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  • Sunset Survivors: Meet the people keeping Hong Kong’s traditional industries alive

    HK$288.00
    • USD: US$36.82
    • CNY: CN¥264.79
    • GBP: £28.89
    • EUR: €33.80
    • AUD: AU$56.11

    with photography by Gary Jones

    Sunset Survivors tells the stories of Hong Kong’s traditional tradesmen and women through stunning imagery and candid interviews. Covering a myriad of curious professions that are quickly falling into obscurity, from fortune telling to face threading and letter writing to bird cage making, readers soon find themselves immersed in the streets of old Hong Kong.

    Filled with interviews, photographs and little-known facts about the city’s twilight industries, Sunset Survivors is a tribute to those who keep the flame burning in a city besieged by foreign imports and stiff competition. This book is a celebration of Hong Kong’s cultural identity. It preserves the memory of these hardy men and women, and educates visitors and locals on the foundations on which the city was built.

    An up-close and personal look at the industries and workers that gave rise to the Hong Kong of today, Sunset Survivors is more than just a travel or coffee-table book; it is a tribute to the city’s character, a celebration of its roots and a guide to its evolution.

    In a city undergoing a dramatic cultural shift, balancing social and political upheaval, the need to document Hong Kong’s traditional livelihoods has seldom been greater. Capturing the true personality of this metropolis, Sunset Survivors is a vital piece of history.

  • Spatial Cemetery: A Journey Beneath the Surface of Hidden Hong Kong

    HK$168.00
    • USD: US$21.48
    • CNY: CN¥154.46
    • GBP: £16.85
    • EUR: €19.72
    • AUD: AU$32.73

     

    The book you are holding contains secrets and stories about Hong Kong that have never before been published. Prepare to have your preconceived notions of this bustling Asian financial hub butchered as you journey through crevices, enter hidden portals, clamber over barbed-wire fences, evade security guards and infiltrate derelict structures to travel back in time. Your hosts are an anonymous grassroots squad of explorers who will show you a side of Hong Kong only a specialist minority know about.

    Although the city has some of the most expensive property on the planet, an unknown world awaits beyond the shimmering skyscrapers and under the glitzy malls. This is the hidden kingdom of non-spaces: environments and structures that lie fallow, usually abandoned and left to rot, or suspended in limbo awaiting evictions and demolition. The HK Urbex crew – a covert collective of urban explorers whose exploits merge archaeology, ethnography, historiography and anthropology – unearth dead zones on the periphery of the city. They invite you to explore haunted schools, rummage through old crime scenes, reconnoitre condemned buildings and uncover the scraps of modernisation which won’t be recorded in history books.

    So come inside, confront the aesthetic of loss, discover the value of dead architecture and see Hong Kong as you’ve never seen it before.

  • Tin Hats and Rice: A Diary of Life as a Hong Kong Prisoner of War, 1941-1945

    HK$138.00
    • USD: US$17.64
    • CNY: CN¥126.88
    • GBP: £13.84
    • EUR: €16.20
    • AUD: AU$26.88

     

    “I can’t visualise us getting out of this, but I want to TRY to believe in a future,” wrote 23-year-old Barbara Anslow (then Redwood) in her diary on 8th December 1941, a few hours after Japan first attacked Hong Kong.

    Barbara's 1941-1945 diaries (with post-war explanations where necessary) are an invaluable source of information on the civilian experience in British Hong Kong during the second world war. The diaries record her thoughts and experiences through the fighting, the surrender, three-and-a-half years of internment, then liberation and adjustment to normal life.

    The diaries have been quoted by leading historians on the subject. Now they are available in print for the first time, making them available to a wider audience.

    Look inside this book
    Click on the following link to read pages from Tin Hats and Rice. You will need a pdf reader to view this excerpt.

