A Voice in Hong Kong: Part 3
Night view of Kowloon side (29/06/2026)
This is the final part of my Hong Kong blog. Here, you can read Part 1 and Part 2.
26.06.2026 - Kai Tak; Sai Kung (+ Sharp Island); Quarry Bay
In the morning, I went to First Sip, a newly opened cafe around the corner from my hotel that I became a bit of a regular at for the final few days of my trip. I had a cinnamon bun and an ice matcha latte. I had arranged to meet up with A again to visit Sai Kung, in teh New Territories. I got the MTR to Kai Tak on Kowloon, where we arranged to meet. We had lunch in the Airside mall. I was amused by the robot cleaner that wandered the mall! A then drove us to Sai Kung.
In Sai Kung, we bought some cakes and pineapple buns and then took a boat over to Sharp Island.
It was raining quite a bit but we wandered over to the tombolo, the sand bar that connects Sharp Island to the islet of Kiu Tau. On the beach, there were pineapple bun rocks - rocks with cracks that made them look like the famous HK pineapple bun.
We caught the boat back to Sai Kung and wandered around a bit more before driving back to HK Island.
We then went to a bit of an photography hot spot: the Monster Building (a.k.a. Transformer Building). It is a group of apartment buildings in Quarry Bay on HK Island that became famous after a photo by HK-based French photographer Romain Jacquet-Lagreze went viral on Instagram. It was apparently also a setting for a scene in one of the Transformer movies. There was a bit of construction going on so there was scaffolding but we still managed to get a nice pic. Felt a bit cringe doing the whole influencer thing.
27.06.2026 - M+ Museum, West Kowloon Cultural District
I went over to the M+, the museum of contemporary art “dedicated to collecting, exhibiting, and interpreting visual art, design and architecture, moving image, and Hong Kong visual culture of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries”. I got the MTR from Sheung Wan to Kowloon. I walked through the Elements mall (and actually got a little lost) to get to the West Kowloon Cultural District and to the museum.
Teaser panel for the Lee Bul: From 1998 to Now exhibit. Part of Lee Bul’s Untitled (Willing To Be Vulnerable—Velvet #15)
I spent about 4 hours in the museum. The highlight for me by far was the ‘Lee Bul: From 1998 to Now’ exhibition (it’s now ended), which showcased “an otherworldly landscape of utopian dreams and future ruins”. Two of my favourite pieces were ‘Monster: Black’ (2011) and ‘Cyborg W6’ (2001) from the Cyborg series and Anagram series. According to the accompanying plaque for the section of the exhibit called ‘The Body and Technology’, “Lee Bul has always been interested in the human body in her work. […] Lee’s art from the late 1990s and early 2000s continues this exploration of the body across a wide range of sculptural forms, methods, and materials. She calls some of these works ‘monsters’, which sprout eel-like tentacles, and others ‘cyborgs’, with technological enhancement that recall both science fiction films and ancient marble statues. Lee’s Anagram sculptures grew out of her Monsters and were made in parallel with her Cyborgs. They are both threatening and ravishing, mechanical and botanical. Lee’s figures invites us to think about a future in which technology and biology come together to form new hybrids.”
I loved ‘Cyborg W6’. I bought a postcard of it. As per the wall label, “with its missing head and limbs, this white figure might remind you of ancient Greek or Roman statues. These sculptures from Western culture have disproportionately influenced beauty standards around the world. But you will also notice that this body is enhanced in unexpected ways, like its armoured limbs and mechanical joints. Throughout history, people have dreamed of transcending the limits of the human body, first through artistic idealisation, and today with technological modification. Lee Bul’s Cyborg series explores this timeless desire, revealing how we continue to project feminine ideals onto new forms.”
I am a massive fan of cephalopods (octopuses, squids, cuttlefish, etc.) so I love these tentacled pieces, especially ‘Monster: Black’. (I got this on a postcard too.) As per the wall label, “"its limbs twist and stretch like creeping roots or wriggling eels. Lee is interested in the idea of hybrid bodies, where organic and artificial elements - often seen as opposites - come together.”
For me, ‘Plexus’ not only has a vague Alien-like chest burster aesthetic, but is also reminiscent of the cordyceps fungus. There is something similar about about ‘Sargasso’. The piece has 11 parts hanging on the wall. “The title, Sargasso, refers to multiple things: the Sargasso Sea region of the Atlantic Ocean; sargassum, a seaweed that grows in massive, drifting mats in which eels spawn; and the 1966 novel Wide Sargasso Sea, by Dominican British author Jean Rhys. The book is a prequel to the Victorian novel Jane Eyre, which explores themes of gender and colonialism. As a young artist, Lee Bul used soft sculptures in performances to address urgent issues like female body standard. Works like these indirectly explore the problematic association between femininity and monstrosity that can be found throughout history” (as per the wall label; see also the website).
Below are various pieces from Lee Bul’s Perdu series. “These are not typical paintings - to make them, Lee builds up layer after layer of pigments mixed with stone powder and mother-of-pearl. She them sands them down to reveal what lies beneath the surface. It is a technically complex and labour intensive process. The series has evolved over time, from more figurative compositions to purely abstract patterns and forms.
