Christmas Bazaar at Royal HK regiment HQ around sport rd and morrisson hill?

PS-I am not a Gwulo. I am a naturalized Chinese Canadian who was born and grew up in HK.  This is my “Remembrance day” writing assignment for a senior creative writing class.  My facts may not be well researched and my viewpoint probably differs from yours.  Comment appreciated.

Remembrance Day is no longer officially observed in HK after the former British colony reverted back to China.  Every year on November 11, A few aging expatriates can still be seen laying a wreath at the cenotaph at Queens square in the central district. Some private schools may still choose to observe a minute of silence at the 11 hour just before lunch break.  And for the record, while passing by HK on November 11, 2012, Stephen Harper, Canadian Prime Minister, paid a visit to the military cemetery to commemorate the 283 Canadian soldiers who gave their life in the defense of HK in 1941.    But to the new master of Hong Kong, Beijing has always regarded the last two world wars as conflicts amongst colonial powers fighting over the spoils of the third world countries, often at the expense of China.   Hence the  new people republic of China would rather chooses to look forward and tried to obliterate a past which had inflicted the once proud but weak nation with shame, humiliation and suffering to its people.

Buried in the maze of a web of overpass expressways, pedestrian crossing tunnels at the junction of Queen’s Road East and Morrison Road and Sports Road, one has to search carefully in order to find a small plaque which describes this was the location where a former military facility where the-Headquarter of the Royal HK Regiment (The volunteer) - once stood.     

Today the barricade had been dismantled to make way for the widening of the roads, a monument in the front of the traffic circle had been unceremoniously relocated to the HK cemetery and the parade ground land redeveloped into the new HK Jockey club museum and clubhouse.  As for the British trained local Chinese soldiers, their regiment was officially disbanded in 1995 before the handover of HK back to China in 1997 leaving them without a job, a UK equivalent military personnel pension entitlement or the right to abode to Britain.

The history of the Royal HK regiment dates back to 1854 when locals were hired to relieve duty of the British garrison stationed in HK who were required to be shipped out to fight in the Crimean war.   During the colonial days, the 2000 strong regiment was made up of several brigades and they assisted in border patrol, reinforced police to crush local uprisings and fought to defense HK against Japanese invasion in the WW2.  After the fall of HK in 1941 with the regiment suffering high causalities, many of these soldiers stayed behind and melted away into the local Chinese population where they continued to fight guerilla warfare and ran reconnaissance mission for their British commanding officers operating outside HK.  Others evacuated with the defeated British force to Burma.  I imagine, with no supporting evidence, thats where some units of the HK regiment were trained how to work with mules as working animals to move supplies and ammunition while building the famous Burma Road.

When I was about 3-5 years old I lived just a block away from the regiment HQ.  Every evening after dinner my father or grandfather would take me out for a stroll.  I remembered we spent quite a bit of time standing behind a tall green front gate watching the little Chinese regiment soldiers marched in formation inside the parade ground to the loud shouting of a big Caucasian drill sergeant.

There were trespassing warning signs posted around military facility and the front gates, manned by two sentry guards, stayed closed except for restricted authorized access.  However for one weekend every year just around Christmas, the gates would be opened, the mess hall fully decorated and the local neighbors were invited to attend the annual Christmas bazaar. There the adults would be encouraged to mingle with the soldiers while browsing over the Christmas crafts. While the parents sipped tea and nibbled biscuits inside the mess hall, excited little children like me would be escorted by the soldiers to wait in line to ride one of the mules for a few laps on the parade ground.

My first mule ride at a tender age of three was one of the joyous exhilarating memories I shall never forget.  While it was not exactly the noble Shetland pony with silky mane found in children book, I can still remember vividly the excitement riding on that funny animal with big brown eyes and perked up rabbit ears-an experience I looked forward to repeat in the coming years.

As for the men and women of the Royal HK regiment, I have no recollection or can I to put a face to anyone of them.  Depend whom you ask, some will remember them as gallant soldiers who put their life on the line for HK. Other will say they were mercenaries, soldiers of fortunes and renegades who worked for a foreign power to oppress the local Chinese people.  Today as the remaining old soldiers started to wither away we have little chance to hear their side of the story.  Personally I like to believe they were just men and women who once took the job so as to feed their family and better position them and their children to lead a better life beyond HK.  Not many of us are familiar about a fellow Canadian by the name of William Poy, previous NCO of the Royal HK regiment.  But we all know of his daughter, Adrienne Clarkson, past Governor General of Canada.

On a separate note as China is moving into a consumer oriented society, the government noticed that in Canada we have the boxing day sales and in the United States they have the pre Thanksgiving Black Friday sales so in China on double eleven (November 11) the date is now officially designated as  “crazy shopper day”.  On recent Asian trip to China, Stephen Harper, PM, inked a deal with the biggest e-commerce company in China which guarantee the sale of 200,000 live Canadian lobsters on its website at a fixed price of $12.80 per pound (100 RMB) on November 11.  (For the record, Canadian fishermen was only able to deliver 30,000 on that day).  So for this year Remembrance Day while many thought of the fallen soldiers, others would be contemplating succulent lobsters and probably just me thinking about a jackass.

Ref: http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/world/harper-honours-canadian-war-dead-in-hong-kong-on-remembrance-day/article5182285/

Ref:http://www.thestar.com/news/canada/2014/11/07/stephen_harpers_first_day_in_china_heavy_on_economic_ties.html

Ref: http://archive.gg.ca/media/doc.asp?lang=e&DocID=4186

Ref: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Royal_Hong_Kong_Regiment

Thanks Dave for the video. Just curious who are these local young men and women in the marching band?  They looked quite young to be members of the Royal HK regiment. Hearing the theme song from “the bridge on the river kwai” brings back old memories.  That was my late dad favorite movie and he used to whistle that tune quite a bit.