Taking time for self-care and further reflections about what Hong Kongers want

The closest thing I've seen to a rainbow in recent days

Or maybe it'd be this (Yes, there still are Lennon Walls about

in Hong Kong -- but mainly on the walls of private establishments)

Hot on the heels of the one year anniversaries of the 1 million persons anti-China extradition march of June 9th, a day that will go into infamy in Hong Kong (and which got me mulling the beginning of the end of the Hong Kong I love), and the death of Marco Leung came that for a massive 2 million (and one) protest march against the extradition bill that, if Hong Kong had a democracy, really should have made it game over for Carrie Lam and co.  But even while the most unpopular Hong Kong Chief Executive by far did withdraw that hated bill last October, the other four demands that the majority of Hong Kongers have been making for a year now remain unfulfilled.    

Worse, one year on, Hong Kong is feeling more and more like a police state, with so many freedoms being eroded even before the enactment of the security legislation the Chinese Communist regime seems utterly determined to impose on this rebellious territory whose people's hearts and minds it surely knows that it has lost.  To be sure, people still have more freedoms in Hong Kong than in Mainland China itself.  But you can't say a place feels free when, for two weeks in a row, a menacing convoy of police vehicles, including a water cannon truck and an armored truck, gets parked outside a public park, ready to roll into what is normally a busy shopping and dining district.  

Having spent quite a bit of time out on Monday, I decided to stay in for much of Tuesday -- and, consequently, missed not only the sight of that convoy of police vehicles but, also, at least one rainbow -- and in some cases two! -- viewable from various points in Hong Kong.  And as it so happened, the most eyecatching news reported that day actually occured thousands of miles away from Hong Kong -- along another section of the Chinese border, involving a clash between Chinese and Indian troops, involving rocks and clubs(!), that left at least 20 people dead on one side alone!  (Oh, and the North Koreans blew up a liason office -- can you imagine what would happen if this occured to the Liason Office in Hong Kong?!)  

I did venture out again yesterday though.  Among other things, I decided to practice self-care by treating myself to a viewing of a Hong Kong movie I had wanted to see for months (but couldn't for weeks because of the cinemas having been closed because of the Wuhan coronavirus).  Ray Yeung's beautifully understated Suk Suk made for an involving watch.  

But while it is a very good film, its viewing did leave me feeling rather sad.  Watching a Hong Kong film in these troubled times, I guess it's inevitable that one will see personal meaning in it.  In this case, there's a moment in the movie when the lead character (sensitively played by Tai Bo) talks about how he's done well for himself since escaping from Mainland China during the Cultural Revolution to Hong Kong.  He has a family, a home, enough money.  What more should he want?

Well, in his case, it would be the freedom to live the way he really wants, and openly -- since he's a gay man who's been so closeted all his life that he got himself married with children and one grandchild (on whom he dotes).  And, really, that's what a lot of Hong Kongers want: to be able to have the freedom to live the way they really want, to not have to pretend to be someone/something else that they really don't feel that they actually are (even if other people think that's the case), to love who and what they want (without being told it's wrong).  To feel free, you know, to sing the songs they like and not the ones they don't.  To feel happy and safe in their home.  Rainbow or not, what a wonderful world it then would be.