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Tam Sau King
Tam Sau King
Retired Jade Merchant
Sex: Female Birthyear: 1924 Age at Interview: 87 Education: No schooling Occupation: Hawker Theme: Community,Social Life Tam Sau King started to operate a street stall on Bowring Street in the mid-1960s. Many street stalls operated in the Bowring Street section between Parkes Street and Nathan Road. The hawkers set their stalls in a row on the footpath close to the ditch. There were pushcarts selling cloth, garments and food. In those days, some poultry dressers operated in the back alley of Bowring Street, today only two of them are left. The shops on Bowring Street mainly sold garment, cloth and shoes. Tam’s stall was outside the porch of the Restaurant ‘Tin Zhi Kui Nui’ and next to the Sun Sun Hotel where many overseas Chinese tourists stayed. To enter the trade, she paid $20 to apply for a mobile hawker licence which stated that the licence holder was permitted to sell all kinds of goods. When she applied, she specified that jade articles would be sold. When she began to hawk on the street, there was a vacant space outside the porch of the Restaurant ‘Tin Zhi Kui Nui’. Accepted by the other hawkers, she was allowed to take the space. Very soon, she became familiar with the neighbouring garments and cloth hawkers. They adjusted to each other’s needs and helped tend the stores and sell goods when anyone had to leave for a while. Tam started her business at 8 am each day. She pushed her cart all the way from her home at Man Yuen Building to Bowring Street via the King George V Memorial Park. She had lunch box with her neighbours at noon, closed the business at 5 or 6 pm and went home to prepare the dinner.
Title Operating a street stall on Bowring Street in the 1960s Date 16/04/2011 Subject Community Duration 4m39s Language Cantonese Material Type Audio Collection Oral History Archives Repository Hong Kong Memory Project Note to Copyright Copyright owned by Hong Kong Memory Project Accession No. YMT-TSK-HLT-001 Before Tam Sau Lin worked as a full-time hawker, she got credit for goods from gold jewellery shops. She ran the sideline business of jade article hawking. The price for a piece of good varied from a few dollars to ten dollars or so. She did not know the retail prices of the jewellery’s goods, she was happy to resell the goods as long as profits were made, despite that it might be a meager profit of a dollar or two. She also consigned the goods for sale at the Kwun Chung market. The hawkers there sold them on credit. She collected the money and unsold goods on the next morning. She never worried about being cheated because she has developed a relationship of trust with the vegetable and meat stall owners from daily visit for food ingredients. And, the latter did not know the source of her goods. Such arrangement met the needs of all.
Title Street-side hawker sold on credit from the gold jewellery Date 16/04/2011 Subject Community Duration 2m36s Language Cantonese Material Type Audio Collection Oral History Archives Repository Hong Kong Memory Project Note to Copyright Copyright owned by Hong Kong Memory Project Accession No. YMT-TSK-HLT-002 Besides tourists, Tam Sau King’s customers at Canton Road also included jade wholesalers from Yuen Long and Sheung Shui. Selling goods to fellow traders made little profit; for example 100 rings sold would yield a profit of only HK$100; the quantity made up for the small profit margin. Among traders there was a practice where bargains were struck through “holding hands”. The hands of the two trading parties were covered by a piece of cloth, and each would hold onto the fingertips of the other party and communicate on the price and quantity.
Title Bargains through ‘holding hands’ : a common practice among jade traders: Date 16/04/2011 Subject Community Duration 2m31s Language Cantonese Material Type Audio Collection Oral History Archives Repository Hong Kong Memory Project Note to Copyright Copyright owned by Hong Kong Memory Project Accession No. YMT-TSK-HLT-003 Tam Sau King set up a jade stall at Canton Road. After the jade business prospered, she travelled to Singapore to sell jade rings. She applied for a local license there and set up stalls at the market to sell the goods, earning a good profit. As business expanded she invited a relative to come help out at Singapore, but was later owed over 100,000 by a local customer. She returned home suffering heavy losses. When the jade business was brisk she had planned to buy a unit at Eight Man Buildings at $140,000, but the losses she suffered in Singapore ruined her plans
Title Failure of a business dealing affected her property dream Date 16/04/2011 Subject Community Duration 2m10s Language Cantonese Material Type Audio Collection Oral History Archives Repository Hong Kong Memory Project Note to Copyright Copyright owned by Hong Kong Memory Project Accession No. YMT-TSK-HLT-004