    Foreword and introduction

  • Out of stock

    Hong Kong 20/20: Reflections on a borrowed place

    HK$148.00
    • USD: US$18.92
    • CNY: CN¥136.07
    • GBP: £14.84
    • EUR: €17.37
    • AUD: AU$28.83

    (Go to Chinese edition)

    The handover in 1997 saw Hong Kong’s smooth transition from colonial to Communist rule under the auspices of the ‘one country, two systems’ framework. But twenty years on, the real impact of the sovereignty change is just starting to register: the city’s near-total economic integration with the mainland, a massive influx of Chinese visitors, simmering cross-border tensions and a rapid erosion of freedoms. Believing that we are stronger and louder together, PEN Hong Kong invited some of Hong Kong’s most prominent literary and creative minds to reflect on the city’s post-colonial development, in a definitive compendium of essays, poems, fiction and artwork that marks this historical milestone.

     

    Michael Braga · Mary-Jean Chan · Jennifer S. Cheng · Kris Cheng · Chow Hon Fai · Larry Feign · Harry Harrison · Gérard Henry · Louise Ho · Oscar Ho Hing Kay · Tammy Ho Lai-Ming · Sarah Howe · Law Lok Man, Louise · Arthur Leung · Leung Ping-Kwan · Louisa Lim · Shirley Geok-lin Lim · Lui Wing Kai, Eric · William Nee · Jason Y. Ng · Margaret Ng · Timothy O’Leary · Michael O’Sullivan · Ilaria Maria Sala · Mishi Saran · Shahilla Shariff · Shen Jian · So Mei Chi · Tang Siu Wa · Eddie Tay · Chip Tsao · Stephen Vines · Marco Wan · Wawa · Kate Whitehead · Joshua Wong · Nicholas Wong · Xu Xi · Marco Yan · Chris Yeung · Douglas Young

    With forewords by Timothy Garton Ash and Kevin Lau Chun-to.

    "The success of Hong Kong’s pluralist citizenship will come out on top whatever the challenges. Reading many of the contributions [in Hong Kong 20/20] confirms me in that view." — Chris Patten, the last governor of Hong Kong
     

     

  • When ‘Jesus’ Came to Hong Kong: The remarkable story of the first European football star in Asia

    HK$148.00
    • USD: US$18.92
    • CNY: CN¥136.07
    • GBP: £14.84
    • EUR: €17.37
    • AUD: AU$28.83

    It took balls to go to Hong Kong.

    When Scottish footballer Derek Currie was made an offer to travel to Hong Kong to play against the one sportsman he had dreamed of meeting on the field, he couldn’t say no.

    From apprentice printer in Glasgow to playing football against Pelé in the Far East, singing with Stevie Wonder and shadow-boxing with Marvelous Marvin Hagler, Currie enjoyed a magical life as one of the first three European professional footballers in Asia. He was quickly nicknamed ‘Jesus’ by Hong Kong football fans.

    Here he traces the early development of professional football in the then-British colony through his own career: the games, the places and the characters he met along the way.

    Given a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, he didn’t think twice – travelling 6,000 miles across the world to pursue his dream of professional football. In the years that followed, he met international stars from music, showbusiness, boxing and horse racing.

    Here in words and pictures is his amazing story – if not for the photographic proof you could be forgiven for thinking it might be a fairy tale! It isn’t.

    "An illustrious playing career. An excellent read." – Craig Brown CBE, former manager, Scotland national football team

    LOOK INSIDE THIS BOOK
    Contents and foreword  Chapters 1 and 2

  • Out of stock

    It Won’t Be Long Now: The Diary of a Hong Kong Prisoner of War

    HK$138.00
    • USD: US$17.64
    • CNY: CN¥126.88
    • GBP: £13.84
    • EUR: €16.20
    • AUD: AU$26.88


    Japan marched into Hong Kong at the outbreak of the Pacific War on December 8, 1941. On the same day, Graham Heywood was captured by the invading Japanese near the border while carrying out duties for the Royal Observatory. He was held at various places in the New Territories before being transported to the military Prisoner-of-War camp in Sham Shui Po, Kowloon. The Japanese refused to allow Heywood and his colleague Leonard Starbuck to join the civilians at the Stanley internment camp.

