In the past, there was no fixed time for Mass, and it depended entirely on the priest's availability, so we would not know in advance when Mass would be held. But there would be three bell tolls, with a gap of about 10 minutes between each. When we were out in the fields and heard the first bell, we would know that Mass was about to begin. So, we would quickly tie up the cows and tidy up our appearance for church. When the second bell rang, we knew that time was running out. Even if we were barefoot and our sleeves and pants were still soaked, we would rush to the church to attend Mass before the third bell tolled. Because we knew that intention was what mattered most was, and the priest did not care whether our pants were dripping wet. Also, in the old days, we would recite the rosary or the Lord's Prayer in Mass, during which the priest would face away from the congregation. Yet we all knew exactly when to stop reciting.

We used to sing a song called "Ah Sik Tsai"(transliteration) and go fishing and swimming with our classmates. Sometimes we would even pick oysters and vegetables to sell in Sai Kung. Many people from Sai Kung would buy fish and come to our village, because their fields were too sandy to grow vegetables like sweet potatoes and radishes, so we sold them. Vegetables tasted way better in the past, since we used natural fertilizers.

Our school adopted a small-class teaching approach, so we had few students in each class. Six grades with six classes each; one row for each grade – we could all fit into a single classroom. When the teacher was busy with one class, the other students would be working on their assignments, so we often finished our homework before school ended. That's why we were free to go anywhere after school. Like little monkeys, we would go up to the mountain and down to the sea to go fishing and shrimping. When we were hungry, we would dig up and cook sweet potatoes that others have planted. We were also smart enough to put stones and water into milk powder tins to cook the fish and shrimps that we caught.

We helped the priest/nun fetch water whenever we had free time. The priest didn’t know how to fetch water, but he had an assistant. We didn’t have any specific arrangement for it, but if we saw that the priest/nun had run out of water, we would immediately help them out. Cooking was mostly done by adults, and the priests were all very nice. They were not picky about food and ate whatever we cooked for them.

The term「down to the sea」refers to activities in the sea, such as picking snails or shucking oysters. We loved going to the "salt pond" – which is now the island’s salt pan. We would catch small fish to feed the ducks, so that they can grow fast and have beautiful feathers. So, we would bring baskets with us and spend entire days catching fish. Picking fish in the mud is actually folk wisdom. The fish jump very fast; they immediately "swish" and disappear in a flash as soon as you enter the mud. So, how do you catch them?

First, you need to keep treading on the mud (near today’s salt pan) until it is soft and then push all the mud and water into a pile on your shoulder. The fish would then jump up and down, and then you can pick them up one by one. Then you repeat the process. Every time you do this, you might get muddy from head to toe, and if you are not careful, your whole body could submerge in mud.

I never learned the things my mother taught me, and it's a real shame. She used to weave decorative flower bands so beautifully, but I never learned how. She also used thread to remove facial hair (threading) – it's almost like getting a facial at a salon, to make your skin fairer and clearer. But I never learned how to do that either, because I used to think these skills were too old-fashioned. It's like in farming - watching the skies and reading the weather, but I never learned how. Looking back, I realize it is such a shame that this was wisdom I never learned.

In the past, it was common for people to cry when their daughters got married. They would cry day and night for different reasons. Mostly women would cry thinking the groom’s family is not good enough.

Whenever I returned to Yim Tin Tsai Village, I loved doing things that I couldn’t do elsewhere, like catching jumping spiders and playing with children. There was someone named Chan Sek Hung(transliteration), the second son of Fuk Loi (transliteration). I am not sure if you have met him or if he is still alive. They lived a few houses down, and he was a little younger than me. He liked to follow me around. Actually, I don’t know who was following whom; he followed me, and I followed him. He took us everywhere, teaching us how to catch spiders and pick kumquats and stone fruit (wild, edible fruits). He was very skilled in crab-catching; he could feel where crabs were just with his feet! When it was dry, we would see clams crawling around on the beach, and horseshoe crabs, too. The grain fields were very beautiful and looked just like an expanse full of green and rapeseed flowers. Salt production had already become history when I was young. We called it a salt pond. We used to walk barefoot in mud to catch prawn for food or as bait. Sometimes, we could even see large mud crabs.

As far as I remember, besides villagers there were also children of boat-dwellers who came to study in our school. At that time, boat-dwellers living near Yim Tin Tsai were extremely poor. The whole family would live on a small wooden boat, and each boat had a mortar and pestle – do you know what that is? It's made of porcelain, with a covered porcelain jar filled with pebbles and vinegar. When there was a storm and they had nothing to eat, they would lick the pebbles and eat plain rice. It’s really miserable thinking how poor they were. So, when we saw them in the village, we would give them some food to eat. It was so difficult even just to sustain themselves in their day-to-day, so imagine what storms would’ve done to them!

