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We’ve all seen countless lists of things we apparently don’t know about Hong Kong, mostly filled with stuff we absolutely do know, such as “Hong Kong is one of the most expensive cities in the world”, and “English is one of our official languages”. No?! You don’t say! So in a bid to teach you overachieving locals something new, we’ve mined Ovolo’s very informative Silver Egg blog to bring you five things you never knew about Hong Kong, for real this time.
Why it’s “Wong Kok” in Canto but “Mong Kok” in English
Image: Ken Shi via Flickr
Those with a bit of basic Canto under their belts, or who ever take their earphones out on the MTR, will have noticed that “Mong Kok” is pronounced “Wong Kok” in Cantonese. However, few of us ever bothered to find out why. Luckily for us, the folks writing Ovolo’s The Silver Egg blog did.
It’s called “Wong Kok” in Cantonese, so why change the “W” to an “M” in the English spelling? Well, according to the most popular version of this tale, the original English language sign in the district was written by an illiterate man who accidentally inverted the “W” to make a “M”. We didn’t tell you it was a particularly exciting story, to be fair.
Mere mortals can fire the Noon Day Gun
It’s been an integral part of Hong Kong daily life since the 1800s, but apparently they let any old fool fire the Noon Day Gun these days… for a price. That’s right, folks. For the absolute bargain “donation” of HKD33,000 to the Hong Kong Community Chest (yep, exactly the same thing as in Monopoly), you can fire one off at noon from the location near the Causeway Bay Typhoon Shelter.
However, you will not be shooting the original six-pounder, but a three-pound Hotchkiss instead, as the former was deemed to be too noisy for Hongkongers’ delicate little ears. And if you know absolutely nothing about the Noon Day Gun (apart from the above newly-learnt fact), FYI, it is thought it was fired at midday every day so that sailors within earshot of Hong Kong Harbour could set their watches, therefore making navigation easier.
We have spiders than can eat birds and snakes (sorry about that)
The Golden Silk Orb-Weaver spider might sound like something out of a fairy tale, but it’s actually more suited to a horror story. While you may not have heard of it before, this terrifying species of arachnid has been around for a casual 165 million years.
They build huge and impressive webs, if you like that kind of thing, and have been known to eat birds and snakes. (“Eww, he’s eating a snake”, indeed.) And yep, unfortunately we do indeed play host to them in Hong Kong. Don’t have nightmares, kids.
Green hats are never in fashion
Image: Courtesy of Unionwear
While some of you “true Hongkongers” may roll your eyes at this one and snarkily say, “Well I knew that”, we’re including it as one of our Hong Kong born and bred editors only found this out recently when wearing a green beanie to China Town in London.
Normally, the curse of the green hat is reserved for men, with the superstition being that wearing a green hat means you are being cheated on by your wife or girlfriend. According to The Silver Egg, this jolly little fashion faux pas originates from Imperial China when pimps were required to wear green hats to denote their profession.
There’s a Hong Kong-China border with no checkpoint, wall or fence
Chung Ying Street and the original stone marking the boundary, laid in 1898, photo likely from the 1970s or 1980s, courtesy of SZ Daily
This is one for all those territorial Hongkongers who complain about the supposed “influx of mainland Chinese” to our shores. There is a border in the North East New Territories town of Sha Tau Kok that has no formal border checkpoint, no wall and no fence. *Gasp!*
Those that live in Sha Tau Kok, both on the Shenzhen side and the Hong Kong side, can pass freely between the two with a Close Area Permit. The dividing Chung Ying Street roughly translates to mean “China England”. The street was originally a river when the New Territories became part of Hong Kong – and therefore under British jurisdiction – in 1898, but it had dried up by the start of WWII. According to the trusty Silver Egg blog, it is almost impossible for anyone other than a resident or someone visiting a close relative to gain access to the street.
So there you have it. We hope you learned something new today, dear reader. If not, hop over to The Silver Egg blog for more fun facts about Hong Kong, and consider starting your own pub quiz.
