Lixiaolong Ancestral Home

Down a Yongqing Fang lane in Guangzhou stands a narrow Xiguan mansion bought in the mid nineteen forties by Lee Hoi-chuen, one of Cantonese opera's four great clowns, famous for ragged-robe roles about beggars and hustlers always scheming for their next meal. The guide follows how his comedy about poverty bought this house of carved beams and stained glass, and how his young son stayed here before the family resettled in Hong Kong. It traces the mansion's decades of decline and its restoration into a free public house, and closes by walking you back out into the food stalls now crowding the same alley.