50. Hong Kong Communities (香港社區)

How did/do communities develop in Hong Kong?

What impact do local communities have on Hong Kong society at large?

How are traditions processed, preserved, and perpetuated in Hong Kong’s communities?

These questions largely stem from the personal curiosities I posited regarding heritage and tradition with respect to the Cheung Chau Bun Festival – which, if you’ll recall, was an age ago… – but this time, the focus is on place more so than event.  More specifically, I would like to look at two very different, but nonetheless highly significant and influential ‘communities’ that have done much (and continue) to shape Hong Kong’s history and traditions.  These two examples also provide some insight (or at least a peek) into the complexities associated with defining any such terms as applied to Hong Kong itself.

49. Cheung Chau Bun Festival (包山節)

Sunday, midnight

A tall white tower stands in the distance, covered completely with plastic buns and radiating (or is it reflecting?) a blinding white light.  Voices carry over loudspeakers, but from where we’re standing (several exchange students and myself) at the very back of the crowd their announcements are meaningless.  Music fills the spaces in between.

And then, seemingly out of nowhere, a countdown (in Cantonese) begins – “10! 9! 8!…3! 2! 1!” – and with the final collective breath a sea of voices – and just as amusingly, phones and cameras – rise in celebration: the games have begun.  Contestants begin climbing the tower in a massive frenzy, knocking down buns as they scramble to the very top to claim those in the upper ranks (more on this later).  They fill their sacks and scramble back down, packs bulging under the strain of carrying so many buns.

This is the Cheung Chau Bun Festival (包山節), one of Hong Kong’s most unique and beloved annual festivals.  But even amidst all the excitement, the inevitable question remains:

What’s going on?

48. Wan Chai (灣仔)

Saturday afternoon

It looks pleasant enough as an aged building.  A four-story colonial building painted in bright blue, with balconies extending from the upper floors.  The surrounding buildings are draped with alternating hues: orange, green, purple, yellow – though the immediate neighbor is a stately earth-brown.  One wonders if the scene has been painted before.

But on street level, the name – first inscribed in Chinese, then its English translation underneath.  香港故事館: Hong Kong House of Stories.

A house of stories in the middle of Wan Chai (灣仔)?  Surely it’s a playful pun on the building itself?  But only the English allows for that possibility; the Chinese meaning is resolute.

So what, then, does one find in a “house of stories” in Wan Chai?  But as I mull the question over in my head, I can’t help but tinker with it, and ask:

What does one find in Wan Chai in a house of stories?

47. Lam Tei (藍地) and the Miu Fat Buddhist Monastery (妙法寺)

Sunday afternoon

Does lightning really strike twice?

On the Light Rail again, and, not for the first time, a huge, colorful structure catches my eye.  A large, tiled orange roof seated atop of a dizzying palette of colors stands next to an even taller glass building.  The surrounding streets are rural and gritty, in stark contrast to their boldly – almost brashly – polychromatic neighbors.

What is this?  Or rather – where is this?

The Light Rail rushes past too quickly to discern anything specific, but the moment it stops, I get off and start exploring.

45. Tin Hau Festival (天后節)

I knew I had to come back at some point.

It had been two long weeks since I had done any serious, recreational traveling in Hong Kong.  One week (actually, spring break) was spent in Guangzhou (廣州) with family, which offered a much-needed – and well-taken – chance to reconnect with my mother and my grandparents, the latter of whom I have not seen in four years.  It was a fantastic opportunity to catch up, listen to stories, help run errands (which included cooking, for once!), and be in the company of loved ones.

The second week (when I got back), on the other hand, was largely  spent within the walls of UST’s library and its labyrinthine shelves of texts and tomes, studying for exams and preparing research for a senior thesis.

It wasn’t pretty.  The second week, at least.

So when I learned that Friday would offer a reprieve, and the potential for a fresh new look at a place I’d been to before and fallen in love with, I seized the opportunity, dropped my books, and set off.  That opportunity came in the form of the Tin Hau Festival (天后節), which in turn told me exactly where I needed to return:

I was going back to Joss House Bay (大廟灣).

44. Ching Chung Koon (青松觀)

Sunday afternoon

I thought, at first, that it was a local monastery, a temple.  All you can see from the Light Rail between Tuen Mun (屯門) and Yuen Long (元朗) are the green-red roofs and orange-yellow brickwork, set amidst a local hospital and apartment complexes.  But the crowd on Sunday was large and two-directional – masses of visitors moved in and out.

