High Tea, Monkeys and other Cultural Activities

Like most cosmopolitan cities, Hong Kong says its has something for everyone. Parisians, Romans, and New Yorkers may not go around saying they wish their city was more like Hong Kong, but the locals here have done an excellent job of providing for cultural institutions during their brief rise in the ranks of international cities. My personal view is that museums form the backbone of any cities claim to cultural prestige by exposing the general public to great work in all its varieties. Hong Kong’s museums were too late to the game to rival the British Museum, Louvre, or even the New York Met, but they have responded by catering to local history, idiosyncratic niches, and education. Let me walk you through a few examples.

One of the best examples of playing to local idiosyncrasies is the Flagstaff House Museum of Teaware. Here’s a question for you: how can a former colony make use of colonial buildings used to generate wealth for the colonizing country, sometimes at the expense of the local populations? Hong Kong’s answer is the Teaware Museum. Housed in the oldest colonial building left in the city (built 1844), the museum “holds regular demonstrations, tea gatherings and lecture programmes to promote ceramic art and Chinese tea drinking culture.” Also of note is the Hong Kong Film Archive, which collects any and all cinematic depictions of Hong Kong, and screens them for the public.

Many elements of local Chinese culture survived the British only to be obliterated by developers and urban expansion, but Hong Kong has selected a number of quality suites to be preserved as historical parks. I visited two former residential areas which have been partially restored and now serve as parks, the Kowloon Walled City and the Sam Tung Uk Museum. The Kowloon Walled City park rescued 31,000 m² of land, which had fallen into tenement status since the Second World War, and used it to rebuild a 15^th century Chinese imperial outpost. The Sam Tung Uk Museum, built in 1786, is one of the oldest walled villages in Hong Kong and was used as a clan residence until 1981, when it was turned into a period museum, depicting the traditional home life and farming practices of the Hakka people.

Hong Kong has made a few forays into the generalist museums, with only middling success. The two examples that do well are the Hong Kong Space Museum and the Hong Kong Science Museum, both of which emphasize educational programs for kids. There is, however, one type of general cultural endeavor which is hard to screw up, and that is a nature preserve. Hong Kong 7m or so inhabitants cram themselves into only 60% of the available land, devoting the other 40% to country parks, which, I might add, is a very convenient arrangement for the thousands of monkeys living in Hong Kong. Last but not least, the Hong Kong government sponsors an annual, month-long Arts Festival, featuring local and international music, dance, theater and opera.

All this amounts to a respectable cultural scene for a city that went from a backwater re-supply station, was conquered by two foreign powers, and overcame the devastating outbreak of a deadly disease in the last 250 years. What's even better about Hong Kong's cultural achievements is that admission to most only costs 10 HKD.