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In 1999, David Howard, a white Washington, D.C., agency director, famously resigned amid the outcry following his use of the word niggardly in reference to a budget matter. For all the moaning about political correctness run amok in the reaction to Howard, who was later rehired, it pretty much took niggardly out of the public lexicon.  Except when quoting sources or in stories referring to the Howard incident, the Washington Post has used niggardly only once since 1999; the term appeared dozens of times from 1990 to 1999. And for all the arguments that it’s a perfectly good word, I’m still waiting for the editor who dares to pen a headline describing one of President Obama’s policies as niggardly.

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Growing Rift Between Hong Kong and Mainland China

Passengers traveling in a subway car in Hong Kong. (Photo: Mike Lee/Flickr)

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It started on the subway. A Hong Kong guy told a Mainland mother, who was letting her kid eat dried noodles, and drop some on the floor, that eating wasn’t allowed on the train. Other Mainland Chinese sitting nearby mocked the Hong Kong guy’s less-than-perfect Mandarin. He retorted that this was Hong Kong — they should be speaking the language here — Cantonese. A verbal feud broke out and police came in.

Eventually, the guy told another Hong Konger who’d come to his defense – “don’t bother. Mainlanders are just like this.”

All this was captured on video, and the video went viral. Some Hong Kongers called the guy a hero. A Peking University professor named Kong Qingdong, hit back on a talk show in Beijing.

“We don’t have the responsibility to speak dialect, but everyone has the responsibility to speak Mandarin,” he said. “Those who think they don’t have to are bastards. Many Hong Kongers think they are not Chinese. Those kinds of people were British running dogs. Now they are just dogs.”

That video went viral too. So did a music video out of Hong Kong, that put new words to the popular Canto-pop song “Under Fuji Mountain” by Eason Chan. It calls Mainlanders locusts, and depicts them as “stealing, cheating, and lying.” “Thanks to Mainland China,” it says, “Hong Kong is deteriorating inch by inch.”

It wasn’t meant to be like this. When Britain handed sovereignty of Hong Kong over to the People’s Republic of China on a soggy June evening in 1997, China’s leaders expected that Hong Kong would return with its heart, as well as its territory. Anxiety at the time ran high, both among Hong Kongers and among international investors.

But fears were soon calmed, when China showed it was mostly serious about its agreement with Britain to maintain “One Country, Two Systems” for at least 50 years. The Hong Kong media remain far freer, Hong Kong courts far more impartial and Hong Kong’s financial world far more transparent than anything found in Mainland China.

Still, Hong Kongers complain that some erosion to civil rights have occurred, and the younger generation has shown itself to be more vocal, even vociferous, in defending Hong Kong rights and identity. Some have even sung the Cantopop locust song at Mainland tourists as they walk by. Mainland tourists have given Hong Kong’s economy a boost, but annoy Hong Kongers with what’s often seen as uncouth and brash behavior.

Mainlanders could point to uncouth behavior by Hong Kongers, too. Quan Xixi, a Mainland graduate student in journalism at the Chinese University of Hong Kong, says a friend of hers was spat on because she was speaking Mandarin on the phone to her mother back in Mainland China.

“My friend just cried, and called me to ask for help,” says Quan Xixi. “This made me very angry. I think there are always some extremist people and – I don’t like their attitude.”

Quan Xixi is young and hip and open to Hong Kong culture. She finds it interesting that there’s a statue of the Goddess of Democracy on her campus – a sculpture made by students to mark the anniversary of the 1989 Tiananmen Square crackdown in Beijing, and says if she’d been young and in China then, she probably would have joined the demonstrators.

“I think students in Hong Kong have a serious enthusiasm about the Tiananmen Square event … Every student in Hong Kong talks about it and is curious about it,” she says. “For them, it’s a signal that Hong Kong has a higher democracy than the Mainland.”

She can accept that, but she says Hong Kongers also look down on Mainland Chinese in other ways.

“In their mind, Chinese people are less cultivated,” she says. “They don’t want to become a part of them. And internationally, Hong Kong has a higher status than Mainland people. So they don’t want to admit they’re Chinese. They just say, ‘I’m a Hong Konger.’”

At the same university, government studies professor Ma Ngok suggests a few reasons Hong Kongers might be feeling this way.

