Kowloon Walled City

http://projects.wsj.com/kwc

by relham • 12 years ago

186 56 12 years ago

projects.wsj.com

resu2• 12 years ago

You can get an idea of what it might have been like, although at a much more modern, safe, and smaller scale by exploring the Chungking Mansions in Kowloon: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chungking_Mansions

olalonde• 12 years ago

Words you are almost guaranteed to hear walking past Chungking Mansions: Rolex, hashish, tailor :)

chandraonline• 12 years ago

This is the first place I stayed in Tsim Tsa Tsui in the late 90s. The diversity of people that lived and visited this place is unbelievable.

KMag• 12 years ago

For anyone visiting, that's a misspelling of Tsim Sha Tsui, (usually just called TST in English) on the southern part of the Kowloon peninsula.

ANTSANTS• 12 years ago

Thanks for reminding me that I never got around to watching Chungking Express: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chungking_Express

aneisf• 12 years ago

The first half of the movie gives a really great image of the Chungking atmosphere, so definitely check it out. I highly recommend it on its own narrative strengths too of course.

resu2• 12 years ago

Loved the movie, you should definitely watch it!

I first visited in 2010 and it was nowhere as gritty as seen in the movie, but also much safer I guess!

cromwellian• 12 years ago

Jean Claude Van Damme's Bloodsport immediately leaps to mind when this is mentioned.

acdanger• 12 years ago

A successfully backed Kickstarter project for a 2nd edition of the book City of Darkness, which features really great documentary photographs of Kowloon Walled City:

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1060791749/city-of-dark...

morsch• 12 years ago

Wow. I bought the book on the used market after reading about it -- I think here on HN, in fact. Probably the most expensive book I've bought so far!

They're selling prints on their website, and I'd love to get one, but they're charging 200 (two oh oh) GBP for a medium sized print which is preposterous, or in any event way out of my comfort zone. Too bad.

PS: If you enjoy City of Darkness, you may enjoy the film Dark Days (different subject, similar theme). Much like Kowloon Walled City, I've never seen anything else quite like it: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dark_Days_%28film%29

coherentpony• 12 years ago

Jesus Christ. I tried loading this in Firefox 28 and it just shit a brick.

Anybody else have this problem?

ersii• 12 years ago

I'm using Firefox 28.0 on Ubuntu, I'm not having any sort of trouble loading the page and browsing around, viewing videos and what not.

DonGateley• 12 years ago

Yeah, after a moving wait bar it just comes up grey.

stefantalpalaru• 12 years ago

I had to disable privoxy (ad filtering) to get it working.

incision• 12 years ago

I've been fascinated by KWC since the first time I saw Bloodsport. I dug the depictions [1] in Gibson's bridge trilogy too.

There's something that draws me to that kind of organic human architecture whether it's Kowloon, Brazil's favelas [2], Torre David in Venezuela [3] or Ponte Tower [4] in Johannesburg.

1: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Idoru

2: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Favela

3: http://www.theguardian.com/cities/gallery/2014/feb/12/la-tor...

4: http://vimeo.com/51295174

state• 12 years ago

I imagine you would also appreciate the work of Lebbeus Woods.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lebbeus_Woods

oofabz• 12 years ago

You can see some of his artwork here:

http://historyofourworld.wordpress.com/2009/11/18/lebbeus-wo...

http://architizer.com/blog/lebbeus-woods-sfmoma/

psgbg3• 12 years ago

Also Villa 31. http://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Villa_31

Villa is the equivalent of Favela. The villa 31 is the most prominent example in Argentina.

Spearchucker• 12 years ago

My friend's older brother had a flat (an apartment) in Ponte in the mid-80's. A lot of students from Wits Tek hung out there, which (to a wide-eyed teenager like me) made for parties more incredible than I could've imagined. At the time that flat seemed to epitomise the whole gothic rock thing I was into at the time. Fond memories.

hxrts• 12 years ago

Here's the full architectural rendering from the book they mention – they seem to have adapted part of it for their splash page. You can definitely sink quite a bit of time looking at what's going on in each room.

http://www.deconcrete.org/wp-content/uploads/2010/03/Kowloon...

rainboiboi• 12 years ago

The kowloon Walled City is a park right now, drop by if you have chance to visit Hong Kong. The rich description and historical display there is simply awesome. And don't forget to check out the delicious dim sum stall nearby. ;)

michaelx• 12 years ago

I‘m also fascinated by Kowloon Walled City since the first time I saw it in the Dreamcast game Shenmue 2.

One of the best documentaries IMHO is the following 4 part series from 1989 which shows the everyday life in KWC: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lby9P3ms11w

I also recommend the already mentioned book City of Darkness and movie Chungking Express. Additional Jackie Pullinger‘s books "Crack In The Wall: Life & Death in Kowloon Walled City" (http://amzn.to/1nNKkuq) and "Chasing the Dragon" (http://amzn.to/1kd9zWc) are worth a read.

psgbg3• 12 years ago

No Shenmue? What a shame

Here a Postmortem on Shenmue I & II and some brief explanation of the generation of the Kowloon scenario.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=4J...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shenmue_II

platz• 12 years ago

Shenmue was great, one of the few mind-expanding video games, at least for a westerner

psgbg3• 12 years ago

My point was... if in the info-graph they featured Call of Duty, it would be awesome if they also included a good game.

ddw• 12 years ago

There's an episode of 99% Invisible about it: http://99percentinvisible.org/episode/episode-66-kowloon-wal...

cdelahousse• 12 years ago

99% PI is what introduced Kowloon. The show did an amazing job of conveying just how special that place was. It is an great pod cast that captures the majesty of day to day design and architecture.

