The story of our university is being told by our trees.
A small tree, next to the foot bridge leading to Tsim Sha Tsui East, was completely browned by the conflagration, perhaps the effect of teargas and fires. Now the half facing away from the most intense abuse is lushly green again. This is no doubt a reflection of our will to not just survive but also to prosper.
The bougainvillea overlooking the carriageway is blooming in a heroic red. The carriage way was once blocked by several low brick walls, littered with broken bricks, with bricks lined up on the ledges overlooking the carriageway, ready for battle. Now it is all cleaned up. The bougainvillea seems to be telling us to forget the past.
The big one, in the middle of the central square, in front of the main building as well as the library, was completely bare after the conflagration. Many were mourning its demise. It is now coming back to life in a hurry, seemingly assuring us of its resilience. And by extension, that of the university.
Even the azaleas are beginning to bloom.
We are being hit by a double whammy - the siege is being followed by the Wuhan virus. The campus is eerily quiet because face to face classes are suspended. But the trees are telling us that we will be back.
China is scared. Hong Kong is scared.Much of the world are also scared.We are continuously hooked to the social media, TV, radio, for updates.We scramble to procure masks, alcohol gels, …We stock up vegetables, noodles, … We find ways to work at home. We cancel or rearrange travel.
We pray for the virus to not to spread to our city, at least not to our neighbourhood. We cast evil eyes on people who do not wear masks. We want to keep anyone coming from the Mainland, at least not anyone coming from Wuhan or have been to Wuhan, away from our city, at least away from our neighbourhood. We want to buy up all the masks that we can find, or least enough to last for half a year. We may feel sorry for those who thus cannot buy any, or we might not. We might use the threat to score political points. We might start rumours for some selfish purpose. We might even collect used masks and resell them for a tidy profit. It is all part of human nature, to look after ourselves, even to be selfish.
On the other hand, we can pray for ourselves, our city, China, and the world. We can share our spare masks with those who could not get one for some reason. Those of us who have the relevant expertise can offer help to those in need, while doing what we can to protest ourselves. We can put down our political or other differences and work together for the common good. We can offer comfort to those who are worried. We can help to dispel rumours. We can fellowship with each other, strengthen each other, and join together to do something good. We can choose to be positive rather than negative. It is also part of human nature, to be magnanimous, altruistic.
It is up to us. It is easy to be good and magnanimous when we are healthy, rich, successful and enjoying good fortune. It is when we are faced with challenges, threats, and worse, when we know what kind of person we really are, and what we really want to be. With God’s help, we can all be brave and self-sacrificing, living on hope built on firm foundations, rather than living only for the fleeting moment. It is up to us to choose.
One day my wife spotted several excavator machines attacking a small house on the roof top of a multi-storey storehouse in front of our window. The small house was probably part of the elevators system, housing the machines that operated the elevator cars. Thus tarted the demolition of the storehouse to make way for a new hotel.
Another small house at a corner on the roof top was soon also attacked.
Some of the excavators are equipped with a digging bucket at the end of the long arm. Some are equipped with a sort of hammer, to break up the concrete.
Soon they started digging holes in the roof top, exposing the next floor down, which was essentially the top floor in the warehouse.
As the walls were knocked down and the concrete were broken up, metal rods, window frames, etc. were savaged and tied up.
The piles of concrete were thrown down the elevator chutes.
The rubbles were piled up to form a ramp, to enable the excavators to move down to the lower floor.
The excavators on the lower floor then turned around and attacked the floor where they came from.
Within a few days, the roof top was completely gone.
The top layer of bamboo scaffolding and free protective nets were also removed at the same time. At one point, the long arm of a crane reached from the ground to the roof. It seemed to be helping to remove the scaffolding and the net. Perhaps the structure was too unstable to send worked up the bamboo scaffolding to dismantle it?
It seems to take several days, up to one week, to demolish one floor.
At this rate, it may take several months to completely demolish the whole warehouse.
My wife and I find it quite fascinating. We are receiving a good education for free. This is the first time that we can watch a building being demolished, without explosives, with front row seats, in the comfort of our own apartment. From this perspective, this is great entertainment.
We love our home. We are praying that the new hotel will not be too high. It is probably a lost cause.
This afternoon I ran into a female colleague on campus. As we started walking in opposite directions after exchanging pleasantries, I became aware of a sweet scent. Was it a fragrance that she was wearing? Then I realised that it was the scent of the sweet osmanthus 桂花.
I looked around. Lo and behold, the sweet osmanthus is blooming again. Just in time for our return to campus. It is as if they know se are coming back, and are timing their bloom to welcome us with their fragrance.
Our return has started but but yet completed. Some of us plunged ahead as soon as we were allowed. But some are still worried about the possible pollutants - on the walls and desks, in the air, in the water, … Now the osmanthus seems to want to assure us that things are back to normal.
How are we going to tell the story? That the campus was attacked and damaged? That operations were interrupted? That even our survival was called into question?
And now - that the whole community, even the osmanthus, is pulling together to repair, rebuild, and renew? What has happened has happened and cannot be changed. The future, however, is up to us.
My service-learning adventure brought me to Cambodia, where I came into close contact with palm trees. I was surprised that there are so many different types of palm trees: coconut palms, date palms, sugar palms, betel palms, …
When I look at the actual palm trees and the fallen branches close up, I was also surprised at how big they are. A single leave can be more than 10 feet long. Usually the dried leaves are burnt, or just thrown away.