    Heywood’s illustrated diary records his three-and-a-half years of internment, telling a story of hardship, adversity, and survival of malnutrition and disease; as well as repeated hopes of liberation and disappointment. As he awaits the end of the war, his reflections upon freedom and imprisonment bring realisations about life and how to live it.

    Accounts of life in the internment camp differed widely. One friend, an enthusiastic biologist, was full of his doings; he had grown champion vegetables, had seen all sort of rare birds (including vultures, after the corpses) and had run a successful yeast brewery. Altogether, he said, it had been a great experience ... a bit too long, perhaps, but not bad fun at all. Another ended up her account by saying ‘Oh, Mr. Heywood, it was hell on earth’. It all depended on their point of view.”

    Heywood’s highly positive attitude to life is food for thought for all of us today, in the midst of increasing consumerism but decreasing spiritual satisfaction. We have enjoyed freedom and an abundance of material wealth in the 70 years since the end of the Pacific War, but we may not always recognise our true good fortune.

    Look inside this book
    Click on the following links to view sample pages from It Won't Be Long Now. You will need a pdf reader to view these excerpts.   Foreword   Chapter 1 - Capture

  • The Mercenary Mandarin: How a British adventurer became a general in Qing-dynasty China

    HK$138.00
    • USD: US$17.64
    • CNY: CN¥126.88
    • GBP: £13.84
    • EUR: €16.20
    • AUD: AU$26.88

     

    Jersey-born William Mesny ran off to sea as a boy and jumped ship at Shanghai in 1860 when he was just 18. Amid the chaos of foreign intrigue and civil war in 19th-century China, he became a smuggler, a prisoner of the Taiping rebels, a gun-runner and finally enlisted in the Chinese military.

    After five years of fierce campaigning against the Miao in remote Guizhou province, Mesny rose to the rank of general and used this privileged position to travel around China – to the borders with Burma, Tibet and Vietnam – writing opinionated newspaper articles, collecting plants and advising government officials on the development of railways, telegraphs and other modern reforms.

    Mesny eventually settled in Shanghai with a 16-year-old concubine and published Mesny's Chinese Miscellany, a weekly magazine about his experiences. But his story was not to end well. After his implication in an illicit arms deal, his fortunes never recovered, and when he died in 1919 he was working as a desk clerk.

    David Leffman has spent over 15 years footstepping Mesny’s travels across China, interviewing locals and piecing together his life story from contemporary journals, private letters and newspaper articles.

    Look inside this book

    Click on the following links to view sample pages from The Mercenary Mandarin. You will need a pdf reader to view these excerpts.   Foreword

  • Strangers on the Praia: A Tale of Refugees and Resistance in Wartime Macao

    HK$78.00
    • USD: US$9.97
    • CNY: CN¥71.71
    • GBP: £7.82
    • EUR: €9.15
    • AUD: AU$15.20

     

    Based on true stories and new research, Paul French weaves together the stories of those Jewish refugees who moved on from wartime Shanghai to seek a possible route to freedom via the Portuguese colony of Macao – “the Casablanca of the Orient”.

    The delicately balanced neutral enclave became their wartime home, amid Nazi and Japanese spies, escaped Allied prisoners from Hong Kong, and displaced Chinese.

    Strangers on the Praia relates the story of one young woman’s struggle for freedom that would ultimately prove an act of brave resistance.

