keep Hong Kong operating as smoothly as possible. He had been un-fairly branded by some as a collaborator. In fact, he had been asked by senior British officials to work with the Japanese to protect the interests of the Chinese in Hong Kong and had done so diligent-ly.62 During the Japanese occupation, the Japanese established two councils for managing Hong Kong’s Chinese population, the

132Marco LoboChinese Representative Council and the Chinese Cooperative Council. In 1942, he urged the Japanese not to raise tram fares and rates on electricity and water. The Kotewall’s are related to the Lobo family through marriage. George Choa, the younger brother of Margaret Choa, Rogério’s wife, married Masie, one of Sir Robert Kotewall’s daughters.Eddie Gosano’s instructions were to contact Dr. Selwyn-Clarke, who before the war had served as director of Hong Kong’s Medi-cal and Health Services. Selwyn-Clarke initially had been allowed by the Japanese to stay outside the internment camp and for some months looked after the sick and starving population. Suspected by the Japanese of spying, he was eventually incarcerated at Stan-ley Camp. The reason for Gosano’s contact with Selwyn-Clarke was that the British government and BAAG were fully aware of the prisoners’ serious health conditions due to malnutrition and torture. Selwyn-Clarke had some hidden stores of medicine. A proper assessment of the colony’s medical needs had to be made.Having delivered orders to Gimson, discussed the food sit-uation with Kotewall, and assessed medical needs with Sel-wyn-Clarke, Rogério and Y.C. returned to Macau. Dr. Gosano remained in Hong Kong. Y.C. made several more trips between Hong Kong and Macau in the following weeks to further evaluate food and medical re-quirements. In September, two large consignments of food from Macau were shipped to Hong Kong with the understanding that the British Government would be responsible for payment when it was able to do so. After Gimson left the prison camp, he set up a government office and declared himself Hong Kong’s acting Governor, thereby re-establishing British rule. Two weeks later, on 1st September 1945 the cruiser HMS Swiftsure sailed into Hong Kong Harbour under the command of British Rear Admiral Sir Cecil Halliday Jepson

133...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José LoboHarcourt. Gimson transferred the role of governor to Harcourt and a military government was officially formed on 1st September.The Japanese surrender of all forces in China became official on 16th September 1945 when Major General Umekichi Okada and Vice Admiral Ruitaro Fujita officially surrendered at Govern-ment House. A series of war crimes trials were held, and 123 Jap-anese were tried. Of that number, 22 were sentenced to death, 14 were acquitted, and the remainder given prison sentences. Among the 22 were the two commanders of the Hong Kong Kempeitai. Sawa, Macau’s Kempeitai commander, was brought from Macau to China and executed for war crimes.After several months of recuperation from his imprisonment as a POW, Governor Mark Aitchison Young returned to Hong Kong on 1st May 1946 to serve out his term of governor.Y.C. Liang was awarded The King’s Medal for Courage as well as an Honorary CBE as he was not a British subject. In 1963, Y.C. Liang became one of the founding partners of the Hong Kong Hydrofoil Company (HMH), one of his first hydrofoils was named Flying Phoenix, after Eddie Gosano’s BAAG codename. Rogério said of his experiences during the war:63 Those years went quickly for me. Before you knew it, you became old for your age, very serious-minded in many ways. If you were in a prisoner-of -war camp, the war years must have seemed endless. But if you were free to move about and you were a young man growing up, life moved very quickly. Before we knew it, the war was over. By that time, after all those experiences, I was an old man. I’d lost my youth, lost my carefree attitude of life. I’d turned into an old man at twenty-one.

134Marco LoboCopy of first page of BAAG secret document dated 30th January 1945, providing details of the servicemen hidden in Macau and what occurred. The initials PL referred to YC Liang. Phoenix was Eddie Gosano’s code name.

135...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José LoboSecond page of document mentioning Pedro Lobo’s role in this incident.

136Marco Lobo8. Photo taken by the poolside of Pedro Lobo’s home - Villa Verde, Macau.Standing, from left to right: Pedro Hyndman Lobo (sixth child), Y.C. Liang - the BAAG man in Macau who was given the responsibility of delivering Britain’s orders to Gimson in Stanley Camp. After the war, he was engaged in transport Hong Kong Macau Hydrofoil as well as bank-ing and as director of several companies.Chong Chi Kong was with Melco (Macau Electric), later with banks and trading – a man with many activities. Ho Yin, liaison between Macau and PRC, Tai Fong Bank, etc.Sitting: left to right: Sir Lindsay Tasman Ride, head of the BAAG, P. J. Lobo.

139...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José LoboChapter 15The Border Gate Incident of 1952In July 1952, an argument over the positioning of a barbed wire fence broke out between Chinese Communist border guards and soldiers of Macau’s Mozambique Company. The Chinese de-manded that the fence be moved back. When the African soldiers refused, heated words were exchanged which escalated into shots being fired and a grenade thrown by one of the Chinese guards.Two short columns appeared in Australian newspapers reflect the international view of the incident.Sydney Morning Herald July 27, 1952BATTLE ON BORDER OF MACAO, CHINAHONG KONG, July 26 (A.A.P.-Reuter).A minor battle is in progress on the border of Commu-nist China and the Portuguese colony of Macao follow-ing a clash between guards last night. Intermittent bursts of machine-gun fire are being ex-changed, and at least three persons have been killed and five wounded. China has rushed a battalion of troops to the border, and a Portuguese gunboat is standing by Macao harbour ready for action.Reports reaching here say that the incident followed a quarrel between Portuguese and Chinese border guards.

140Marco LoboChinese guards demanded that a barbed-wire barri-cade erected by the Portuguese on the border should be moved back a little. Portuguese guards refused, and when the quarrel grew heated pushed the barricade a little further forward.The Communists then opened fire with rifles and threw a grenade.The colony, on a small peninsula on the mainland, about 40 miles south-west of Hong Kong, is in a state of tension.The Portuguese have clamped complete censorship on all news, but the Reuters correspondent has arrived in Hong Kong with first hand reports.A few days later, a more detailed account appeared in The West Australian July 31st, 1952Macao Portuguese Fire Over BorderHONG KONG, Wed.—Portuguese gunboats and light artillery are reported by the United Press to have fired on Communist positions today in renewed clashes along the Macao-Chinese border. Two hour-long skirmishes with machine guns and rifles occurred yesterday morning, but there were no immediate reports of casualties.Communist Chinese newspapers reacted by demand-ing that the Communist army should throw the Portu-guese out of Macao colony and “liberate the oppressed Chinese people” now living there.Reuters says that according to unconfirmed reports one Portuguese gunboat, the Goncalo Velbo, opened fire early today from Macao harbour when frontier fight-ing broke out again between Portuguese colonial and Chinese troops.

141...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José LoboTelephone messages from Macao—the tiny Portuguese colony 40 miles south-west of Hong Kong—said that Portuguese and Chinese troops exchanged fire for 1¾ hours last night after a lull of nearly three days in bor-der incidents. Another clash began shortly after three o’clock this morning and lasted about half an hour. Shells were fired for the first time in this clash from both a Portuguese gunboat in the inner harbour and the Portuguese fort near the border.ReinforcementsChina was again reported to be rushing reinforcements to her garrisons on Lapa Island, about a mile east of Macao, and at Pak Shan Liang, about 15 miles north of the frontier.Guia lighthouse, which commands Macao harbour, was turned out last night, apparently indicating that the Portuguese had again closed the colony to shipping from China.Clashes on the frontier began last Friday night when East African colonial troops from Portuguese Mozam-bique quarreled with Chinese guards over a barbed-wire barricade and the Chinese opened fire.Reports reaching Hong Kong said that Macao’s pop-ulation of 350,000 was in a state of “near panic” this morning.The Macao guards suffered one killed and a dozen in-jured in the weekend incidents, reports the American Associated Press.The Communists said that they suffered more than 100 casualties and demanded 88,000 dollars (about £39,200) indemnity.

142Marco LoboMany residents of Macau of the time remembered the tense period and the fear gripping population, even recalling the sound of the gunboat firing at the Chinese side, The situation was resolved a month later when Pedro, then the director of the Economic Affairs and Statistics Bureau of the Macau Government, signed a written apology on behalf of the Portuguese administration to the Frontier Defense Bureau of the Public Security Department. Three envoys, Pedro José Lobo representing Macau’s govern-ment, plus Ho Yin and Ma Man Kee representing the interests of Macau’s Chinese community, went to Zhuhai on 23rd August 1952 and presented the letter of apology to a representative of the Provincial People’s Government of Guangdong. The letter ex-pressed regret for the incident and agreed to pay compensation for the deaths and woundings on the Chinese side. The fighting that took place that summer was real enough, but the true story of what happened was long in the making. An examination of the facts provides a look behind the curtain into Macau’s true value to China, as well as the lengths the Chinese leadership went to in maintaining Macau’s independent status. The complex relationship of the time also goes some way towards explaining the historical context which formed the basis for Ma-cau’s post hand-over relationship with China, and the efforts made by both sides — Portuguese and Chinese — with Macau acting as a channel.Following the Japanese defeat in 1945, the 18-year civil war in China between the Kuomintang (KMT) government of the Republic of China and the Communist Party of China (CPC) began again in earnest. U.S. forces continued to support Chiang Kai-shek’s Nationalist Government, both as its ally during the Second World War and as a way to prevent the Communists tak-ing control of China. The Americans went as far as flying Nation-

143...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José Loboalist Chinese troops into Japanese-occupied territories so that they would be the ones to accept the Japanese surrender.Even while the civil war between the KMT and CPC was going on, the Communists had decided to maintain the status quo of both Hong Kong and Macau, mainly to avoid a confron-tation with the United States. Additionally, it was a way of uti-lizing the two foreign colonies to maximize China’s interests in finance, economics, trade and intelligence gathering.64 This policy necessitated a delicate balancing act on behalf of the Communist leadership. On the one hand they had loudly and publicly declared the official view that all vestiges of Western Imperialism would be purged from China. On the other, they needed the colonies for their own purposes. Keeping the official view alive in the hearts and minds of the Chinese population was of prime importance.In August of 1949, the CCP established the Nam Kwong Trading Company in Macau. The purpose of this company was ostensibly to encourage trade between Macau and the mainland and while it did play this function, it also served as China’s unof-ficial representative in Macau.As the CCP forces began to push the KMT out of Guangdong Province in 1949, they declared several times that Macau’s neutral-ity would be respected in order to appease the frightened residents of Macau. Earlier that year, several hundred members of the Por-tuguese community in Shanghai arrived in Macau after being ex-pelled. This action was in line with the CCP’s official anti-imperial stance and the Chinese assurances were a great relief to Macau. Amongst the arrivals from Shanghai was the Da Roza fam-ily. The parents and three children were given accommodation by the Macau Portuguese Government at Camp No. 3, located behind the Central Hotel. The camp’s position gave Francisco, the eldest child, five years old at the time and his father front row seats from which to view the fighting. Francisco recalled:65

144Marco LoboThe camp was at the end of the Avenida de Almeida Ribeiro, the main thoroughfare. The refugee camp was pre-viously designated as a police station and was located behind a block of buildings. The block faced the main road running along the inner harbour (that is, facing North) and there was a lane to the left of the building. It so happened that where my father and I were sitting which was in front and at the corner on the left side of the refugee camp which gave us a line of sight to the harbour and the mountain opposite the harbour because of the gap made by the lane. I was five years old, but my memory is clear. It must have been at the height of the trouble that it so happened father and I were at the refectory on the sec-ond floor leaning against the bannister across the window looking out from the front of the building. From where we were standing, we could see the hill on the Chinese side of the inner harbour. All of a sudden, we saw flashes of explosion on the side of the hill. The Portuguese frigate docked in the harbour on the Macau side was lobbing shells across. The hillside which was uninhabited was being bombarded and we could see clearly the flashes. At around the same time, we saw Portuguese armoured personnel carriers rushing along the main road towards the direction of the Barrier Gate. I was saddened momentarily by the unfolding events and I asked father whether there was going to be a war and we had to flee again. My reaction would have been our ex-perience from fleeing Shanghai as refugees. He said he did not know. There was no panic at the camp. In fact, it was rather quiet. After that day, we did not hear any more about the incident. But of course, there was a lot more going on.

145...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José LoboWhen China became involved in the Korean War in 1950, an embargo was imposed against China through CHINCOM, a US-led body that coordinated the restriction of trade with Chi-na. Essentially, it prohibited the export of strategic materials. Initiated by the U.S. and Canada, it was later joined by other Western powers. The pact drew up long lists of forbidden items for shipment into China. Portugal, at Britain’s invitation, even-tually also joined.Though Macau officially became part of this agreement, the flow of goods into China continued. This situation further en-hanced Macau’s value to China as a way to skirt the embargo. During the Second World War, Macau’s leading businessmen had become adept at smuggling and the situation provided op-portunities to continue their lucrative clandestine trade. In 1950 and 1951, Macau and Hong Kong were China’s second-largest trading partners after Russia.66 The Nam Kwong Trading Com-pany controlled several large warehouses that held everything from automobile parts and fuel to electronic equipment for ship-ment into China.The illicit trade did not go unnoticed by the other members of the embargo group. Although pressure was applied to put an end to it, Portugal continued to argue for Macau to be put under a special status that would be exempt from the agreement. Pedro was well aware of the importance China played in keeping Macau’s population fed, in particular the important role of neighboring Guangdong Province. In his book Bases e Proces-sos da Economia de Macau, he wrote that the boundary of Macau’s land border with China, an extension of the district of Chong San, an important producer of rice, sugar cane and other products valued at more than 100 million patacas per year. It traveled by road through the Portas do Cerco.67 As a strong advocate of commercial freedom, he wrote:

146Marco LoboMacao has benefited from the advantages that commer-cial freedom has derived, without abandoning the economic method of ‘ direct exchange’.In a passage of his 1953 book, certainly written during the time of the border gate incident, he writes about taking the safest economic pathway. Pedro quotes António de Oliveira Salazar: “It is a great thing to be walking in the wake of a good, clear path easily, secure of not having to stumble...” He appears at times, when it suited the occasion, to adopt a dogmatic approach when it came to economic management, quot-ing a passage from the Charter of Overseas Provinces:The economic regimes in overseas provinces are established in accordance with their developmental needs, their nature and the rights and obligations of the neighbouring countries and the legitimate conveniences of the Portuguese State.Pedro argued that if Macau were to stop supplying China, the neighboring areas of China such as Zhongshan would cease supply-ing food to Macau, a view that was supported by Macau’s Governor. In January 1952, under enormous pressure from CHINCOM members, Lisbon ordered the Macau administration to draft se-vere regulations which would monitor and license the transship-ment, import and export of merchandise. The news of this infu-riated China, with leaders of Guangdong advocating the use of force against Macau, to teach Portugal a lesson.At the end of July 1952, the Chinese leadership began to harass Macau along its border, the most serious incident the one involving the Mozambique Company at the Portas do Cerco. Three weeks later, Pedro submitted the letter of apology to the Chinese authorities.

