Those of us who’ve been in Hong Kong are constantly barraged by articles and people describing the magic of the now-dismantled Kowloon Walled City. Amidst the romanticization of this 6.5 acre block that was ungoverned or policed for decades (it lay in limbo between communist China and colonial British rule), people rarely offer any photographs of its inside. Until now, I had…
This suburban expansion has taken place so quickly that in some places, it has created what are known in Chinese as 城中村 or chengzhongcun, which translates roughly to village-in-a-city: older mud and brick houses and abandoned fields surrounded by brand new apartment complexes. Often,…