The title comes from the French author Marcel Proust’s À la recherche du temps perdu (In Search of Lost Time), published in the early twentieth century. The word ‘perdu’, or ‘lost’, suggests how the artist slowly excavates things hidden within. These artworks are perhaps a metaphor for memory - how our mental images are lost and recovered again, sometimes clear, but more fragmented and altered” (as per wall label).
As someone who has an affinity for posthumanism, I enjoy pieces that question the boundaries between human, animal, nature, and technology. I loved Lee’s ‘Titan’ (2013). “This hybrid figure looks both human and animal, natural and artificial. Its antlers stretch high above its head, while mechanical joints connect human and hooved feet. People have long dreamed of overcoming the limits of the body to become something greater. Yet the shattered mirrors and broken antler here remind us that these ambitions toward power and immortality are always fragile. This idea is also reflected in the title of the work, Titan, which refers to the ancient gods in Greek mythology who were ultimately overthrown by their own descendents” (quoting the wall label).
‘Infinite Starburst…’ (2009) - “Do you find this humanoid structure beautiful or frightening? The way we understand our bodies is constantly changing. Today, we alter ourselves in countless ways, whether to improve our health or reach for unattainable beauty standards. Lee Bul has noted, ‘I’m always concerned with notions about extension of the human body, substitution of the human body, transcendence of the flesh, and the desire for immortality…’. As technology advances, modifying our bodies becomes ever more possible. How do you feel about this new future we live in?” (quoting the wall label).
‘Aubade’ (2007) - This metal structure is designed to capture the “idea of failed idealism”. It “plays a series of messages in blinking lights, like a radio tower broadcasting information. The texts are quotes from utopian theory and literature written in Esperanto, a ‘universal language’ invented in 1887 to promote world peace and mutual understanding. But the experiment was a failure - very few people ever learned Esperanto.” With ‘Aubade’, “Lee explores the contrast between these lofty ideals and the disappointments that soon followed” (quoting the wall label).
The metal tower of ‘Aubade V’ (2019) was “made of metal salvaged from de-commissioned guard posts in the Korean Demilitarised Zone (DMZ) between North and South Korea.[…] The word ‘aubade’ refers to a poem or piece of music for the morning, typically a lover’s parting song. It conveys an ambiguous sense of grief and loss, but also a longing to reunite. The tower seems to represent the stalemate between Korea’s two widely contrasting ideological systems. The message on the LED screen is an astronomical fact describing the Earth’s tilt, which makes these ideological conflicts seem small in comparison” (quoting the wall label).
Below are highlights from elsewhere in the museum, including the M+ Sigg Collection: Inner Worlds that looks at Chinese art of the mid-1990s to 2010s through the lens of emotional expression, where the artists “communicate joy, sadness, calm, anxiety, doubt, and wonder.”
Fang Lijun’s ‘SARS’ “depicts a sea of bald men looking in the same direction with gaping mouths. Their expressions convey a sense of restlessness”. Fang Lijun “accentuates the contrast between the orange-yellow heads and the black eyes and mouths, capturing the crippling anxiety caused by the SARS outbreak in 2003” (according to the accompanying plaque). It could easily apply to anxiety of the Covid-19 pandemic too.
By far the creepiest piece was Yue Minjun’s ‘2000 A.D.’, which consists of 25 life-sized sculptures. “Here, [Yue Minjun] arranges them like the famous terracotta warriors found in the mausoleum of Emperor Qin Shihuang. Each figure has an identical facial expression, clothes and posture, making their tightly shut eyes and uncanny grins feel intimidating” (according to the accompanying plaque).
Yu Youhan’s ‘Untitled (Mao Marilyn)’ obviously combines the image of Mao and Marilyn Monroe. It acknowledges “their shared status as popular icons. By merging their images, Yu also considers the complicated relationship between socialist ideals and commercialism, which co-existed in China despite contrasting values” (according to the accompanying plaque). My only gripe is that it should have been called Mao-ilyn Monroe or maybe Marilyn Mao-roe.
I also enjoyed Ai Weiwei’s ‘Fragments’, Yangjiang Group’s ‘Calligraphy Peach Blossom Garden’, and Liu Ye’s ‘Gun’.
A few more pieces I liked from elsewhere in the museum:
The piece below is incredible. It is Yang Jiechang’s ‘Black and White Mustard Seed Garden (Tale of the 11th Day Series)’. “In this expansive landscape, animals and humans transcend all conventional boundaries to engage in relationships that are by turns playful, erotic, and predatory. Is this a paradise of unfettered desire, or a lawless and chaotic hell? Trained in calligraphy and ink painting, Yang Jiechang invokes the cultural authority of these classical art forms through brushwork and compositional models. At the same time, he subverts this authority with suggestions of violence and sexuality. Nestled amidst tree branches on the rightmost panel, the artist gazes back at the viewer as a bald human-animal hybrid. By including his own portrait in the way, Yang seems to implicate himself in this morally questionable scene” (as per the accompanying plaque).