147...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José LoboThe violent incidents spurred the Portuguese to again press its CHINCOM for Macau’s trade controls to be eased. By the end of 1952, written memorandums were arguing for Macau’s exemption from trade restrictions with China.Some scholars argue that the importance China placed on Macau as its trading conduit not only protected Macau from an outright takeover, but that through its understanding of the pow-ers at play, was able to manipulate Portugal’s foreign policy as well. 9. Pedro Lobo and Roque Choi delivering Letter of Apology 1952.In July 1952, an argument over the positioning of a barbed wire fence broke out between Chinese Communist border guards and soldiers of Macau’s Mozambique Company. Pedro, then the di-rector of the Economic Affairs and Statistics Bureau of the Macau Government, signed a written apology on behalf of the Portuguese administration to the Frontier Defence Bureau of the Public Security Department.

149...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José LoboChapter 16The Macao Air Transport Company MATCOI felt so grown up being introduced to the pilot by my mother and shaking his hand. As a seven-year-old, this was my first time up in an aeroplane. The route: Hong Kong to Macau, a flight of about 15 minutes.I cannot remember many details of the aircraft, just that it felt very small and, in my recollection, my mother and I were the only passengers. Perhaps this was because we sat directly behind the pilot. The plane would have been a Piaggio P136-L2, acquired in November 1960, the previous year. In the few minutes we were in the air, I divided my attention between looking out the window, down at the sea and the lush green hills, and trying to look over the back of the captain’s seat at the controls and out the front of the plane. At one point I saw a shadow of an aeroplane sliding across the surface of the sea. “That’s us, that’s us,” I blurted out.Soon, the brown silty water indicated that we were nearing Ma-cau. The amphibian aircraft descended and not quite crash-landed but skidded bumpily over the waters of Macau’s outer harbour. The engines kept running, driving the plane along like a motorboat be-fore the twin engines revved up and powered it up a ramp to where the current ferry terminal is.

150Marco LoboMATCO, the Macao Air Transport Company was formed in 1948, a partnership between P J Lobo & Co., American entre-preneur Roy Farrell, and Australian aviator Syd de Kantzow. The same two men had previously formed Cathay Pacific, originally as an airline transport company to fly goods for trade between Aus-tralia and Shanghai. Due to some difficulties with Chinese rivals, the pair decided to relocate their business to Hong Kong. From there they operated flights between Hong Kong, Manila, Bang-kok, Singapore and Shanghai, with occasional flights to Austra-lia. The partnership between these entrepreneurs and Pedro be-gan when they first rented offices from P J Lobo & Co. Shortly thereafter, P J Lobo & Co. became the agents for Cathay Pacific, initially handling the bookings for the two DC-3’s in operation in 1946, and the additional three aircraft the following year.In 1948, as a move to expand and upgrade their business, Farrell and de Kantzow formed a partnership with the British trading company Butterfield and Swire. Butterfield and Swire’s involvement ended PJ Lobo’s agency work for Cathay, but not the business relationship with Farrell and de Kantzow. In that same year, MATCO was established.In Rogério Lobo’s words: I was in the office when those two big chaps came in and said they wanted to start and airline flying between Hong Kong and Macau. When I reminded them that Ma-cau didn’t have an airport, they said the solution to that was to use ‘flying boats’, Catalinas.Another problem occurred, which Farrell and de Kant-zow had faced earlier with the formation of Cathay Pacific, and that was for an airline to be registered in Hong Kong the company needed two-thirds British ownership. They pointed the finger at me and asked me to become British. I was Por-

151...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José Lobotuguese at the time, but since I had made a move to live in the British colony, I thought it couldn’t hurt, and so I did.68 MATCO began offering an alternative to the three-hour ferry trip between Hong Kong and Macau.10. One of the original MATCO aircraft, a PBY It was one of the most widely used seaplanes of World War II. The original of this photograph hung in Rogério Lobo’s private study.11. MATCO insignia outside the cockpit.

152Marco Lobo12. Cathay Founder and Pedro Lobo.Pedro Lobo pictured with Sydney de Kantzow, one of the founders (with partner Ray Farrell) of the original Cathay Pacific. It was said that Madame Chiang Kai-shek always asked for Sydney personally as her pilot because of his excellent flying skills. The partnership between these entre-preneurs and Pedro began when they first rented offices from P J Lobo & Co., and then shortly thereafter, the Lobos became the agents for Cathay Pacific. Sydney de Kantzow returned to Aus-tralia after leaving Cathay Pacific in 1951. He died in an accident in 1957. The Lobo and the de Kantzow families have maintained their friendship.

153...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José Lobo13. Cathay Pacific — MATCO Advertisement.Original Cathay Pacific advertisement in the late 1940’s when PJ Lobo & Co still acted as agents. Note the prices shown at the bottom of the picture.14. MATCO Advertisement.Early 1960’s advertisement for MATCO when Cathay Pacific was no longer in the picture.The short flying time was referred to as a ‘one cigarette flight’. The amphibian plane shown here is a Piaggio P136-L2 that had been acquired in November 1960. The idea for using sea planes between Hong Kong and Macau was suggested by Roy Farrell and Sydney de Kantzow. Although there had been talk of building an airport in Macau since the 1960’s, Macau’s internation-al airport did not open for commercial use until 1995.

154Marco LoboOpium gives way to gold and its transportationThe end of the Second World War did not bring an end to Macau’s fragile security relationship with China, an issue which would not be completely resolved for another forty years. One of the complaints China had against Macau was that it still actively traded opium, a business controlled and licensed by Macau’ gov-ernment, one that contributed handsomely to its coffers. The matter of opium use in China was highly complex with Chiang Kai Shek on the one hand stating support for the com-plete eradication of opium, while also attempting to exert control over its distribution in the large tracts of Chinese land dedicated to growing opium poppies. It was only after Mao Zedong’s gov-ernment came to power that major efforts were made to eradicate both consumption and production of the drug.The opium problem in China had been so intense under the KMT, that it encroached upon the entire structure of China’s po-litical economy. The national and local administrations in China were so reliant on profits from opium sales that it could not easily be stopped. Chiang Kai Shek had formed alliances with regional leaders as well as gangsters who demanded protection for their stake in the opium traffic. Chiang used the opium trade to finance his fights against the Japanese, the Communists, and rival war-lords. Chiang Kai Shek stated that he intended to suppress the opium trade but instead tried to bring it under his control. The result was a rampant alliance between the KMT and gangsters which only served to increase the opium business, monopolizing it and forcing out competitors.69 China’s vehement opposition to opium was well understood, it had resulted in her having to give up Hong Kong after the Opium Wars. We don’t know how Pedro personally felt about the opium business, but he had been in charge of it on behalf of the Macau

155...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José LoboGovernment since 1927. Now, twenty years later, it was such a risk to Macau’s survival that a decision was made to ban the trade to avoid jeopardizing Macau’s sovereignty. Portugal’s Minister for Foreign Affairs ordered the end of Macau’s opium trade and by June 1947 opium was made illegal officially stating:For many years, the exclusivity of opium was one of the important sources of revenue of the colony of Macau, and great fortunes were made in its wake. This regime lasted until recently and has now been abandoned because we un-dertook, by virtue of the agreements we signed, to abandon the monopoly system. Provincial finances have been dealt a severe blow, but the country has gotten strictly into the field of legality, from which it cannot leave. It cannot, nor is it appropriate, because what is required is to contribute ener-getically to the suppression of illicit traffic.The ban of opium might have had a devastating financial ef-fect on Macau had it not been replaced by the gold trade. With strict limitations imposed by the Government of Hong Kong and prohibitions in force in China on the import and trade of gold, Macau stepped into the void, permitting free entry of the precious metal in various forms. The result was that large quantities started to be imported into the territory.Soon, Macau’s government seized on this opportunity and stepped in to license and regulate the gold trade. As the Director of Economic Services, Pedro issued the following order:70The importation of gold in bars, ingots, or other forms, including foreign currencies, will only be made under license issued by the Central Bureau of Economic Services and that all holders of licenses previously granted for the import and

156Marco Lobotransit of gold by Macao prior to this legalization would have to deliver them in this Office. It so happened that in 1944 a new international monetary system. the Bretton Woods Agreement had been negotiated and signed by 44 parties. Under the agreement, currencies were pegged to the value of the U.S. dollar, which in turn was pegged to the price of gold. It was from this agreement that two im-portant organizations—the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank were created. Under this system, the exchange rate applied at the time set the price of gold at US$35 an ounce. Most importantly for Macau was that Portugal did not sign on to the Bretton Woods Agreement. This meant there was signif-icant profit to be made by trading gold to any party willing to pay a higher price There was significant demand in Hong Kong, China, and across Asia, where it was not uncommon for gold to be traded at US$50 or even US$100 an ounce. Returning to the story of MATCO, what faster and safer way to transport gold than by air?Cathay’s Butterfield and Swire were not interested in the gold trade, nor did they want the two aging Catalinas owned by Far-rell and de Kantzow. In 1948, MATCO took over the two flying boats. The Lobo partnership with Farrell and de Kantzow lasted four years, until 1952.Gold was flown initially into Hong Kong’s Kai Tak Airport from Asian countries as well as from Europe and the Middle East. Once in Hong Kong it was stored in bond before being exported to Macau. The main importers in Hong Kong were Mount Trad-ing (part of Samuel Montagu of London), Commercial Invest-ment Company (a subsidiary of Wheelock Marden) and Premex (owned by Swiss and Panamanian interests). These three firms formed a cartel that functioned cooperatively.

157...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José LoboMATCO charged a fee of HK 30 cents per ounce to transport the gold to Macau. The sum was lucrative. Up to 70 thousand ounces (approximately 2,000 kilograms) could be shipped on a single flight.The Macau Government benefitted through a tax levied per ounce of gold imported, and by the early 1960’s, the amount account-ed for about 20% of total government revenue. In 1961, 991,000 ounces of gold was legally imported into Macau.71 That is not to say that MATCO had a total monopoly on gold transport. Almost as soon as a price was quoted by the airline, competitors began offering lower prices, offering to ship the cargo by junk or other vessels. But MATCO’s service was certainly the fastest and the safest.A substantial portion of gold that arrived in Macau was smug-gled back to Hong Kong. Some estimates put the amount at 80%. Macau’s smugglers had transported all kinds of goods between Ma-cau, China and Hong Kong evading Japanese patrols during the war years; here came a new opportunity for them to use their know-how. Macau’s role in the international gold trade was well-known. In 1950, celebrated writer and photo-journalist Harrison Forman was in Macau wanting to know all about it. He met with Pedro, who provided introductions to people who showed Forman how the whole operation worked. In particular, he was given an inside look of how the Tai Fung Bank (owned by Ho Yin), managed its gold operation. Here are some excerpts from a piece he wrote following his trip.72 The Tai Fung Bank is little more than a hole-in-the-wall in a row of Chinese shops on the Avenida Almeida Ribeiro. But more bullion passes through its doors than anywhere else in Asia. In a back room of the bank, the manager showed me an accumulation of wooden boxes. Each contained two big bricks of gold.

158Marco Lobo“What’s it worth,” I asked.“About five million American Dollars. Sounds like a lot doesn’t’ it, but it’s just an average shipment. We get two or three of them a week — our invisible export.”He showed Forman a room filled with roughly-made gold jew-elry and ornaments that could be bought by individuals and brought back to Hong Kong as souvenirs, just to be melted down again and formed into ingots. The manager explained to Forman, “It’s illegal to bring gold bullion into Hong Kong, but there’s no restriction on ‘souvenirs’. Hundreds of Chinese come over from Hong Kong every day, load up on ‘souvenirs’ and return the same night.Next, he led Forman through the furnace room where gold was being melted down and reformed into smaller bars, each about six inches long.Forman went on to explain:While a big-time dealer may buy all the gold he wants in Macau, he is on his own when it comes to moving out to his customers overseas. Most the gold is carried on modified fishing junks, first to Hong Kong where it can be repackaged and then smuggled out again.Forman was taken down to the harbour where he was able to have a closer look at some of the fishing junks that were being reconfigured for smuggling. He noticed one being fitted out with an auxiliary engine to allow it greater speed in outrunning the au-thorities. On several others there were large and small cannon on the decks, some fitted with steel shielding for protection against small arms.When Forman returned to Hong Kong, he spoke to the Chief Revenue Officer who told him:

159...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José LoboOur job is not an easy one, there are literally thousands of fishing junks coming in and out of Hong Kong daily. We can’t possibly check out all of them, particularly when they’ ll bury the stuff under tons of smelly, squirming fish.The officer told Forman that the gold-running junkmen had fighting traditions that went back to the times when piracy was an honorable profession in Asia. They were prepared to stand and fight when cornered and were well-armed, not only with cannons and scatter guns, but with rifles, grenades and even machine guns.When Forman asked Hong Kong’s Chief Revenue Officer how much of the smuggled gold was intercepted by the author-ities, the man leaned back in his chair and with a look of despair said, “We knock off less than three percent of it.”This brings us to the story of the first-ever hijack of a commer-cial aircraft in aviation history.15. MATCO Gold Shipment.Armed guards preparing for the departure of a gold shipment to Macau in the 1960’s from Kaitak Air-port in Hong Kong. MATCO charged a fee of HK 30 cents per ounce to transport the gold to Macau. The sum of 30 cents could bring in vary large sums when one considers that amounts up to 70 thou-sand ounces (approximately 2,000 kilograms) could be shipped on a single flight. In 1961, 991,000 ounces of gold was legally imported into Macau by various means including by MATCO’s sea planes..