On the Feast Day, there is a joyous parade at St. Joseph's Chapel. From the pier we would walk all the way to the church. (Other villagers added,) Instead of walking straight up there, the priest would take all the villagers for a walk around the village, including a visit to the cemetery. He sprinkled holy water on each grave, which looked like individual houses. He would sprinkle holy water on each of them.

I have very fond memories of Father Giuseppe Famiglietti (Rev. FAMIGLIETTI, Giuseppe PIME). Whenever we saw him in the church, we would swarm around him and say, "Father, we want candies (glass candies)!” Father would stir a powder with water in a frying pan to boil. As the mixture cooled, it slowly solidified into a large piece of candy. Then, Father would smash it into pieces of glass-like candy for us children to share. I actually don't know why this memory is so deeply embedded in my mind.

I was always so excited when the priest came to the village. Why? Because it would mean that there’s food! Whenever he came, I would always follow him everywhere. As soon as he arrived, the first thing he would do was to visit patients at the hospital, and all us children would tag along just for treats. We didn’t have many snacks at home back then, and sometimes the priest would bring the best candies that you couldn’t find anywhere else. He also gave us cookies, like milk or oatmeal cookies, and they were all so delicious. Because we didn’t have much food at the time, so we always found everything he gave us to be very tasty.

We would get married in the church. Because we were poor, we couldn’t afford wedding dresses, so we only wore regular clothes. Around 60 years ago, a couple could only marry in the church if both the bride and groom were Catholic. Nowadays, they may do so if either is Catholic. The wedding ceremonies followed Western traditions. I’m not sure what it was called exactly, but there was always a priest who would officiate the union.

We were very well-behaved. Why? Because then we would be chosen as little angels. Look at this photo, some of us are scattering petals – we picked these flowers ourselves. We made flower crowns with them, too! The white dresses and veils were made by the Sisters. As little angels, we could wear make-up. Oh! Such envy!

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When our people converted to Catholicism, they adjusted the church bell (previously located outside of the church) so that it could be heard halfway on the way to Sai Kung. During the Japanese occupation, the church had four or five frames (mirrors) that were all stolen by the Japanese. They also dismantled and took away the bell from the tower. When my father, a teacher and a Japanese speaker, found out about this, he went and got everything back. But one time, the bell was stolen by a tourist, who simply picked it up and carried it away, because the bell wasn't that big. I am not sure what the bell was made of, but it rang very loudly.

One thing that I find quite special is that when Hakka people go to Mass, they will recite the Bible by singing. It's like when we recite the Rosary, we would sing it out like a song. I think all women over 50 would sing it, so it's a very special thing. Maybe it's unique to our village because we have a Catholic church there. Most women go to the church every night to pray, so they are very devout believers.

Even if the priest was not present, we would still go to church three times every Sunday; in the morning, afternoon, and evening (because Sunday was rest day). We would only miss church if it was harvest day, a rainy day, or if there was an emergency. If it was harvest day, we had to harvest our crops right away, or else all our rice would get wet and go to waste. Actually, I have never heard of any temple here on Yim Tin Tsai where incense is burned. I have only heard of the church.

When I was in school, the priest would come to our village every week. The priest sometimes stayed here for a day or two. I remember he was always kind to us and would give us cake. Some were Christmas cakes from abroad, approximately six to seven inches in size. The butter cakes had fruit peels and raisins and were very delicious. Because he would always give us the same cake every time, I remember its taste very well. The priest would distribute slices of the cake and gave us blessed necklaces with the cross and hats.

In anticipation of a wedding ceremony, villagers would begin preparations three days in advance. Depending on the number of guests, they would build two to three outdoor stages with stone. While men were mostly responsible for cooking, women would help in food preparation, such as washing and chopping up ingredients for cooking.

If mushrooms were on the menu, the women would soak them in the well the night before. The dining tables were not always set outside of the couple’s home, because in front of every home was an empty outdoor space that could be used for this purpose. They were sometimes set in different places like small alleys, old houses, and new houses. Even the regular, inexpensive village food served was extra delicious given the special occasion we were celebrating.

Because there was no electricity at night, if we had to go back late, we would use gas lamps. Otherwise, we mostly used kerosene lamps. We lived in a typical village where people go to bed early, because they always get up early in the morning to start working on the farm. They would eat two meals a day, including breakfast and another meal at around four or five in the afternoon. Then, at seven or eight in the evening, when the sky turns completely dark, they would go to sleep. But if the priest is around, the elders in the village would come over to my house to have a chat.

Hakka dishes are relatively simple. We usually eat whatever is available. Sometimes we had chicken, but it’s usually reserved for special occasions. Pork soup was also rare. For any celebration, such as a wedding banquet, we would serve pork soup to the whole village for a few days. We would slaughter a pig ourselves between four and five in the morning. The villagers would make a big pot with yellow mud instead of cement, which would crack when heated. Men would slaughter the pig and cook, while women would help with washing and preparing ingredients. One unforgettable dish is pufferfish cooked with radish. I don’t quite remember the taste – only that it is a very special dish.

