Shek K. C., Arthur

KC Shek was born in Kwong Wah Hospital in 1948. Kwong Wah was under Tung Wah Group of Hospitals. Many Yau Ma Tei residents were born there. Pregnant women in the old days had to work for a living and only went to the hospital before labour. KC Shek’s family ran a porridge stall on an alley in Yau Ma Tei. When KC Shek was a kid, he often slept on the street and strolled around the different streets in the district. He grew up in Yau Ma Tei. When in primary school, he lived at Portland Street. When in junior secondary school, he lived at Shanghai Street. When in senior secondary school, he moved to Tung Choi Street. He hardly travelled by bus but on foot since his family was poverty-stricken. He had travelled north to Pek Ho Street, south to Jordan Road and east to Diamond Hill.

The economic activities occurring in Yau Ma Tei were categorized as either ‘sunshine’ or ‘underground’. ‘Sunshine’ connoted lawful businesses such as the hospital-dependent sanctuaries and coffin shops, and the gold shops in Shanghai Street, ‘banks for fishermen’. ‘Underground’ denoted vice establishments such as prostitution, gambling and drugs. KC Shek had got accustomed to seeing the opium, heroin and whores.

Title	A short summary of KC Shek’s childhood. Two types of economic activities in Yau Ma Tei
Date	17/02/2011
Subject	Community
Duration	3m42s
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-SKC-SEG-001

Since his birth until promotion to middle school, KC Shek lived in the rear part on the ground floor of 74 Portland Street. The front part was a home-shop selling leather. There existed many shops selling leather, shroud and casket. Lee Shing Hing was a famous shroud shop in Kowloon. KC Shek often visited the shop when he was young. He grew up with the kids in the shop. The Sheks ran a cooked food stall at a side door at Portland Street. In the morning, plain congee, beef congee, fish & peanut congee, boat congee and pig’s blood congee were served in the morning. In the afternoon, sweet soups, fried vermicelli, fried noodles, glutinous rice, rice dumplings, honeyed roasted pork buns and rice rolls were served. The whole family was involved in running the cooked food stall. The courtyard at the back of 74 Portland Street was deployed as kitchen.

Even when going to middle school and university, KC Shek still helped out in the congee stall. Over a thousand customers came to the stall each day, so the stall had to pay lots of ‘protection fees’ to the police station in return of privileged treatments from the police despite their long-term illegal hawking. Later the police station notified KC Shek’s mother that a charge had to be laid ‘according to the laws’, specifying certain exhibits to be surrendered: 6 bowls, 6 spoons and 1 pot of congee. Grandpa reported to the police station on behalf of the stall. Seeing his old age, the policeman at the station told him to put 20 dollars into the donation box and compensate for the property that had been forfeited. Each subsequent year, Grandpa went to the station and paid a fine of 20 dollars. KC Shek lamented that he was not sure if corruption was good or bad.

74 Portland Street was later rebuilt. As the building came into use, Mother rented a flat of 600-700 sq ft on the 2nd floor for sub-lease. Cubicles and beds were available, accommodating tens of tenants in peak season. KC Shek’s family had also rented houses for sub-lease at Shanghai Street, Waterloo Road, Dundas Street, which was a business of them. Upon the demolishment of the flat at Portland Street, the Sheks moved to the 3rd floor of 380 Shanghai Street (of which the Sheks were the sublessor). The neighbouring building was a school. The opposite of 380 Shanghai Street was Tak Yu Teahouse. The teahouse used to be just 3 or 4 stories tall. The whole block was opened for the business. It was slowly heightened later on. In his childhood, KC Shek went to Tak Yu Teahouse with his granduncle at 6 every morning for a big bun before heading for school.