160Marco LoboMiss MacaoAt 5.30 p.m. on July 16th, 1948, Miss Macao, one of MAT-CO’s Catalinas, took off from Macau on a scheduled flight to Hong Kong. On the aircraft were 23 passengers and four crew members. Just minutes into the flight, three armed hijackers went into action. The plan was for one of the men, who had learned to fly sea planes in Manila, to take over the controls and fly Miss Macao to a location in China where they would loot the plane and passengers for any gold and valuables. Had all gone according to plan, the hijackers would have gotten away with a substantial haul — amongst the 23 passengers were four wealthy individuals, one reportedly carrying half a million Hong Kong dollars and another flying with a shipment of 3,000 taels (113 kilograms) of gold.When one of the armed men demanded that the pilot give up the controls, the pilot refused. With a gun held at the pilot, another of the men ordered the passengers to one side of the air-craft. In the confusion, the first officer saw an opening and struck one of the hijackers. The attack sent the hijacker crashing into the man holding the gun to the pilot’s head. The gunman accidental-ly pulled the trigger, shooting the pilot in the back of the skull. The gunshot set the three gunmen into a panic, firing indiscrimi-nately. In all, 18 bullets were fired. Meanwhile, the pilot slumped forward onto the controls and Miss Macao went into a steep dive, crashing into the sea. There was only one survivor, one of the hijackers by the name of Wong Yu. A short time later a fishing junk owned found him drifting, clutching a cushion from the plane. They pulled him aboard and took him back to Macau where he was admitted to hospital for treatment of his injured arm and leg.By 6.30 p.m., airline staff in Hong Kong had become anxious, but nothing of the disaster was yet known. The following morn-

161...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José Loboing, the company’s other Catalina flew to Macau to investigate Miss Macao’s disappearance. Over the next few days, de Kant-zow, Farrell and Rogério Lobo participated in the search for the wreckage. Rogério recalled:In the early part of the search the dragging nets had snagged several large parts of wreckage and these were flagged. Yet, nothing had been recovered from the sea. Now smaller parts, scattered over a wide area, were eluding our search. Exceptionally strong currents were adding to our woes and for hours we drifted aimlessly.Eventually, the wreckage and bodies of the passengers and crew were recovered. When questioned, the sole survivor told a story of an explosion aboard. But the mystery deepened when spent bullet casings were discovered in the wreckage after it had been brought ashore. He had contributed little else to explain what happened, saying only that he had jumped when the plane struck the water. Macau Police were under pressure to solve the case. When pressed, the police commissioner revealed that several individu-als were ‘helping police with their investigation’. Two women had been taken into custody when they visited the mortuary to identify the bodies of the men suspected of being involved in the hijacking.When post mortems were performed, the bodies were found to have bullet holes with both entry and exit points. Some of the bullet wounds were consistent with firing at very close range. Wong Yu continued to profess his innocence, even when confronted with the evidence of spent cartridges found in the wrecked plane.Desperate to have a confession from Wu, the Macau Police concocted an elaborate plan to have Wong reveal all he knew. A

162Marco Lobowell-known gangster was enlisted to participate in the plot. Under pretense of a medical condition, the gangster went into the same hospital room as Wong. His arm was bandaged from surgery pur-portedly for treatment to remove a bullet. The act went as far as having the gangster’s relatives visit him in hospital. It didn’t take long for Wong to feel comfortable enough to begin bragging about his role in the failed Miss Macao robbery and the police had the full story and Wong’s confession.Macau Police learned that the 24-year old Wong, a rice farmer from Doumen, now part of Zhuhai, had a detailed knowledge of the coastline and knew of places where a hijacked Catalina could land out of sight. The two others also came from Wong’s village, one of them the trained pilot.On the morning of the failed heist the three bought Europe-an-style clothes. That afternoon they boarded Miss Macao carry-ing handguns and placed themselves in positions to cover the pilot and flight crew.Almost immediately after hearing the confession, there were concerns as to how to proceed, since at the time there weren’t clear laws as how to prosecute such a case. It was clear from the con-fession obtained through entrapment that Wong took part in the incident and should face trial, but without the know-how or pro-cedure to try such a case, the authorities in Macau offered to hand Wong over to the courts in Hong Kong. The argument was Macau had no jurisdiction over a crime committed in international waters aboard a British plane. Hong Kong’s Attorney General asked Macau to reconsider its decision on the basis that since the confession was obtained through entrapment, there was no admissible evidence that would allow a prosecution in Hong Kong’s courts.With no legal action taking place, Wong languished in prison for three years, finally being released in 1951. His fate after release

163...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José Lobois uncertain, but the rumor at the time was he died in China soon after release. An ‘accident’ had been arranged for him.In October 1961, Rogério, who was MATCO’s managing di-rector, announced that the passenger service would be suspend-ed due to poor landing conditions at Macau’s harbour. He stat-ed that the water at Macau was getting shallower every day due to the heavy silt circulating in from the Pearl River delta. The last MATCO’s scheduled passenger service was on 29th January 1965, although the gold transportation business continued on for several more years. By 1964, two companies were already oper-ating hydrofoil services between Hong Kong and Macau. The high-speed boats offered an attractive alternative for passenger and cargo transportation. When the company was eventually closed on 12 November 1968, it had transported over ten million fine ounces of gold in and out of Macau and, with the exception of the Miss Macao heist, without losing a single grain.

164Marco Lobo16. Miss Macao Hijacking Newspaper story.Newspaper article reporting on what was thought at first to be a crash of ‘Miss Macao’, one of MAT-CO’s aircraft. In fact, it was the failed first attempted hijacking of a commercial aircraft in history. On 16 July 1948, ‘Miss Macao’ departed from Macau with 23 passengers and four crewmembers. The scheduled flight missed its arrival time and stayed out of radio contact causing airline’s staff in Hong Kong to become worried. Fishermen spotted the aircraft suddenly changing direction and then plunging into the sea.

167...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José LoboChapter 17Vila Verde Radio and the Macau Cultural CircleTo this very end, new street lamps are being manufac-tured in England, for example, with a superior illuminative power, relieved of discomforting odour and safety risks, and giving a brighter, clearer light. Availing itself of these street lamps, which are not expensive, and fueling them with oil supplied from Timor, the government and Council of Ma-cau will indeed install a fine system of illumination and ren-der a great service to the townspeople and the country at the same time.As mentioned earlier, the same conservative outlook that pre-vented electricity from coming to Macau delayed all forms of en-tertainment that required electricity from starting. And so, cin-ema was also a victim of this conservative mindset. It was not until 1904 that the Leal Senado signed a contract with a French engineering company. A year later electric light was introduced to Macau and a couple of years after that came cinema.Today with the myriad choices of entertainment, it is un-imaginable that so few existed at the time. Still, Portuguese so-ciety in Macau was entertained with concerts and recitals at the

168Marco LoboDom Pedro V Theater (built 1860), and at two social clubs — the Military Club and Clube de Macau. Parties and picnics were com-mon, as were musical soirees and even poetry readings. One mustn’t forget the importance of religious processions such as Procissão do Nosso Senhor Bom Jesus dos Passos, which remains today one of the most important Catholic traditions of the city. On such occa-sions, celebrations were held in church courtyards and worshippers were treated to fireworks displays and other entertainment. In 1950, Pedro established Radio Vila Verde to further his dream of spreading Portuguese music and culture throughout the region. A small purpose-built green building was construct-ed in a corner of Pedro’s property just a few meters from his swimming pool. An impressive antenna jutted upwards from the top of the building. For his many grandchildren, the radio sta-tion was just an extension of an area they considered their play-ground. They recall wandering in and out of the station at will, looking through the glass into the room that housed the equip-ment and broadcasters. Vila Verde was not the first radio station in Macau. A short-wave broadcaster named Radio Club Macau had begun broad-casting in the 1940s. From this station Pedro initially borrowed equipment to start his own venture. Roque Choi, lifelong friend and colleague of Pedro’s explained it this way:I studied under a Lithuanian piano teacher by the name of Harry Ore, one of the refugees that arrived from Hong Kong. To those of us that loved music, Macau was like a desert but that all changed when the new radio station be-gan broadcasting 60 minutes of Portuguese music a day. Additionally, Pedro formed the Vila Verde Orchestra which played Pedro’s own compositions and broadcast through the

169...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José Loboradio station. I was given several chances to play the piano as part of the orchestra for the radio and enjoyed playing in public concerts as well.17. Pedro Lobo conducting his orchestra.

170Marco LoboVila Verde initially operated for 12 hours, beginning at 9:00 a.m. with Pedro’s own music. During the day it broadcast for sev-eral hours in Chinese and then reverted to Portuguese as well as some English programs in the evening.Professionally run, the radio station had its own Controlling Engineer, Johnny Alvares, as well as a Programme Director, Jose Noronha. It also had regular radio announcers for its Por-tuguese, Chinese and English programming. Pedro continued investing in the radio station, replacing its primitive 250-watt transmitter with one that delivered 3,000 watts. The broadcast-ing range increased and is said to have been heard as far away as New Zealand and Tasmania.As different forms of entertainment became plentiful, Vila Verde Radio lost much of its audience and by the late 60’s contin-ued broadcasting only in Chinese. When Pedro’s old home was demolished to make way for real estate development, the station was moved into a high-rise building. Eventually, the station was sold to an organisation interested in broadcasting dog and horse races to audiences in Hong Kong and it was once again relocated, to the Macau Jock-ey Club. In its current form, Radio Vila Verde exists as an online station using the Chinese name for Vila Verde (Green Village), Luk Chuen.Vila Verde Radio served as an outlet for Pedro’s passion for music. It encouraged him to both write and perform music, as well as to promote Portuguese language and culture, but it did not stand alone. In the same year that the radio station was estab-lished, Pedro formed the Macau Cultural Circle. The purpose of the Macau Musical Cultural Circle (MCC) was to promote the dissemination of artistic and literary culture and to make Macau, in all aspects, better and better known in other Portuguese colo-nies and everywhere in the world where Portuguese was spoken.

171...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José LoboThe original Musical Cultural Circle began in Portugal and was set up by a wealthy lady with a passion for music. There was later an effort to set up branches in the colonies. Pedro, as the true music lover and a resourceful man, took charge of the society in Macau. As President of the Musical Cultural Circle, Pedro, with other members of the group, kept up efforts to bring internation-al musicians to Macau to perform at the Dom Pedro V Theatre. After Pedro’s death in 1965, the activities of the Musical Cultural Circle, continued for several more years. When the group ceased its operations, some of the activities were taken over by govern-ment institutions which had begun to engage in similar activities. The MCC supported performances of internationally and locally renowned artists at the D. Pedro V Theater, sponsored exhibitions of art works by painters, organized debates and conferences, edit-ed books and promoted sports activities.In collaboration with leading writers and journalists of Ma-cau, the Macau Cultural Circle also published the Mosaico cul-tural magazine, written in Portuguese, Chinese and English. At the time, this publication is believed to have been the only Por-tuguese, English and Chinese cultural magazine to be published in the world. Although Pedro was the driving force and soul of the MCC, the organization had several other key members who were linked to local government, the military or other professions. Among them were Macau’s Governor Albano Rodrigues de Ol-iveira, well-known academic and writer José Silveira Machado and linguist Luis Gonzaga Gomes.After seven years, Mosaico Magazine published its final issue, releasing it in December 1957

172Marco Lobo18. Cover of Mosaico Magazine September 1950 (MCML).In collaboration with leading writers and journalists of Macau, the Macau Cultural Circle published the Mosaic cultural magazine written in Portuguese, Chinese and English. At the time, this publi-cation is believed to have been the only Portuguese, English and Chinese cultural magazine to be published in the world.

173...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José Lobo19. Poster advertising Vila Verde Radio.Established in 1950, Radio Vila Verde was established as part of Pedro Lobo’s dream to spread Por-tuguese music and culture throughout the region. Vila Verde initially operated for 12 hours, begin-ning at 9:00 a.m. with Pedro’s own music. During the day it broadcast for several hours in Chinese and then reverted to Portuguese as well as some English programs in the evening.

174Marco LoboMusical Legacy: The Vila Verde OrchestraRogério reminisced about how music was always present in their home, how Pedro would often be humming a tune and jotting down ideas for new melodies. It is a wonder that amidst his official responsibilities and those of caring for a large fam-ily that he found time to satisfy his passion for music. The son Pedro, P. H. Lobo, once told the story of when he returned to Macau after graduating from university in the United States. On his arrival, his father greeted him with a welcome home gift, a saxophone.His days at the seminary taught Pedro the basics of music composition, but Pedro’s musical ambitions of composing works for an entire orchestra went beyond his capabilities. He was re-signed to having to play his own tunes on a violin. As a devout Catholic, Pedro donated generously to charities and came to know many of the clergy who ran Macau’s charita-ble organizations. A breakthrough to his musical dilemma came when Father Schmidt, an Austrian priest and music professor at the Salesian Institute, decided to arrange a choral performance in honor of the birth of Pedro’s first grandchild in 1947. Father Schmidt had heard Pedro humming his own tune while cradling the baby in his arms. the priest wrote down the music and had it performed by his choir. That was the first time Pedro was credited as the composer of a piece of music. Given the shortage of musicians trained in western musical instruments in Macau at the time, Pedro’s first “orchestra” con-sisted of a small ensemble of players who came and went as they were available. However, by the mid 1950’s, Pedro had assembled a small orchestra, “the Vila Verde Orchestra”, which played reg-ularly for Radio Vila Verde and performed at the Dom Pedro V Theatre. They practiced in the second-floor room of a building

175...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José Lobonear Vila Verde. The usual group consisted of three violins, a cello, two clarinets, a piano, an organ and a bass.Pedro collaborated with Father Schmidt on several classical pieces and went on to compose and conduct his orchestra. He sometimes engaged professional overseas orchestras to play and record the music on 78 and 45 rpm discs. The compositions he worked on with Father Schmidt were waltzes and marches that had a distinctively Austrian flavour. He later collaborated with other musicians on pieces that reflected the big band sounds of the late 1940’s and 1950’s. Sadly, due to the deterioration of the records over the decades, much of his music has been lost. What was salvageable, was compiled by Rogério in 1992 and preserved as a CD entitled Gems of the Orient.Pedro’s most ambitious musical project was a four-act operetta called Cruel Separation. First performed in public in June 1949, Pedro is said to have come up with the idea when he was writing of his experiences in Macau during the Second World War. It has been suggested that he came across characters and a story he believed would make a good operetta. The lead character, “Baron Okedo”, bears a strong resemblance in name, family, and history to the Japanese prime minister from 1934 to 1936, Keisuke Oka-da. There were newspaper reports at the time that Pedro was in talks with a US movie studio to make the story into a Hollywood movie. Nothing came of the film project which if successful might have put Macau into the limelight.Cruel Separation is the tale of a Japanese nobleman, Baron Okedo, who while living in London fell in love with a beautiful English lady.If Pedro drew on his wartime experiences, including his in-volvement with the Japanese and other foreign nationals in Ma-cau during that time, he might have observed interracial romances. Many such relationships didn’t survive the political realities of those dark years. Looking more closely into the story of the oper-

