The December 2011 issue of Varsity looks at groups and issues that were once highly visible in Hong Kong, but have since faded from view and public awareness:
Varsity December 2011 – Editor’s Note
Bygones are not bygones
Be it universal suffrage or the minimum wage, Hong Kongers hotly debate the big issues every day. We show our interest in various issues and stories by watching the news on television or reading newspapers and magazines.
But our attention span does not usually last for long and our interest in the issue of the day will wane. It may be considered a luxury for an issue or a person to grasp the media’s attention for more than three days.
Issues and characters that once formed part of Hong Kong’s pre-1997 landscape and mediascape have faded from our consciousness. Take the Kuomintang (KMT) presence in Hong Kong, the Gurkha soldiers and refugees and asylum seekers – they have been all but forgotten.
In December’s issue, Varsity delves into the stories of these forgotten groups.
The Kuomintang, or Nationalist party used to have many active supporters in Hong Kong. Their influence extended to cultural spheres such as the cinema and to organizations such as schools and labour unions. By the time of the handover, and even more so after 1997, KMT followers and activities are hardly seen. We talked to some KMT supporters to see if they still have the Nationalist fervour.
Gurkhas were stationed in Hong Kong right up to the final days of the British colony. After 1997, some of the soldiers chose to live in Hong Kong, though many others chose to leave. However, their children have returned to make their lives here. We look at some of the problems they encounter when they make Hong Kong their home.
We also look at how refugees and asylum seekers struggle to survive under the government’s refugee policy. The issue of refugees was a prominent one when boatloads of asylum seekers from Vietnam arrived in Hong Kong starting from the 1970s. With the ‘settlement’ of the Vietnamese boat people issue, refugees in Hong Kong have faded from the public eye.
In the People section, we profile the painter and actor Chan Min-leung and activist Vivian Leung Tai Yuet-kam. Chan is perhaps better recognized as a TV villain but he shows Varsity what a dedicated artist he is. Leung is an unlikely activist, a homemakers who always is not afraid to stand up for what she believes in and puts her words into action.
Enjoy!
Victor Chan
Managin Editor
White Sun Sets in Hong Kong
Kuomintang presence and influence have waned since 1997, but Nationalist sympathies remain alive in Hong Kong.
Reporter: Margaret Ng Yee Man,Christine Tai
Outside a two-storey house, tucked away in Zhongshan Park in Tuen Mun, some 200 people gathered in front of a memorial bust of Sun Yat-sen on October 10 to raise the flag and sing the anthem of the Republic of China (R.O.C.). Their display of patriotic fervour was to mark the annual Double Tenth Festival and, more particularly, the 100th anniversary of the Xinhai revolution which saw the overthrow of China’s last imperial rulers.
The house, known as Red House, was one of the command centres from where Sun, the man regarded as the father of modern China, planned uprisings and coups against the Manchu government between 1901 and 1911.
Through Sun and his fellow revolutionaries, Hong Kong developed strong historical links with the republican revolution in mainland China. Later, it would also have links with the party founded by Sun, the Kuomintang (KMT), or Nationalist Party. Those links grew after the ruling KMT was defeated by the Chinese Communist Party and forced to retreat to Taiwan in 1949.
The then British colony became a haven for thousands of KMT soldiers. They were first settled in refugee centres in Kai Lung Wan on Hong Kong Island. However, the colonial government decided to move the Nationalists to a more remote spot after riots broke out on October 10, 1956 when government officers tried to remove R.O.C. flags in Lei Cheng Uk. The community was moved to Rennie’s Mill, now known as Tiu Keng Leng.
This enclave came to symbolize the KMT in Hong Kong in the minds of many Hong Kong people. But it was not the only place where the KMT’s presence was felt in the colony.
Chang Chak-yan, who teaches Asian comparative politics at The Chinese University of Hong Kong, says the KMT organised many social activities in Hong Kong before 1997. The colonial government was tolerant of the activities as long as they were not too overtly political.