It is unfortunate that the images don't work on the episode page.

Renaud4• 12 years ago

I arrived in Hong Kong in 1996, too late to see the KWC but I would certainly have taken the risk to experience it had it still be there.

Hong Kong is still filled with weird little wonders that you can only uncover by chance if you take the time to look around and explore. My favourite pastime is to lose myself in the city, taking every little back-alley, climbing stairs, slopes, paths, trails that I can find.

I'm always reminded though that these little hidden treasures have a tendency to disappear fast here, without a trace. Conservation of heritage is unfortunately not a big thing in Hong Kong, although it has gotten a little better.

rsync2• 12 years ago

As someone who has always been deeply pleased by the Minneapolis skyway system, I was very happy to find the "Central Mid Levels Escalator":

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Central%E2%80%93Mid-Levels_esca...

Renaud4• 12 years ago

Yes, that re-shaped the area by making it easy to travel along that steep slope. There are lots of elevated foot paths as well in Hong Kong, interconnecting buildings with each-others, usually going from shopping mall to shopping mall in a dizzy labyrinth of walkways and escalators.

In Hong Kong, pragmatism tends to win over other considerations. Making things convenient is a build-in feature of the culture.

steveklabnik2• 12 years ago

I know next to nothing about Hong Kong, but I would have safety concerns while doing this. Is that just not an issue?

ddeck• 12 years ago

If you mean with respect to crime, then no. Hong Kong has one of the world's lowest crime rates and what violent crime does exist, is typically targeted (e.g. organized crime, domestic disputes).

For example, the intentional homicide rate is 0.2 per 100,000 people, vs 4.8 in the US. [1]

I have lived here for many years, and I can't think of any area that i would feel uncomfortable going at any hour of the day or night.

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_intentiona...

Renaud4• 12 years ago

I feel so safe in Hong Kong that, by comparison, I feel unsafe almost everywhere else.

Even though local people bemoan the rise of petty crime and violence compared to the old days, it's still not an issue and I feel safe going anywhere, at any time of the day or night. There is no street violence, no street gangs (although there is organised crime of which the Triads are the most famous of course), not even much graffiti (there is a bit of it, but it's mostly artistic/social expression from underground artists rather than used for turf wars).

Actually I have not even ever seen anyone jump over a turnstile to avoid paying a fare.

caycep• 12 years ago

There's still Chungking Mansions...until it gets bulldozed for a luxury hotel...

pathy• 12 years ago

I stayed there when I was in Hong Kong a few years back. Interesting place. I have a video of the back alley entrance to our hostel somewhere...

A weird place.

dkasper• 12 years ago

This was another good article about KWC I saw recently http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2139914/A-rare-insig...

the_cat_kittles• 12 years ago

I don't know why, but I think that people that are fascinated by Kowloon and the like would really enjoy the movie Samsara. Really, I think everyone one earth would enjoy it.

frozenport• 12 years ago

I felt the locations were too exotic.

"Some of the connections made are too obvious, like following images of ammunition with a portrait of a severely wounded veteran, while others are completely elusive. Shots of the devastation Katrina left behind in New Orleans are beautifully spooky, but does it say anything useful to follow that with images of Versailles? The makers of 'Samsara' want to free our minds, but their technique makes us their prisoners more often than not." ~ Kenneth Turan

SeanLuke4• 12 years ago

When I was 20 years old, I worked in the Kowloon Walled City at its height. I've recently been back to Hong Kong to see it now replaced by a park and an excavated, restored garrison (they did a great job). In the original KWC, the garrison courtyard -- I had thought it might be a temple -- was never built on, making a small "hole" in the middle of the city. I remember the original garrison walls. Now they're all that's left! It's a very strange experience going back.

I know this isn't reddit, but AMA.

Renaud4• 12 years ago

Lucky you!

What kind of work were you doing there?

SeanLuke4• 12 years ago

From 19-21 (the standard age) I was a cantonese-speaking Mormon missionary in Hong Kong.

rbobby• 12 years ago

Was it dangerous to be there?

SeanLuke4• 12 years ago

Not particularly. Hong Kong is a very safe place, and the Walled City was the most dangerous part of Hong Kong. We never had any problems at all.

aaron695• 12 years ago

Hmmmm any story would be pretty cool.

Do you think it was a positive place given the real world we live in?

Do you think it should have been knocked down?

Realistically was the sense of community strong?

How did the kids inside go? Did they just leave for walks or did they spend lots of time inside.

SeanLuke4• 12 years ago

- It was a horrible, hellish place that desperately needed to be destroyed. The people living there were in pretty desperate straits, many of them illegal immigrants trying to escape China.

- There was solidarity but little sense of community I think. It was everyone for himself.

- I honestly do not know how the plumbing in the place worked, but expect the answer could well have been "not at all". Most people did not spend a lot of time there: you couldn't, it was too horrible inside.

Fun fact. The street-facing shops of the KWC, all the way around it, were dominated by unlicensed Chinese dentists trying to hawk their services in Hong Kong against the law. They all had skeletons and skulls in the shop windows with their dental handiwork applied to show off their dental mojo, completely oblivious to the irony of doing this.

jpatokal• 12 years ago

The "Japanese theme park" mentioned in the lead is this video arcade (!) in Kawasaki, Japan, not far from Tokyo:

http://randomwire.com/kowloon-walled-city-rebuilt-in-japan/

ekianjo• 12 years ago

This article does not EVEN mention Shenmue 2 as one of the major games inspired by the walled city. Did they do their job?

Kowloon Walled City

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