Title	The Shek ran a congee stall in Portalnd Street. Childhood in Portland Street
Date	17/02/2011
Subject	Community
Duration	11m8s
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-SKC-SEG-002

KC Shek was promoted to Primary 1 at To Kwan Primary School. Every morning he got up at 6 and went for a morning tea with his granduncle before walking to school at 7. After school he sometimes hung around Sheung Heung Road. His father put great emphasis on education. He switched to Farm Road Government Primary School at To Kwa Wan when studying Primary 3. When going to the new school, he waited for Bus No. 9 or 6C outside Kwong Wah Hospital at 7 every morning. He went back home from school by Bus No. 6C. He sometimes went playing on Shing Heung Road after school. His family was not poor so KC Shek did not have to worry about pocket money. He was granted 60 cents as pocket money each day. He liked treating himself a bar of Cadbury Chocolate. He went back home and did his homework at his parents’ food. After the stall was closed at 4 he helped them to split firewood, grind rice and bean until dinner at 8. Afterwards he continued his homework. His father listened to the radio after getting home. For example, he listened to BBC’s English programmes to learn English.

KC Shek liked cooking when studying at primary school. Having sat the secondary school promotion exams in Primary 6, he made his classmates his guests at his home at Shanghai Street and cooked chopped squid and chicken rice in a porcelain pot together with them. He once went on a picnic with his classmates. All the food was self-prepared. Sandwiches were carried in meal boxes while milk tea was contained in thermo flasks. KC Shek advanced to Elizabeth Secondary School upon graduation from primary school. He got back to school at 6 each morning to play soccer. The janitor had not opened the school gate by then. He slipped into the campus by striding over the wall. He stayed on campus to play soccer after school, which his family had no knowledge about. When activities were held at school, he would leave school for home by 10 pm the latest.

Over the weekend, he stayed home for laundry. He helped out in the cooked food stall less often after studying at secondary school. When his mother fell sick, he went home right after school to help out in the stall. KC Shek seldom left Yau Ma Tei. He was uninterested in going to other places as he thought that he had seen life in Yau Ma Tei, an area full of colours and flavours. He said he had been used to the Yau Ma Tei lifestyle and so did not longer for such “superior” places like Central and Sheung Wan, where he had never been a part of.

Title	KC Shek's daily life during primary and secondary schooling
Date	17/02/2011
Subject	Community
Duration	9m40s
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-SKC-SEG-003

KC Shek studied Primary 1 at To Kwan Primary School at Soares Avenue. Every day he spent half an hour walking to school from Portland Street. Schooling was full-time in those years. He took the same route back home at 3 or 4 after school. In winter, it was getting dark when school ended. The street was dusky and he would nip along the street. In those years the Yau Ma Tei section of Nathan Road was barren and especially quiet at night. The portion nearest Kwong Wah Hospital ran past a mountain, which as removed and replaced by buildings only in the 1980s. The junction of Nathan Road and Pitt Street used to be the exchange building and warehouse of a telephone company.

Streets such as Sai Yeung Choi (Lit. watercress) Street , Tung Choi (Lit. water spinach) Street, Garden Street, Yim Po Fong (Lit. fabric dyeing) Street, Hak Po (Lit. black fabric) Street and Pak Po (Lit. white cloth) Street looked just the way their names sounded, reflecting the lack of commercial activities in those areas. The commercial area along Nathan Road mainly lay in the section spanning from the southern end of Jordan Road to Tsim Sha Tsui, while shops and buildings were sparse on the section spanning from the northern end of Jordan Road to Shantung Street. Yau Ma Tei’s commercial area lay along Shanghai Street and Temple Street from Jordan Road to Argyle Street. When young, KC Shek often went to Yung Shue Tau and watched martial arts performances, or, in his hunkies, watched others having fortune reading, or tasting various tasty snacks around open square. He was not prohibited from hanging about by his family. His footprints went as far as Pak Hoi Street in Sham Shui Po.

Title	Deserted streetscape in early Yau Ma Tei
Date	17/02/2011
Subject	Community
Duration	7m31s
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-SKC-SEG-004

KC Shek had played in the vicinity of Kowloon Wah Yan College since 5 or 6 years old. In the 1950s Wylie Road did not come to existence yet. Wah Yan was situated on the border of Yau Ma Tei. Behind the mountain were King’s Park and a reservoir. He liked fighting with other kids, tossing stones and catching a bug nicknamed Golden Cat on the mountain. Parents regarded the mountain a dangerous place and hardly let their kids climb it. But KC Shek’s parents had no time controlling his activities.