     

  • The Tiger Hunters of Tai O

    HK$118.00
    • USD: US$15.09
    • CNY: CN¥108.49
    • GBP: £11.84
    • EUR: €13.85
    • AUD: AU$22.99

     

    Hong Kong, 1954. The British colony was not yet ready to hear about a Eurasian policeman having an affair with the police commissioner’s daughter. Twenty-two-year-old Simon Lee tasted swift punishment. He was banished to the outer fringes of the territory, to the far tip of a wild and distant island a stone’s throw from mainland Chinese waters — to Tai O, the ancient and murky trading post where fishermen, salt-farmers and refugees were thrown together with spies, pirates and triads. Pink dolphins swam the waters, eagles fished the sea, and some still believed that a tiger prowled the hills at night.

    It was a place haunted by history, where corpses had floated in the bay just a decade earlier when Japanese troops occupied the police station, and everybody had a secret about what they did during the war.

    Life was unpredictable for the band of beer-swilling misfits that staffed Tai O Police Station. Some said they needed reining in. But when a stranger was murdered on a beach, accused of being a Communist spy, Lee found himself on an unexpected collision course with his own masters in Central. Who had the dead man been working for? What did the secret agents know? Why was Central so eager to brush the execution aside? And who or what really was the ‘tiger’?

  • with John Peters and Lizzie Sharp-Eliazar

    Did you leave your fishing rods at home before relocating to Hong Kong, unaware that such a densely populated place could support recreational fishing?

    Mike Sharp and John Peters walk you through the local angling spots and describe key tactics normally known only by Hong Kong anglers. Carp fishing, pier fishing, and trolling for game fish are just some of the topics covered in a warm, descriptive text beautifully illustrated by Lizzie Sharp-Eliazar.

    Whether you live in a skyscraper or a village, this book will encourage you to get out onto the territory's beautiful waters or rocky shore and cast a line―in the hope that the next one will be the one that didn't get away.

    Look inside this book
    Click on the images on the left to view sample pages from Fishing in Hong Kong.

  • Stories from the Royal Hong Kong Police: Fifty accounts from officers of Hong Kong’s colonial-era police force

    HK$138.00
    • USD: US$17.64
    • CNY: CN¥126.88
    • GBP: £13.84
    • EUR: €16.20
    • AUD: AU$26.88



    Fighting to survive on a police patrol launch during a typhoon, and investigating a murder by a Vietnamese gangster in a refugee camp. Battling riots during the Cultural Revolution, countering drug smuggling and pimping by the triads, and dealing with bank robbers in a hostage situation. These are just some of the stories told in this riveting compilation of personal experiences of former Royal Hong Kong Police officers.

    In 1997, Hong Kong returned to Chinese sovereignty after 156 years of British rule. This collection of no-holds-barred accounts by some 50 individual police officers, put together by three former colleagues, illustrates the last decades of the colony’s colourful history. This is what life was really like on the front line.

    LOOK INSIDE THIS BOOK
    Click the following link to read excerpts from the book.

    Contents, preface and three stories

  • Out of stock

    Sheriff of Wan Chai: How an Englishman helped govern Hong Kong in its last decades as a British colony

    HK$138.00
    • USD: US$17.64
    • CNY: CN¥126.88
    • GBP: £13.84
    • EUR: €16.20
    • AUD: AU$26.88


    In 1976, Peter Mann left a gloomy England for the last corner of the British empire: Hong Kong.

    As a police inspector, he commanded a sub-unit and led a district vice squad in Kowloon, before joining the colonial government’s Administrative Service and working in the fields of transport, housing, security, environment and tourism. He also served as District Officer, Wan Chai. From raids on gambling dens to organising Governors' visits, his work involved him in all levels of Hong Kong society.

    Mann’s memoir is an anecdotal, historical and racy account of Hong Kong’s last decades as a British colony and the colourful story of a young Englishman in the twilight of empire.

