Into the raging sea
Into the Raging Sea Heidi Kawai Smith
In 1982, the Hong Kong movie ‘Boat People’ depicted a photojournalist’s attempt to find out what was happening in the newly established Socialist Republic of Vietnam and the desperate escape of the people due to the authoritarian society. The movie was banned in China, Taiwan and Vietnam, respectively. The movie’s Chinese name was ‘投奔怒海’ which translated as ‘Into the Raging Sea’.
On the 30 of June 1997, the last Hong Kong governor Chris Patten gave a Farewell Speech before leaving Hong Kong with her family, on the HMS Tamar.
Your Royal Highness, Prime Minister, Distinguished Guests, People of Hong Kong: For Hong Kong as a whole, today is cause for celebration not sorrow. But here and there, perhaps there will be a touch of personal sadness as is true of any departure, a point to which I shall return. History is not just a matter of dates. What makes history is what comes before and what comes after the dates that we all remember. The story of this great city is about thte years before this night, and the years of success that will surely follow it. Of course, Hong Kong’s story is not solely that of the century and a half of British responsibility, though it is the conclusion of that chapter that we mark tonight. This chapter began with events that, from today’s vantage point, at the end of the following century, none of us here would wish or seek to condone. But we might note that most of those who live in Hong Kong now do so because of events in our own century which would today have few defenders. All that, all that is a reminder that sometimes we should remember the past the better to forget it. What we celebrate this evening is the restless energy, the hard work, the audacity of the men and women who have written Hong Kong’s success story -- mostly Chinese men and Chinese women. They were only ordinary in the sense that most of them came here with nothing. They are extraordinary in what they have achieved against the odds. As British administration ends, we are, I believe, entitled to say that our own nation’s contribution here was to provide the scaffolding that enabled the people of Hong Kong to ascend: the rule of law; clean and light-handed government; the values of a free society; the beginnings of representative government; and democratic accountability. 2
This is a Chinese city, a very Chinese city with British characteristics. No dependent territory has been left more prosperous, none with such a rich texture and fabric of civil society -- professions, churches, newspapers, charities, civil servants of the highest probity, and the most steadfast commitment to the public good. I have no doubt that, with people here holding on to these values which they cherish, Hong Kong’s star will continue to climb. Hong Kong’s values are decent values. They are universal values. They are the values of the future in Asia as elsewhere, a future in which the happiest and the richest communities, and the most confident and most stable too, will be those that best combine political liberty and economic freedom as we do here today. All of us here tonight, and I am sure all my fellow countrymen and women watching these events from afar, wish the Chief Executive of the Special Administrative Region and his excellent team the very best of luck as they embark on their journey. C. H. Tung and his wife, Betty, will serve Hong Kong with dedication, strength, and enthusiasm. Everyone here, and people outside Hong Kong as well, will be willing them to succeed in the challenging years that lie ahead. I said that tonight’s celebration will be tinged for some with sadness. So it will be for my family and myself and for others who, like us, will soon depart from this shore. I am the 28th governor, the last governor. Like all the other governors and their families, my wife, my children, and myself will take Hong Kong home in our hearts. You have been kind to us. You have made us as welcome. It has been the greatest honor and privilege of my life to share your home for five years, and to have some responsibility for your future. Now, Hong Kong people are to run Hong Kong. That is the promise. And that is the unshakeable destiny.
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In April, 2022, a Cambridge undergraduate student from Hong Kong became the youngest winner of the National Poetry Competition, his poem Fricatives, which navigates race, migration, oppression and the struggles of those leaving their homes behind to start anew in a foreign country
Fricatives by Eric Yip
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To speak English properly, Mrs Lee said, you must learn the difference between three and free. Three men escaped from Alcatraz in a rubber raft and drowned on their way to Angel Island. Hear the difference? Try this: you fought your way into existence. Better. Look at this picture. Fresh yellow grains beaten till their seeds spill. That’s threshing. That’s submission. You must learn to submit before you can learn. You must be given a voice before you can speak. Nobody wants to listen to a spectacled boy with a Hong Kong accent. You will have to leave this city, these dark furrows stuffed full with ancestral bones. Know that death is thorough. You will speak of bruised bodies skinnier than yours, force the pen past batons and blood, call it fresh material for writing. Now they’re paying attention. You’re lucky enough to care about how the tongue moves, the seven types of fricatives, the articulatory function of teeth sans survival. You will receive a good education abroad and make your parents proud. You will take
a stranger’s cock in your mouth in the piss-slick stall of that dingy Cantonese restaurant you love and taste where you came from, what you were made of all along. Put some work into it, he growls. C’mon, give me some bite. Your mother visits one October, tells you how everyone speaks differently here, more proper. You smile, nod, bring her to your favourite restaurant, order dim sum in English. They’re releasing the students arrested five years ago. Just a tad more soy sauce please, thank you. The television replays yesterday on repeat. The teapots are refilled. You spoon served rice into your mouth, this perfect rice. Steamed, perfect, white.
