Room for me, you, you, you, and you

I am fascinated by how most Hong Kong families manage to live together in such close proximity in cramped spaces without overly driving each other insane or resorting to gross physical violence. Space is a huge issue in Hong Kong, which is bursting at the seams with a population of almost 7 million squished into 1104 km². Put two and two together and you get an overall population density of more than 6300 people per km². Although the Tourist Board makes one believe that Hong Kong is made up of shopping malls, stockbrokers, and investment banks, in actual fact the highly steep mountainous geography lends itself to only 25% of the land being developed (in mind bogglingly high density), and 40% officially designed as country parks and nature reserves. So the above figure of population density is very misleading: it's probably more along the lines of 25200 people per km² if not more, since most of the population is concentrated in Kowloon and Hong Kong Island. The up side is that Hong Kong is the only mega-metropolis that I have visited that boasts so much accessible greenery, with an uncountable number of unspoilt mountains, bays, beaches, lakes, and rivers. If you've ever wondered why a team of Hong Kong men win the Oxfam Sydney Trailwalker, year in year out, it's because they have far superior training grounds; in fact, the Trailwalker event started in Hong Kong as a training exercise for the British military!

Traditionally, Chinese customs and culture has the family living together in one abode (which would have been an estate of multiple buildings in the past). If you combine such traditions with the lack of space in Hong Kong, you end up with the normality of having extended family, sometimes spanning up to three or four generations in the same home. It is relatively rare, but increasingly popular, to have young people in 'share houses' as is common in the West: children often do not move out until they are married, and young families often take in their elderly parents to look after them. In addition to Chinese traditions, the Confucian principle of filial piety and the ridiculous costs of real estate (rent or buy) lead to family being the default choice for housemates.

Cramped housing is by no means unique to Hong Kong, as most under-developed countries are victim to this. But the image that Hong Kong promotes is one of affluence, abundant material comfort, and capitalist-driven sophistication. In reality, the Kowloon Walled City was only demolished in 1993 (which had a population density of 1923077/km² in its high days); odd dwellings still exist in forms such as the famous Chungking Mansions in Tsim Sha Tsui; whilst about 100 'cage' houses are allegedly hidden amongst the alleys between giant highrises. Such dwellings are tiny apartments subdivided into 'cages', with cages stacked in twos and threes, where each cage only has enough room for one bed. The exact number of 'cage people' varies from 900 to 10000, depending on the source; sadly, 70% of the inhabitants are elderly singles with no family. Hong Kong's continuing housing problems stem from its history since the refugee influx from the civil war, Japanese occupation, and communist takeover in China during the 1930s-50s, where immigrant workers flocked to the territory chasing opportunities in Hong Kong's growing economy, industries, and trade.

Living with at least two generations of the same family is troublesome enough before you throw in the complication of limited space. Hong Kong apartments are tiny, and a steady 50% of the population have been residing in public housing estates over the last 20 years, due to the exorbitant costs of private housing. This trend began after the immigrant squatter fires in Shek Kip Mei in 1953, which left 53000 people homeless overnight. This disaster forced the Hong Kong Government to provide emergency housing in the form of multi-storey utilitarian single-room dwellings for families: each unit was 24-28m² in size, housed 5 people (if not more), with washing and toilet facilities communal to each floor. The Shek Kip Mei housing estate thus set the standard for Hong Kong public housing policy; public housing estates have since spawned all over the territory with the average space per person increasing from 6.2m² in 1988 to 12.2m² in 2007.

The obvious conflicts that ensue from cramped family housing are often depicted and parodied in Hong Kong TV series, which is what intrigues me about such sitcoms (apart from the language practice - I love the colourful slang unique to Cantonese!). Yes, Hong Kong's movie industry is famous for its martial arts and cop flicks, but the TV sitcoms quite accurately reflect the daily goings-on for the local lower to middle-class Chinese: the blatant lack of privacy at home, juggling family relationships, and having to share space within the home as well as at work and in public. In conjunction with reading academic texts, watching sitcoms that my Grandma records from TV is about as close as I'm going to get to understanding Hong Kong culture and everyday family life. It looks like personal space, which is something that I treasure, will have to reconciled with if I'm to pursue my desired stints in South-East or East Asia!