Remembrance Day HK

Captain Nam Sing Thapa and ex-Gurkhas pose for a photograph in front of the Cenotaph in Hong Kong

REMEMBRANCE SUNDAY HONG KONG 10 November 2019

The Gurkhas and many veterans from the Brigade of Gurkhas in Hong Kong were assembled with smart Regimental blazers, caps with own Regimental cap badges, medals and decorations at the Cenotaph in Central Hong Kong before 1100 hours on Sunday 10th November. There were many others, also very smart, from various units including ex-servicemen from the Navy, Army, RAF, the Hong Kong Ex-Serviceman’s Association, government officials, consulate representatives, religious representatives etc. There were also serving personnel in uniform from the Scouts, the Hong Kong Volunteer Regiment, Navy, and the Hong Kong SAR Police Force. else in order of precedence. Captain Tara Prasad Gurung and Captain Nam Sing Thapa laid the wreath on behalf of all members of the 6th Queen Elizabeth’s Own Gurkha Rifles Hong Kong (6 GRRA HK). After the completion of laying the wreaths, the Chinese national anthem was played by the Hong Kong SAR Police band and instantly anti-government Hong Kong youth protesters in a huge crowd started shouting and waving Union Jack flags outside the area of the Cenotaph cordoned by the Hong Kong SAR Police. The parade ended at 1130 am and all spectators and guards of honour dispersed. Soon the protesters had also left the area. The programme had run smoothly and successfully.

The Hong Kong SAR Police band played music and provided the bugler. After the two-minute silence wreaths were laid at the Cenotaph, beginning with dignitaries and government officials, then everyone Jai Legendary Gurkhas! Jai Sixth!

Nam Sing Thapa

KOHIMA Written after a visit to the Commonwealth War Graves Cemetery, Kohima, Nagaland.

There’s some corner of a foreign field Not forever England’s, but ours’, our gravestones’. Assamese or Limbu, we stood here too. Suffered bullet and bombshell with England’s best, With them died and held, Our blood mixing with that of Dorset, Norfolk, the Fells. Voices that spoke, speak no more. The accents we could not understand: The longshoreman’s Lowestoft drawls, Clipped, hard accents from a Sheffield forge. Nor they ours: Rajput, Rai, Urdu. The sibilant, soothing, mortal grain of words Have all become this one long silence. Though language was not necessary after what we did.

One thousand of us claim this ridge, Indifferent now to the homage you bring, Mouthing our lost names under the all-day din Of an oriole in a cherry tree, Where once a sniper culled. We were young-limbed and beautiful then, And are beautiful still. It is only death that has made all the difference. At Kohima we lie in a hundred rows, So many todays for your tomorrows.

Rick Beven, 1992