When Chong King Mansion was mentioned, perhaps several images would come to my mind before I finally paid a visit there. One is about Wang Karwai’s film Chung King Express and several shots are from Chung King mansion. It is also said that Wong used to live in Chung King guesthouse right after he arrived in Hong Kong. The second image is that I recalled my experience when I was checking the youth hostels of Hong Kong from worldwide traveling websites only to find hostels in Chong King Mansion received great reviews with top ratings. The third image is about a cubic building divided into lots of boxes where visitors perform their own life. These three pictures came in collision in my mind once I stepped into this building. Although some people feel nervous when stepping to an unknown world especially with people with color, actually I was very excited to feel pressure unloaded. Travelers with backpacks (maybe they are westerners who has also checked the hostel info from web, without any awareness that refugees living next door) were busy getting their money exchanged and shops there are seldom with any decoration. This informal and casual environment made me relaxed a lot. Actually I like this place when firstly stepping in.
(I have to say that my mind jumps over a little bit in disorder….)
Actually the people in shops from south Asia are neither refugees nor asylum seekers and Chong King Mansion is symbolic for Hong Kong interacting with Indians, Sri Lanka and so on. Living in an imagined hybridized community, people from South Asia with legal right staying in Hong Kong should have become part of the existing system, and every culture should have been melt equally into a hybridized culture. But actually I found people in Chung King Mansion are proof to the opposite. Chung King Mansion and communities like Chinatowns overseas are similar to a certain extent. People with similar cultural background gather in Chung King Mansion for certain cultural elements, like food, costumes, and VCDs, etc. According to what the asylum seeker I talked with said, they feel treated with respect here, and so this kind of community caters for their need such as the building up esteem and avoidance of discrimination. Chung King Mansion seems to become a symbol for resisting the unsuccessfully hybridized Hong Kong. Besides, Chung King Mansion also serves as a very initial step for out comers to become insiders. Certain information belonging to their community is shared there, such as job information, and other information that can really help you make a living in Hong Kong. So I am wondering whether they have the same access to these resources and I just believe the answer is no, because the local seem to be unaware of their life, let alone the recognition of refugees in Hong Kong. Refugees and asylum seekers seems invisible to me before I finally got the chance to know their life. From some certain point of view they are lucky because they understand a common global value of HUMAN RIGHTS is protected in Hong Kong. They are the beneficiary of the triumph of liberalism previously shared by the west (later on the east). But the wishful thinking of human rights is in collision with the social system based on the global hybridization, according to their tearful life experience.
(Sorry that my mind jumps again….)
Another issue interests me when talking about the refugees of North Korea being repatriated by China government. I searched the response from China Ministry of Foreign Affairs on the internet and found their response focused on two points—one is that people escaping from North Korea were not identified as refugee (they are in economy problem, not political problems); another is that their behavior of breaking into the embassy has already broken the law. The first response is based on such an assumption that asylum seeker (not officially recognized refugee) with open case should be repatriated, in contrast with the situation in Hong Kong. Ironically China is the country having signed the refugee convention, but Hong Kong has not. I am not here to blame China government and I just believe government is not charity. Even the so-called country with most freedom USA cannot welcome the refugees in Afghanistan and Iraq to their home country. In this case there are two levels of globalization—ideology and bureaucracy. Humanitarianism is commonly shared by most of the countries today, no matter a capitalist county or a communist country. But humanitarianism becomes like a mask and what underlies the mask is the benefit of countries which is of course cannot be shared. So bureaucracy, including low efficiency in judging identity of refugee and finding excuses not recognizing them is developed. Contemporary world is a place mainly consisting of nation-states and it is challenging to hybridize into a culture without solving deep rooted national issue.
2 comments:
It’s a mansion of shabby flats, but home to people who are homeless.
Somalia frequents newspaper headlines, and in this country there is not even a government to issue ID. However, I used to distance myself from such reporting, I didn’t expect one day I would have even the slightest association with people there. However, meeting Mustafa changed my world view. Mustafa is from Somalia, but surprisingly the only one I met that day who was dressed neatly in shirt and pants.
Lisa thought he was in his forties, whereas he is only 22, just over the age of drinking permission. Actually, in Hong Kong you can hardly grasp some hints of a gentleman’s age simply from his shape. Yeh-su, a popular Hong Kong writer, once commented that people living in a metropolis look more sophisticated than they really are. Well, I think what is also true is that extreme hardship will make you overly grown-up, for you can’t do anything about yourself but to struggle for life.
We took on topics about family. “I have two brothers and one sister.” He said with an unusual tenderness. But when I was about to show how much I envy those who have a large family, he added, “But they all died, and my father also died. Only my mother is alive.” …I lost my words but he just smiled. When tears mean nothing, smile perhaps is the last thing he could do in a homeland where death is even more common than birth.
yes,I agree that the visit to Chung King Mansion exposes a world we are not familiar with. Actually I have never given the problem of the stability of a government a second thought before, but the impact of a shaky government causes harm to local residents. At the same time the central powered government is another underlying factor increasing the possibility of refugees fleeing to other countries. Thanks to the convention of UN, a shared value helps them to be in stable situation in short period. But also, being separated from their original social network can be painful.
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