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Quote by Chris Patten

“[Hong Kong] was indeed (in the words of the Chinese journalist Tsang Ki-fan) the only Chinese society that, for a brief span of 100 years, lived through an ideal never realized at any time in the history of Chinese society — a time when no man had to live in fear of the midnight knock on the door.”

Book:EAST AND WEST

Work

EAST AND WEST

This book delves into the complexities of cultural differences and geographical divides through a series of short stories, offering readers a nuanced understanding of the East and West from various perspectives. more

Author

Chris Patten

Chris Patten, born on May 12, 1944, is a British politician who served as the Governor of Hong Kong. He held the position of Chief Secretary for Administration from 1985 to 1989 and Governor of Hong Kong from 1989 to 1992. During his tenure, he advocated for the democratization of Hong Kong and worked to maintain its prosperity and stability. After Hong Kong's return to China, Patten continued to be active in international affairs, serving in various roles. more

“British colonial disdain for human rights even left its mark on the English language. The word “coolie” was borrowed from a Chinese word that literally means “bitter labor.” The Romanized first syllable coo means “bitter” and the second syllable lie mimics the pronunciation of the Chinese logograph that means “labor.” This Chinese word sprang into existence shortly after the Opium War in the nineteenth century when Britain annexed several territories along the eastern seaboard of China. Those territories included Hong Kong, parts of Shanghai, Canton city (Guangzhou) and parts of Tianjin, a seaport near Beijing. In those newly acquired territories, the British employed a vast number of manual laborers who served as beasts of burden on the waterfront in factories and at train stations. The coolies’ compensation was opium, not money. The British agency and officers that conceived this unusual scheme of compensation—opium for back-breaking hard labor—were as pernicious and ruthless as they were clever and calculating. Opium is a palliative drug. An addict becomes docile and inured to pain. He has no appetite and only craves the next fix. In the British colonies and concessions, the colonizers, by paying opium to the laborers for their long hours of inhumane, harsh labor, created a situation in which the Chinese laborers toiled obediently and never complained about the excessive workload or the physical devastation. Most important of all, the practice cost the employers next to nothing to feed and house the laborers, since opium suppressed the appetite of the addicts and made them oblivious to pain and discomfort. What could be better or more expedient for the British colonialists whose goal was to make a quick fortune? They had invented the most efficient and effective way to accumulate capital at a negligible cost in a colony. The only consequence was the loss of lives among the colonial subjects—an irrelevant issue to the colonialists. In addition to the advantages of this colonial practice, the British paid a pittance for the opium. In those days, opium was mostly produced in another British colony, Burma, not far from China. The exploitation of farmhands in one colony lubricated the wheels of commerce in another colony. On average, a coolie survived only a few months of the grim regime of harsh labor and opium addiction. Towards the end, as his body began to break down from malnutrition and overexertion, he was prone to cardiac arrest and sudden death. If, before his death, a coolie stumbled and hurt his back or broke a limb, he became unemployed. The employer simply recruited a replacement. The death of coolies in Canton, Hong Kong, Shanghai and other coastal cities where the British had established their extraterritorial jurisdiction during the late 19th century was so common that the Chinese accepted the phenomenon as a routine matter of semi-colonial life. Neither injury nor death of a coolie triggered any compensation to his family. The impoverished Chinese accepted injury and sudden death as part of the occupational hazard of a coolie, the “bitter labor.” “Bitter” because the labor and the opium sucked the life out of a laborer in a short span of time. Once, a 19th-century British colonial officer, commenting on the sudden death syndrome among the coolies, remarked casually in his Queen’s English, “Yes, it is unfortunate, but the coolies are Chinese, and by God, there are so many of them.” Today, the word “coolie” remains in the English language, designating an over-exploited or abused unskilled laborer.”

Racism China Britain Colonialism Exploitation Asia British Empire Hong Kong British History Chinese History

Book:The Turbulent Sea: Passage to a New World

Source: The Turbulent Sea: Passage to a New World

“Somewhere to the south of your tiny refuge, Hong Kong is currently surrendering to Japan this very afternoon. The history textbooks will refer to this day as Black Christmas. Soon, troops will move in to establish martial law and subjugate the population. Soon, thousands of men will die in prisons and POW camps, while thousands of women will face rape and sexual slavery. Thousands more will starve because there is no food coming into the ports, while many will die screaming from torture. I cannot help most of them, and my heart bleeds for this. The darkest hours of your city are here, and they will last for three years, eight months. The legacy of pain they leave behind will last even longer. It is everything your parents feared would happen, and more.”

Hong Kong Ww2 History Asian Fantasy

Book:The Girl with a Thousand Faces

Source: The Girl with a Thousand Faces

“A Harley Davidson fanatic,he owned two of them he told me proudly”

Hong Kong Meth Eating Smoke Triad Psychosis

Author:Chris Thrall

“Give Hong Kong to an Artist. He can use it. It can be poetised.”