5pm Sept 29th How The Wanchai Police HQ Standoff Began #OccupyCentral

September 30, 2014

This was about 5pm, earlier today. Near one of the ol' stalwarts: "American Restaurant" in Wanchai, on the onramp to Gloucester Rd., opposite the Hong Kong Police Headquarters a brand new standoff occurred.

Right now, at 1:40am tonight it is turning out to be one of the most tense standoffs between the protestors and the police. The fact that it is happening meters away from the very symbol and main organ of the HK Police, their Arsenal Street complex, in addition to their ingress and egress point for all manner of HK Island-based vehicles and personnel makes it obviously a transit point the HK Police cannot cede.

I was there this afternoon to capture the moments when protestors took the skybridge leading down to the standoff line, shooing away a whole column of passenger vehicles. Here are the photos:

4pm Sept 29th #OccupyCentral Causeway Bay SOGO

September 30, 2014

Scenes from earlier this afternoon Sept 29th #OccupyHK @ Causeway Bay

What, Me Worry? I'M NOT A COP!

September 29, 2014

12:30am Sept 29 #OccupyCentral Causeway Bay SOGO

September 29, 2014

The SOGO protest

5pm Sept 28th 2014 @ #OccupyCentral #OccupyAdmiralty

September 28, 2014

One of the side crowds, West of the main protest area

These were the everyday police units. No real special gear here. None was apparent at 5pm.

Then there was this massing of people, and at approx. 5:30pm the crowd was still steadily growing. There were plenty of people to the North, on the sidelines too (this view is looking East)

Designer Fans? The Piaget Ad got a lot of play too :)

Rebuttal to Eric Liu's 8/29 Piece in WSJ

August 31, 2014

I was browsing the WSJ, on its very capable iOS app, and came across the headline: “Why I Can’t Just Become Chinese” by Eric Liu. A headline like that jumps out at you, especially if you are writing an upcoming book on Chinese and Western culture as I am. So, naturally I clicked on it.

I didn’t know what to expect, really, but I think Mr. Liu gets it wrong. I think he gets both China and the U.S. wrong.

This gentleman was utterly unfazed by the Red Rainstorm Warning

Causeway Bay 19:30 August 12 2014: RAIN

August 12, 2014

A quick update on the weather in Hong Kong: it is wet, wet, wet.

Floating City

July 31, 2014

Bo is referred to as 番仔, meaning "foreign kid." "番" is the character that precedes Potato 番薯 and Tomato 番茄, making new nouns out of "Foreign Tuber" and Foreign Eggplant," to describe the curious produce that the Portuguese had originally introduced to China via Macau a few centuries ago. Bo, it turns out, is half-Chinese. A mild spoiler: Bo discovers late in the movie his mother (played by Josie Ho) was raped by a British Seaman (pun not intended). That biological mother tearfully gives him up for adoption. A family of fisherman, who ply the waters of the South China Sea, living and fishing on/off their vessel adopt Bo and do their best to give him whatever attention and care is possible, amidst some rather hardscrabble circumstances.

Lei Yue Mun

June 9, 2014