    Hong Kong is one of the most intriguing places in the world and its modern history is endlessly fascinating. This book is a highly readable addition to the canon of memoirs which illuminate the period.” – Rachel Cartland, author of Paper Tigress

    Look inside this book
    Click on the following link to read pages from Sheriff of Wan Chai. You will need a pdf reader to view this excerpt.  Arrival in Hong Kong

  • The Chinese Wet Market Handbook: A guide to shopping at Hong Kong’s fresh food markets

    HK$98.00
    • USD: US$12.53
    • CNY: CN¥90.10
    • GBP: £9.83
    • EUR: €11.50
    • AUD: AU$19.09

     

    Have you ever wondered about that wacky-looking fruit staring back at you in the local wet market? Or did you want to know how to cook a particular Chinese vegetable, but don’t have the language skills?

    The Chinese Wet Market Handbook gives you the answers! This pocket-sized guidebook, designed to be taken out shopping with you, identifies fresh produce commonly found at Hong Kong’s food markets.

    Each item is identified by a photo, its English name, its romanised Cantonese name with tones, and its name in full-form Chinese characters. The guide explains traditional signage in Chinese characters, including weights and measures, and indicates whether a food is locally produced. Finally, it describes ten lively Hong Kong wet markets especially worth visiting and provides directions on how to find them.

    Whether you’re a Hong Kong resident who wants to shop at food markets but lacks the linguistic and culinary know-how, or a tourist who wants to explore the local culinary sights, this handy guide will help you navigate your way around one of the liveliest and most colourful parts of Hong Kong’s food scene.

    Look inside this book
    Click on the below links to view sample pages from The Chinese Wet Market Handbook. You will need a pdf reader to view these excerpts.

    pages 2-11 (fruit)   pages 23-29 (vegetables)   pages 71-75 (dried foods)

  • No City for Slow Men: Hong Kong’s quirks and quandaries laid bare

    HK$128.00
    • USD: US$16.37
    • CNY: CN¥117.68
    • GBP: £12.84
    • EUR: €15.02
    • AUD: AU$24.94

    with illustrations by Lee Po Ng

    Author and blogger Jason Y. Ng has a knack for making the familiar both fascinating and funny. Three years after his bestselling début HONG KONG State of Mind, the razor-sharp observer returns with a sequel that is bigger and every bit as poignant.

    No City for Slow Men is a collection of 36 essays that examine some of the pressing social, cultural and existential issues facing Hong Kong. It takes us from the gravity-defying property market to the plunging depths of old age poverty, from the storied streets of Sheung Wan to the beckoning island of Cheung Chau, from the culture-shocked Western expat to the misunderstood Mainland Chinese and the disenfranchised foreign domestic worker. The result is a treatise on Hong Kong life that is thought-provoking, touching and immensely entertaining.

    Look inside this book
    Click on these links to read pages from No City for Slow Men. You will need a pdf reader to view these excerpts.

    Introduction   Horo-Logic   The Storm Cometh

  • Destination Peking

    HK$138.00
    • USD: US$17.64
    • CNY: CN¥126.88
    • GBP: £13.84
    • EUR: €16.20
    • AUD: AU$26.88

     

    New York Times bestselling author Paul French (Midnight in Peking, City of Devils) returns to the Chinese capital to tell 18 true stories of fascinating people who visited the city in the first half of the 20th century.

    From the ultra-wealthy Woolworths heiress Barbara Hutton and her husband the Prince Mdivani, to the poor “American girl” Mona Monteith who worked in the city as a prostitute; from socialite Wallis Simpson and novelist JP Marquand, who held court on the rooftop of the Grand Hôtel de Pékin, to Hollywood screenwriter Harry Hervey, who sought inspiration walking atop the Tartar Wall; from Edgar and Helen Foster Snow – Peking's ‘It' couple of 1935 – to Martha Sawyers, who did so much to aid China against Japan in World War II; Destination Peking brings a lost pre-communist era back to life.

    Paul French resurrects a Peking that was filled with glitter as well as evil, but was never known for being dull.” The Economist

    LOOK INSIDE THIS BOOK
    Click the following links to read excerpts from the book.

