Gweilo: Memories of a Hong Kong Childhood
SynopsisPlot
As an inquisitive seven-year-old, Martin Booth found himself with the whole of Hong Kong at his feet when his father was posted there in the early 1950s. Unrestricted by parental control, he had free access to hidden corners of the colony normally closed to a Gweilo, a “pale fellow” like him. Befriending rickshaw coolies and local stallholders, he learned Cantonese, sampled delicacies such as boiled water beetles and one-hundred-year-old eggs, and participated in colourful festivals. He even entered the forbidden Kowloon Walled City, wandered into the secret lair of the Triads and visited an opium den. Along the way he encountered a colourful array of people, from the plink plonk man with his dancing monkey to Nagasaki Jim, a drunken child molester, and the Queen of Kowloon, the crazed tramp who may have been a member of the Romanov family.
Story
About this book
Martin Booth arrived in Hong Kong as a seven-year-old in the early 1950s, when his father was posted to the British colony. In this memoir he recalls moving through the city with unusual freedom, learning Cantonese, befriending rickshaw pullers and stallholders, and tasting century eggs and boiled water beetles. The title comes from the Cantonese word gweilo, used for a pale foreigner.
His explorations took him into places few Western children saw, including the Kowloon Walled City, a dense enclave largely outside colonial administration, and an opium den. He met street performers, a man with a dancing monkey, and a homeless woman known as the Queen of Kowloon, rumoured to be a Romanov. Not every encounter was harmless; the book also names an adult who preyed on children.
Family tension runs beneath the account. Booth's mother shared his interest in Chinese life, while his father objected to what he saw as the family drifting away from English habits. Booth finished the manuscript shortly before his death in February 2004, recording a colonial arrangement that no longer exists.