176Marco Loboetta, as a long-time resident of Japan, I immediately thought ‘Oke-do’ an unusual name for a Japanese. The name would have been more natural as ‘Okada’. As I thought more about it, I remembered that Okada was the name of a Japanese prime minister from 1934 to 1936, Keisuke Okada, and actually a baron under the Japanese hereditary peerage system Kazoku (華族, “exalted lineage”).An admiral of the Imperial Japanese Navy, Okada was named Prime Minister of Japan in 1934 while also holding the post of Minister of Colonial Affairs. Keisuke Okada pushed back against Japan’s rising militarism and became a target for the extremists that encouraged totalitarianism in Japan. In 1936, Okada sur-vived a failed assassination attempt during which his secretary, mistaken for Okada, was killed. Okada who went into hiding left office shortly after the incident.Okada continued to exert his influence after leaving office, ar-guing against starting a war with the United States. During the Second World War, he formed a group with other politicians seek-ing an early end to the fighting. When Japanese forces were de-feated at the battles of Guadalcanal and Midway, Okada urged the Japanese Government to negotiate an end to the hostilities. He played a central role in the removal of Tojo, Prime Minister of Japan during much of the war and general of the Imperial Japanese Army.The story of Cruel Separation tells of how Baron Okedo encoun-ters Lady Jane, a beautiful Englishwoman as he strolls along the Thames River in London. The two marry and live happily in London.Eighteen years later, in 1941, the Japanese attack Pearl Har-bour and follow with assaults on British forces in Malaya, Singa-pore, and Hong Kong. Japan declares war on Great Britain and Baron Okedo is forced to depart for Japan accompanied by his wife Lady Jane. Back in Japan, Okedo voices his strong opposi-tion to the war and is locked up. Lady Jane is sent back to Britain, singing her final goodbyes in the final scene.

177...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José LoboIn explaining the operetta’s third act, which takes place in Japan where the couple realise their desperate situation, Pedro writes of Macau as the only land of peace in the Far East. The fourth and final act occurs at the Japanese Military Command in Tokyo where the Baroness witnesses her husband’s arrest, which cruel-ly separates the loving couple. Baron Okedo’s character mirrors Okada’s in which his anti-war sentiments are attacked by his fel-low countrymen. Lady Jane is forced to depart for London.Cruel Separation was performed again in 1953, the year after Keisuke Okada’s death. This time the operetta was performed at the Dom Pedro V Theatre with all proceeds donated in support of the children of Santa Infância, a charity established by the Canos-sian Daughters of Charity to care for children abandoned at birth.20. The Vila Verde Orchestra, pictured on the steps of Vila Verde 1953.This is the orchestra that performed the music for the operetta ‘Cruel Separation’ in 1953 at the Dom Pedro V Theatre. Seated at the piano next to Pedro is Roque Choi — long-time friend and confidant of Pedro’s. Roque worked closely with Pedro and even accompanied him across the border after the Border Gate Incident in 1952. Successful businessman on his own right, he acted as Pedro’s personal secretary. Roque later took over as personal secretary to Ho Yin. He died in 2006 at the age of 85.

179...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José LoboChapter 18Macau’s GoldfingerThe opening chapter of this book mentions Pedro’s meeting with Ian Fleming and how some believe that Pedro Lobo was the British author’s inspiration for the novel Goldfinger. The fact is that Goldfinger, the seventh novel in the James Bond series, was first published in March 1959, eight months before Fleming be-gan his round-the-world trip and before meeting Pedro. Further-more, Fleming’s manuscript had been completed the year before its release. Curious as to what Fleming had said about Macau and Pedro, I first read Thrilling Cities in 1970. I recall being rather horrified at the way he depicted my grandfather and ridiculed his hospitality. Having re-read the book more recently, I can look back at those passages with humor, with the understanding that Mr. Fleming’s intention was to entertain his readership, albeit at Pedro’s (and Macau’s) expense. In August 1949, Life Magazine printed article entitled “MACAO A DREAMY OLD COLONY WHOSE SMUGGLERS PLY THE CHINA COAST FLOURISHES AS RICHEST TRAFFIC CENTER OF WORLD GOLD TRADE”.

180Marco LoboThe article, complete with photographs of gold-smuggling junks and the melting and casting operation, drew some unwel-come attention. Pedro, shown in a photograph conducting his or-chestra with the caption: REAL RULER Dr. P J Lobo Portuguese citizen who controls all gold imports. Amateur composer, he directs his own operetta, Cruel Separation.Pedro must have been wary of another article about Macau that talked of gold smuggling. But through someone in Hong Kong with connections to Australian writer Richard Hughes, an interview was arranged. Hughes was accompanying Fleming. Since the Macau Goldfinger myth has persisted for six decades, it is worth looking at Fleming’s account of his meeting with Pe-dro. It reads like a BBC radio comedy, the Goon Show perhaps, a comedy program which included humorous segments alternating with musical interludes.At first sight the doctor, in his trim blue suit, stiff white collar, and rimless glasses, looked like the bank manager or dentist (in fact he started life as an oculist) one would have found in the more benign Wimbeldon.If Fleming had done better research, he would have discov-ered that Pedro was a Doctor of Economics, not an eye doctor. But then perhaps the eye doctor story had more appeal to readers of fiction. He goes on to describe Pedro as a small, thin Malayan Chinese with a pursed mouth and blank eyes.Fleming continues:A powerfully built butler, who looked more like a judo black-belt than a butler, offered us Johnny Walker, and we launched into careful conversation about the pros and cons

181...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José Loboof alcohol and cigarettes, neither of which, Dr. Lobo said, appealed to him.Those who have seen the 1964 movie Goldfinger will remem-ber the villain’s butler-cum-henchman Oddjob. Fleming couldn’t resist writing an Oddjob into the scene.Fleming paints a picture of Pedro as a bumbling eccentric, a kind of Peter Sellers character who is sometimes Inspector Jacques Clouseau and at other times Evelyn Tremble, the Pe-ter Sellers version of James Bond from Fleming’s f irst novel, Casino Royale.When he asks to hear something of Pedro’s musical composi-tions, Pedro graciously accommodates by placing a record on his gramophone. Fleming describes the scene that ensues, one that could have been specifically written for Peter Sellers:The doctor put ‘Waves of the South Seas’ on the gram-ophone and turned various knobs, which resulted only in a devastating roar of static from a concealed loud speak-er. More knobs were turned and still the static hooted and screamed. Dr. Lobo shouted through the racket that there was something wrong. The secretary was sent off to fetch the house engineer.Fleming goes on to describe the lunch he was invited to at Vila Verde as starting with a tepid macaroni and vegetable soup that promised an un-memorable meal. Whether the meal was good or not, after the Peter Sellers set-up, how could it have been anything but un-memorable?After lunch, Pedro shows Fleming the Vila Verde Radio Sta-tion before their departure. As they drive off in a car to taking them back to their hotel, he wrote:

182Marco LoboMy last sight of the enigmatic Dr. Lobo, as we rattled away in the ancient Chevrolet, was of a small, trim figure cutting short the last wave of his hand as he turned and, flanked by the powerful secretary and powerful butler, dis-appeared back into the Villa. This time not only one Oddjob, but two!And so there it is. Debunked, but the Goldfinger of Macau myth may persist for those who still want to believe it.

185...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José LoboChapter 19Modernizing Macau - Tourism and GamblingMacau’s economic survival has throughout its history been dependent on ‘special industries’,73 the opium trade, gold smug-gling and gambling. These activities sometimes occurred at the same time but took turns as the primary money earner for the en-clave’s financial lifeblood. All this was made possible by Macau’s very special geographical position and, in more recent history, her special administrative status. In Macau’s modern era, gambling has been the most important means of public financing. From its origins as a means of securing additional revenue for the Macau government, there has been a licensing system for gambling houses. The system was first introduced in 1849, under then-Governor João Maria Ferreira do Amaral. Moving forward to 1934, the second casino monopoly concession was granted to the Tai Heng Company. Though significant, it did not then have the economic impact it would later. During the 1930s, tax from gambling brought to the government coffers an annual revenue of about 1.5 million patacas, whereas the annual exports amounted to about 10 million patacas.

186Marco LoboPedro had managed the process of receiving the gambling bids for many years. An amusing anecdote was recounted by John Pownall Reeves in his memoir.74The story goes that on one occasion the usual sealed tenders were to be opened by Mr. Lobo. One only had up to then been presented, that of the Company which had held the concession for many years. At the last moment another envelope was presented, to the consternation of the Concessionary Compa-ny who asked for another five minutes, at the end of which they entered a tender for an extra quarter million. Mr. Lobo then drew from the other envelope a blank sheet of paper and blandly remarked that evidently the Company was not find-ing taxation too heavy. This story at least deserves to be true.Real change occurred in 1961, when Governor Jaime Silvério Marques, declared Macau’s status as a low-taxation region. This po-sitioned it as a tourism and gambling site, aiming to develop these activities. The Portuguese Foreign Department then put it into law, officially declaring Macau a tourist area and legally permitting its gaming industry as a “special entertainment”. The era of the old monopoly came to an end when the government opened bidding for the right to offer games of fortune to the public. Listed below are the basic terms that the bidding companies had to accept:1. Pay gaming tax of not less than MOP 3 million an-nually to the Macau Government, with an additional 5% tax for the reserve of a tourism department fund, and an extra 1% for the civil servant support fund.2. The winner had to build a new casino and a luxury hotel within three years of winning.

187...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José Lobo3. The concession would last no longer than eight years, after which, all the facilities would be handed over to the government unconditionally and then transferred to the new bid winner.The bid was won by the Sociedade de Turismo e Diversões de Macau (STDM), owned by Stanley Ho and his original partners. Pedro was in charge of the bidding process which received two bids for the monopoly. One from the Tai Heng Company which promised MOP 3.15 million, and the other, STDM’s, which came in a just a few minutes later with a bid of MOP 3.167 million. In 1962, STDM officially took over the gaming monop-oly in Macau. This was one of Pedro’s final duties before his retire-ment in 1964 at the age of 72. Stanley Ho had this to say about the winning bid:76I made important promises to make sure we won the bid. In those days, you could only go from Hong Kong to Macau on the slow boat to China, you couldn’t go on a day trip. All the hotels were sub-standard, and so were the ca-sinos, and they only offered Chinese games. So, I promised in my first tender: first that I’d try to bring Macau nearer to Hong Kong by opening up a new channel and provid-ing high-speed ferries. Second, I promised to build high-class hotels. Third, I promised to introduce European games into the casinos, and to make sure the croupiers were well dressed and well educated.

189...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José LoboChapter 20FamilyPedro was a loving patriarch, but he was also a strict discipli-narian, traits he would have learned from his adoptive father and later the Jesuit priests who taught him for seven years at St. Jo-seph’s. He didn’t hesitate to correct his grandchildren when needed.Grandson Roger Lobo had this to say about an experience he had as a young boy. “Once, when Mum and Dad were not around, Avô was put in the position of a disciplinarian — Dad must have been in Hong Kong and Mum must have been busy with one of the babies. I had done something like bullying one of the young-sters. I was brought to Avô who called me a ‘pirate’ — he was stern and asked why I behaved like a pirate — only pirates behave like this. I do not remember getting a punishment per se, but the severe look made it clear he wouldn’t tolerate more of the same.”One of the older Hyndman cousins, Isabela Palmer, had this to say about him. “He was a very stern man if you stepped out of line, which I did when I lived in Praia Grande with the Lobo family during the war years. There was a new movie in town, it was called ‘Zorro’ and the actor, Tyrone Power, I thought bore a strong resemblance to your father. I was most impressed with Zorro and put large chalk ‘Z’ on the neighbor’s doors. When you

190Marco Lobograndfather heard about it, he had an audience with a 6-year-old me and handed me a bucket of water, some soap and a brush and instructed me on what to do.”His son Rogério told about a time that Pedro chased him around the house with a rolled-up music score he had been work-ing on. Y. C. Liang, had given Rogério a pistol after the Second World War. Pedro was leaning over his desk writing the music when Rogério accidentally fired it. The bullet tore through Pedro’s trousers, luckily not hitting his leg. The diminutive Pedro, chased his much larger son around the house with a rolled sheet of paper.Pedro felt a strong need to fulfill his role as head of the family and to take on that responsibility for the extended family. Here’s an anecdote from another Hyndman cousin. “When I got mar-ried, I was very young, in my late teens, and my parents were quite concerned. They only agreed if we honeymooned in Macau and stayed with Aunty Nanning (her great aunt Consuelo Hyndman). This was fine by us. Well, on our third day in Macau we were summonsed to Uncle Lobo’s residence at Vila Verde. To our sur-prise, he called my new husband into his room and paid him a dowry for my hand in marriage. I never knew how much it was. He was the best Uncle ever.”Just as people from Hong Kong would travel to Macau for some peace and quiet, the reverse was true. People of Macau went to Hong Kong for excitement and shopping. The British colony bustled with activity; it was sophisticated. A sizeable Portuguese community thrived in Hong Kong. The migration of Macau Portuguese to the new British colony began soon after its establishment in 1842. After the assassination of Governor João Maria Ferreira do Amaral It increased significantly77 and accelerated further after the great typhoon of 1874 devastated Macau. By the early 1900’s, it had grown to several thousand. Hong Kong’s Portuguese community played an important com-