    Contents & Introduction

    The Rooftop of the Grand Hôtel de Pékin: Wallis Spencer’s Peking World & Those Who Went Up on the Roof (1924)

  • Drawing on the Inside: Kowloon Walled City 1985

    HK$288.00
    • USD: US$36.82
    • CNY: CN¥264.79
    • GBP: £28.89
    • EUR: €33.80
    • AUD: AU$56.11

    Curated by Benjamin Salmon

    Imagine an illegally built mini-city formed of multiple 12-storey blocks, taking up only the area of a sports stadium but home to 60,000 people. What was it like living in the most densely populated place on Earth?

    Intrepid 22-year-old artist Fiona Hawthorne spent three months inside the notorious Walled City of Kowloon, an apparent no-go area right in the heart of bustling Hong Kong. This book reveals the sensitive and extraordinary artworks she created there. It is a unique record of a time and place that no longer exists.

  • With a foreword by Lord Wilson of Tillyorn, Governor of Hong Kong, 1987-1992

    We had no jurisdiction outside of Hong Kong waters. But we could see their vessels sinking in heavy seas. It was life or death, right there. We just went.”

    Former Marine Police officer Les Bird tells of the harrowing sea journey to Hong Kong made by tens of thousands of refugees in the years that followed the end of the Vietnam War. As he patrolled the southern maritime boundary of Hong Kong, he photographed their makeshift boats and later the people-smuggling vessels coming in – including the Sen On, a freighter ship that was abandoned by its crew and ran aground on Lantau Island.

    With this previously unpublished collection of personal photographs, taken by himself and his former police colleagues, he tells the stories of these boatpeople – the young children, the father who just bought a boat to embark on a 1,000-mile journey, and the disillusioned North Vietnamese battle-hardened veterans – all searching for a new life.

    LOOK INSIDE THIS BOOK
    Click the following links to read excerpts from the book.

    Introduction

  • Policing Hong Kong – An Irish History

    HK$158.00
    • USD: US$20.20
    • CNY: CN¥145.27
    • GBP: £15.85
    • EUR: €18.54
    • AUD: AU$30.78

     

    Part of the Royal Asiatic Society Hong Kong Studies Series

    Hong Kong, 1918. A tranquil place compared to war-torn Europe. But on the morning of the 22nd January, a running battle through the streets of Wanchai ended in “The Siege of Gresson Street”. Five policemen lay dead, so shocking Hong Kong that over half the population turned out to watch their funeral procession.

    One of the dead, Inspector Mortimor O’Sullivan, came from Newmarket: a small town nestled deep in rural Ireland. He, along with a dozen and more relatives, had sailed out to Hong Kong to join the Police Force.

    Using family records and memories alongside extensive research in Hong Kong, Ireland and London, Patricia O’Sullivan tells the story of these policemen and the criminals they dealt with. This book also gives a rare glimpse into the day-to-day life of working-class Europeans at the time, as it follows the Newmarket men, their wives and families, from their first arrival in 1864 through to 1941 and beyond.

    “This groundbreaking book is a story of life, death, and crime in colonial Hong Kong. It is also an account of an important part of Hong Kong’s population that has eluded most historians: the European working class. With an arsenal of previously untapped materials in Ireland, Britain and Hong Kong, Patricia O’Sullivan tells the remarkable tales of the families who built their own ‘little Ireland’ in Hong Kong.” – John M. Carroll, Dept. of History, University of Hong Kong

    Look inside this book
    Click on the following link to read pages from Policing Hong Kong – An Irish History. You will need a pdf reader to view this excerpt.

    Introduction

  • Shanghai’s Baghdadi Jews: A Collection of Biographical Reflections

    HK$180.00
    • USD: US$23.01
    • CNY: CN¥165.49
    • GBP: £18.05
    • EUR: €21.12
    • AUD: AU$35.07

    with a foreword by Irene Eber

    A compilation of 26 biographical accounts from the entire spectrum of Shanghai’s Baghdadi Jewish society offers fresh insights into a remarkable community that lived through the crossroads of China’s 20th-century history.

