Heirlooms, Trinkets and Trophies

What we keep, what we lose and the stories that slip between our fingers.

My mum loved trinkets.

In Shanghai and Hong Kong where she grew up, she stashed her precious things in a biscuit tin.

By the time she began earning money as a journalist, and later married my dad, the world had opened up to her. The biscuit tin was replaced (though never abandoned). By the 1960s and 70s, she and my Dad were veterans of the antique shops of Hollywood Road, returning from auctions with mysterious treasures wrapped in old newspaper. They soon filled two display cabinets. And covered the walls, bookcases, window ledges of our apartment.

My parents called them curios; curiosities, intriguing objects.

From auctions, travels, and gifts passed down by beloved aunties, Mum gathered treasures — snuff bottles, miniature clay teapots, lacquer boxes, and carved chops.

I remember her coming home with a carved ivory figure - the length of her index finger - of a naked, reclining, woman. She called it a Netsuke and explained that in ancient China, women these around to discreetly point out to the doctor which body part was giving them grief.

Not my Mum’s actual Netsuke, but it looked like this.

I’m not sure that the figurine actually was a Netsuke, which is a Japanese kimono toggle. And the story about showing the doctor proxy private parts may not be totally accurate either. But none of that matters. I derived joy from from watching my mother’s hazel eyes widen and then crease when she told that story.

I don’t know why, but I often think about that figurine. Recently I looked it up online. Mum’s Netsuke could have been an ancient Chinese mass-produced replica. But that hardly matters. It was her story that gave it its charm, and my memory of it.

After she died in 2022, I found a small seal or chop in the shape of a guardian lion — though Mum probably thought it looked like a dog. Perhaps she was right in spirit; she was born in the Year of the Dog, after all.

Mum’s guardian dog seal or chop

My friend tells me the chop reads: “the treasure of Qianlong”. Qianlong (1736–1795) was a supremely cultured Qing Dynasty emperor who reigned for sixty years. These seals were used by the emperor on the paintings he collected.

Qianlong probably had more than a thousand of these chops in different styles, shapes, and sizes. I haven’t done much research on this one, but it’s likely to be a counterfeit as it appears to be made from bone rather than ivory or precious stone.

Still, I adore it, because it was Mum’s.

The truth is, I never asked her about her favourite trinkets:

Why was this special to you?
What made you buy it?
Where or who did it come from?

If we’d brought it to a taping of Antiques Roadshow, I’d probably have asked the experts, “And how much do you think it’s worth?!”

In her later years, Mum would wave the naked lady figurine around, suggesting she should give it to her long-time GP (doctor). I guess she did, because it was not amongst her belongings. I wish I had said something.

All over the world, there are dozens of little museums in every city and town filled with objects which have been amputated from their stories, waiting for someone to reattach their meaning.

Volunteers dust them, label them, and try to imagine their pasts. “Teacup, c.1930.” “Unknown origin.”

I fear this for my own family trinkets, not that they’ll be amputated, but that they’ll remain as silent as the imperial dog.

My Dad is a different story. Decades ago, he quietly began sticking tiny labels to the backs of paintings and objects: a date, who it belonged to or created it, a brief note. “Bought in Weihaiwei, China 1930s.”

His neat, deliberate handwriting is a trail for whoever comes next.

It’s such a simple act of care. And it’s made me wonder about my own things: the souvenirs, books, photos, the objects that have followed me from one stage of life to another. What would my descendants make of them if they found them in a box? Would they know why I kept them? Would it ,matter?

We often say that stories are what connect generations, but sometimes stories need something to hang onto: a physical anchor, a way to begin the conversation. If my mother’s figurine has taught me anything, it’s that an heirloom doesn’t have to be valuable, or even real. What matters is the story we attach to it.

Without that, it’s just clutter.

Do you have an object that holds a story? A cup, a badge, a photograph? I’d love to hear what you’ve kept and why.