191...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José Lobomercial role in there, mainly working as intermediaries between the British and Chinese.Pedro made regular trips to Hong Kong and it was during these visits that he became acquainted with the Hyndman family and met Branca Hyndman, the woman who was to be his wife.The Hyndman family were amongst the early Macau-Por-tuguese settlers in Hong Kong. Captain Henry Hyndman had served in Singapore in the East India Company. He married Antonia Josefa de Gamboa. They moved to Macau and became Portuguese citizens. One of their sons Henrique, Branca’s fa-ther, settled in Hong Kong and worked as a clerk in the Hong Kong and Shanghai Bank.As to how Pedro and Branca met, at least according to fami-ly lore, Pedro attended a musical recital in Hong Kong of Maria Hyndman, Branca’s older sister. Also in attendance was a gentle-man by the name of Verissimo Gonsalves. He worked in Hong Kong as a clerk for D. Sassoon & Co. Verissimo and Pedro be-came best friends. Verissimo later married Maria Hyndman.Pedro went to Hong Kong on weekends and attended Sun-day Mass with Verissimo at Rosary Church in Tsim Sha Tsui, Kowloon. The church choir was said to be the best amongst all of the territory’s Catholic churches. Although the Hyndman fam-ily lived on Hong Kong Island on Mosque Street, they attended Rosary Church, where the musical family made up a large part of the choir. Once Pedro spotted Branca, he was smitten. He was introduced to Branca by his friend Verissimo. From then on, he made it his mission to get to know her better. He did so by join-ing the choir himself. As his son Rogério told it, Pedro, a little dark, skinny fellow from Macau found it tough going trying to be accepted by the Scottish-Portuguese Hyndman clan. At 28 years old, he hadn’t yet achieved fame or fortune. He was sim-ply an employee at the BNU, holding a clerical position like that

192Marco Lobomany Hong Kong-Portuguese held with the much larger and more prestigious Hong Kong Shanghai Bank. Pedro wasn’t de-terred. As with most endeavors he persisted, and Branca Helena Hyndman eventually agreed to be his wife. Pedro and Branca were married in Hong Kong and over the next decade had six children. Their marriage was to last just twelve years. In 1932, Branca died as a result of complications due to childbirth. Pedro was 4o years old. Rogério spoke of the anguish felt in the Lobo household during Branca’s illness when she filled the house with loud cries of pain before finally succumbing.Pedro never married again. That is not to say that he never again enjoyed the company of women. In fact, it was quite the opposite. My mother used to say quite unashamedly that he loved wine, women and song. Pedro had a string of mistresses and some of them had his children, though not his name. Over the years the author met and become friends with a few of these ‘cousins’.There are two versions of the story why he decided not to re-marry after the death of his beloved Branca. The first one is what the family were told, a belief long held to and may well be true: that he made a promise to his wife on her deathbed that he would not marry again. There was the romantic notion of a bereft man, left to care for his six children on his own. The other explanation came as a result of information found in the course of research for this book; looking at dates and timelines and talking to the few people who knew about his personal life. It appears he did not want his six children to have a stepmother that did not love and care for them in the same way as their real mother Branca had.Pedro and Branca were wed at Rosary Church in Hong Kong on 11th July 1920. Their first child, or rather Pedro’s first child Marietta, was born in Timor on 1st November 1920, three and a half months after the wedding. This obviously places Pedro in Timor sometime at the start of that year. The best guess is that he

193...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José Loboreturned to Timor to see Belarmino and while there, engaged to Branca, Marietta was conceived. It will probably never be known who the woman was that Pedro was involved with in Timor; per-haps an old flame, maybe a servant girl. In all the found docu-ments, Marietta is recorded as the daughter of Pedro José Lobo and Branca Hyndman Lobo. Branca wasn’t to meet Marietta for several years. Marietta ar-rived in Macau from Timor as a little girl who joined the Lobo household as ‘big sister’. So, coming back to the reason for Pedro’s pledge not to remarry: It was said that although Marietta was Pedro’s favorite, she certainly was not Branca’s. Branca was often quite unkind to her, treating her worse than the other children, her real children. Seeing this, Pedro did not want to risk subject-ing the family to this kind of treatment ever again and so made this promise to himself.It has also been suggested that Pedro adopted Marietta, the child of a relative, carrying on in the same tradition that he ben-efitted from with his own adoption by Belarmino. But it is only speculation. No evidence has been found to support this idea.Marietta was dark complexioned and of a slight build like him-self. Auntie ‘Eta’ is remembered as being very kind and gentle. As the eldest of Pedro’s children, she often acted as mediator when ar-guments broke out between her siblings. If they wanted something from their father, they would often consult Marietta for advice as to how to go about asking for it, or even get her to negotiate on their behalves. There was never any question that the other chil-dren fully accepted Marietta as their big sister. After Branca passed away, she was an excellent administrator of their household.Marietta married Constâncio Lemos de Araújo, originally from Timor. He worked as sub manager of Macau’s Water Sup-ply Company. They had a son, Pedro Francisco. Sadly, Pedro José would see his first-born daughter fall victim to a gambling ad-

194Marco Lobodiction. The irony of seeing his child consumed by a vice he con-trolled as Economics Chief must have weighed heavily on him. Given unlimited credit due to her family connections, Marietta constantly fell into debt at the casinos and had to be bailed out. She grew continually more estranged from her siblings and after Pedro’s death she and her family left Macau for good. They set-tled in Darwin, Australia where her husband found employment as the Portuguese Consul. She passed away in Australia in 1980.Of his other children, Olivia Maria, born a year after Mari-etta in 1921, would marry Adelino Barbosa da Conceição, a well-liked teacher and Macau’s Inspector of Primary Education. The couple emigrated to Portugal with their two daughters.Their third child, Rogério Hyndman was born in 1923. A little has already been written about him and his marriage to Margaret Choa. As his first son, Rogério would grow up to work closely with his father in Macau and then later in Hong Kong. Rogério and Margaret had ten children.Next came a daughter, Natércia, born in 1925. Natércia married Arnaldo Carlos Maria Rodrigues da Silva. They had two children. The family would also emigrate to Portugal after Pedro’s death.Another son came in 1927, Orlando dos Passos Hyndman. Orlando was the first of the children to benefit from a university education, earning his bachelor’s degree as well as a doctorate in economics in the United States. Orlando had a successful career with the IMF in Washington DC. He and his American wife Jo Ellen had four children.The sixth and youngest child, Pedro Hyndman, was born in 1930. Like Orlando, he received a university education in the United States, after which he returned to Macau and worked with his father. Later, the younger Pedro ran the Lisboa Hotel and held directorships in several companies. He married Maria Alice Dias Lemos and they had three children.

195...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José Lobo21. A swimming pool party at Vila Verde.Pedro is pictured here walking on the lawn dressed in white at the center of the photograph. Note the piano and chairs on the veranda, set-up for an outdoor concert. Pedro lived in a complex that included his house, his office and the radio station he founded which was built on the site to the left of this picture. The entire site has been redeveloped and is now dominated by supermarkets and shops at the junction of Rua de Francisco Xavier Pereira and Avenida do Ouvidor Arriaga, a couple of blocks away from Kun Iam Temple.22. Branca Helena Hyndman Lobo 1895 – 1932.The Hyndmans trace their roots back to 18th Centu-ry Scotland. Captain Henry Hyndman had served in Singapore in the East India Company. He married Antonia Josefa de Gamboa and they moved to Macau and became Portuguese citizens. The Hyndmans were amongst the early Macau-Portuguese settlers in Hong Kong. One of their sons Henrique, Branca Helena’s fa-ther, settled in Hong Kong and worked as a clerk in the Hong Kong and Shanghai Bank. Pedro and Branca were married in Hong Kong at Rosary Church in 1920. They had six children. Branca died at the age of 37 due to complications related to childbirth.

196Marco Lobo23. Rogério Hyndman Lobo and Margaret Choa Wedding 7th April 1947.Back Row: George Choa, Robert Choa, Andrew ChoaSecond Row: Pedro J. Lobo, Louise Choa, Kathleen Choa, Gertrude ChoaThird Row: Tommy Johnson, Marietta LoboFront Row: Leo Choa, Netercia Lobo, Rogério Lobo, Margaret Choa, Angeline Choa, Pauline ChoaJohnson, Dr. Alberto Rodrigues (best man), Mary Jaqueline Johnson (flower girl), Felicie Belilios Choa (far right)24. Pedro J Lobo and granddaughter Maria Margarida Lobo da Conceição ‘Rita’, 1951.This picture captures an intimate moment shared between Pedro and his grandchild as they sit on the steps of the little girl’s Macau home, blowing soap bubbles. The Conceição family moved to Portugal after Pedro’s death and now reside in Lisbon.

199...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José LoboChapter 21At the EndEach breath is labored, like trying to suck air through a crimped straw. The sound of Happy Valley’s afternoon traffic drift-ed in through an open window of the hospital room at the Hong Kong Sanitorium. “Is he awake?” I asked my mother.“He’s resting with his eyes closed, but he knows you’re here,” she said.I look up at her and give one of those little boy nods that show that I’m not convinced. My grandfather seems to be in deep sleep. He appeared frailer than when I last saw him a few weeks earlier. His hair, still dark but thinning, was swept back over his large forehead and fell limply onto a starched, white pillowcase. The hair was much longer than I remembered it being. He was always so well-groomed, it was unusual to see him that way.“Avô needs a haircut,” I said.Mother was silent for a while, then said, “Yes, we’ll get a barber to come soon.”That was the final time for me to see my grandfather Pedro José Lobo, but the image of that day is seared into my memory.

200Marco LoboHe died on 1st October 1965 at the age of seventy-three. The registrar recorded his profession simply as ‘Retired Civil Servant’.Pedro was buried alongside his wife Branca in Hong Kong’s Catholic Cemetery. In addition to family and close friends, the funeral was attended by a large number of mourners that included representatives of the Hong Kong and Macau governments and prominent members of their business communities. In the pho-tographs taken on the day of his burial are the pall-bearers, his friends, representing important periods of his life. Notable among those guiding Pedro’s casket to its final resting place were Sir Lindsay Ride, the Australian physiologist who formed and com-manded the British Army Aid Group (BAAG), headquartered in Kweilin, the group that provided help to POW’s and allied servicemen escaping into China, Dr. Alberto Rodrigues, a key member of the Portuguese community in Hong Kong and Se-nior Unofficial Member of the Executive Council of Hong Kong, Ho Sin-hang, entrepreneur, philanthropist and financier who co-founded the Hang Seng Bank, Ho Tim, another founder of the Hang Seng Bank and brother of Ho Yin, and Y C Liang, a key member of the BAAG in Macau and later founder of the HK Macau Hydrofoil Co. as well as numerous other businesses and philanthropic causes.

201...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José Lobo25. Pedro’s and Branca’s tomb in Hong Kong’s Catholic Cemetery in Happy Valley.

203...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José LoboChapter 22AccoladesToday, when individuals are scrutinized at every turn for their actions, big and small. These safeguards are supposedly in place to protect the public from transgressions of the rich and powerful. We have concepts of ethical governance, a better understanding of what constitutes conflicts of interest, of operating with transparen-cy. It is inconceivable that a government servant would be allowed to engage in private enterprise for personal financial gain. And yet, this is exactly what happened back in Petro Lobo’s day. It can’t be said that nobody questioned it, but few did. Pedro was a complex individual and like everyone else he had his flaws. Around him he had his family, his lifelong friends and his string of lovers. He also had rivals if not absolute enemies. But the truth is that when Ma-cau needed saving, he pulled out all stops and saved her.Say what you may about him, but when push came to shove, he wasn’t one to shy away from trouble. The diminutive fellow approached the Japanese commander who was lobbing artillery shells at Macau and offered him drinks before the situation esca-lated into an invasion of the colony, and he took it upon himself to apologize on behalf of Portugal for the Border Gate Incident — well, that took huge... courage.

204Marco LoboFamily friend Jim Silva wrote that there was never any ques-tioning in Macau about the high wealth and power of a govern-ment servant — but not everyone was a fan. For example the Portuguese Consul in Hong Kong in 1948, Eduardo Brasão, ve-hemently objected to the way that Pedro conducted his affairs, accusing him of discrediting Brasão, interfering in matters of all kinds as well as convoluting the matters of state and private enter-prise. Brasão also accused him of trying to dictate Macau’s (that is, Portugal’s) foreign policy with regard to Hong Kong. He cited in particular the matter of the gold trade as a conflict of interest.78Others argued that he and his group of friends had ‘taken pos-session of Macau’. They had everything that represented a source of revenue for the colony. Rice trading (smuggling) as well as more or-thodox enterprises were in the hands of Lobo, as was even the water company, in which Pedro José Lobo and his son were partners.I was once asked in an interview what I thought about the var-ious facets of Pedro J Lobo, combining functions that in today’s world would be incompatible. My reply then, as it still is today, was that I believed he was a man that did things because he saw a need for them to be done. In other writing I’ve explored the issue of colonial governors being ineffective, who saw their roles as tem-porary, as stepping stones to better things, as care takers. Pedro was a product of his time because he stepped into a power vacuum and stayed there, something which may not have been possible if stronger government had existed and persisted. One could argue that the world was a simpler place in the seven decades of Pedro’s life. There didn’t seem to be a sense that for him and those who surrounded him that anything was im-possible. He arrived in parochial Macau as an outsider, worked as a bank clerk and then rose to the position of Head of Economic Services, then founded an airline and controlled Asia’s largest gold trading business.

205...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José LoboAt the close of the Second World War, Louis Mountbatten, Supreme Allied Commander for South East Asia, awarded Pe-dro a certificate for his assistance to British troops during the con-flict. For his service to Macau and to Portugal, Pedro was awarded the Order of the Colonial Empire in 1952, this a colonial order of knighthood as a reward for services in the Portuguese colonies. In 1955, the same year that Macau was declared a province of Por-tugal, he was again recognized, being declared as an ‘Honorary Citizen of Macau’. In the same year a road was inaugurated in his name: Rua do Dr. Pedro José Lobo. Upon his retirement from pub-lic service in 1964 at the age of seventy-two, Pedro was honored with a second order of knighthood, the Order of Prince Henry.He drew great strength from the lessons learned from his adoptive father Belarmino. As I studied how he lived, I saw a clear pattern of emulation. Belarmino’s lessons of altruism were ingrained in his adopted son’s psyche, as was his devotion to the Catholic Church and its charities such as the Santa Casa da Mi-sericórdia. Belarmino’s fondness of choral composition led Pedro to create and perform his own music. Belarmino’s public service as President of the Dili City Council was matched by Pedro’s own presidency of Macau’s Leal Senado; Rua Belarmino Lobo was fol-lowed by Rua do Dr. Pedro José Lobo. Even the title ‘Doctor’ was a mark of distinction that preceded both father and son’s names — Belarmino as a medical doctor and Pedro as a Doctor of Com-merce and Economics.At the start of this book, I shared some ideas about writing and honesty. I truly hope that readers will feel that I have been faithful to the task. The mission was daunting from start to finish and involved many dream-fueled sleepless nights. For almost a year, my writing room became a dusty cave that held a beast that scared the life out of me — the computer that held this manu-script stewing in its bowels.

