Colonisation

Colonization of Hong Kong

Two islands under the Qing Dynasty of China were taken over by UK and Japan respectively. These two islands faced a different fate.

In 1684, before the island Taiwan was lost to Japan in 1895, a “Taiwan Administration Department” was formally established by China, thus giving the island the status of a province with its own corresponding administration organ. Under the Japanese colonial power, the prevailing education system was changed to accommodate the Japanese principles on education. That is to say, the Chinese there were forced to learn Japanese as well as acquire the Japanese identities. The total submission was forced on the Chinese with brutality.

However, the Chinese in Hong Kong were in no way forced by its British colonial power to adopt the British way of living after hoisting of the British flag in 1841. The British chose to leave the Chinese to themselves inasmuch as their normal daily lives were concerned. It was the trade which mattered. English was and still is nowadays an official language of the Crown Colony even though the island was returned to the Chinese rule in 1997. In his book written on Hong Kong, Jan Morris wrote：”Of these businessmen (the British, the Americans, the French and the Dutch), much the most numerous, truculent and successful were the British, to whom China seemed a putative extension, if only in commercial terms, of their highly profitable Indian Empire. They were in a mood of dynamic confidence. The power of new technology was behind them, and they felt themselves to be on a winning streak. In particular, victory in the Napoleonic wars had made their nation indisputably dominant in the East.”

The British culture, however, leaves its traces in Hong Kong. The Royal Hong Kong Jockey Club, founded by and for the English-speaking community, still maintains its prestige of exclusivity. Horse races is the sport of the people, even though it is the betting part of it which appeals to most. The “gentleman” behaviour is still expected, so as the “lady-like” manner, let alone the English language which was the key to promotion at work during the British rule and is still regarded as a must for all at the present time.

Sources

Wu, Xiang. Riben Qing Hua Shixi Jimin Jiuyu Zhenca. Liuling, China: Liuling Zhubenshe, 1994.

Morris, Jan. Hong Kong Xianggang. London: Penguin Books, 1997.