{"id":27628,"date":"2014-10-02T12:03:57","date_gmt":"2014-10-02T04:03:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/?p=27628"},"modified":"2014-10-02T10:18:25","modified_gmt":"2014-10-02T02:18:25","slug":"hong-kong-protesters-try-to-win-over-tourists-from-mainland-china-but-get-an-earful-instead","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/2014\/10\/02\/hong-kong-protesters-try-to-win-over-tourists-from-mainland-china-but-get-an-earful-instead\/","title":{"rendered":"Hong Kong protesters try to win over tourists from mainland China but get an earful instead"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Protesters<\/a>
Protesters occupying Harcourt Road, Admiralty hold a “candlelight vigil” (with mobile phones) during Occupy Central, 2014 Hong Kong protests. Citobun \/ Wikimedia Commons.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

HONG KONG\u2014The luxury boutiques of Hong Kong\u2019s Tsim Shai Tsui district are so mobbed with vacationing Chinese customers that store owners have put up red velvet ropes to control the crowds. Pro-democracy protesters saw it as a perfect spot to spread the word to their mainland brethren.<\/p>\n

But instead of support, many of the young demonstrators got an earful Wednesday from grumpy tourists who appeared more intent on shopping than talking about democracy. Some complained that Hong Kong already enjoys more freedom than the rest of the country.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat you kids are doing is meaningless! You are too idealistic!\u201d a woman in her late 50s shouted at the students who are conducting sit-ins in the tony neighbourhood.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat they\u2019re doing is quite selfish and doesn\u2019t make them look good,\u201d added Selena Lau, 45, who was visiting from Guangzhou.<\/p>\n

The students have been boycotting classes since early last week, and more protesters of all ages have since joined huge street demonstrations calling for genuine democratic reforms in the semiautonomous enclave. Police tried to disperse them with tear gas Sunday, but they regrouped and spread to several other neighbourhoods.<\/p>\n

No images of the protests have been shown in China\u2019s state-run media on the mainland, where a 1989 pro-democracy movement was crushed in a brutal crackdown in Beijing\u2019s Tiananmen Square and has not been tolerated since.<\/p>\n

The media blackout prompted some student demonstrators to spread their message in the Tsim Shau Tsui district Wednesday, the start of a seven-day holiday on the mainland.<\/p>\n

The group was hoping to \u201cget the attention of the mainland tourists … who may not have heard anything about what is happening in Hong Kong,\u201d said Serena Chan, a 17-year-old student at Hong Kong University.<\/p>\n

About 200 people, mostly students, had gathered by afternoon, setting up a blue tarp and sitting cross-legged. Entrances to the district\u2019s boutiques offering brands such as Louis Vuitton and Gucci remained unobstructed.<\/p>\n

\u201cI do support democracy, but not when protesters are blocking the streets and inconveniencing everyone,\u201d Lau said. \u201cThe government has some responsibility, too. They should try to negotiate with the protesters and have some dialogue.\u201d<\/p>\n

Lau noted that many parts of the\u00a0world\u00a0don\u2019t have democracy, and that Hong Kong has more liberty than the rest of China.<\/p>\n

\u201cPeople in Hong Kong are already so lucky, and they should just work hard to make better lives for themselves,\u201d she said. \u201cThat\u2019s what people in mainland China do. We just think that if we work hard, we fend for ourselves; we don\u2019t make demands of the government.\u201d<\/p>\n

Hong Kong and the mainland have long had an uneasy relationship, with residents of the former British colony seeing themselves as urbane and cosmopolitan, while viewing mainlanders as uneducated and ill-mannered.<\/p>\n

When China took over Hong Kong in 1997, it negotiated a \u201cone country, two systems\u201d arrangement that ensured the territory would retain its Western-style civil liberties, and promised eventual universal suffrage. Beijing\u2019s recent decision to impose a screening process for candidates in the territory\u2019s first direct election in 2017 was seen by many in Hong Kong as reneging on that promise, prompting the protests.<\/p>\n

\u201cWould Hong Kong people really prefer to be a colony of Britain than be a part of China?\u201d asked a 45-year-old man from Heilongjiang province who gave only his surname, Chen.<\/p>\n

He spoke initially with a reporter but gradually raised his voice to address his comments to the nearby protesters.<\/p>\n

\u201cPeople just need to have good livelihoods; the other things don\u2019t matter,\u201d Chen said.<\/p>\n

Eric Tang, a 32-year-old protester, said tourists from other countries were more sympathetic to their cause.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Chinese people who come to this area tend to be the privileged and the wealthy who benefit from the undemocratic system in China,\u201d he said. \u201cI don\u2019t think we\u2019re going to have much success trying to change their thinking.\u201d<\/p>\n

Some people on the mainland, however, have shared information and expressed support for the protests by circumventing the tough censorship on social media, often via cellphone messaging services.<\/p>\n

One visitor, Lam Hong from Shenzhen, said he was joining the pro-democracy rallies.<\/p>\n

\u201cI hadn\u2019t seen any\u00a0news\u00a0about protests in Hong Kong before arriving this morning to visit friends,\u201d said the 43-year-old small business owner. \u201cI joined in because I support what Hong Kongers are trying to do and why they\u2019re angry. There\u2019s supposed to be \u2018one country, two systems.\u201d\u2018<\/p>\n

Lam added: \u201cWith police treating protesters like they did, it seems as if Hong Kong is already the same as China.\u201d<\/p>\n

Associated Press writer Ian Mader in Beijing contributed to this report.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

HONG KONG\u2014The luxury boutiques of Hong Kong\u2019s Tsim Shai Tsui district are so mobbed with vacationing Chinese customers that store …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":44,"featured_media":27629,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1145,17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-27628","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headline","category-news-w","mauthors-joanna-chiu","mauthors-the-associated-press"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27628","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/44"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=27628"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27628\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/27629"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=27628"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=27628"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=27628"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}