Repulse Bay
The bay as it was when we lived there and as it was in 2000 when I visited. The flats we lived in are circled.
We lived in the old, now rebuilt, Burnside Estates. The blocks in the centre looked a bit Ceausescu like.
The long building on the shore was some
sort of restaurant, with a coffee shop at the near end.
I got thrown out of there for doing "the twist" to the very exciting jukebox they had!
All I can say is that Repulse Bay has changed dramatically in the last 40 odd years. I can remember the old Repulse Bay Hotel, (here's the new one), where we'd have Sunday lunch on the veranda from the magnificent seafood buffet, and apart from a coffee shop at one end of the beach, there was nothing like the amount of development one sees today. When I left Hong Kong to go to boarding school in the UK, the execrable food was a real challenge. Even in the best UK restaurants it was crap compared to the old Repulse Bay Hotel and almost anywhere in HK, including street stalls - come to think of it, especially the street stalls.
Now the Bay has KFC, Macdonalds, one of the ugliest buildings I have ever seen in my life occupies the site of the old hotel and completely dominates the bay. It's painted in bottom-of-the-swimming-pool blue - absolutely ghastly and the whole place has managed to, I don't know, get somehow shabbier, while simultaneously getting more expensive. There are one hell of a lot more people living here now, thats for sure.
Since 2000 when the photos on this page were shot, a completely new monstrosity has risen in the bay.To me it looks like a British power station stack, circa 1960. It's also enormous and built quite close to where Burnside Estates were. Just wait till I get back out there with my camera. Combined with the building on the site of the Repulse Bay Hotel, the whole bay looks sort of unbalanced, and a collection of wildly different constructions that bear no relation to each other, but are instead jostling for space and a view.
I have been contacted by past general manager of the Repulse Bay Hotel, explaining that the old building was unsafe and had reached the end of its economic life. Everything has to move on, but I think the Bay is now a monument to what can happen when there are virtually no planning laws, as in HK. Its not just the new Hotel building that I dislike (mind you, in the 60's the old ones, apart from the Hotel, weren't exactly anything to write home about), it's the combination of all the new stuff that's been built in the last 40 odd years. It looks a bloody mess.
Repulse Bay was the most disappointing place on my trip. I had a very strange feeling when I stood on it for the first time in 35 years, but the tat and the new buildings put me right off. The flats we inhabited have long gone and instead there are numerous high-rises. However, one thing they can't change is the view.
It was great to stand on the beach, gaze out to sea, and let the memories come flooding back. Also, I got there by taking the bus from Exchange Square, and we travelled the road (there's only one) that I took every day to get to school in Victoria. Just driving along and seeing the junction with the road to Aberdeen etc. - now that was enjoyable, slightly disturbing and a whole load of other things which I can't quite work out. I think the main feelings I got were: "I never should have left this place", and "This is where I belong".
I used to scramble along the rocks on the left side of the bay and at the end there is a cave, which would flood at high tide (I heard its now sealed). The South China Sea used to throw up all sorts of wonderful stuff for a kid to investigate. One of the memories that came back to me was of Dad and myself climbing along these rocks, and getting to a point where return by our outward route was impossible - I was only a child. For some reason I stayed calm and composed (now I'd probobaly panic) and reached safety.
Another childhood story - I was swimming around one day with my polyurathane half surfboard when the alarm was sounded from the lookout tower thingie on the beach. All the swimmers clambered onto the round platforms which are moored about 20 metres out from the shore - the lookout had spotted a shark. Unfortunately my board blew out of my hands, and like a fool I dived in to retrieve it. I got the board and some horrified Chinese hauled me out onto the platform. We looked down into the water and we saw the large white/grey shape of a large shark coming to investigate my snack potential, and it circled our platform a few times before swimming off. A small boat was sent out to ferry me back to shore. A narrow escape!
Some other things haven't changed...its best to avoid some of the local wildlife. I noticed that the Bay now benenfits from a Shark net - not there in my day. Wimps!
And here's the no fishing sign at the end of the jetty where I spent many enjoyable childhood hours, er, fishing. It was allowed then, or at least no-one stopped me. The groin itself has benn rebuilt - in my day it was a crumbling, ugly, grey, narrow concrete strip. It's much wider and smarter now.
To be honest jellyfish were always more of a problem than sharks, and a much more likely encounter. For instance, the childhood trip in the photo a couple of paragraphs above was curtailed by a jellyfish swimming past that was approximately the same size as the inflatable dinghy I'm in (well it looked that way to me anyway). There were occasional blooms of tiny round yellowish ones which were quite painful if you got stung by twenty or so at the same time, as well as other larger species. I've no idea what they were, but its wise to treat them all as dangerous. During the hot weather, the best place to be is in the water, and there was always the Country Club or Shek-O, which had a salt water pool. I can remember getting my first face mask, swimming round the bay and observing what I'd been swimming over and through for the first time - I was absolutely horrified. Fascinating beach-combing after a typhoon though.
Classic "European Bubble" shots below:
My Mother and me at Shek-0, South East corner of HK Island, at the very
edge of the old Empire. Note Union flag flying on hillside. Life was tough
in the colonies! Since Hong Kong became British by "virtue" of a
series of enormous dope deals, 100 years before this photo
was taken, the lifestyle was entirely appropriate.
Diving practice at 1960's Hong Kong Country Club.
I think the main thing I learnt from this trip to HK was that if I could change one thing in my life, it would have been my family not moving back to the UK and instead staying right where we were.