In fact, it did not take long after 1949 for the KMT’s influence to spread through Hong Kong society. In the early years after the civil war, the territory became a propaganda battleground between the rival governments in Taipei and Beijing.
The R.O.C.’s flag symbolising a white sun in a blue sky and the red earth flew freely in the New Territories and KMT-subsidized schools like Hong Kong Tak Ming College and Chu Hai College of Higher Education were established along with pro-Taiwan trade unions like the Kowloon and Hong Kong Trades Union Council.
Once We Were Warriors
Hong Kong’s Gurkha Brigades left in 1997, but the soldiers’ children are returning to make Hong Kong home
Reporter: Yvonne Yeung, Cherry Ge
As Hong Kong prepared for the handover of sovereignty from Britain to China in 1997, a military band played “Sunset” on their bagpipes on a polo field in Sek Kong, Yuen Long.
The date was November 1, 1996 and the men were “beating retreat”, a military ceremony to mark the end of the 48-year presence of the Gurkha brigades in Hong Kong.
It is now 14 years since the territory’s 700 Gurkha servicemen were redeployed but their legacy lives on in Hong Kong’s small but growing Nepali community, and in the annual Trailwalker charity event.
“It will be legendary if we can see Gurkhas competing against the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) in the 30th anniversary Oxfam challenge in Hong Kong,” says Danny Thapa. Thapa, now 57, served in the British Army for 20 years, from 1972 to 1992. He was one of the men involved in mapping out the original Trailwalker route.
Trailwalker began in 1981 as a British army training exercise led by the Hong Kong Gurkha Signals Squadron. The exercise raised HK$80,000 to help the Spastics Association of Hong Kong and build a library in a poor Nepalese village.
In 1986, teams of civilians were allowed to take part and Oxfam Hong Kong was brought in to help organize the event. Oxfam Trailwalker has since become one of the largest fundraising sports events in Hong Kong. It is also held in 11 other countries around the world.
An event that tests physical and mental endurance and teamwork, Trailwalker symbolizes the Gurkha spirit.
“Better to die than be a coward” is the motto of the fearsome Nepalese fighters, who became an integral part of the British Army. The name “Gurkha” comes from the hill town of Gorkha, the ancestral hometown of the Nepalese royal family.
Gurkha soldiers fought on the frontline for the British army for 200 years. They participated in the two World Wars, and were assigned to Hong Kong, where their security duties included patrolling the border to prevent the entry of illegal immigrants from the mainland.
After the handover in 1997, the regiment moved to the United Kingdom. Only a few ex-servicemen chose to remain in Hong Kong and make their living here.
Danny Thapa was one of them. After leaving the army in 1992, he got a job as a manager in the manufacturing sector. He says the transition was challenging but not one that he could not overcome. “It takes time to adjust, as we have to face the world as an individual rather than a unit,” he recalls.
Thapa says the Gurkhas who stayed in Hong Kong served in a variety of roles in the military. Most of them were in the infantry but there were also significant numbers of engineers, logisticians and signals specialists.
In the army, Thapa gained knowledge and experience in communications and electronics, which gave him a wider choice of employment in civilian life. “The UK Ministry of Defence (MoD) provided education for related trades and training in the army in order to make sure each serviceman was capable of surviving even after they resign,” he says.
Living in Limbo
Refugees and asylum-seekers in Hong Kong struggle to survive under the government’s current refugee policy.
Reporters: Lotus Lau , John Yip
For many people in Hong Kong, the word “refugee” conjures up images of violent riots at detention camps and people being carried kicking and screaming onto airplanes to be repatriated to their home country.
Starting in the mid 1970s and throughout the 1980s until the early 1990s, boat loads of Vietnamese refugees and asylum seekers arrived in Hong Kong. They were fleeing persecution and seeking a better life in the countries of the West.