“Some people are worried that the Mainland tourists came and pushed local consumer prices up,” he says. “And for the lower class immigrants, some worried that they took away welfare, and were a burden on Hong Kong society. Of course, the most recent debate is about Mainland women, who come down to give birth in Hong Kong.”

More than 30,000 such women came last year – paying a premium to give birth in Hong Kong, so their babies would have Hong Kong resident status, and could go to better schools and hospitals in Hong Kong, even if their parents still live across the border. Hong Kongers complain this is a drain on resources.

Even Mainland women who have Hong Kong husbands are protesting. A group of them and their supporters recently gathered outside the Hong Kong Chief Executive’s office to deliver a petition. They want to be given priority for hospital beds over Mainlanders with no Hong Kong ties.

“They don’t treat us fairly,” said Yang Li Xiang, 21, who married her Hong Kong husband 11 months ago and is due to give birth in April. “Our husbands are Hong Kong residents who pay taxes. We shouldn’t be treated the same as someone who comes from outside.”

Some Hong Kongers agree, while others say, Hong Kong services should be for current Hong Kong residents only. But there’s more going on than anger over food in the subways, or Mainland women in Hong Kong hospitals. There’s also been a shift in how Hong Kongers feel about being part of China.

“Hong Kong is a free society. We treasure different views,” says Robert Chung, director of the University of Hong Kong’s Public Opinion Program. “And when we see dissidents in China being oppressed and being jailed, of course people are skeptical about it. That has been very clear to us and Chinese officials know that too.”

For 20 years now, Chung has been doing regular surveys of how Hong Kong people see themselves. His most recent survey found that, for the first time, a majority identify as “Hong Konger” rather than Chinese. It also found that trust in the Chinese government has fallen sharply over the past three years, as that government has cracked down on and imprisoned civil rights activists in China.

The survey results have irritated the Chinese government. The response has been – metaphorically – to shoot the messenger. Hong Kong media with ties to China’s Communist Party have called Chung a traitor, and accused him of having ulterior motives.

“That’s not really welcome by me, or by Hong Kong society. Because those are not really civilized ways of discussing a problem,” he says. “I don’t mind discussing with anybody about the motives of our work, the findings of our work, the methodology of our work, but I think it has to be done in a very civilized way. “

But that’s not the way Hong Kong’s Beijing-friendly leftist press operate, says government studies professor Ma Ngok. He says they’ve been known to target individuals in Cultural Revolution-style smear campaigns, hoping to discredit the target, and dissuade others from speaking out.

“The leftist press have always been unhappy with certain figures in Hong Kong, because they think they’re anti-China,” Ma says. “I think they are testing the waters, and if it will work, and if it will silence some critics, they will go on. But if it creates a big outcry, they will silence a little bit for awhile. And then they will pick another time.”

They’ll have another opportunity next month. That’s when Chung plans to run a civil referendum — a kind of shadow election, to see who Hong Kongers would elect as their leader — if they were given that right. They were supposed to have had it five years ago –they’ll have to wait at least another five. But there’s always Chung’s referendum.

“It will be Internet voting, plus of course on-site polling station type of voting,” Chung says. “We think this will be some sort of futuristic technology for civil society participation.”

And it’s happening just days before a Beijing-approved group of delegates elects Hong Kong’s next Chief Executive. There are two candidates. Public opinion polls are already showing the one favored by Beijing, Henry Tang, is polling in the low 20s. If Tang is chosen, when he’s known to be unpopular, it could provoke an outcry from Hong Kongers, and could embarrass Beijing in a year when China faces its own leadership transition. In the midst of all this, Robert Chung says he’s already getting more criticism for his plan to hold the civil referendum.

“I won’t say the Mainland government, because they have not made any statement,” he says. “But the commentators, the radical leftist commentators, they have already branded this activity as unconstitutional, and with separatist motives.”

Chung chuckles. In his sweater and wire-rimmed glasses, he looks pleasant and scholarly – hardly a threat to China’s territorial integrity. And he’s not, he says. He suggests his data could be useful to China’s and Hong Kong’s leaders – to help them better understand, and serve, the people they govern. And that just might help more Hong Kongers be more accepting of their Mainland compatriots – and of their own status as citizens of the People’s Republic of China.

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• I listened to this report. However, I think the interview is still biased. Why do the Western media refuse to interview Hongkongers and ask them about Mainlanders? Why do all the Western media just interview Mainlander in Hong Kong?  Scholars don’t count as ordinary Hongkonger.

