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Kaifeng Jews Help Art Dealer Finish Four-Decade Trip to China
Sept. 11 (Bloomberg) -- Gallery owner Norman Tolman's debut collection in Shanghai brings to mind one of those travel quizzes that tease with an unidentified photo and ask, ``Where are we?'' One painting shows a towering gate with a Chinese idiom declaring the city blessed by the nation and heaven. In the crowd below are men wearing Jewish yarmulkes atop their queues, the traditional imperial braided ponytails. Another depicts a synagogue at Rosh Hashanah, the congregation in long robes and white shawls, the rabbi reading from the Torah. Carved mahogany screens and a Chinese incense burner complete the scene. The exhibit of 21 paintings takes us to Kaifeng, along the Yellow River 375 miles southwest of Beijing, starting around the 11th century. Jewish merchants from Persia traveling the Silk Road passed through the city, capital of the Song Dynasty (960-1279).
Six brides but just one wedding dress
FROM THE USA to Norfolk via Wilmslow, this beautiful hand-me-down gown has been down the aisle six times in a century. Radiant bride Charlotte Middleton, 27, is the latest to wear the heirloom which has been worn by five other members of her family since 1910. Each blushing bride has looked radiant in the silk gown in six marriages spanning the Atlantic. .
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