“Bắt đầu từ nay”, meaning “beginning from now” became the only Vietnamese phrase most people in Hong Kong knew. It was the opening phrase from a broadcast on public radio here, warning asylum seekers and migrants that they would be repatriated to Vietnam.
By 2000, most of the 200,000 Vietnamese boat people in Hong Kong had either been granted asylum in western countries or repatriated and around 1,400 refugees and migrants were allowed to settle in the territory.
Society at large considered Hong Kong’s refugee “problem” to be over and the issue of refugees faded from public consciousness.
Yet, Hong Kong continues to be a refuge for people fleeing persecution. According to the United Nations High Commission Refugees (UNHCR) there are currently more than 700 refugees and asylum seekers in Hong Kong.
The UNHCR defines a refugee as a person with a “well-founded fear of being persecuted for reasons of race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group, or political opinion,” who is unable to return to their country because of that fear.
Adam, a refugee who refused to disclose his real name, left his family and travelled across half the world from East Africa to Hong Kong seven years ago. He had been persecuted in his home country for alleged political subversion and was eager to seek peace and safety here.
Adam was lucky in being granted refugee status just five days after his arrival. Some other asylum seekers may have to wait for two to three years on average. At first, he felt very grateful just for the safety he enjoyed here. As time went by, he began to want more out of life but Hong Kong could only provide the minimal for survival.
Refugees in Hong Kong are taken care of by the United Nations (UN). The UN provides financial aid through the Hong Kong branch of the International Social Service Hong Kong Branch (ISS-HK). To ensure refugees’ basic shelter and food needs are met, they are given HK$1,500 for rent, which is paid directly to their landlords, and another HK$1,200 for food, transport and other daily necessities.
Time to be a Dad
What paid paternity leave means for Hong Kong’s new dads and dads to be?
Reporter:Billy Leung, Stephanie Chan
Welcoming a new baby is one of the most precious moments in life, but it can also be a stressful, chaotic and overwhelming time. It takes time for new parents to adjust to their new identities and responsibilities. This autumn, there was good news for civil servants who are expecting to be fathers, as the government announced it would introduce paid paternity leave for its employees.
Civil servants may enjoy paid paternity leave starting from the second half of next year, but the wait for most private sector workers will be longer. The government says it will conduct a feasibility study before making any recommendations on that front.
For those Hong Kong dads who have been given paid time off work to spend time with their newborns, the benefits are tangible.
Colin Cheung Kwok-lam, a studio technician at the Chinese University of Hong Kong, took his five days paid paternity leave in October. “I was not just physically by [my wife’s] side but I could also provide emotional care and comfort to my wife and baby,” Cheung says of his week at home.
Cheung says he was able to help his wife in very practical ways. “I could accompany them home from the hospital, cook for my wife, and take my child to the clinic.”
What is more, Cheung says he experienced a miraculous bonding with his baby during his one-week leave. Although he is just an infant, Cheung finds his son can recognize those who are closest to him. “When I hold him in my arms, he feels comfortable and natural,” Cheung says. “But he does not react naturally when others hold him in their arms.”
Cheung’s wife approves of the workplace policy. She believes her husband’s presence has helped her to adapt to the change in their lifestyle and that Cheung has been able to share the burden of taking care of the newborn. For his part, Cheung believes his presence aided his wife’s recovery and eased any emotional problems she may have otherwise experienced.
Speaking as a mother, Mimi Choy, director of the Talent Management Department of Hong Kong Broadband Network Limited, also thinks it is crucial for mothers to have support from their partners after childbirth. She recalls the emotional roller coaster that new mothers go through as a result of hormones and the sudden changes to their lives.
Choy’s company provides paternity leave for all its male employees with the aim of creating a better workplace. Since 2007, male staff are entitled to two days paid leave.
“Apart from their work, employees also bear family responsibilities,” says Choy. “Family problems would in turn affect their job performance if they cannot handle them well.” According to Choy, whether the leave is paid or not is not the most important thing; the crucial point is to give employees time to concentrate on their family affairs.
