1937 Hong Kong

Wong Yuk Mei
Born in 1937
Meifoo, Hong Kong
Interviewed on Jan. 28, 2018
by Yan Ho Kenny Lam

Although I can’t recall clearly, I think one of the very first movies I watched is My Son A-Chang starring Bruce Lee when he is still a kid. I watched it in the theatre closed to our home in Meifoo, but I think it closed down some thirty years ago. The movie about the daily lives of the kid and his father, nothing too special I remember, but it really depicts the lives of grassroots in that generation: living in public housing or subdivided flats. Bruce Lee, though, was a very gifted performer even in his age. It is funny how the kid later became a Kung Fu legend.

Movie theatres are always huge, chaotic and somewhat dirty when I am young. When I am around 10, there are not many other forms of entertainment in Hong Kong, which makes going to movies a very economical and practical option. There was more differentiation of tickets back then: Sitting in the front rows, middle rows, the back, and the balcony all cost different. The tickets back then are around $1 (around 0.13 USD), but as a kid, it is a huge amount of money. Luckily, there is a rule that adults can bring however many kids in the theatre with them, and so “Meng saam mei” (following a stranger adult into the cinema by holding onto the corner of their clothes) are common. Those are some good times.

The one thing that I remembered is the food. Whenever a screening as about to begin, hawkers gathered outside the theatre to sell food and beverages to movie-goers. Sugar canes are the most popular snack, although I’m not a huge fan of as you have to spit out the residue after each bite and it gets messy really quickly. Chicken drumsticks were my personal favorite, and caramel popcorn was only for special occasions as it was sold by the theatre but not hawkers, and was usually more expensive.

It is not until around 30 did I first meet my husband. He is an owner of a garment factory back in Mainland China, and so he was able to treat me to some nicer places. The Li Theatre in downtown Causeway Bay was, at that time, the most expensive theatre in Hong Kong, decorated with marble and Italian decors. We went their quite often, maybe once a week or two. That was an era when the Hong Kong movie industry bloomed, the movies we made were sold all over Asia. Although Hollywood films are available, we usually choose Cantonese films as I can’t understand English at all. We usually opt for Hong Kong style musicals or Kung Fu movies. Chan Po-Chu and Siu Fong-Fong are some of our favorites. Of course, everyone will go watch Bruce Lee immediately when his films are on. The proliferation of the entertainment industry definitely marked the epoch of economic prosperity of Hong Kong.