206Marco LoboHaving finished, I am thankful for the opportunity to have studied Pedro’s life, and in doing so gained a deeper understanding of the wonderful place that is the “City of the Name of God”. 26. Award from Louis Mountbatten 1945.

207...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José LoboAlma minha gentil, que te partiste Tão cedo desta vida descontente, Repousa lá no Céu eternamente, E viva eu cá na terra sempre triste.79 Rhymes, Sonnet XIIILuís Vaz de Camões

209...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José LoboAppendix 1 Background on the historical links between Macau and JapanMost people will be familiar with The Perry Expedition during which on July 8, 1853, four U.S. Navy warships steamed into Edo Bay and threatened to attack if Japan did not begin trade with the West. This marked the reopening of the country to dia-logue with the west after more than two centuries of isolation and again, there is a link to Macau which I will explain from a person-al perspective — something I experienced while living in Japan.On 11th March 2011, a devastating earthquake and tsunami struck Japan. Large areas of the eastern shoreline were affected, with the most damage being inflicted in the Tohoku Region, par-ticularly the northern area near the city of Sendai. Waves surged as high as 39 meters and went as far 10 kilometers inland. Having decided to go skiing in the mountains of Nagano that weekend, I was fortunate to have been quite a distance from the most damaged areas. Shortly before 3 pm on that Friday, the ski lifts stopped working. We hadn’t felt the earthquake but knew that something big had happened as all telephone signals ceased — fixed line as well as cell. We hiked back to our ski lodge and found every-one gathered around a television set in the lobby. Less than an hour after the massive earthquake (magnitude-9) the first tsunami waves

210Marco Lobostruck the coastline. We learned about the devastation from the television as news helicopters flew over the flooded areas —coastal areas where the tsunami hit had been flattened. An elderly relative lived right in one of those areas and without any way to contact her we made the decision to go drive up to make sure she was safe. Arriving at Sendai Port, we saw that indeed everything had been flattened. Ships had been carried inland, cars were stacked up onto each other and sat overturned on the roofs of buildings. We did find the elderly woman and brought her with us back to Tokyo. The point of this story is that on that same day, a 164-foot fishing boat called the Ryou-Un Maru was dragged out to sea from its port in Aomori in northeastern Japan. From there, pushed along by ocean currents the ship traveled for an entire year across 6,000 kilometers of the Pacific Ocean, finally reaching the coast of North America. It was first spotted in April of 2012, more than a year after the tsunami near the Canadian coast off British Columbia before floating into US waters. Attempts to salvage the vessel failed and it was finally sunk by the U.S. Coast Guard to prevent it from becoming a navigation hazard.Here is where the Macau-Japan connection comes in with an-other of those seemingly unrelated events that in fact are inextri-cably linked — another example of how Macau becomes part of a story due to its openness and strategic location.The journey of the Ryou-Un Maru in some ways replicated an incident which took place 179 years earlier when another Japanese ship was carried by ocean currents along a similar path. It is the remarkable story of Yamamoto Otokichi and his shipmates — one of survival and adventure that brought together several significant events of the 19th Century.In 1832, a 15-meter Japanese ship on a routine trading voyage to Edo was caught in a typhoon. The Hojunmaru lost its rudder and mast and like the Ryou-Un Maru, was cast out to sea. At the

211...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José Lobotime, under the sakoku edict the restrictions had already been in place for 200 years and the crew of 14 had little knowledge of what lay beyond the shores of their country.Carried by ocean currents, the Hojunmaru drifted for four-teen months with the crew living off the limited cargo they had on board. By the time the vessel reached land, the shores of Cape Alava in the Oregon Territory, only 3 of the crew were still alive.Their ordeal was far from over. The three young Japanese sailors were then captured and held prisoner by members of the Makah Tribe, the indigenous people living in the Pacific North-west of the continental United States and Canada. This may well have been the first contact between Japanese and Native Ameri-cans. News of the Japanese captives, Otokichi, Kyukichi and Iwa-kichi eventually reached the ears of western fur trappers and after several months, the Hudson Bay Company made arrangements to rescue the three ‘Chinamen’. They were handed over to John McLoughlin, the Chief Factor for the Columbia District at the Hudson’s Bay Company.McLoughlin, seeing the Japanese sailors as a way to open trade with Japan, then brought them to England to seek the ap-proval of his superiors at the HBC for pursuing the plan. The trip in 1835, made Otokichi and his two former shipmates the first nineteenth-century Japanese to visit England.After several weeks of deliberation, McLoughlin’s plan was denied, and the Japanese were once again put on a ship; this time the destination was Macau where they arrived in December 1835. They stayed in Macau for 18 months waiting for a ship willing to take them back to Japan. During this time, Otokichi who was still only 16 years old studied English and Chinese.In Macau, Otokichi met the famous German missionary, Karl Friedrich August Gutzlaff. Gutzlaff was the first Protestant mis-

212Marco Lobosionary to visit Korea and was one of the first missionaries in Chi-na to dress in Chinese clothes.Otokichi taught Japanese to Gutzlaff and worked with him on a translation of Christian texts. Gutzlaff’s intention was to find a way to enter Japan and spread Christianity there. An opportunity to return to Japan finally came when Charles King, an American trader offered to take them; again it was with the hope of estab-lishing trade relations with the country.In July 1837, they sailed to Japan and anchored at the en-trance of Edo Bay. There the ship was fired on by cannon and King was unable to complete his mission, finally deciding to give up and return to China with the castaways. Charles King later wrote about his failed trip and being attacked by the Japanese. King’s failed mission to Japan roused interest in the United States in bringing that country out of isolation; a goal that was realized by Commodore Matthew Perry when his ships arrived in Ja-pan in 1853, the first of two visits. Commodore Perry’s ‘Black Ships’ appeared belched smoke from their funnels and presented such shock and awe to Japanese that the country was forced to end its closed-door policy. Within a decade, fundamental regime change was to follow in Japan. Perry’s large, modern ships and firepower were yet another example of how superior technology often wins the day.Unable to return to Japan, Otokichi started a new life in Ma-cau. He worked as a translator for the British trade legation and British missionaries and is known to have returned to Japan twice. The first time was as in 1849 when he entered Uraga Port in 1849 aboard a British ship as a translator, to conduct a topographical survey. On that occasion, Otokichi was said to have disguised himself as Chinese. The second time was in 1854 as a member of the British fleet that docked at Nagasaki where the British signed the Anglo-Japanese Friendship Treaty.

213...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José LoboOtokichi was well rewarded for his role in opening the port in Nagasaki. He took the name of John Matthew Ottoson and was offered and accepted British citizenship. Toward the end of his life, Otokichi moved to Singapore where he died in 1867 at the age of 49 and was buried at the Japanese Cemetery of Singapore. Parts of his remains were returned to his original hometown of Mihama in Japan in 2005.Readers might well have seen reproductions of the 17th centu-ry painting of the Christian Martyrs of Nagasaki displayed in the museum beneath the Ruins of St. Paul’s Church. If Macau had not become a refuge for Christians in Asia and a base for spreading Christianity, and if Otokichi had not been aboard a ship blown off course by a typhoon, he would never have met Gutzlaff in Macau. Gutzlaff’s failed attempt at entering Japan would not have gotten the notice of Commodore Matthew Perry... and Japan might have remained a locked country for a much longer time.With the importance of Japan’s influence over Macau during the Second World War, it is fitting to briefly provide some back-ground as to how their expansionist psyche developed to the point of outright aggression against foreign sovereign nations.Most my adult life has been spent in Japan, the country that invaded and occupied my birthplace, Hong Kong, and had a stran-glehold on Macau, our family’s link to Portuguese heritage. Occa-sionally I hear comments from friends or family members whose relatives suffered under the Japanese during the Second World War about how terrible the Japanese were. My uncle Rudy Choy was interrogated and tortured by the Japanese due to his role in helping the wife of John Pownall Reeves (British Consul, Macau) escape from Hong Kong to Macau. And yet there are also some tales of compassion as the one told by my cousin Isabela Palmer who lived in Macau with Pedro while her father was interned at Shamshuipo Camp in Hong Kong.

214Marco LoboOne day my mother was out trying to get milk for my sis-ter by bartering. A Japanese officer went up to her and asked her what she was doing, and she told him. He said, ‘I have a wife and two daughters in Tokyo, and if they were here, I’d be trying to find milk for them too. I’ ll help you.’ He found out where we lived and came around with boxes of carnation milk. He also gave her a watch: he’d bought it for his wife, and he told her to sell it if she needed money for more milk.The Japanese soldier’s watch was never sold, it stayed with Bela’s mother Katy (Katherine Hyndman) and then was passed on to Isabela.As far back as my days as a university student in Tokyo, know-ing the history of the Japanese occupation of Hong Kong and of their time in Macau, I wondered how these gentile, polite people I came across every day could have been responsible for the atroc-ities during the Second World War. Pedro’s son Rogério, who shared the war years with him, said, “I never felt hatred for the pro-Japanese Chinese or the Japanese in Macau. To me they were just people doing their thing and I was doing my thing.” This statement might seem callous to some who endured great suffering under the Japanese, but it reflects the attitude of making the best out of an extremely difficult situation — a small territory surrounded, even infiltrated by a belligerent force. The sentiment was shared between father and son, and my life in Japan would not have been possible if this attitude of acceptance had not been passed on to me. Perhaps a romantic notion, but I consider my ex-perience of living in Japan as a continuation of the long history of the Portuguese, or Macanese diaspora in Japan, a relationship that began in the sixteenth century. It is worth examining then, how the Japanese came to be the aggressive warmongers they were the years preceding and through the Second World War.

215...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José LoboBritish Consul, John Pownall Reeves put it this way in his memoir The Lone Flag:Mr. Lobo may certainly be mentioned as a friend of Britain, all the more valuable a friend for the appearance of strict neutrality he managed to maintain vis-à-vis the Jap-anese who also regarded him as friendly. Perhaps the finest compliment ever paid to him was by a Japanese: “Lobo is a very good friend of ours, but nothing could buy his loyalty to Portugal”. I could have said the same, but I would have been justified in using far warmer terms.Long before they became modern-day inventors, the Japanese were copiers and assimilators. The first Portuguese visitors intro-duced the arquebus, long guns highly valued and sought after by Japan’s warring factions. Before long, they had reverse-engineered the weapons and built their own. Often, they made improvements of the copied articles, refining them until their versions became the best available. Myriad examples can be cited, from cameras and watches to cars and even whisky. They were copiers and assimilators not only of technologies but of culture and ideas, borrowing philosophy, writing and agri-cultural techniques from China and Korea. Though they attempt-ed to keep abreast of advances in the outside world during their period of self-imposed isolation, through the Dutch some west-ern-style scientific and medical innovations did flow into Japan through what was called Rangaku ‘Dutch learning’. The arrival of Commodore Matthew Perry’s Black Ships came as the shock that highlighted their technological backwardness.By the time of Perry’s arrival in 1853, Japan had witnessed the results of the Opium Wars and seen China cede Hong Kong to Britain. They were also aware of Dutch and British colonization of

216Marco Loboother parts of Asia, and now America had bullied them into sign-ing a trade treaty. Prior to Perry’s mission to Japan, the country had thought itself strong and secure. Forced into submitting to treaties, by America and Great Britain a year later, everything changed. Isolation had given the Japanese a sense of security in being able to avoid the same fate as China, pressed under the thumb of imperialism. Fearful that they would suffer the same consequenc-es as China, Japan was spurred into a frenzy of reform, ending the feudal system with a shogun as its head, restoring the emperor to power with the Meiji Restoration in 1868. Japan’s military was reformed along western lines and the country pursued a period of rapid industrialization. The fastest way Japan knew to catch up was by copying. The country began a movement for “civilization” and “enlightenment”, hoping to impress on the West that Japan was now an equal part-ner in world affairs. The Meiji Government sponsored various mis-sions to America and Europe, it invited several thousand foreign teachers and translated foreign books into Japanese. Western dress and hairstyles were adopted, and foreign architects were invited to design and erect buildings and bridges of concrete, stone and brick.To Japan, the concept of imitating western powers also extended to the idea of becoming an imperialist power. By 1894, its military had been sufficiently reformed and strengthened to the point it felt emboldened enough to cast its eye towards the Korean peninsula. A vassal state of China, Korea was rich in coal and iron. Fur-thermore, if taken over by a western power, its proximity to the Japanese islands would put Japan in a precarious position if war were to break out. Japan went to war against China and gained control over Korea as a tributary state and additionally, Taiwan as a colony. China ended up having to pay reparations. It was forced to grant Japan special trading rights in various Chinese cities in the same way that it had done so previously only to western powers.

217...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José LoboAs western powers began to exert increasing pressure over China, Japan continued to grow in military strength and impe-rialistic ambitions. By 1904, when Russia threatened to take con-trol of Korea, Japan declared war and was victorious. Japan thus established itself as an East Asian colonial power, continuing its enmity with the Russians that had their own designs on Manchu-ria as well as Korea.

219...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José LoboAppendix 2 Timeline of major events that occurred during P. J. Lobo’s life YEAR AGE MILESTONES1892 0Pedro is born, January 12th. Birth parents: Ana and Francisco das Neves Lobo.Adopted by Goan doctor, Belarmino Lobo.Studies under Jesuits until his departure for Macau.1901 9 Sent to school in Macau at the Seminary of St. Joseph.1902 10 Banco Nacional Ultramarino (BNU) established in Macau.1904 12 Electric lighting is introduced in Macau.1906 14Pataca’ becomes the official currency in Macau.Cinema comes to Macau.1908 16Pedro completes his studies at the Seminary of St. Joseph.Continues his studies in accounting and works as a mathematics teacher for next few years.1910 18October Revolution (5th October).The overthrow of the Portuguese Monarchy and replacement by the Portuguese Republic.