  Look at the following Hong Kong news. 1. http://badcanto.wordpress.com/2012/02/05/more-fight-between-hongkonger-and-mainlander-on-hong-kong-mtr/

  2. http://badcanto.wordpress.com/2012/02/03/mainland-old-man-pushed-hong-kong-pregnant-woman-on-the-floor/

•  I agree.. this is biased.. How come you guys do not interview Hong
  Kongers about this issue? Why do you interview those who cause the
  trouble? You don’t make sense…

  They don’t like Hong Kongers attitude? You guys are very biased.. You
  interview only those who insult HKers. You people are ‘American’,
  correct? You know your history better than I. America was once a British
  Colony until the uprising, rebellion, and revolution of the American
  colonists against the British rulers. Do you not understand the fact of
  abuse by the government (Chinese government, and the Chinese populace
  taking advantage of Hong Kong benefits).

  America became more free than Britain. What if Britain was still an
  Empire, and Britain re-took America as a colony and re-enforced the
  Imperial ways on the now-free America? That is exactly the relationship
  between HK and China. The freedom Hong Kong once had is now under fire.
  The Chinese have over-stayed their welcome. America expelled the British
  from America, why do you not understand that Hong Kong is in the same
  position America was once was in 300 years ago.

• Let me also point out that we cannot “admit” to be Chinese, if we are not in the first place. Chinese is both a [national] identity, and an ethnic race. We do not deny being ethnic Chinese, but we have every right to decide our identity. We can be Hong Konger Chinese, Canadian Chinese, American Chinese, British Chinese, Australian Chinese, etc. It is an identity, not a race. There is NOTHING WRONG with rejecting an identity. As human beings, of those who live in a free society, who is separate from China, the identity there is also separate, and thus, we have every right to call ourselves Hong Kongers. If I move to America, does that mean I am rejecting my ethnicity as an ethnic Chinese by saying ‘I am an American’? No. You should damn well know the difference between identity and ethnicity, and stop following the damn Communists in (purposely) mixing up the two terms, making it mean the same thing.

• Agree with above.
  Why is it so hard to accept Hong Kongers calling themselves Hong Kongers?
  A large population of Australians, New Zealanders, Canadians, British and Americans are ethnically Anglo-Saxon, yet we dont call all of them as the same people, we treat them as different people.

  China is bigger than Europe and Europe contains hundreds of different ethnicities, launguages cultures, and physical appearance. Spanish and French are Europeans but not the same people, just like Chinese from the north are different to people from the south. Its just easy to lump all the people as one because they are all located in one country.

  The way i see it is
  Chinese is equivalent to being Europeans (a group of people) That encompasses different groups of people such as Cantonese, Hakka, and Hoklo people the same as Europe encompasses Spanish, French and German people.

•  That is my view as well on China.. China can be compared to the European Union. What the EU wants to achieve (one politic, currency, etc.) has been achieved by China long ago, albeit it being accidental… But I won’t go deep into that as it strays from the topic. But I am glad there is someone else out there who sees it the same way!

• In NPR’s programme  ”On the Road to China” (http://www.npr.org/programs/morning/features/2004/aug/china_road/), Rob Clifford told his listeners that he regretted speaking Mandarin with a Tibetan in an interview.  However, the reporter in this one, obviously speaks Mandarin as she can translate “吐口水” (spat), sympathies with this Mainland Chinese in Hong Kong, who speaks Mandarin most of the time. The double standard in dealing with language imperialism is quite terrible. 

• I left Hong Kong many years ago and I am very sadden by the fact that Mainland China is still treating the citizens of Hong Kong as rebels, dogs and bastards, it may not be on paper/officially but many Hong Kong citizens know it.  Funny how China saw Hong Kong as a place of evil before 1997 BUT then they love our wealth, our stabilities and our economic growth.  Hong Kong became Hong Kong today is solely the responsibilities of the British, even though we were colonists, they treated us fairly, freely and built a world class city out of it, I always wonder what would’ve happened to Hong Kong if China was in charge in the olden days?  I sincerely doubt Hong Kong would’ve been a world class city right now.

