HONG KONG 2023

My Story 

During the 1967 anti-colonial government riot, my family left our one and a half units in the resettlement tenements of Li Cheng Uk 李鄭屋邨徙置區 to emigrate to America. 

The 7-story tenement was genius. There were 19 stacks in our “estate.” And there were more such estates in Kowloon. The British were top notch at reorganizing chaotic populations. They had to deal with the influx from Mainland, and displaced squatters from encampments that were destroyed by fire, etc. In the end, they housed everyone, albeit, into 120 square feet concrete cells that came with just a wooden window and a wooden door, and no built-in electricity, gas, or water. It was up to the occupants to cope and alter any way they must. There was no code or occupancy limit to slow anything down. Each floor had a men and a women toilet-rooms, and a men and a women bring-your-own-bucket bathing-rooms with stalls but no doors, which were near the faucet-room for easy water access. I dreaded dim and sweaty floors, with unsanitary edges, corners, and occasional flying or crawling bugs. Unlike other kids, I could never be barefooted in these rooms. My mother bought me wooden clogs to wear.  Kindergarten was on the top floor. Again, a perfect designation, as kids could not be lost coming and going.  Alas, climbing the steps to and from 7 stories was obligatory exercise.  Street level units, taking advantage of walking traffic, were generally home shops.  Street level had the additional perk of having a foot-wide drainage gutter that ran the length of all four sides around the building, where dumping liquid, including peeing was convenient.  Inevitably the gutter had clutters of wastes too, but somehow a flow was maintained. My mother placed a board in front of our unit, for me and our cat to cross. During rain or typhoons, children made paper boats to float down the gutter.  Our “kitchen,” like every neighbor’s, made use of the threshold just outside our unit.  My mother cooked on a portable kerosene stove, had a few utensils and pots, and a big tank that held water fetched from the faucet room.  There was no storage, so my mother bought groceries every day from street vendors.  Bargaining dimes and nickels was customary and sociable that all parties enjoyed.  Vendors efficiently tied up fish, meat, or vegetables for carry away with salt-water grass strings. No bags.  Unfortunately this no cost and eco-friendly practice had vanished from the world.  Between tenement buildings was pedestrian open space for activities such as laying out food items to dry, traveling performances, peddling goods, children running amuck, and in most evenings, residents relaxing. 

My two older brothers slept in the half unit on the 5th floor in another building, where despite being only 120 square feet, the unit was 2 separate dwellings by a dividing wall. An adult lady, who worked as a maid for foreigners, occupied the other half. When she was gone, she had temporarily sublet her side.  Once, it was to a man, who piled mounds of quail size chocolate Easter eggs against the dividing wall, such that the presence of a hole tempted us children to dig through it.  Chocolate was a rare treat.  The lady had taken me to see American movies, because a child could share a seat without paying.  I saw many western sagas, including Clint Eastwood's.  I loved the gunfights and horses without any need to know the plots. 

My father made use of his street level 120 square feet as our home and metal workshop.  He built a ceiling loft, accessed by steps from the shop, where my mother and I slept.  At night after the shop tidied up, my father slept in a portable canvas cot.  

Our shop first produced painted silver hooks that anchored Venetian blind strings.  My father self-taught tool die and mode casting for chopping sheet metal into hook shape.  We had other mechanical machines to bend pieces and drill holes.  Somehow electricity was connected.  It was dirty hard work.  My oldest brother started working full time along with my parents; he barely finished elementary school.  Child labor was common.  My father’s business took off when his sturdy metal knitting stands became known to new textile factories.  A metal “business card” was secured onto every stand, like an artist’s signature, to facilitate new orders.  Men in suits had visited our little shop for orders of over 100 stands.  Everyone worked; I held metal beams while my brother drilled. My mother and other brother painted the frames in oil based battleship gray.  When necessary, we hired neighbors to get the orders done. 

Privacy was unusual.  One neighbor on our street level managed to never socialize with anyone. She was a “Susie Wong.” Her little girl was always home alone with the door closed.  The shop to our right was 余九記; this metal workshop had several live-in hired men.  Once they stole my brother’s dog and cooked it.  My brother cursed them into the night.  The shop to our left was a man who sold aquarium fish.  He had basins and buckets spread out beyond his shop everyday to entice passersby.  Clusters of tiny red worms in plastic water filled bags were a hot sell.  The first shop at the corner was a cheong-saam tailor. His wife was always pregnant; they had 5,6, or 7 kids. Their very old grandma still helped out, and could thread through a needle at night under minimal light without eyeglasses.  I remember one of their children was my friend, but suddenly she was gone.  Sometimes I got a dime to go across for snacks from 潘齒香 .  Across too was my favorite shop 黃興記, a stationery store that also made ritual products for burning to the underworld.  Colored tissues covering bamboo stick frames made into cars, and mansions with furniture (much like a doll's house).  I had two friends my age that lived on the second floor (aka US first floor).  They started working in factories at age 14.  Everyone loved playing mahjong. My friends and I learned how to play before attending kindergarten.  My other friend lived across, next to the snack shop. She married at 15 to get away from her stepmother, who was in fact a quiet and kind woman, and who occasionally got beaten by her father.  Somehow we lived thriving lives with almost nothing left to lose.  Thanks to Stephen Chow’s movie “Kung Fu Hustle,” for bringing the old neighborhood back to life. 

2023 

Like sandcastles on the beach, wiped out by the tides, all of the above was gone without a hint left.  I located our tenement based on 中聖學校 a nearby elementary school. The Han Tomb 李鄭屋古墓 entrance with two stone lions, where I used to hang out wondering what was inside, had been completely remodeled since my prior visits.  Unfortunately the grander newer look only made this ancient tomb look anonymous and bland. To replace 7-story with 27-story housing was justifiable, but not all renovation for the sake of renovation was good. 

On this visit I also ventured out to Kowloon Walled City 九龍寨城. This 6.5 acre (0.01 square mile) of housing jungle that had housed 50,000 people was wiped out too. Dedicated to its memory was a beautiful and serene Han garden. 

Housing the Hong Kong growing population has historically been a primary worry. Land owners have little incentive to develop more residences to compete with their existing real estates. The government and people are on their knees needing more land to develop. Already residential highrises had blocked the horizon. My friend lives on the 32nd floor. 

Am I now a stranger in my motherland? I visited Macau, Wanchai, Aberdeen, Hong Kong Central, Sham Shui Po. I recognized the same never-say-die people focusing on making a living like my father did, and the same cut to the chase attitude that made them brilliant in survival. Beyond memories, the only connection I now hold on to was friends I met on this and prior times. Through them, I saw myself in a parallel universe, growing up with Hong Kong. 

SPECIAL THANKS to Winnie and 阿景, Candy, 阿忠 and Feddy, Winnie and Sam, Ivy and Ming, and Leo. 

IN MEMORIAM: 李俊國