06-04-20
Hong Kong is small. We do not have hometowns. We have ‘home districts’. We miss our home districts. Where we came from is now gone. But, your heart is obsessively held by the beautiful district that you cannot forget.
Let us examine the old old districts of Hong Kong, say around 100 years ago. Western District used to be a nightlife area and is now outdated. Sheung Wan was a Chinese business hot pot and is now in the embarrassing process of gentrification. Central, after years of ruthless demolitions of office buildings, got a Botox face which we could no longer recognise. Wan Chai was a gathering place of seamen and soldiers. It is now eclectic, devoid of any orderly style. Hong Kong’s crown jewel is the most famous tourist area Tsim Sha Tsui, possessing all the histories, diversities, humanities and charms of city, from colonial to modern days.
Tsim Sha Tsui was one of the immediate causes of the notorious Anglo-Chinese War in 1840. In 1839, a villager in Tsim Sha Tsui was beaten to death by a British soldier but the British government declined any responsibility. National hostility of 2 nations began.
The hillocks of Tsim Sha Tsui were inhabited before 1830s, and the place was shaped like a nose running down to the Victoria Harbour. The southwest of Tsim Sha Tsui was a pier with warehouses. There was railway with a clock tower in the opposite southeast. Due to the surrounding large blocks of rock now known as Kowloon Park and Observatory Hill, Tsim Sha Tsui was safely secluded from the ‘poor man’ areas of Jordan. The town centre was divided into 2 parts in the 1940s: south of the main street Nathan Road, where Her Majesty The Queen’s birthday parade later took place in the 1950s, was an area swamped by nice hotels which entertained flocks of English and American tourists. It used to be the shopping paradise full of shops selling jewels, antiques, paintings, embroideries and rattan furniture. Street names were very Chinese such as Canton Road, Peking Road and Hankow Road. There was even a street with a Vietnamese name i.e. Haiphong Road. The north of Nathan Road was a residential area crammed with houses and cream-coloured blocks. The exclusive and opulent hotels there such as Astor Hotel and Grand Hotel attracted tourists as well as bars along Humphreys Avenue and Carnarvon Road. It is sad that all the old hotels and bars now disappeared without leaving a trace. The street names there were nostalgically English such as Cameron Road, Granville Road, Kimberley Road and Austin Avenue.
Simon Wong, a band drummer and now retiree whose family has lived in Tsim Sha Tsui for generations remembered, “I love Tsim Sha Tsui and am proud of it. It was a truly international and outstanding district even during the years when Hong Kong was still backward in the 50s and 60s. Tsim Sha Tsui stood out elegantly. People escaped from Peking, Shanghai, Tianjin, Macau, India, Vietnam and Malaysia and even Russia to Tsim Sha Tsui where it was easier to find a job and there was no discrimination against individuals on the basis of their country, skin colour or ethnic origin. Apart from Chinese, English was the most common language spoken. Most Chinese immigrants did not speak Hong Kong local dialect. Food was fantastic. We had gourmets from every country. The Russians who were refugees in the 1950s got us the borscht, a popular soup from Eastern Europe. I enjoyed the English fish and chips sold in Cornwall Avenue. The top Indian restaurants were in Tsim Sha Tsui and they sold spicy but cheerful curries.”
Simon added, “Tsim Sha Tsui had a lot of tourists, expats and international population. From high class shopping to energetic nightlife, there were many reasons to love this unique and charming district. We also had a highly developed bar culture. Almost every hotel had a bar or lounge. Our band performed in several bars. I still kept the remembrance of the happy moments when we sang and talked in such places.”
Plastic surgery was given to Tsim Sha Tsui in the 80s in order to create a twin along the abandoned railway in the east. The new district was called Tsim Sha Tsui East, an un-inspiring and dull area with a geometrical pattern of office towers. Soon, this pseudo-Tsim Shan Tsui area was tarnished by the expensive, tacky and bad taste ‘Japanese nightclubs’. Then, gangsters invaded the tract. Tsim Sha Tsui lovers felt lost, hesitant and sad at this sad change.
The affliction of our city is not that romantic beautiful thing ended so soon, but that we are no longer able to create new things which are better enough to replace the old.
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