  China wanted to save their bloody faces after the opium war and the treaties they signed back in the olden days, then in 1997 China dishonoured the treaties all together.  China took over the entire Hong Kong, not just North of Boundary Street, the New Territories and the outlying islands because they didn’t think the treaties were fair.  What?  You lost a bloody battle, you made a mistake, wheather you liked it or not, live with it.  We all made mistakes, we all regret our mistakes but learn from it and then move on.  China cannot save their faces now after what they did during the opium war, it became part of history so swallow your pride and move on, grow up!

  Hong Kong citizens have been given good educations by the British, we were taught common sense and polite manners and we obey the laws.  We earned our respect from the rest of the world by being polite, well mannered and nicely educated.  We have the right to be mad at Mainlanders if they don’t obey the laws or when they disrespect our city, our way of life and poor manners.  Please DO NOT spit on our streets, go back to Mainland if you are so desire to spit.  Please DO NOT eat at our MTR areas, signs say NO EATING so please respect our laws or GO HOME.  If we are such Colonial dogs and bastards, why on earth are Mainlanders rushing South and have babies in our city?  Crap, your offsprings may become dogs and bastards too, so stay far away from us dogs and bastards, leave us peacefully.  Cantonese is our dialect, it is our home and we speak our home language, we don’t force Mainlanders to speak it but then why should we have to change and speak Mandarin?  Hong Kong is a free city, we enjoy our freedom, we wish to be left alone and mind our own business, our own laws, our own lifestyle, our own language, our polite manners, etc.  Respect is something that you earn, not something you can buy from one of our shopping malls.  If you respect our ways of life, I’m sure we will look at Mainlanders a little different when that time comes.  Until that time, remember this: It works both ways, not the Mainland’s way, ever!

• This is MaryKay, the reporter who did the story.  Thanks for all your comments.  It’s good to hear that so many Hong Kongers are listening to “The World.”  

  If you listen again to this piece, or look at the print version, you’ll see that Hong Kong views are represented multiple times — by the video on the subway, by the ‘locust’ song and video, by Ma Ngok, who offers a more nuanced yet pointed Hong Konger’s view, and Robert Chung, who has been rather viciously targeted by pro-Communist Party press.  In terms of Mainland voices, there was one Mainland Chinese student who studies in Hong Kong, a Mainland woman married to a Hong Kong man, and a Peking University professor whose slurs against Hong Kongers made him, rather than Hong Kongers, look bad.  That’s a fairly balanced roster of voices, in a piece of this length.

  The general focus of the story was on ways that Hong Kong people feel their rights, identity and way of life are getting squeezed, with the flow of Mainlanders into Hong Kong being yet another irritation, rather than the only issue at play.  That point was made fairly strongly by the subway video and locust song, and to put it mildly, Peking University professor Kong Qingdong did not come across well in calling Hong Kongers “dogs.”   The Mainland student, who speaks some Cantonese and generally likes Hong Kong, still felt some of the recent anti-Mainland rhetoric and occasional actions were themselves  uncivilized and unfair.  

  I must disagree that academics “don’t count.”  Robert Chung is not sitting in an ivory tower, looking down from a safe perch.  He has, repeatedly over the years, been verbally attacked by supporters of both the Beijing and Hong Kong governments (Tung’s, specifically) for the surveys he’s done over two decades on Hong Kong identity.  That in an of itself is an important part of the story.  So is the fact that Hong Kong academics, themselves, sometimes come under pressure from Beijing to be less critical — one of the ways in which free speech could be eroded.I did, in fact, also talk with ordinary Hong Kong people for this piece.  Some shared the irritations expressed in the subway video, some were less irate, but still concerned about certain aspects of the China-Hong Kong relationship.  Because of time constraints (in a radio piece) or space (in a print piece), not everyone interviewed can be quoted by name in the final piece — but each interview informs the reporter’s view, as did my interviews with Hong Kongers, and my previous experience in and knowledge of Hong Kong. I lived in Hong Kong in the mid-90s, covered the Hong Kong handover, and was present at  the huge 2003 and 2004 protests.  I remember interviewing Hong Kongers in 1995-96, when few ordinary people on the street wanted to talk politics to a foreign journalist, or seemed much interested in politics at all.  Obviously, that has changed as a newer and more vocal generation has come of age under “One Country, Two Systems,” with the feeling that Hong Kong has a separate identity and way of life that is worth fighting for.  Still, like it or not, Hong Kong is now part of China — and in 35 years, could become a more closely integrated part of China.  The frustrations expressed lately suggest that China’s leaders — and Hong Kong’s — need to think more carefully about how to preserve and protect Hong Kong’s unique character, its civil society and rule of law — all of which help make it the respected international business center it is today — while also thinking about how integrated Hong Kong is going to be with the rest of China in the future.  Several of the comments here suggest a desire that further integration not happen.  That’s going to be a challenge, for Hong Kong and China to work out.