Time is what Peter Tung, who works for New World Telecom, needed after his baby was born. After giving birth, his wife’s health deteriorated and she suffered from high blood pressure.
Peel Off the Label
Most Filipinos in Hong Kong may be domestic helpers but who are the rest?
Reporters:Dorothy Goh, Joyce Lee
On any given Sunday in Central, the weekday business suits and power dressing gives way to a more casual and diverse ensemble of outfits. The space around the former Legislative Council building fills up with groups of Asian women sitting on flower-shaped mats and enjoying elaborate picnics. There air is filled with the sound laughter, of conversations and songs in Tagalog. A visitor stumbling onto the scene may feel she is in the Philippines.
As of the end of September 2011, there were 163,800 Filipinos in Hong Kong, according to statistics from the Immigration Department. This makes the Filipino community the largest population of expatriates in the city.
According to a survey of 208 local people conducted by Varsity earlier this month, 97 percent of respondents said their immediate association with Filipinos is domestic helpers. However, while most of the Filipinos in Hong Kong do work as domestic helpers, the territory is also home to Filipino professionals and business people who have regular working visas or permanent residency.
Rey De Guzman came to Hong Kong on a working visa four years ago to work for an international electronics company. Later, he decided to start his own business, Dogside Café, a canine friendly eatery and meeting place in Causeway Bay. The business is doing well as De Guzman has successfully targeted Hong Kong’s middle class pet-lovers.
De Guzman’s experience is a Filipino success story highlighting the opportunities to be had in this city. But not every Filipino professional in Hong Kong has found it so easy to start and then advance their career here.
“You just feel like you have to prove yourself all the time.” says Daisy Mandap, Editor of the Sun, an English language newspaper circulated widely within the Filipino community in Hong Kong.
Mandap is a permanent resident of Hong Kong, along with her husband and their two daughters. Before coming here to work as a journalist 24 years ago, she had been a lawyer and a journalist in the Philippines.
Mandap has personally experienced discrimination as a professional Filipino working in Hong Kong. She worked for ATV for 10 years as an English news producer and editor. One time an anchor who had never written a story wanted to change a line in one of her scripts, arguing that Mandap did not even speak the language. Mandap replied that she had studied the language and it was more important to study a language than to just speak it without understanding whether or not what you are saying is right.
She says she came to the realisation that, “No matter how hard you worked, there is always either a white person or Chinese person above you.”
Not only did Mandap feel that her professional skills were questioned by her co-workers, she says the mere fact of being a Filipina meant she has been mistaken for a domestic helper, even by her compatriots.
Varsity Survey on Hong Kong People’s Perspectives to Filipinos
Modern Treasure Hunters
Geocaching – all you need is courage, curiosity and a GPS device for you outdoor adventure.
Reporter: Carmen Shih
Feeling quite seasick after their journey to the remote island of Ng Fan Chau near Shek O, two young men eagerly jump off the boat as it approaches shore. They land on rocks and climb quickly into a tangle of bushes. The men look like characters in an action movie but, in fact, they are modern day treasure hunters taking part in geocaching (ge-o-cash-ing), a pastime that combines travel, hiking, navigating and exploring.
Geocaching is a worldwide treasure hunt using modern technology. With Global Positioning System (GPS) receivers or smartphones, participants look for hidden containers known as geocaches (or “caches”) whose coordinates are listed on geocaching websites. Every geocache contains a logsheet or logbook. Participants, who are known as geocachers, can write down how they got to the cache and share their feelings about it.
Geocaching uses technology to pull people away from their computers and into the great outdoors. “The most important part is the idea of finding an adventure at a location, the idea that you can go out and then you’ll find an adventure somewhere,” says Jen Sonstelie, the marketing manager for Groundspeak, the company that runs geocaching.com.
Currently, there are over 1.5 million active geocachers all over the world.