He graduated from Dao Kwan Primary School at Soares Avenue for both nursery and primary education. Since kindergarten he had walked to school on his own, passing by Pitt Street and Kwong Wah Street. Kwong Wah Street used to have short houses lining up on both sides and big banyan trees planted all along the way, creating a gruesome atmosphere which was particularly petrifying in winters. He felt scared when walking home along it from school. Kwong Wah Hospital’s mortuary provided caskets and hearses for the deceased at the hospital. The funerals of KC Shek’s grandfather and granduncle were held there. As the Sheks were hawkers who were acquainted with lots of people in the community, his grandfather’s funeral was so big that 40 funeral processions were held, each of which comprised of 10 to 20 persons. Hundreds of people went seeing him away. The processions ran as long as several streets. Suona was played all the way and the sounds were deafening. There were many casket shops and flower shops near Kwong Wah Hospital. Many Taoist priests and funeral staffs lived nearby.

Title	Waterloo Road, Kwong Wa Steet, and Pitt Street in early post-war years
Date	17/02/2011
Subject	Community
Duration	6m23s
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-SKC-SEG-005

To KC Shek’s understanding, the line dividing the police districts of Mongkok and Yau Ma Tei Police Stations was drawn along Dundas Street, which means the northern area was Mongkok District while the south was Yau Ma Tei District. The Sheks ran a congee stall and had often to pay the policemen ‘protection fees’, and thus got aware of the border between the police districts. Sai Yeung Choi Street used to be rather quiet and scattered with home-run mechanics stores. Chung Nam Bookstore (i.e. Chung Nam Books Co. Ltd) opened in the 1970s. KC Shek often went there to buy books. The old-style blocks built before the 1960s were only 2 or 3 stories tall. For those built after the 1960s, their distinctive feature was the closed balcony. Hong Kong was deluged with numerous immigrants from the mainland in the 1960s. In order to increase living area, the Housing Authority issued a probationary ordinance, which permitted the installation of windows on closed balconies. Most of the buildings with balconies then had been newly built after the War.

There were many pleasure houses at Reclamation Street and Soy Street. At 2 am the whoremaster escorted sexy girls to the junction of the two streets and attracted the attention of many ‘maladies’ (nickname of vulgar men). Some prostitutes at Dundas Street came from countries including Russia, Janpan and Korea. In the 1980s there occurred an influx of prostitutes from the mainland. Most of them shared their profits with the whoremaster. A ‘stable’ could hold a combination of prostitutes of different kinds and offered ‘red girls’ (overseas prostitutes) and ‘northern ladies’ (mainland girls) at the same time. The guesthouses and hotels mainly served prostitution, and were not fit for long stays. Temple Street was a conventional red light district in Yau Ma Tei. The prostitutes there ran their businesses on their own. Not controlled by anyone else, they did not have to count on the whoremasters as middlemen. To KC Shek, nightclubs were dark places and ‘goldfish tanks’ where whore-goers picked the right girls for sex deals in a room out there.

Title	Early landscapes in Dundas Street, Sai Yeung Choi Street and Soy Street
Date	17/02/2011
Subject	Community
Duration	12m11s
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-SKC-SEG-006

Yau Ma Tei’s coastline used to ran along Portland Street and Shanghai Street. ‘Portland’ referred to promenade while ‘Shanghai’ referred to land near the sea. In contrast with Tsim Sha Tsui, which was Kowloon’s commercial district for the expatriates, Shanghai Street was Kowloon’s commercial district for the Chinese. Shanghai Street was a wealthy street where non-businessmen could by no means get a place. Mahjong houses, gold stores and herbs stores were aplenty on the street. Mahjong houses could be called Hong Kongers’ casinos.