It is worth clicking on and exploring to see all the detail:
I bought a bunch of postcards from the museum gift shop to decorate my room at home. I also got a poster print of Marc Riboud's photo of Gong Li.
I hadn’t eaten any lunch so when I left through the Elements mall I got a bento bowl. I then got the MTR back to Central.
In the evening, I went for an egg bubble waffle from the Michelin recommended Mammy Pancake in Sheung Wan. I settled in a nearby rest garden to eat it. 😋
28.06.2026 - FIFA Museum, Causeway Bay
In the morning, I captured some street art in Sheung Wan (Seth 2024) and then stopped for a coffee and breakfast at the Last Sip, which had some great latte art.
The 2026 FIFA World Cup was in full swing. I was not able to watch any of England’s group stage matches as they were kicking off at about 4am and, while I follow football, I am not so much of a fan as to get up that early to watch an England group stage match. Anyway, I found out that there was a FIFA Museum in Times Square shopping mall in Causeway Bay.
I admit I hesitated to give money to FIFA after their absolutely appalling behaviour, especially Gianni Infantino cosying up to Trump. But I am a football fan. This is the insidiousness of FIFA. They exploit our love of the game. There will have to be a reckoning at some point I’m sure. But, until then, I just wanted to see some footballing history.
I went for lunch in the Times Square shopping mall. Afterwards, I went to another Uniqlo shop and got a t-shirt for a gift for my Dad, who is notoriously difficult to buy for. He has since worn the t-shirt a lot so I consider that a win.
While I had been away, I had been talking to a lovely woman, N, on an app. We arranged to meet up in the afternoon. We went on a hunt for some street art. There was an awesome cat/woman piece that was part of the HK Walls project. However, it was from 2019 so it was rather unrealistic that it would still be there. That’s kind of the beauty of street art. The city is a living, breathing entity. The only constant is change. New buildings go up, old ones come down. Street art can be ephemeral. It can get covered and disappear with nary a thought. Indeed, it looks like the HK Walls project often uses the same locations, covering old art with new. But it was so lovely just walking around and chatting with N it did not matter that we didn’t find it. Even though we didn’t see that specific piece, we did find some other cool street art (below). We walked down by the harbour, along Wan Chai Waterfront Promenade (if my memory is correct), and we sat in a retired MTR train carriage.
We then went for dinner, and then a cocktail at The Mixing Room in Central.
The Mixing Room was such a cool cosy bar. It was dark with low, almost candle-like lighting, and it had thousands of vintage glass bottles hanging from the ceiling, on the walls, everywhere really.
To round the evening off, we had some ice cream at Messina 😋
29.06.2026 - Central (Tai Kwun)
I went on another graffiti hunt around Central. I still had some to check off my list, and then some I just randomly found while searching:
For lunch, I went to Tai Kwun, the former Central Police Station compound that is now an art space and houses bars and restaurants. I had been told that LockCha teahouse in Tai Kwun did fantastic vegetarian dim sum. It was such a hot day and there was only space to eat outside. I had a cold phoenix oolong tea in a beautiful bottle and lovely dim sum. Afterwards, I wandered around Central a bit more. I went to tea specialist Yuan Yuan Tang and bought some tea as a gift for my sister.
In the evening, I met up with N again. We met at Tin Hua MTR station and then had dinner at a Japanese restaurant, Kyukyoku Do, in Fortress Hill. We then went and had some glutinous rice balls (some with sesame paste filling, some with peanut butter) in a warming sweet ginger broth. We then took a beautiful walk by the harbour.
30.06.2026 - Last Day
This was my final day in HK. And I got sick! I think all the MTR journeys packed with people at close quarters had caught up with me (I should have worn a mask) or perhaps the going in and out of cold AC buildings into the HK heat also had an effect. I was surprised it had taken this long to be honest.
I had planned to go to University of Hong Kong campus for an exhibit in the University Museum and Art Gallery on The Little Prince and Antoine de Saint-Exupéry. But I was not feeling up to it. I slept in and then dragged myself into the baking HK heat to go and get a load of medicine from Watsons to try and make the 14 hour flight back more bearable. While out, I got some takeaway sushi for lunch and ate it in my hotel room. By the afternoon, I was feeling a bit better so decided to cross one more thing off my list. I wanted to try the pineapple bun bubble waffle from Chicken Egg Boy. It’s an egg bubble waffle but each bubble is like a little pineapple bun! So, once more I dragged myself out and got a takeaway and ate it in my room. So good!
My flight wasn’t until 22:45, but had to check out of my hotel at 5pm. Took the bus to the airport, and got there at about 6 so had a bit of time to kill. Amazingly, N met me at the airport to say goodbye. She’s such a good egg! 🫶
The flight home was not as bad as I was expecting. I watched a bunch of films, and managed to get some sleep. Arrived back in UK at 6am July 1st. Then had to sit through a 5 hour bus ride, but arrived back in Nottingham around midday. Home!