The game started on May 30, 2000. It quickly spread to different parts of the world — and even into space. The first traditional geocache in Hong Kong was hidden in January 2002 by Joan Garcia, a chemist from Spain. He hid the cache, named “Tram Peak”, inside the Lung Fu Shan Country Park, near the peak of High West.
“It is very important to choose a place you know others will enjoy, don’t just go with a box to a place you still do not know and try and find a place,” says Garcia, who chose the location because it has a view of both skyscrapers and dense vegetation.
Garcia was delighted that he hid the first cache in Hong Kong. “I try to imagine how other people will live the experience.” He even left a camera in the box for the geocachers to take a picture of themselves.
There are currently more than 400 active caches in Hong Kong and local geocachers have established a geocaching community with around 30 active members. Jimmy Tang Tai-kwan, one of the young men at Ng Fan Ch au, started geocaching in 2005. Tang, who is a software engineer, acquired a GPS chip through work. His research revealed that geocaching was one of its uses.
Although Tang grew up in Hong Kong, he says geocaching has allowed him to learn more about the place. His most memorable cache in Hong Kong so far is the “Pillbox” at Wong Nai Chung Gap. A pillbox is a type of military bunker and the pillboxes at Wong Nai Chung Gap date from World War Two.
“Climbing into the water tunnel was the only way that I could reach the cache. It was steep but not very dangerous. I estimate the risk before I take action,” says Tang.
The search itself was rewarding because it led him to the best preserved pillbox in Hong Kong. The cache is owned by a geocacher who loves WWII relics.
Groom to Bloom
Spa days for Hong Kong’s pampered pets
Reporter: Amy Leung
Walk along almost any street in Hong Kong and you will find dog owners carrying around their pets in their arms. These canines are immaculately coiffed and dressed in designer clothing with matching accessories.
Dogs are no longer kept for utilitarian purposes, to guard their owners’ premises or even for simple companionship. Some of today’s owners treat their pets as their children, their most precious possessions or even as status symbols and style statements. The mushrooming of pet–grooming shops and spas is evidence of such trends.
Academy of Modern Pet Ltd., which was established in 2007, is one of the pioneers in the pet grooming and pampering industry.
Sandra Cheung, the principal of this pet-grooming school, has been working in the industry for nearly two decades. The school offers a variety of professional training courses for people who are interested in becoming pet-groomers. These courses can cost up to $43,500 and topics covered include how to clip the fur of different breeds of dogs, how to dye their coats, their biology and anatomy, and business management.
“Being a pet-groomer can be treated as a job as well as an interest,” says Cheung, “that is why it is so welcomed by the public.”
However, Cheung stresses that when she started the business, her aim was not to make money. Likewise, she says most of her students attend the pet-grooming courses not because they want to turn their expertise into a business, but simply out of their love for animals.
In addition to the professional courses, the school also offers many short courses on how to care for and groom individual breeds of dogs, including how to groom them for dog shows. Students come from all walks of life; there are men and women, teenagers and homemakers, and their ages range from 14 to 62. “Because you love the pets, you will feel the time fly,” says Cheung.
According to Cheung, the industry really started to take off around 2006, when “bear bear poodle style”, which means a dog that is groomed like a teddy bear, became popular. “When the pet is beautiful, the owner feels happy. In return, the pets will feel the same too,” she says.
Cheung jokes that the look of a dog follows the interests of its owner. “How they dress their pets can definitely reflect their taste.”
People’s attitudes towards their pets and how they look have certainly changed over the years but to further develop the industry Cheung believes people need to look beyond Hong Kong. Therefore, she provides her students with opportunities for technical exchange, visits and international competitions. They travel to the mainland, to Japan and even the United States to acquire a deeper understanding of industry trends and apply what they have learnt.
“The world is ever-changing,” she says, “being in this industry, you must have a sense of the new products and inventions.”