220Marco Lobo1911 19The Xinhai Revolution breaks out.The Qing Dynasty overthrown, ending 267 years of Manchu rule and ending China’s Imperial System.1912 20 The Chinese Republic declared.1912 20Timorese native rebellion — gunboat sent from Macau. The culmination of a series of revolts led by Dom Boaventura, the chief. The last and most serious revolt against the Portuguese.1914 22 Start of the First World War.1916 24Fighting on Lapa Island. Governor da Maia sent an army officer at the head of twenty policemen to Lapa in order to assert Portuguese sovereignty over the disputed island.1917 25 End of WWI ‘Macau Sold’ scare.1919 27First public buses in Macau. Pedro spends time in Timor.1920 28 Pedro marries Branca Helena Hyndman on 11 July at Rosary Church, Hong Kong.1920 28 First child: Marietta born Nov 1.1921 29 Second child: Olivia Maria born Aug 20.1923 31 Third child: Rogerio born Sept 15.1925 33 Fourth child: Natercia born March 28.1926 34 The Tai Hing Company takes over the gambling monopoly.1927 35Fifth child: Orlando born Jan 18.Pedro joins Macau Government.Appointed as administrator of opium.1929 37 Japanese granted fishing rights in Macau waters.

221...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José Lobo1930 38Sixth child: Pedro born Aug 11.Establishment of the Estado Novo.1931 39 Japan invades Manchuria.1932 40 Pedro’s wife, Branca Hyndman dies.1933 41 Pedro appointed as Macau’s administrator of economic services.1934 42 The second casino monopoly granted to the Tai Heng Company.1935 43 Macau Pataca became indexed to the Portuguese Escudo.1936 44 Japan sides with Axis Powers.1937 45Japanese harassment at Macau’s border and nearby islands.Pedro appointed as Vice President of Leal Senado.1938 46Pedro receives university graduate degrees in Economics and Commerce.Guangzhou falls to the Japanese Army.1939 47 Chinese refugees flood into Macau to escape fighting in S. China.1940 48 Governor Gabriel Maurício Teixeira arrives in Macau.1941 49 Hong Kong falls to Japanese Imperial Army.1941 49 Japanese Army encircles Macau and has a stranglehold on food supply.1941 49Japan invades Hong Kong .Japan opens a consulate in Macau with the arrival of Fukui Yasumitsu.1941 49 Refugee problem becomes more serious with arrivals from Hong Kong and China.1942 50 Japan invades Timor, an act that significantly increases tensions between Portugal and Japan and threatens Macau.

222Marco Lobo1943 51Azores bases leased to UK and the US gets access to the mid-Atlantic air base, allowing a shift in the Battle of the Atlantic in favor of the Allies.1944 52Bretton Woods Agreement signed by 44 parties; Portugal not a signatory.Pangtangs officially banned in February 1944.1945 53Japanese Consul Fukui assassinated 2nd February.Atomic bombs dropped on Nagasaki and Hiroshima, Japan surrenders 15th August.22nd August, YC Liang, Eddie Gosano and Rogério go to Hong Kong on a secret BAAG mission to hand British orders over to Colonial Secretary Franklin Gimson.Supreme Allied Commander for South East Asia, Louis Mountbatten awards a certificate to Pedro for his assistance to British troops during WWII. 1946 54 Mark Aitchison Young returns to Hong Kong as governor.1947 55Opium made illegal in Macau.The gold trade begins in earnest.Pedro celebrates the birth of his first grandchild.1948 56Macau Air Transport Co. (MATCO) formed.July 16th, 1948, Miss Macao attempted heist.1949 57 12th June: Cruel Separation at Vila Verde.1950 58Trade embargo imposed against China through CHINCOMRadio Vila Verde is establishedMosaico Magazine publishes first issue1951 59 Wong Yu, sole survivor and hijacker of ‘Miss Macao’, released from prison

223...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José Lobo1952 60Border Gate incident between Communist Chinese soldiers and Macau’s military.Receives the Order of the Colonial Empire.1953 61 15th October: Cruel Separation at Dom Pedro V Theatre.1954 62 The first Macau Grand Prix was held.1955 63Macau declared an overseas province of Portugal.Declared as an honorary citizen of Macau and Rua do Dr. Pedro José Lobo is inaugurated.1959 67 British author Ian Fleming visits Pedro in Macau and writes of their encounter.1960 68 Piaggio P136-L2 amphibian aircraft begins service for MATCO.1961 69 New gambling concession awarded.1962 70 STDM takes over the gambling monopoly.1963 71 Y.C. Liang starts the Hong Kong Hydrofoil Company (HMH).1964 72Receives the Order of Prince Henry.Pedro retires from public duties.1965 73 Pedro’s death: 1st October.

225...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José LoboEndnotes Chapter 1 1. Ian Fleming, Thrilling Cities (London: Jonathan Cape, 1963). The cities covered by Fleming were Hong Kong, Macau, Tokyo, Honolulu, Los Angeles, Las Vegas, Chicago, New York, Hamburg, Berlin, Vienna, Geneva, Naples and Monte Carlo.2. Ian Fleming, Thrilling Cities, (London: Jonathan Cape, 1963), 33.Fleming added to this comment: “What do I think of Dr. Lobo? I think that while there may be unexplained corners in his history, as there are in the histories of many a successful mil-lionaire, he is what he appears to be: a careful, astute operator who has chosen an exotic line of business which may have caused a good deal of pain and grief in its retail outlets to the regret, no doubt, of the wholesaler.”3. João de Pina-Cabral, Between China and Europe: Person, Culture and Emotionin Macao, (New York: Continuum, 2002), 14.The author noted: Pedro Jose Lobo negotiated the terms with the Japanese during the Pacific War.Chapter 2 4. Bikash Kumar Bhattacharya, The Timor-Leste Tree: How East Timor Nearly Lost Its Illustrious Sandalwood, (The News Lens, https://international.the-newslens.com/article/96622 , 2018).Professor Tirta N Mursitama, who led a research at the University of Indone-sia’s Centre for East Asia Cooperation Studies (CEACoS) on Indonesian mili-tary’s involvement in illegal logging and illicit timber trade in East Kalimantan (1999-2006), says, “Indonesian military personnel from low-ranked soldiers to territorial commanders were found to be involved in the practice of illegal log-ging in East Kalimantan. They acted as coordinators, investors, middlemen and people who deliberately failed to monitor flow of illegal logging transport.”

226Marco Lobo5. Edward Cavanough, The Mountains: Timor Leste’s Blessing and Curse,(The Diplomat, https://thediplomat.com/2018/03/the-mountains-timor-les-tes-blessing-and-curse/, 2018).6. Edward Cavanough, The Mountains: Timor Leste’s Blessing and Curse, (The Diplomat, https://thediplomat.com/2018/03/the-mountains-timor-les-tes-blessing-and-curse/, 2018).Their exploration of the island was so minimal that it was not until the ear-ly 20th century, according to Beloved Land author Gordon Peake, that the Portuguese even charted the entire island: “Even in the latter half of the 19th century, fewer than 100 colonists lived beyond the city… for centuries, no one seemed particularly certain even of where the island ended.” 7. Max Roser, Cameron Appel and Hannah Ritchie, Human Height, (Our Worldin Data, https://ourworldindata.org/human-height, 2019). The authors state: Poor nutrition and illness in childhood limit human growth. As a consequence, the average height of a population is strongly correlated with living standards in a population. This makes the study of human height relevant for historians who want to understand the history of living conditions.It is important to stress that height is not used as a direct measure of well-being. The variation of height within a given population is largely de-termined by genetic factors8. Joan B. Silk, Adoption and Kinship in Oceania, (American Anthropologist,82(4):799 – 820 https://www.researchgate.net/publication/229662365_Adoption_and_Kinship_in_Oceania, 2009).In Oceania kinship is an important factor in the selection and treatment of adopted children as adoption occurs almost exclusively among close relatives.9. Adapted from Fernando Sylvan, Cantolenda Maubere, (Fundação Austronésia Borja da Costa, 1988). There are various versions of this myth, but they all tell a similar tale of the crocodile Lafaek Diak, who out of friendship for a human boy sacrificed itself to become the child’s home.10. Alfred Russel Wallace, The Malay Archipeligo, (London: MacMillan, 1869).11. Gudmund Jannisa, Timor-Leste in the World: BC to Independence (A Malae production 2019).

227...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José LoboExcerpt: A person of utmost importance during the times of da Silva was Dr Belarmino Lobo. He presided over the municipal council of Dili and was given free reign by the governor. Lobo introduced piped water, street planning, public buildings (including a hospital) and a municipal garden. A period of transition from outpost or village to some semblance of a West-ern-style town began around 1900.12. Northern Territory Times and Gazette, The Island of Timor, (Darwin, NT, Sat 13 Sep 1919).13. Christopher J. Shepherd and Andrew McWilliam, Cultivating Plantations and Subjects in East Timor: A Genealogy, (Journal of the Humanities and So-cial Sciences of Southeast Asia, https://brill.com/view/journals/bki/169/2-3/article-p326_6.xml, 2013).14. Ivo Carneiro de Sousa, History of East Timor, (Macau: EWIAS, East-West Institute for Advanced Studies, 2018).“Young people from Timor began to come to study in Macao, especially at the Seminary of St. Joseph, at the Infante D. Henrique Secondary School and at the Commercial School. And these former students of Macao formed an important part of the intellectual class of Timor before the occupation of Indonesia. More than 30 East Timorese priests who currently work in Timor, like the author, studied in Macao and were students with proper achievements. The secretaries-general of the three main East Timorese po-litical parties that emerged in Timor in 1975 were former seminary stu-dents. The first President of the Republic of Timor-Leste, Francisco Xavier do Amaral, was a former student of the Seminary of St. Joseph.”Chapter 3 15. Imagens que passais pela retina, Camilo Pessanha. Original in Portuguese follows:Dos meus olhos, porque não vos fixais?Que passais como a água cristalinaPor uma fonte para nunca mais!...Ou para o lago escuro onde terminaVosso curso, silente de juncais,E o vago medo angustioso domina,- Porque ides sem mim, não me levais?

228Marco Lobo16. Camillo Pessanha, biographical note:In August 1893, Pessanha applied for a position as teacher in the gymna-sium of Macau and was appointed on December 18. On February 19, 1894 He arrived in Macau April 10, 1894. In 1895 he bought a Chinese concu-bine from a broker. The local Portuguese community was shocked by this relationship but Pessanha was defiant and in spite of being thought of as an eccentric, he became a central figure in the cultural, political and civic world of Macau. He was a respected teacher (of Philosophy, History, Geography, Portuguese Literature, Law), attorney and judge, and he was an adviser to the several governors of the city. In 1900 he was nominated public defender, and later judge. Pessanha died on March 1, 1926 due to tuberculosis aggravated by his chronic opium addiction. 17. City of the Name of God — origin of name:In 1587, King Philip II promoted Macau from “Settlement or Port of the Name of God” to “City of the Name of God” (Cidade do Nome de Deus de Macau).18. Macau Data, Portos de Macau, The Harbours of Macau, (Macau: Harbours https://www.macaudata.com/macaubook/book114/html/05901.htm ).19. Monsignor Manuel Teixeira, audio recording: City of the Name of God, (Macau, RTHK, 1999). 20. Leonor Machado, Macau Buses: A Story Dating Back to 1919, (Macau: Macau Lifestyle, 2018)Everything started in 1919, when there were only three vehicles which posed as public buses. There were no local bus companies, so the first transportation of this kind began with businessmen and neighborhood associations who wanted to facilitate commuting for citizens. These first buses were called “Ji You Che” (free/freedom vehicles). They were basical-ly big cheap trucks repurposed with wooden seats inside. Over time these trucks – though still unofficial – grew in number and became known as “Kai Fong Che” neighbor vehicles).21. Michael Hugo-Brunt, The Jesuit Seminary and Church of St. Joseph, Macao, (University of California Press, Journal of the Society of Architectural Histori-ans Vol. 15, No. 3, Portuguese Empire Issue, 1956), 24-30

229...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José Lobo22. Maria Do Mar Gago, Things of Darkness: Genetics, Melanins and the Regimeof Salazar, (Centaurus, Wiley Online Library, https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/1600-0498.12073 2014).23. Rogério Lobo, audio recording: City of the Name of God, (Macau, RTHK, 1999). 24. Geoffrey Gunn, Timor Loro Sae: 500 Years, (Macau, Livros do Oriente, 1999).Chapter 4 25. Luís Cunha, Macau Between Republics: Neither War nor Peace (1914-1918), (Lisbon: School of Social and Political Sciences of Lisbon University, Ori-ent Institute, 2017), 107Excerpt: “A Republic was proclaimed yesterday with the help of the army, the navy, and the people. Enthusiasm. Absolute Order,” stated the telegram. News of the Republic’s advent did not give rise to the same kind of enthusiasm in Macau, where indifference reigned. On 11 October a new supplement to the official gazette invited – in very unenthusiastic fashion, and by order of the governor – “all officers, public servants and clergy” to participate, “out of inclination or duty,” in the proclamation of the new Republic in the Leal Senado, Macau’s municipal body. Not long after the Republic’s proclamation, the governor was replaced and the Chinese population began to abandon the colony, fearing the unknown consequences of the impact of the new regime on Macau’s administration.26. Austin Coates, Echoes: A Macao Narrative, (Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press, 1978), 32.Excerpt: No officers being at Macao with proper instructions, the admin-istration of the place began under a committee of the principal traders; and by the time officials were appointed by Goa this committee, called the Sen-ate, was an established institution, which the Macanese had no intention of giving up.27. Pedro José Lobo, Bases e Processos da Economia de Macau, (Macau: Edição da Repartição Central dos Serviços Económicos, 1953).

