Barca 新橋區

Setting and landscape

San Kio is one of the earlier-developed communities of the peninsula. It once lay in the north-west, but repeated land reclamation around the coast has left it at the peninsula's geometric centre. The neighbourhood runs from Avenida de Horta e Costa (高士德大馬路) and Avenida do Almirante Lacerda (罅些喇提督大馬路) near Mong Ha Hill (望廈山) in the north to Rua de Francisco Xavier Pereira (俾利喇街) in the east. Camões Garden (白鴿巢公園) adjoins it on the west, and it faces Mount Fortress hill (大炮台山) to the south.

The name means "new bridge": it first belonged to a newly built bridge in the area, and residents kept using it for the surrounding streets after the bridge was demolished.

What to see

Lin Kai Temple (蓮溪廟), opposite Cinema Alegria (永樂大戲院), takes its name from the Lotus Stream (蓮溪) that once flowed through San Kio from the south side of Lin Fong Hill (蓮峰); the temple stood on its right bank. First built in the Jiaqing reign of the Qing, it collapsed in a storm on 9 October 1829 and was rebuilt the following year. After the Jiaxu typhoon (甲戌風災) destroyed it again, it was rebuilt with added halls for Guanyin and Jinhua (金花) and finished in the Guangxu reign, which is why it is also called Lin Kai New Temple (蓮溪新廟).

The temple is five bays wide and three halls deep, nine halls in all, and enshrines as many as fifteen kinds of deities, among them the God of Wealth (財帛星君), Huaguang (華光), Guanyin and Guan Yu (關公). Its scale is exceeded only by Lin Fong, A-Ma and Kun Iam Tong temples. The open ground in front was once a stage for opera performed for the gods and later became the cinema. The birthday of Huaguang on the 28th day of the ninth lunar month is still celebrated. The temple was classified as a monument in 1992 and is run by the San Kio residents' mutual-aid association (新橋區坊眾互助會).

Highlights

• Lin Kai Temple 蓮溪廟: Nine-hall temple rebuilt after 1829 and again in the Guangxu reign; classified as a monument in 1992.