Although not as experienced as Cheung, Shuet May has been a pet-groomer for nearly six years and opened her own grooming shop “Pet Fantasy” in 2005.
She went to Japan to learn the new trends in pet health and beauty treatments, and introduced some new facilities to Hong Kong. Pet Fantasy is one of the two shops in Hong Kong that provide something called the “Micro Bubble Pet Spa”. She describes the spa as similar to skincare treatments for humans. “It is a deep-cleansing procedure,” she explains enthusiastically. “The micro bubbles are so tiny that they can get into the pets’ pores and remove the dirt.”
Prices for the treatment range from $280 to $580 depending on the size of the dog; clipping and shearing costs extra. May says the prospects for the pet-grooming business are good because more people are willing to spend money to groom their pets.
“For people owning pets these days, it is just like having one more child at home,” May says. “They treat them like children.”
Most of the customers in her shop are young couples, but she also notices there have been more men, mostly single, visiting her shop in recent years. She attributes this to owners who view pet keeping as an activity through which they can socialize. “When the masters walk their dogs at night, they often stop and chat with each other,” says May. “It is a good chance to make friends with people with the same interest.”
Sometimes, owners will watch their pets having all the treatments, but most of the time they simply drop their pets at May’s shop for a few hours and pick them up later. May says that every time she hands the pets back to their owners, she feels like a teacher meeting parents. “It is as though I were giving out report cards after school. I have to report their performance in detail,” she says with an understanding smile.
Big Canvas for a Small-screen Villain
He plays gamblers and addicts on TV, but off-screen Chan Min-leung is a master Chinese painter.
Reporter: Charlie Leung
It was a rainy day on location in Sai Kung and some actors were standing around chatting, waiting for the shooting of the costume drama to continue. One of them, Chan Min-leung sat aside from the others and contemplated the mist that had lightly settled over a flowerbed. Captivated by the sight, Chan immediately drew the scene on the back of his script.
The name Chan Min-leung may not ring any bells, but his face is a familiar one. Many will have seen him on their television screens playing bit parts – a drug-user here, a swindler or a jobless, gambling addict there. The real Chan, aged 61, could not be more different from his on-screen persona; he is an artist, an accomplished Chinese painter who has won numerous awards and held exhibitions in Hong Kong and overseas.
Chan has been drawing and painting since he was young. His father was a baker who ran his own shop in the 1960s. When the bakery closed at 11p.m., Chan would cover the greasy worktops with newspaper and paint. At first, he did not have any teachers and taught himself by copying the pictures he liked in magazines.
Chan began to study Chinese painting at a studio at the age of 17 and threw himself into the art. However, when he said he wanted to be a painter, he got little support because nobody thought he would be able to make a living as an artist.
“Though the living was hard at that time, painting was my only occupation. I had given up all other activities for it. My motive for going to work is also painting.’’ Chan says.
In 1972, the bakery closed down because of the high rent. Chan decided to start his own bakery in Ma Wan, thinking he would be able to control his schedule and have more time for painting. However, as Chan had never started his own business before, it took him more time to learn and manage the bakery than he had anticipated.
In order to spare more time for painting, he soon closed the bakery and went to work in a carving factory. He also taught Chinese painting at a community centre and worked for a theatre company, both onstage and behind the scenes. Chan says he was lucky because his boss at the carving factory supported his painting and allowed him to be absent on weekdays to teach at the community centre.
Then, in 1977, a friend of Chan’s, who knew he had drama experience through the theatre company, approached him to ask if he would be interested in bit parts in TV drama.
In the 1970s, Television Broadcasts Limited (TVB), Commercial Television and Rediffusion Television were engaged in fierce competition and recruited large numbers of actors. Chan began his TV career and was formally contracted as a TVB artist in 1989.
“Show business is brilliant; it’s like a ‘Dream Factory’. People dream of becoming superstars. But it is also superficial and impractical,” Chan says. As a member of the entertainment industry, Chan has also thought about becoming a leading actor one day.