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My parent moved after I moved to the UK, I used to have a spare box room reserved for me whenever I went home, but it was given to my niece in 2015. The TV was at my parent’s home in Tuen Mun, Hong Kong. 2006
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In a lift in the MTR station, we were carrying pieces of luggage, but no one gave us any priority. 2015
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Me and my niece getting to know each other. 2018
P11 My dad usually sat on the stall to read the racing paper. 2018 P13 From inside the HK MTR underground train, we stopped at the Mongkok station, which was one of the key protest sites in 2016. The photo was taken in 2015 P15 When I was a child, we used to go to the Town Hall at night to enjoy the air conditioning. I saw this old man standing up, meditating, or practising TaiChi on the podium. 2015 P16 The view from my hotel in Mongkok 2018 P19 I grew up here in this building. I lived here before moving to the UK. I hung out with my friends on the basketball court down there. I slept on the top level of a bunk bed, and this was the view I saw every morning first thing and every night before sleep. 2015 P20 A wet market near where I lived in Tuen Mun, nothing really changed over the years @2018 P21 A replica of the Goddess of Democracy statue as part of the Tiananmen Memorial in Hong Kong Polytechnic University, this statue was removed in Oct 2021. I studied art and design at the Polytechnic from 1993 to 1995, the first step of my creative career. 2015 P22 The view from a taxi. 2018 P24 On top of Victoria Peak, everyone wanted to take photos from the same spot. 2015
P27 My mother like to put colourful posters on the wall; I found this one year when I came home for Chinese New Year, everything was perfect. 2010 P28 When I was young, my parent would take me to the beach on summer afternoons. I must be around five years old when this photo was taken. My mother didn’t want her picture taken, so she moved the paper to tell the shooter to stop, but my dad was happy to be snapped. I remember this because when we got home, they had a row, and this was brought up, I don’t remember what the row was about, but I remember the photo. Circa 1979 P29 Last time I went home, I didn’t have a chance to spend any time with my brother. One day, I found him playing a computer game in his bedroom, trying to rest. I walked in, and my niece followed me, and we all sat on the bed to chat for hours. 2018 P30 In my parent’s living room: when my niece was little, she would draw on the wall. 2018 P33 There were many old people collecting cardboard boxes or packaging on the street to take to recycle centre to exchange for money. It’s common to see people pushing a big trolley of empty containers. 2015 P 34 View from my hotel room @2019 P 35 This was a fish tank outside a restaurant we were dining in, fresh abalones available for stream or bake. P37 Butterfly beach. I remember being taken here on a summer holiday, this beach is about a mile from my parent. I learnt how to swim in this sea; the promenade is new. @2013 P39 A wall tile in the stairwell of the Former Victoria Barracks, which was built by the British Army in the mid-19th century for explosives and ammunition production and storage. This was now the site of Asia Society Hong Kong’s Chantal Miller Gallery, which runs regular art events. 2019
P43 Ferraga Mo playing football in the garden with his flipflop. This is the first time I have stayed with them, and we are getting to know each other. P44 The family arrived on the 27th of March 2021 P45 They brought with them a sense of adventure and fun. Both parents were product designers in Hong Kong; one of them used to work as a toy designer, it’s a family of many toys and games. Jun 2021 P47 I’ve given a polaroid to Ferraga Mo, the 10-year-old son, to document their new lives for me for the first three months. P49 They bought a piece of Hong Kong history: The Watermelon ball. During the manufacturing heydays of the 1960s and 70s, Hong Kong’s factories pumped out a massive slice of the world’s toys; these were made in Hong Kong but often exported to other countries. An exception was the watermelon ball, named after its resemblance to the stripey, spherical fruit. Created in 1959 by industrialist Chiang Chen, these affordable plastic balls were not only made in Hong Kong but also played within Hong Kong. ( excerpt. from 10 iconic products that are made in Hong Kong, Time Out) P50 Using the money from selling their Hong Kong home, they bought their UK home while renting Oct 2021 P51 Going to British Museum for the first time ever. Jun 2021 P52 I played the game of life, Hong Kong edition, with the family. A lot was determined by what job you’d got and how much money you’d earned. This seemed to be the perfect game for this moment. Jun 2021 P55 © Farraga Mo P57 The family had gone into town in Southampton. Feb 2022 P58 They were showing me the toy they’ve brought from Hong Kong and decided to demonstrate the lightsaber in the neighbourhood in Jun 2021
P61 Showing off the toys they’ve got on the table. Jun 2022 P63 They’ve been living in Southampton for three months, and they’ve never seen the sea. We took a trip together and walked to the end of the pier to look at the sea. For people that came from Hong Kong, being able to look at the sea was almost a granted experience. Jun 2021 P65 Lichens, Oct 2021 P67 The family initially didn’t want a garden; being always lived in a city, having a garden was a novelty and worrisome. Farraga asked if they could live in a house; since it’s something you only see on TV, they end up getting somewhere with a garden. Oct 2021 P68 The family had been exploring Southampton; they told me they found a place where you could feed the geese. When Kurium took the bread out of his bag, the geese went mad and started to chase us. Three groups of geese attacked us separately, and I protected Farraga while Kurium and Ring tried to give all the bread away. They won’t be going back to feed them for some time. Jun 2021 P 70-71 © Farraga Mo P73 Throughout the days, Farraga would ask me to play games. He had the cards with him and would teach me to play a different quick game when the parent was busy. We played poker, blackjack and the basic who’s got the bigger card when the time was tight. Oct 2021 P 74 Kurium was having lunch. Jun 2021 P75 Posting at British Museum stairs Jun 2021 P76 - 77 © Farraga Mo P78 Playing football in the garden Jun 2022
©2021 All right reserved. All work © Heidi Kawai Smith Poem © Eric Yip Polaroid © Ferraga Mo Special thanks to the Mo family’s given me unlimited access to their journey, on moving from Hong Kong to the UK in 2020.