Memories of a Former British Colony

Hong Kong is Daughter No. 1's true motherland, and appropriately, the group's first stop in China. Hard for her to believe that Hong Kong has now been absorbed into the larger whole of the da lu, otherwise known as the mainland. During her childhood, when fellow American citizens asked her, "Where is your family from?" Daughter No. 1 would always specify, "Hong Kong, not China;" her response, a result of years of brainwashing. To her family, this little British colony had a different identity and culture from the motherland. Probably superior and unique at the same time. Her own grandparents had passed on a sense of fear and distrust toward Chinese Communism, vowing never to never "go back," and securing Canadian citizenship in the early 1980s. What did Popo fear more, being persecuted years after 1947 for Nationalist ties, or using a squat hole in Guangzhou? Sometimes it was hard to tell. And with all that history, Daughter No. 1 comes back to Hong Kong, to find that little has changed, ten years after the "handover." The city echoes with the hum of post-capitalism...skyscrapers are erected and torn down again, the harbor hums with movement, and wealthy tai tais continue to wind their way up the Peak in chauffered German sedans.

Although it is the vestiges of British colonial order, rampant commerce, wild nightlife and high fashion that usually impresses the typical tourist, Daughter No. 1 remembers Hong Kong as a place of beautiful ordinariness. Her grandparents's home was in Mid Levels, a humble flat along Caine Road, an area now glamorized by the fact that the large escalators take people up and down the different cliffs and contains the spilloff of the Lang Kwai Fang bar district. She remembers going with her grandmother to the wet market, choosing a live chicken, and minutes later, having it returned to them in a plastic bag, ready to be made into a dish, steamed Hainan style with its own peppery scallion dressing. Or having fresh milk delivered to their doorstep, in glass bottles, and going to the bakery to select perfectly square loaves of white bread. The routine was to come home and make little tea sandwiches with a thin smear of peanut butter. Her Grandmother would meticulously trim the edges of the bread before serving, and it was like eating a perfect white greeting card. Daughter No. 1 remembers riding the double decker bus with her mother to the beauty salon; labor was so cheap that she could afford to go several times during one trip. She would sit in the salon chair, an 8 year old anticipating the curly hair that would emerge after each chemical treatment, hoping each time it would transform her into Alyssa Milano of television's Who's the Boss. After she cried with disappointment after each visit, her mother would try to console her with lunch at the nearest restaurant, and there, Daughter No. 1 would be able to hone her palate with the finest dim sum made by Hong Kong's highly trained and trend-setting chefs.

On this trip Daughter No. 1 finds herself on a small tour bus with her new family and other travelers, climbing the mountain to Repulse Bay. Although the view is breathtaking, and lunch is near, she reserves a distant appreciation for the moment. She knows that being here is just a nod to the past, and that things will never be the same again.