This is nothing new, I thought.  Weekends (and certainly sunny weekends) are a natural time for worship of any faith in Hong Kong, and on such a beautiful day like this it all made sense.  So I exited the Light Rail myself – I didn’t really plan on going all the way to Tuen Mun at that point; I just wanted to see the local scenery – and followed them.

Just beyond the main entrance, hordes of families, children, visitors, and the elderly were purchasing paper; eating lunch; ascending and descending staircases.  The grounds themselves were even more brightly colored than they looked from afar.

But it wasn’t long after arriving here that I discovered – with genuine internal shock – that this was not just a local monastery.  Nor was it just a temple.

This was a burial ground.

43. Yuen Long (元朗)

Sunday morning

Dear reader,

I want to tell you something about the market town/city of Yuen Long (元朗).  I really do.  This is a wonderful place – a magical place – that I can’t believe I’d overlooked before.

But it’s difficult to do anything like that if I’m not sitting next to or across from you, maybe with a cup of milk tea (奶茶) in one hand.  The milk tea isn’t really necessary, in truth (unless we’re having breakfast), but the contact (or potential for contact) is.  Because I would much rather tell this story using hand gestures; visual cues; call-and-response; scents – anything but words, either in English or in Chinese.

This is how it seems to work in Yuen Long, too – how it has always worked here, everywhere in Hong Kong (and elsewhere) since the beginning, as I’ve realized.  Histories and cultures are codified not only in words and images but also in tone and pitch, in gruffs and laughter, in aromas and sounds and tastes and textures.

That’s the ideal story I would like to tell.  No, scratch that – this is the ideal conversation I want to share with you.  A conversation that lets both of us discover what makes this place so remarkable, so compelling, so beautiful.

But since I am here and you are there, and because these screens cannot reconcile the distance between us…well, could I ask you to use your imagination a bit?  To take the skeins of text and imagery I’ve compiled and to put them together?

40. Po Toi O (布袋澳) and Joss House Bay (大廟灣)

Three attempts.

It took me three tries, three trips, three turnarounds to finally find this place.  I can’t tell you how long I’ve wanted to visited this area, at once a part of and yet so far away from Hong Kong and what the territory spans.  The first attempt to get from there to here (here to there?) was a casual reconnaissance-turned-retreat mission; the second, a logistical disaster with respect to transportation and circumstances.

But on the third attempt…well, even the success story isn’t a perfect one.  But I think it’s worth telling all the same.

36. Chai Wan (柴灣) and Shau Kei Wan (筲箕灣)

Chai Wan (柴灣).  Chai Wan.  Chai Wan.

I am, in my head, trying to pronounce the name as properly as I can.  It’s the first character, “chai (柴),” that has me confused – I can’t recognize or remember any of its Cantonese homophones, which leaves me confused as to the consonance (is it really a “ch” or more like a “ts?”) and the tone (is it low, or does it rise?). Every encounter with the MTR’s Island Line (港島綫) has included the female announcer’s voice saying the station name: 往柴灣列車即將到達，請先讓車上乘客落車……The train to Chai Wan is arriving.  Please let passengers exit first.  And somehow, every time I hear it, I forget the name.

Until today, when I suggest to Jordan (Melody, unfortunately, isn’t able to join us on this trip) that we take the train to its end.  Having consulted the MTR “tourist attractions” map, we decide it’s a good idea – the map doesn’t explicitly show it, but the legend indicates there’s at least one “arts/culture” attraction available here.

Pronunciation complete.  It really is “ch,” and the tone starts low before rising slightly.  Or something like that.

But that’s only a small discovery, only the tiniest of insights into what lies on this side of the Island – because if you look closely enough, you can see so much more.

33. Tai Po I (大埔一): The Markets (大埔虛及街市)

Four days – it’s been four days since I last updated this project.  An eternity elsewhere in the world; a blink of the eye here in Hong Kong.  (Maybe that’s what they mean by “time difference?”)

At any rate, I’m sincerely sorry for the delay.  Academics, lethargy, and other responsibilities (not sure if “lethargy” counts as a responsibility) had hindered any attempt to travel, let alone write.

Until yesterday, that is.  So let’s jump in, hop on the East Rail Line, and head to Tai Po.  But let’s take our time, because Tai Po, as we’ll discover (or maybe you’ve consulted a map already?), is huge.

And once again, we’re heading for the markets.