TIME: Almanac 1990/1990 Time Magazine Compact Almanac, The (1991)(Time).iso/time/011689/01168900.073

Text File | 1990-09-17 | 4KB | 71 lines

BOOKS, Page 72

Wind and Water


    HONG KONG
    by Jan Morris
    Random House; 359 pages; $19.95

    Not wanting to miss a historic bash, Jan Morris has already
booked a room in Hong Kong for July 1, 1997. That is the day when
Britain's 99-year lease on the crown colony runs out and the
People's Republic of China moves in. Except for replacing the Union
Jack with its red banner, Beijing does not now plan any major
redecorating. The island and its adjacent territories are to be
designated a Special Administrative Region with authority to
continue practicing their unfettered style of economic
individualism.

    So much for the domino theory. Despite China's power to
stalemate the Korean War, and the U.S. defeat in Viet Nam,
capitalism has flourished in Asia -- a painful irony when one
considers the price paid by successive American governments to
contain the Commies.

    Morris' guide to Hong Kong's past, present and future provides
useful perspectives on the shifting balances of economic power. If
her tone ranges from the cheerfully neutral to the unabashedly
admiring, it is because this author of travel books and studies of
British imperialism is fundamentally an optimist.   New forms and
new methods superimposed on ancient beliefs give Hong Kong its
basic texture.  One can see a computer-store manager keeping
accounts with an abacus. Hong Kong's skyline bespeaks the sterile
utility of modern commercial architecture, yet few of the colony's
real estate developers would pick up a shovel before consulting a
geomancer to site the building according to the rules of feng shui,
meaning "wind and water" and envisioning a felicitous balance of
place and design.

    "Nothing is more flexibly resilient than Chineseness," says
Morris. Similar adaptability can be attributed to the first
European and American merchants who were allowed to open factories
and warehouses on the Guangzhou coast 150 years ago. The British
eventually achieved dominance by dealing drugs, importing opium
from India and selling it to mainland China. A pragmatic lot, the
rulers of the Celestial Empire seem to have understood that the
opiate of the people was opium.

    It took some gunboat diplomacy to bring the area under British
sovereignty. The Treaty of Nanking in 1842 ended the First
Anglo-Chinese War and transferred Hong Kong to the crown. In 1898
the mainland region later known as the New Territories was added
under the 99-year lease agreement. The only disruption of the
tenancy was the Japanese occupation during World War II.

    An extensive knowledge and understanding of historical forces
gives Morris a leg up on most travel journalists. What
distinguishes her work is an ability, if not need, to write with
her senses as well as her intellect. The sights and sounds of what
she calls Hong Kong's "fructifying untidiness" are abundant and
enthusiastically conveyed. So are the odors, especially what the
author calls a blend of "duck-mess" and gasoline.

    After more than a dozen books and scores of travel articles,
Morris remains unjaded by the noise and disruption of urban life.
She is certainly a believer in possibilities (see Conundrum, her
1974 account of the medical and psychological sex-change procedures
that turned James Morris into Jan Morris). It is worth noting that
when she writes about the "architectural hodgepodge" and
"irresistible activity" of Hong Kong, she does so as a visitor, not
as a permanent resident. Home base is a quiet village in Wales
where, one can reasonably assume, the feng shui has been good for
centuries.