January 2000 Specialty shops
Aura of traditions
Photo and text by Wong Po Kwan and Wong
Sze Man
When people shops in modern halls, they may not notice the
specialty shops surrounding the malls on small side streets.
Traditional groceries, key making stalls and tea shops are
difficult to find in modern shopping malls.
Mnay of these traditional shops were established in the
'60s. With the re-development of many of the old districts of Hong Kong, a lot of these
specialty shops have had to shut down.
Those specialty shops that have not yet shut down are
concentrated mainly in old districts like Shek Kip Mei, Sham Shui Po and Choi Hung,
although people can still found some of them in the side street of some modern districts
like Causeway Bay.
Some of these shops provide services that are unavailable
in contemporary shops. For example, traditional groceries provide services like delivery
of rice and seasonings to the neighbourhood.
Although these specialty shops add a great deal of color
to Hong Kong street life, with the construction of new shopping malls, such shops face an
uncertain future.
As new towns keep developing, it is not known when these
shops will be elminated, but one thing is certain: They will not be with us forever.
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