The Sunbeam Theatre has been synonymous with the operatic heritage of China’s southern Cantonese-speaking minority since it opened in 1972.

The 1,000-seat venue has earned landmark status on Hong Kong’s art scene, standing in stoic defiance of the former British colony’s transformation into a flashy, ultra-modern hub of finance and banking.

But after years of fending off Hong Kong’s all-powerful property developers, it will see the curtain come down for the last time on Sunday when the Sunbeam stages its final, sell-out performance.

Opera star and playwright Yuen Siu-fai, 66, says the Sunbeam’s fate typifies the loss of Hong Kong’s cultural heritage to the pursuit of profit.

“This is a huge blow for Cantonese opera,” he says. “We are losing a cultural landmark, we are losing our main theatre. Where do we go? This is another great example of how we don’t preserve our historical buildings.”

Other all-purpose venues around Hong Kong will continue to stage traditional opera performances, but none has dedicated itself exclusively to the art as the Sunbeam has done over four decades.

Businessman Francis Law bought the 80,000-square-foot (7,432-square-metre) theatre in 2003 through his real estate and investment firm Toyo Mall, with reported plans to replace it with a shopping mall.

The Sunbeam escaped the bulldozers initially, but it has been fighting soaring rental prices ever since and was nearly shut down twice.

When its last lease expired in 2009 — the year Cantonese or Yueju opera was recognised as part of the “intangible cultural heritage of humanity” by UN cultural agency UNESCO — the landlords reportedly more than doubled the rent.

The government stepped in to help achieve more favourable terms for the opera house, but the landlords still demanded almost HK$700,000 ($90,256) a month, or more than twice the previous rate, according to local media.

Toyo Mall spokeswoman Rosanna Liu says Law had yet to decide what to do with the site, dismissing media reports that it will become a shopping centre.

She says Sunbeam’s managers had cancelled the lease “even though we were not planning to raise their rent”.

The theatre’s management turned down requests for an interview, saying only that the closure was a “pure commercial decision.”

————————————————————-

Lawmaker Jennifer Chow, the local district councillor who had launched a campaign to save the theatre, says Sunbeam has been losing money. “They decided to discontinue the tenancy,” she says.
Whatever the reason for the closure, opera lovers are in no doubt that property developers are to blame.

“New York and London are known for their sky-high rentals too, but look at them, how many theatres do they have?” asks Yuen, who has played in some of the Sunbeam’s final shows and started his opera career at the age of seven.

“The heritage and historical values of a property should not be killed by its commercial value.”

Tickets for the Sunbeam’s closing performances have been sold out for weeks, testifying to the enduring popularity of traditional opera in a city usually associated with Canto pop music and the kung fu movies of Bruce Lee.

Sunbeam’s final show is the story of Justice Bao, a tale of an honest official’s struggle for justice and integrity.

Other than its southern dialect, Cantonese opera differs from mainland operatic traditions in its use of percussion instruments like gongs and cymbals. Actors wear elaborate costumes and make-up, and must be adept at elaborately choreographed martial arts as well as singing.

Wedged below residential apartments in an eastern neighbourhood, the Sunbeam has an elderly tribe of loyal fans who have regularly packed out performances. A huge red “sold out” sign often sits outside the lobby.

“It’s very sad we’re losing this landmark theatre in Hong Kong,” says 65-year-old housewife Leung Lai-ming outside the theatre before a show.

“But what can we do if the rents are just too high and beyond affordable levels?” she asks after posing for photos with friends in front a poster of white-and-pink-faced opera stars.

The government, stung by criticism that it has failed to do enough to nurture local art, is backing a massive new cultural complex which will include an opera house of 1,100 seats.

But that theatre is not scheduled to be completed until 2016, meaning fans like Leung will have to wait at least four years before they can see the heroes and heroines of the Cantonese stage perform in a new home.

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