    Using previously unseen diaries and archival material, Shanghai’s Baghdadi Jews documents the rise and fall of larger-than-life personalities who witnessed the Sino-Japanese War, the Occupation of Shanghai and the Communist Party’s rise to power. Photographs illustrate the life and times of these individuals and the magnificent, cosmopolitan city they called home.

    Look inside this book
    Click on the following links to view sample pages from Shanghai’s Baghdadi Jews. You will need a pdf reader to view these excerpts.

    Foreword  Sample photo pages

  • Welly the Wild Boar and the Quest for the Egg Puffs

    HK$100.00
    • USD: US$12.79
    • CNY: CN¥91.94
    • GBP: £10.03
    • EUR: €11.74
    • AUD: AU$19.48

    Illustrated by Catherine Choi

    Welly the wild boar loves nothing better than eating fluffy egg puffs! He roams his home city of Hong Kong in search of his favourite snack, but he finds many other tasty foods to try along the way.

    This poetic and fun tale of a loveable local creature will introduce you to traditional Hong Kong snacks and persuade you to go out and try some for yourself. See how many of these hometown street foods you can find!

     

  • Lost Hong Kong: A history in pictures

    HK$168.00
    • USD: US$21.48
    • CNY: CN¥154.46
    • GBP: £16.85
    • EUR: €19.72
    • AUD: AU$32.73

     

    The story of Hong Kong is one of almost constant change. From a sleepy fishing community, Hong Kong – now a Special Administrative Region following its return from Britain to China in July 1997 – has grown into one of the most significant financial and trading centres of the world.

    Hong Kong Island itself has witnessed massive rebuilding over the years, with the result that much of the colonial-era architecture has been swept away and replaced by skyscrapers. Moreover the first high-rise buildings constructed from the late 1950s onwards are now themselves under threat as the constant requirement for more accommodation – both for people and for businesses – continues.

    The Kowloon peninsula and the New Territories have also experienced development, whilst the construction of the new airport saw the destruction of an entire island to create the foundations of the new facility. The pressure for land has seen reclamation schemes extend the coastline of Hong Kong Island far to the north.

    Over the years photographers have recorded the changing face of Hong Kong: its street scenes, buildings and people. This new book – drawing upon images from a wide range of sources, many of which are previously unpublished – is a pictorial tribute to this lost Hong Kong. Once familiar but now long-gone scenes are recorded, offering a tantalising glimpse back at an era which in chronological terms may be relatively recent, but given the rapidity of change, seems like a distant age.

  • 詠春善戰者–葉問的私徒

    HK$98.00
    • USD: US$12.53
    • CNY: CN¥90.10
    • GBP: £9.83
    • EUR: €11.50
    • AUD: AU$19.09

    (Go to English edition)

    梁紹鴻,Duncan Leung,詠春善戰者。由兒時好友、已故電影巨星李小龍介紹去學詠春功夫。1955年,年僅十三歲的他以「三跪九叩」之禮,拜詠春第六長門代葉問為師,成為葉問的「第一私家門徒」。

    1955至1959這四年間,葉問親自上門,悉心教導梁紹鴻,傾囊相授,跟他練習,還傳授「實踐」詠春的秘訣。梁紹鴻天天練武、練功六小時;要學以致用,他就上街打架、上武館「講手」,實踐所學。他對中國武術各門各派的打鬥經驗可謂獨一無二。

    1964年,一次行俠仗義令梁紹鴻有緣遇上一位老人。那老人教他「空手入白刃」、「貼身搏擊」、「無聲殺敵」等技巧。

    1974至1976年,梁紹鴻在美國紐約設館授徒。中、外習武者上館挑戰可謂無日無之,他未嘗敗北,因此應付外國武藝的經驗也相當豐富,可謂世上絕無僅有。

    1976至2002年間,梁紹鴻在美國弗吉利亞灘 (Virginia Beach)定居,受聘於美國海軍海豹隊(U.S. Navy Seals)、美國聯邦調查局( FBI )及美國特警部隊 (SWAT)。

    2002年8月,梁紹鴻接受可能是他有生以來最大的挑戰:要在兩年內,培養六名中國少年成為世界級職業「散打」拳手。於是,他到了中國去完成這能人所不能的使命。

     

  • Sale!

