In a quiet corner of the Flemish countryside, just outside Bruges, sits a Benedictine abbey dedicated to St Andrew. Like places in this part of Europe, it bears the marks of centuries of upheaval. Earlier foundations were destroyed by reformation and revolution before monastic life returned in the 19th century. Yet even this history is perhaps not as fascinating as the story of one of the men buried in its cemetery: the former Chinese prime minister Lou Tseng-tsiang (Lu Zhengxiang).
At first glance there seems little reason why a Chinese statesman should lie buried among Flemish monks. The road that led Lou to this Belgian woodland passed through the final decades of the Qing Empire, the birth of the Chinese Republic, the peace negotiations at Versailles and some of the most dramatic political and religious transformations of the modern age.