230Marco LoboChapter 5 28. Gudmund Jannisa, Timor-Leste in the World: BC to Independence (A Malae production, 2019), 66-67.Excerpt: Governor Eduardo Marques introduced an imposto de captação (head tax). Every Timorese male between the age of eighteen and sixty was liable for this tax, which meant he had to produce agricultural prod-ucts for the market or engage in wage labour. The Portuguese justified this by referring to the already existing traditional tribute of goods and services that the Timorese farmer paid to his liurai. There was, however, a major difference between the two systems, in that the traditional one was seen a reciprocal system in a cosmological context. In upholding this traditional order, both farmer and liurai saw themselves as partaking in a cosmological scheme of reciprocal duties, with the end result being the well-being of the society. The head tax imposed by the Portuguese had none of these implications to the Timorese, and therefore caused deep resentment; more so in fact than any other infringement upon indige-nous society.29. Michael Leach, Nation-Building and National Identity in Timor-Leste,(New York: Routledge, 2017).Excerpt: The rebellion saw a wide alliance of traditional reinos in the west of Portuguese Timor coordinate their resistance to encroaching co-lonial power, and Portugal call in troops from Angola and Mozambique, along with troops of the second line and other Timorese ‘irregulars’ to suppress it.30. Frédéric Durand, Three centuries of violence and struggle in East Timor, (Mass Violence and Resistance - Research Network, 2001 https://www.scienc-espo.fr/mass-violence-war-massacre-resistance/en/document/three-centu-ries-violence-and-struggle-east-timor-1726-2008).31. Geoffrey C Gunn, Timor Loro Sae: 500 Years, (Macau: Livros do Oriente), 183Chapter 6 32. Luís Cunha, Macau Between Republics: Neither War nor Peace (1914-1918),(Lisbon: School of Social and Political Sciences of Lisbon University, Ori-ent Institute, 2017), 115.

231...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José Lobo33. Paul Spooner, Republican Revolutionaries: Sun Yat Sen, Carlos da Maia andthe Macao Harbour Project, (Macau: Review of Culture, 2010), 23.34. Luís Cunha, Macau Between Republics: Neither War nor Peace (1914-1918),(Lisbon, School of Social and Political Sciences of Lisbon University, Orient Institute, 2017), 123.Chapter 1035. Michio Kitahara, Portuguese Colonialism and Japanese Slaves, (Tokyo: Kadensha, 2013).In this paper, the author states that throughout the latter half of the 16th century and into the 17th, Portuguese traders sold Japanese as slaves over-seas, so that toward the end of the 16th century, a large number of Japanese were in several parts of Asia. They were found in the regions where Portu-gal was dominant as a colonial power such as India, Southeast Asia, and southern China, particularly in Macao, around the Strait of Malacca and in Goa, India.36. Theodore C Bestor, Japan and the Sea, (Boston: Harvard University Press,2014) 50-56.Excerpt: By the 1930s, Japan had a fishing fleet twice the size of any other nation, and local fishing stocks were becoming increasingly depleted. Jap-anese vessels were going ever farther out to sea, to the Gulf of Alaska, the coast of Mexico, the Sea of Bengal, and the Arabian Sea. As Japan milita-rized in the 1930s, its commercial fishing fleets were increasing commis-sioned for the war effort37. Mark Pinkstone, Why Churchill didn’t want Hong Kong defended against Japanese, and how the colony survived wartime occupation, (Hong Kong: South China Morning Post, 2017).Regarding the defense of Hong Kong, Winston Churchill is quoted as saying: “This is all wrong. If Japan goes to war, there is not the slightest chance of holding Hong Kong or relieving it. It is most unwise to increase the loss we should suffer there. Instead of increasing the garrison, it ought to be reduced to a symbolical scale. Japan will think twice before declaring war on the British Empire and whether there are two or six battalions in Hong Kong will make no difference to her choice. I wish we had fewer troops there, but to move any would be noticeable and dangerous.”

232Marco Lobo38. Frederic (Jim) Silva, Reminiscences of a Wartime Refugee, (Macau: International Institute of Macau, 2013), 17.39. Frederic (Jim) Silva, Reminiscences of a Wartime Refugee, (Macau: International Institute of Macau, 2013), 20-22.Chapter 11 40. Geoffrey Gunn, Wartime Macau: Under the Japanese Shadow, (Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press, 2016), 202.41. Jill McGiverns, Macao Remembers, (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999), 108.42. Jill McGiverns, Macao Remembers, (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999), 108.43. Victor F S Sit, Evolution of Macau’s Economy and Its Export-Oriented Industries, (Copenhagen: The Copenhagen Journal of Asian Studies, 1991), 6744. Victor F S Sit, Evolution of Macau’s Economy and Its Export-Oriented Industries,(Copenhagen: The Copenhagen Journal of Asian Studies, 1991), 67.45. Commander José Ferreira dos Santos, Lancha-canhoneira ‘Macau’, (Macau:Macau Antigo, Ships of the Portuguese Armada in the Great War — Navy Academy, 2008 http://macauantigo.blogspot.com/2013/08/lancha-can-honeira-macau.html), Chapter 12 46. Rui Miguel, A Colonia de Macau Durante a II Grande Guerra, (Macau: Relatórioda Gerência 1938-1945, 2011).47. Pedro José Lobo, Bases e Processos da Economia de Macau, (Macau: Edição daRepartição Central dos Serviços Económicos, 1953).48. Geoffrey Gunn, Wartime Macau: Under the Japanese Shadow, (Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press, 2016), 68.

233...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José LoboChapter 13 49. Irene Smirnoff, Memoir/Diary, (Hong Kong, Gwulo, https://gwulo.com/node/35127, This text first appeared in the Foreword to the book “Macao - People and places, past and present” by Jason Wordie).50. John Pownall Reeves, The Lone Flag, (Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press, 2014), 129.51. John Pownall Reeves, The Lone Flag, (Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press, 2014), 130.52. Rogério Lobo, audio recording: City of the Name of God, (Macau: RTHK,1999).53. Sebastian Paul Swann, The Tientsin incident (1939): a case-study of Japan’s imperial dilemma in China, (London: University of London, 1999).54. George Solt, The Untold History of Ramen, (Berkeley, California: University of California Press: 2014), pp. 2, 6.55. This is emphasized by a saying often told to children, “Every grain of ricehas seven fortune gods,” so you’d better not disrespect them by not eating them all. The saying and the concept itself encompass the ideas of respecting the farmers and resources that made the rice and that there are people in our world that don’t have any rice to eat. 56. Jill McGiverns, Macao Remembers, (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999), 77.57. Stanley G. Payne, Franco and Hitler, (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2008)A non-belligerent is a person, state, or other organization that does not fight in a given conflict. The term is often used to describe a country that does not take part militarily in a war. The status does not exist in interna-tional law. A non-belligerent state differs from a neutral one in that it may support certain belligerents in a war but is not directly involved in military operations. The term may also be used to describe a person not involved in combat or aggression, especially if combat or aggression is likely. In a situation of civil unrest such as a riot, civilians may be divided into bellig-erents, those actually fighting or intending to fight, and non-belligerents who are merely bystanders.

Marco Lobo234Chapter 14 58. Colonel LT Ride, BAAG Gwulo https://gwulo.com/atom/3003859. Paul Dukes, Great Men in the Second World War: The Rise and Fall of the BigThree, (London: Bloomsbury Academic, 2017) 132.Excerpt: Chiang Kai-Shek asserted that he should receive the surrender in Hong Kong since it was part of China. But Truman accepted Attlee’s request that Hong Kong should surrender to the British, although adding that its status might be discussed in due course and recalling later that Roosevelt had wanted it to be returned to China. Already by the end of the war, then, there were rifts threatening not only between the Soviet Union and its allies, but also between the UK on the one hand and the United States and China on the other, clearly indicating a decline in the UK’s influence.60. Hong Kong Heritage Project, Sir Roger Lobo, video: (https://www.hongkongheritage.org/Pages/oral_history.aspx)61. Brian Edgar, Chronology of Events Related to Stanley Civilian Internment Camp, (Hong Kong, Gwulo, https://gwulo.com/node/11771), 2012.62. Vaudine England, Race Memory Puzzles in China, Japan War Histories, (https://www.hkhistory.net/2015/09/03/178/)Excerpt: Leading figures such as Shouson Chow and Robert Kotewall, members of the Li (Bank of East Asia) family, and others did consent to take roles in committees set up by the occupying Japanese powers. No doubt they did so for self-preservation, but it is also on record that departing Brit-ish senior civil servants had specifically asked Chow and Kotewall to deal with the Japanese to help feed the people.63. Jill McGiverns, Macao Remembers, (Oxford, Oxford University Press, 1999), 77.Chapter 15 64. Moises Silva Fernandes, Macao in Sino-Portuguese relations, 1949-1955, (Portuguese Studies Review, vol. 16, no. 1, 2008) 153-170.65. Francisco Da Roza, Journeys, (unpublished memoir).

...everyday is mine - The life of Pedro José Lobo23566. Moises Silva Fernandes, Macao in Sino-Portuguese relations, 1949-1955,(Portuguese Studies Review, vol. 16, no. 1, 2008) 153-170.67. Pedro José Lobo, Bases e Processos da Economia de Macau, (Macau: Ediçãoda Repartição Central dos Serviços Económicos, 1953), 15.Chapter 17 69. Jonathan Marshall, Opium and the Politics of Gangsterism in Nationalist China, 1927–1945, (Bulletin of Concerned Asian Scholars, 1976), 19-48.70. Official Gazette the regulation of the gold trade under a license issued by the Central Bureau of Economic Services of Macao. Ordinance No. 4: 176.71. C.R. Schenk, The Hong Kong gold market during the 1960s: local and globaleffects, (Glasgow: The University of Glasgow, 2013), 139-15.72. Harrison Forman, The Gold-Runners of Macao, (Austin TX: Western Publi-cations Inc, reprinted 1977).Chapter 19 73. Victor F S Sit, Evolution of Macau’s Economy and Its Export-Oriented Industries, (Copenhagen: The Copenhagen Journal of Asian Studies, 1991), 66.74. John Pownall Reeves, The Lone Flag, (Hong Kong, Hong Kong University Press, 2014), 64.75. Chi Chuen Chan, William Wai Lim Li, Eugene Chung Ip Leung, Problem Gambling in Hong Kong and Macao: Etiology, Prevalence and Treatment, (Singapore, Springer 2016) 17.76. Jill McGiverns, Macao Remembers, (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999), 112.

236Marco LoboChapter 20 77. António M. Pacheco Jorge da Silva, The Portuguese Community in Hong Kong: A Pictoral History, Vol. II, (Hong Kong: Instituto Internacional de Macau, 2007) 18.Chapter 22 78. Jorge Godinho, Os Casinos de Macau, (Coimbra: Almedina SA, 2019), 234, 235.79. English translation: My gentle soul, that you departed So early in this discontented life, Rest in Heaven eternally, And live me here on earth always sad.

Colecção 1) Timor – da guerra do Pacífico à desanexaçãoFernando Lima2) Liou She Shun – Plenipotenciário do Império da China – Viagem ao Brasil em 1909Carlos Francisco Moura3) Macau 1937-45 – Os anos da GuerraJoão F. O. Botas4) Filhos da Terra – A Comunidade Macaense, Ontem e HojeAlexandra Sofia Rangel5) Chineses e Chá no Brasil no início do Século XIXCarlos Francisco Moura6) Portugal e Indonésia – História do Relacionamento Político e Diplomático (1509-1974)Coordenação - Jorge Santos Alves7) Brasileiros nos Extremos Orientais do Império (Séculos XVI a XIX)Carlos Francisco Moura8) Filhos da Terra – A Comunidade Macaense, Ontem e Hoje - Edição ChinesaAlexandra Sofia Rangel9) Figuras de Jade – Os Portugueses no Extremo OrienteAntónio Aresta10) China na Grande Guerra – A Conquista da Nova Identidade InternacionalLuís Cunha11) Mao, China y Los ‘Otros’Beatriz Hernández12) Joaquim Guerra S.J. (1908-1993) Releitura universalizante dos Clássicos ChinesesAntonio José Bezerra de Menezes Jr13) Macau ConfidencialJoão Guedes14) O Oriente na Literatura Portuguesa – Antero de Quental e Manuel da Silva MendesCarlos Miguel Botão Alves15) China’s Techno-Nationalism in the Global Era – Strategic Implications for EuropeLuis Cunha

16) Five Hundred Years of MacauStuart Braga17) The Western Pioneers and their discovery of MacaoJ. M. Braga18) Da estada em Macau do Dr. Sun Yat Sen – interpretação do seu pensamento revolucionárioFok Kai Cheong19) Before the first Guangzhou uprising in 1895 – The Macau experience deciphering the revolutionary thoughts of Dr. Sun Yat SenFok Kai Cheong20) Instrumentos Musicais Chineses – Colecção do Museu do Centro Científico e Cultural de Macau/LisboaEnio de Souza21) Para uma Literatura da Identidade Macaense – Autores/ActoresMaria Barras Romana22) A Faixa e Rota chinesa: a convergência entre Terra e MarPaulo Duarte23) A China e a Revitalização das Antigas Rotas da Seda Novo Vetor do Comércio MundialCoordenação – Fernanda Ilhéu e Leonor Janeiro24) Pioneers of Macao – the story of 14 Chinese who helped to make the cityMak O’Neil25) Macau – um diálogo de sucessoFernando Lima26) Figuras de Jade II – Os Portugueses no Extremo OrienteAntónio Aresta27) Dating à Chinesa – A comercialização do casamento na China contemporâneaShenglan Zhou28) Pioneiros de Macau – A história de 14 chineses que ajudaram a contruir a cidadeMak O’Neil29) Filhos da Terra – A Comunidade Macaense, Ontem e Hoje (2ª. Edição)Alexandra Sofia Rangel30) The New Silk Road and the Portuguese Speaking Countries in the New World ContextEdited by Fernanda Ilhéu, Francisco Leandro and Paulo Duarte

Pedro Lobo was born in 1892 and was sent to Macau for schooling in 1901. Beginning his work life as a mathematics teacher and then a bank employee, Pedro Lobo rose to the position of chief of Macau’s economics department from where he guided Macau through some of its most difficult times such as the virtual Japanese occupation during WWII, the feeding of hundreds of thousands of refugees, and the rise of Communism in China. He knew that Macau’s survival meant that it had to stay independent and be useful to all parties as an independent entity. Readers of this book will have a better understanding of Macau as seen through the eyes of those who lived through some of its most important moments.Marco Lobo was born and raised in Hong Kong. He studied business and economics in the USA and then Japan, where he currently lives. The subjects of his writing revolve around the lives and history of the Portuguese diaspora.Everyday is Mine, the story of Pedro Lobo’s life is his fifth book.COLECÇÃO