Penang - Goddess of Mercy Temple

Founded in 1728, the Goddess of Mercy Temple, in George Town, Penang, is the island's oldest. It is dedicated to Kuan Yin, the Taoist goddess of mercy, but started life dedicated to Ma Zu, the Hokkien deity of the sea, patron of seafarers.

Its conversion took place in 1824, when the temple was renovated, reflecting the more diverse origins of the Chinese community in the city by that juncture. The temple acted as mediator in disputes between the Hokkien and the Cantonese, run as it was by a balanced committee of the two ethnic groups.

These secular purposes transferred to the Penang Chinese Town Hall subsequent to the Penang Riots of 1867. Remarkably, the temple survived unscathed the aerial bombing that presaged the arrival of the Japanese in December 1941.

The building features extensive porcelain decorations, created in the chien nien style, which involves clipping into the requisite shapes many thousands of pieces from broken-up Chinese bowls of various colours.

Shell - Rock - Shell

The Church, in the form of James Ussher and his The Annals of the World, published 1650, hilariously asserted that all creation commenced at about 18:00 on 22 October 4004 BC. Ussher, Primate of All Ireland from 1625 to 1656, was out by about 13.8 billion years.

 

Our current best estimate of the age of the universe is 13.799 billion years, plus or minus circa 21 million years. This estimate is based on studies of microwave background radiation, which provides the universe's cooling rate, in conjunction with measurements of the expansion rate of the universe.

The carboniferous limestone rock of Great Britain and Ireland was formed between 363 and 325 million years ago. It is a sedimentary rock that formed in shallow tropical seas, made up of the shells and hard parts of trillions of sea creatures, in a matrix of carbonate mud. In lay terms, limestone is made from shells.

Under the hand of stone carver Lottie O'Leary, of Knucklas, Powys, a shell has re-emerged from a large limestone boulder. The work took five days and was undertaken with an angle grinder and a compressor-driven series of stone carving tools - the small photographs show stages of the carving. The shell is left incomplete to emphasize its origins - and those of the rock.

Brogyntyn - Home Farm, c.1894