Hong Kong culture and Origami

International Friendship Dept.

Hong Kong culture and Origami*

*Origami is the art of folding paper into various figures.

Time: November 21(Sun.13.00~15.00)
Place: Sougou Hukusi Kaikan, No.1meetingroom
Lecturer: Ms.Lily Chong (Hong Kong / China)

At first, Ms. Lily (she is from Hong Kong) talked about the difference between Hong Kong and China. Hong Kong is a Special Administrative Region of the People’s Republic of China and has a population of seven million and fifty thousand. It is a distinguished global city and about half as large as Tokyo.

In 1872, the Qing dynasty ceded Hong Kong to UK under the Nanjing treaty, and since then Hong Kong was a colony of UK. It was returned from UK to China on July 1, 1997 and has been a special administrative region of China. Since the colonial period, Hong Kong has had an important position of Southeastern transportation, finance, and distribution.

Many overseas tourists visit Hon Kong to enjoy shopping and foods. A special feature of Hong Kong is that it has a variety of good points to see in the small country, such as skyscrapers in the downtown area and natural environment in the suburbs hills and solitary islands. Some tourists visit Macau and Shenzhen on their way to Hong Kong. The climate of Hong Kong is warm/dry in autumn/ winter and high temperature/high humidity in spring/summer.

Ms. Lily is explaining Hong Kong currency.

Attendants are eagerly listening to her presentation.

In Hong Kong, people speak Cantonese that is a dialect of Chinese languages.
We got explanations of the difference between Pekingese and Cantonese.

We had a pleasant chat with each other having Hong Kong’s confectioneries and Yumcha which were bought with Ms. Lily. After chatting, we experienced Origami and tried on Hong Kong costume.

Ms. Lily’s comment in the chatting was impressive. “It is strange that Japanese people do not think highly of their own country. They should be more confident and prideful.”

We could deepen our understanding of Hong Kong through this saloon.