Gold stores were fishermen’s banks. Many fishermen had gold teeth implanted to reserve their wealth, giving rise to such proverbs as ‘all’s left after death was teeth’ and ‘strip your teeth’. One end of Shantung Street was Mong Kok Ferry Pier, from where the ships sailed to Hong Kong Island. At Shantung Street there was a Chinese restaurant called Wan Hoi Teahouse. In the evening, it offered formal dance room where customers could call their favourite classic songs. Its night tea was rather light. Mainly desserts such as Cantonese sponge cake and white sugar sponge cake were served. At Portland Street and Reclamation Street, there were numerous mechanics stores selling used machines, motors, wires, ropes and others for use of barges anchored at the shore. KC Shek liked to pick used stocks from the mechanics stores when he was a kid.

CPMS Yaumatei Church was situated at Hamilton Street. Missionaries gave sermons in uniform. When KC Shek was a kid, he attended Sunday Services at the church every December. Roll calls were made at the church. If children attended all the Sunday Services of December, they would receive a Christmas gift. At that time Salvation Army’s church had a similar arrangement. So KC Shek went to two Sunday Services every Sunday in December. He went to Salvation Army’s church at 10 am and CPMS Yaumatei Church at 1 pm. At Yue Lan Festivals every year, it was a custom to spread money on the streets in Yau Ma Tei. Alongside other kids, KC Shek went to the street to pick up the money, and could collect more than 10 five-cent coins In those years one five-cent coin could buy an ice-lolly while three five-cent coins could buy a frizzy drink. In his childhood, he hung onto different religions at different festivals with a view to maximizing his material gain, fully reflecting the essence of a ‘street kid’.

Title	Early landscapes in Shanghai Steet, Reclamation Street and Hamilton Street
Date	17/02/2011
Subject	Community | Social Life
Duration	12m52s
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-SKC-SEG-007

Yung Shu Tau was the heart of Yau Ma Tei with commercial activities going on around the clock. Crowds came for fortune-telling, kung fu performance and singing performance. Anita Mui, Mimi Chu, Wan Kong and other singers once performed at Yung Shu Tau. Yau Ma Tei Car Park Complex used to be open square, where lots of hawkers sold dried or wet goods. The layout of the stalls at Temple Street was not stipulated by the authority but the triads. The hawkers simply got to their positions on their own and obeyed the triads’ instructions.

Some of the buildings at Temple Street were built in the 1940s, and were characterized by the pillars erecting on pedestrian’s walkway. The high-class buildings had overhang balcony which were spacious enough for a mahjong game. The balcony also blocked sunlight from falling into the house. Windows could be well opened on rainy days. The house stayed cool and had plenty of air flow throughout the year. The entrances of the staircases of many aged buildings at Temple Street were the doors to brothels. Pimps and whores were posted there to lure and guide whore-goers to go upstairs. Since a kid, KC Shek had grasped the distribution of brothels in Yau Ma Tei from the words of the adults. After he grew up, he was elicited by whores when he was walking on Temple Street. After marriage, he took his wife to Temple Street to observe prostitution at Temple Street. He told her things to avoid on the street and ways to tackle troubles.

The entrances of the staircases at Temple Street were hot spot for doping. The drug junkies in those days inhaled drugs by means of burning tinfoil. The main type of drugs was opium. The popular drugs of today are white powder (heroin) and K Chai (ketamine), which were usually consumed with syringes. KC Shek’s granduncle liked smoking opium at the smoking cabinet at Man Ming Lane. There were about 40 shops at Man Ming Lane in the early post-war period. The wealth that the Sheks had accumulated through selling congee was sufficient to buy out all the shops at that street. KC Shek joked that he was fortunate to have not bought any property in those years, or else he would have died of venereal diseases or drugs. Kung Wo Tong at Temple Street was renowned for its chilled herbal jelly, which cured the sexually transmitted diseases suffered by a lot of patients nearby. If the residents caught flu, they usually went to Tan Ngan Lo Medicated Tea for cures. Luen Fat and Kam Shan were the old-style teahouses at Temple Street. Luen Fat served people of all backgrounds. In those years, most sizable teahouses set up a moon cake club.