    Trading Places: A photographic journey through China’s former Treaty Ports

    HK$480.00
    • USD: US$61.37
    • CNY: CN¥441.31
    • GBP: £48.14
    • EUR: €56.33
    • AUD: AU$93.51

    With a foreword by Professor Robert Bickers

    China’s treaty port era extended from the 1840s to 1943, during which time foreigners had a significant presence. This book contains more than 700 photographs of many buildings from this period, most of them commissioned by foreign interests. Many argue that they should never have been built, let alone still be standing. But this book is not concerned with the rights and wrongs of how these buildings came to be. It simply celebrates their existence. A significant number are innately beautiful and all of them embody a history that has clear and present links to our own time and thus remain relevant.

    This book was driven by the author’s interest in the history of China’s treaty port era, in which several generations of his family played a part. It is a tribute to the buildings that remain as a reminder of the past, and a guide to where to find them.

  • Hong Kong Noir (Akashic noir series)

    HK$125.00
    • USD: US$15.98
    • CNY: CN¥114.92
    • GBP: £12.54
    • EUR: €14.67
    • AUD: AU$24.35

    Edited by Jason Y. Ng and Susan Blumberg-Kason

    Published in association with Akashic Books

    Akashic continues its groundbreaking series of original noir anthologies, launched in 2004 with Brooklyn Noir. Each story is set in a distinct neighbourhood or location within the city of the book.

    Hong Kong Noir features brand-new stories by Jason Y. Ng, Xu Xi, Marshall Moore, Brittani Sonnenberg, Tiffany Hawk, James Tam, Rhiannon Jenkins Tsang, Christina Liang, Feng Chi-shun, Charles Philipp Martin, Shannon Young, Shen Jian, Carmen Suen and Ysabelle Cheung.

    What will Hong Kong look like in five years, ten years, or thirty years when the “one country, two systems” promise expires? It’s impossible to foresee. Hong Kong’s future may be beyond our control, but some things aren’t. We can continue to write about our beloved city and work our hardest to preserve it in words.

    When we asked our contributors to write their noir stories, we didn’t give them specific content guidelines other than to make sure their stories end on a dark note. What we received was a brilliant collection of ghost stories, murder mysteries, domestic dramas, cops-and-robbers tales, and historical thrillers that capture Hong Kong in all its dark glory. The result is every bit as eclectic, quirky, and delightful as the city they write about.

    Look inside this book
    Click on the following links to read pages from Hong Kong Noir. You will need a pdf reader to view these excerpts.

    Contents and Introduction

  • HONG KONG State of Mind: 37 views of a city that doesn’t blink

    HK$118.00
    • USD: US$15.09
    • CNY: CN¥108.49
    • GBP: £11.84
    • EUR: €13.85
    • AUD: AU$22.99

    with illustrations by Lee Po Ng

    Hong Kong is a mixed bag of a city. It is where Mercedes outnumber taxi cabs, partygoers count down to Christmas every December 24, and larger-than-life billboards of fortune tellers and cram school tutors compete with breathtaking skylines.

    HONG KONG State of Mind is a collection of essays by a popular blogger who zeroes in on the city’s idiosyncrasies with deadpan precision. At once an outsider looking in and an insider looking out, Ng has created something for everyone: a travel journal for the passing visitor, a user’s manual for the wide-eyed expat, and an open diary for the native Hong Konger looking for moments of reflection.

    Look inside this book
    Click on this link to view sample pages from HONG KONG State of Mind. You will need a pdf reader to view this excerpt.

    Kowloon Complex