In the mean time, we were making lights for the villages using bare LEDs, powered by the electricity generated by solar panels. The bare LEDs were functional but ugly. So our team came up with the idea of embedding LEDs into the dead palm leaves shaped into desk lamps. Up-cycling in action! We later taught our students, as well as students in Cambodia, how to make these lamps. Sustainability incorporated into service-learning. We are told this is partly how we convinced our partner university in Cambodia to work with us. And we have been collaborating closer and closer ever since.
The dead palm leaves is a kind of very soft wood. It is not very strong but easy to work with. I have since created a variety of objects with them. One of which is this “Skinny Dinosaur”.
The body is a 4.5 feet long woody stem of a palm leaf.
The leg and feet is another piece of the woody stem, closer to the trunk of the palm tree.
I cut a long hole into the body, a key is inserted and turned 90 degrees to lock the leg and feet to the body.
The result is a very skinny dinosaur that can balance, gingerly, on its feet, with the help of a small piece of the woody stem hidden under the feet.
It is now a hobby of mine to create things using palm leaves - one of the many things which came about because of service-learning.
In the early morning of Monday, November 18, 2019, I had a scary encounter with the Hong Kong Police. It was at the height of the Siege of PolyU. Hundreds of people had been arrested already, with hundreds (some of them were believed to be our students) still inside campus.
A colleagues called me from a small park at the corner of Winslow Street and Chatham Road, around 1 AM. The park was only about 100 meters from the rear entrance to PolyU at the back of Block Y. She told me that a Catholic bishop and a number of legislators had gathered there, trying to negotiate with the police to assist the students on campus.
I didn’t think I could be of any help. But decided to get down there anyway, to offer my support. I put on a white long-sleeved shirt, long pants, and dress shoes, in the way I normally go to work. When I stepped onto an elevated walkway, about 4 blocks (~300 meters) away from the park, I saw that the walkway was practically empty. Except for ~5 riot police in front of me in the direction of the park. Actually, all I could tell was that they dressed like riot police - in reality I could not confirm that they were actually police officers.
As soon as they saw me, they rushed towards me, menacingly. I instinctively raised my arms above my head, to show that I was unarmed. They demanded, in a very loud and threatening way, to know why I was on the street. I froze, then told them I am a staff of the university and was just trying to find out the situation of the students. At least one of them screamed: “What students?” “There are no students there. Just rioters.” “If you are with them, you will be arrested too.” “Go away!” I had wanted to reason with them. But I have to admit that, at that point, I was quite a bit scared - by their threatening speech, menacing posture, and waving of weapons.
I started to back up, with my arms still in the air. I was truly worried that they might beat me up. I have seen too many people being beaten up by the police recently, even right in front of numerous reporters and cameras. At that middle of he the night on the walkway, there were no witnesses. One of them screamed: “Turn around and go away.” I did.
In a few minutes, I was back inside my apartment complex. At that point I realised I was shaking all over. I had not been so scared for quite a while. I was a bit ashamed that I did not reasoned more strongly with the police. As a citizen, I have the right to be on the street. They have no right to stop me going where I wanted. I shudder to think what could have happened to me had I tried to take a photograph of them.
I can understand better now, in a more personal way, why there is such depth of hatred against the police.
At the New Year’s Day Protest March today, my wife and I stumbled upon something very puzzling. Around 3:45 PM, we were marching on Hennessy Road in Wanchai towards Central, passing in front of the CLI Building, just before the junction with Tonnochy Road.We were in the middle of the crowd when we heard several very loud Bangs coming from the direction of the CLI Building. At first, we didn’t quite know what was going on.
Pushing through the crowd, we could see some big glass windows were broken. The noise was most likely coming from someone breaking the glass. Several people dressed completely in black were running away. One was running towards Causeway Bay, but several others were running towards Central, then around the corner and northward along Tonnochy Road towards Lockhart Road and the water front. Many marchers were chasing the black-clads. Shouting after them: “Are you undercover police?”
I decided to follow the bigger group that ran northwards on Tonnochy Road. We were flabbergasted when we found more than 10 police officers in riot gear standing on Lockhart Road, no more than 50 meters from the scene of the broken windows.
By this time, the black-clad vandals were nowhere to be seen. Seeing that there did not seem to be immediate danger, we decided to walk towards and then past the riot police, to see better what was going on.
Amazingly, we found most of the police actually moving away from the crime scene, further north towards the footbridge on Jaffe Road. By then, there was a big commotion at Hennessy and Tonoochy. People were talking, shouting, pointing, gesturing, … Instead of moving in to investigate, the police were actually retreating from the crime scene, as if it is not their concern.
On the other hand, we have to wonder. If you were the vandals, you must have planned your actions in advance. Why would you flee TOWARDS the police? Do you know IN ADVANCE that the police would not give chase? That is incredible.
Of course, one possibility is that those vandals are actually undercover police. That was what many of the marchers were saying. They were very angry at the vandals, who put the peaceful march at risk, who put every marcher at risk. Many were convinced that they were police provocateurs who were vandalising businesses to give the police an excuse to suppress the peaceful marches.
This case that we witnessed with our own eyes is very puzzling.
But one thing is very clear. The depth of the hatred towards the police is unmistakable. There were so much insults, curses, middle fingers, …, directed towards the police all along the march whenever police officers are in sight, and often even when no police are in sight. It is not just a few people who did it. But hundreds upon hundreds, perhaps much more. This depth and breadth of ill feeling was certainly not there before June 2019. The case with the vandals that we witnessed today is part of the reason why such hatred is there.
It is very troubling. If the police and the government continue to try to explain it away simply as the result of fake news, they do not deserve the trust that they are asking for. At the least, they are not competent. Worse, they are neither honest nor honourable.