Title	Street scenes around Yung Shau Tai and Temple Street
Date	17/02/2011
Subject	Community
Duration	26m29s
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-SKC-SEG-008

The entrances of the staircases at Temple Street were hot spot for doping. The drug junkies in those days inhaled drugs by means of burning tinfoil. The main type of drugs was opium. The popular drugs of today are white powder (heroin) and K Chai (ketamine), which were usually consumed with syringes. KC Shek’s granduncle liked smoking opium at the smoking cabinet at Man Ming Lane. There were about 40 shops at Man Ming Lane in the early post-war period. The wealth that the Sheks had accumulated through selling congee was sufficient to buy out all the shops at that street. KC Shek joked that he was fortunate to have not bought any property in those years, or else he would have died of venereal diseases or drugs. Kung Wo Tong at Temple Street was renowned for its chilled herbal jelly, which cured the sexually transmitted diseases suffered by a lot of patients nearby. If the residents caught flu, they usually went to Tan Ngan Lo Medicated Tea for cures. Luen Fat and Kam Shan were the old-style teahouses at Temple Street. Luen Fat served people of all backgrounds. In those years, most sizable teahouses set up a moon cake club.

In KC Shek’s many years living in Yau Ma Tei, Portland Street had grown to be his favourite place within the district. Since small, he had been every corner of the street and acquainted with all the kids there. Portland Street could indeed be called his “territory”. Cars were rare on the street in those days. There might be not even one single vehicle rolling on it in a one hour span. The kids could play shuttlecock in a circle at the middle of the street. Sometimes the adults drove the kids away right after the kids gathered on the street so as to avoid any trouble. The border of Mongkok and Yau Ma Tei used to be deserted. Pedestrian flow on Sai Yeung Choi Street stayed below 100 per hour. On Kwong Wah Street, which was more remote, not even one person could be seen in half an hour. The dusky and bizarre atmosphere there had always frightened KC Shek when he walked along it in his early years, especially during winter dusks. Night teas were available at some teahouses in Yau Ma Tei around 9 pm to 1 or 2 am. Patrons were mostly business inheritors from veteran shops in the district or those without working burdens (pejoratively called good-for-nothing), both of who were the lazzies faire who were indulged in spending and leisure. The working class never cared for a night tea as they just dropped dead right after back home from their exhausting work.

KC Shek’s family moved to Sai Yeung Choi Street in Mongkok after he went to secondary school. As his family had rented many blocks for sub-lease in Yau Ma Tei, and had quite a number of relatives in the district, they kept close contact with Yau Ma Tei after moving away from Portland Street. When getting married, KC Shek lived in a rooftop house at Sai Yeung Choi Street. It was a shamble house with just a temporary toilet. When it rained, he needed an umbrella to sleep. His wife was working as a tutor at University of Hong Kong then. In order to facilitate her going to work and at the same time improve the couple’s living condition, KC Shek moved to Hong Kong Island one or two years after marriage. He spent his childhood in Yau Ma Tei and could not be more familiar with the streets and shops there. It could be said that he knew where all the holes and slits could be found. All the sceneries were exceptionally familiar. When a kid, KC Shek lived near some funeral-related shops, and got “acquainted” with the dead since then. Some of his relatives passed away successively in recent years. Their funerals were held in Yau Ma Tei Funeral Parlour. He met the staff there again after such a long time of separation, and talked with them in a language free from any taboo or barrier.

To KC Shek, Yau Ma Tei had scarcely any offensive trade but a clean environment without peculiar smells. The only unforgettable smell was that of the leather that filled his house at Portland Street during his childhood. The street he lived at during childhood was full of casket shops. It was tranquil all days except when the suona was played at funeral processions. When his grandfather’s funeral was to be held, an application had to be submitted to the police station. The route of the procession was drawn up. It normally covered the places visited by the deceased when he was alive so as to let his neighbourhood know about his death. The entourage delivering his grandfather’s casket set off at Man Ming Lane, went all the way north along Portland Street, turned into Dundas Street, and stopped at the mortuary at Kwong Wah Hospital. He was buried in Mui Wo at last.

Title	Yau Ma Tei Life in retrospect: living environment in tenement house, street scenes, community sentiment in Yau Ma Tei
Date	17/02/2011
Subject	Community
Duration	14m7s
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-SKC-SEG-009