According to Hakka customs, the groom’s family would be busier than the bride’s in preparing for a wedding. Marrying off a daughter meant losing a source of labour. Usually, children were asked to do chores like washing dishes during the banquet. When there was a wedding in our village, it would involve the entire village. We would bring our own chairs and tables and start working. When a married woman returns to her parents' home during Chinese New Year, she would bring home sugar, stewed pork, and rice cakes as gifts. The sugar could be either brown sugar or rock sugar. Together with ‘Ching Po Leung’ (a Chinese soup), they were sometimes used for making sweet dessert soups, or as seasoning in cooking. Sometimes sugar would also be added to Hakka ‘Cha Gwo’ or puffed rice.

There were some customs that no longer exist today. For example, we would not go to the hospital when an elderly person in the village passed away. Instead, we would lay the deceased on a bamboo mat in the living room for around two or three nights. The village would arrange for men to keep watch at night to prevent animals from disturbing the spirit of the deceased. In daytime, Mr. Wu would take around eight to ten of us to the church to get three candles and place them at the head of the deceased. We would then light the candles and Mr. Wu would lead us in prayer until the burial. About two or three days later, the elders would help clean the body of the deceased, and the younger people would place the body in a coffin before carrying it to the burial site. The whole process was not as complicated as it is today, but rather everyone in the village would help out.

This is a local sentimentality that we should cherish and remember. These rural customs teach young people what respect means (with profound significance). If you continue to live this way, you will benefit from it your whole life.

Something that was available only on rainy days was fried flour. Some children liked fried food because they could make it at home. Flour crisps were somewhat similar to Daan Saan (a traditional Cantonese snack) but didn’t need to be shaped; you could just fry it piece by piece. Still, they looked better if you shaped them, and I would cut a slit and thread one end thorugh to make it look like a bow. It could either be a savoury or sweet snack depending on how you season it to your liking. We liked trying out different shapes and flavours and ate them no matter how they looked or tasted.

In the 1960s, students from a number of universities were sent to Yim Tin Tsai village to provide assistance with road repairs (it lasted for around two summers). There were several dozens of them (around 20 to 30 in the first group) who took turns repairing bumpy roads. Not everyone could work for a whole summer. I had a good relationship with the students, and some of them were sad to leave when their placement ended. The villagers cooked peanuts and sweet potatoes for them. They stayed in the Ching Po School, where desks were put together and used as makeshift beds.

I have seen an anaconda as big as my arm when I was catching jumping spiders once. I was really scared when I saw it, and because children would turn away when they saw one, there was no one to catch it. Of course, there were also venomous snakes like cobras that can crawl into the bathroom through the drain. So, back then, if you go to the bathroom at night (it would be pitch-black) and hear a "hissing" sound, you should immediately come out to avoid getting bitten by a snake.

When I was little, my mother used to work in the fields. Back then, I didn't understand why we could see so many fireflies only when we were farming. The area around the salt pan used to be a stretch of paddy fields, and I remember looking down and seeing a sea of fireflies, but now they're gone.

Other than paddy fields, the areas in which we grew vegetables were called "che” in our dialect. We had good harvests and couldn't eat all of them ourselves. Sometimes our neighbours would come over and pick our vegetables – and only let us know afterwards that they have taken some. Looking back, it was quite interesting!

We used to play hide-and-seek near the salt pan when we were kids. With different heights and lengths, the grass provided a suitable place for such games.

One time, I saw a big, rolled up snake. I was standing in the grass and suddenly felt something cold. I turned around and saw a big pile of cow dung! But then I thought, “Wait a minute, how can there be such a huge pile of cow dung?” I looked back again and realized it was a curled-up anaconda! It had eaten eggs, small chicks, and rats and was too bloated to move. I screamed for help. My uncles came and killed the snake with a fishing spear. They boiled the snake and fed it to the pigs.

During Ching Ming Festival, if we saw people arriving on Kau Sai Chau (Sam Mun Tsai) for tomb-sweeping, we children would walk across Yuk Tai Bridge to Kau Sai Chau to ‘Ta Shan Tau’ （also known as “Ta Diu Mong” in the Hakka dialect).  ‘Ta Shan Tau’ means asking for money or food from tomb-sweepers, who usually brought a lot of food like oranges and roasted meat for their ancestors. We would wait for the rituals to be done, and they would give us either leftovers or some money for food, because we didn't have much to eat back then when we were young. In fact, boat-dwellers welcomed this practice of ‘Ta Shan Tau’, because they believed it would bring greater prosperity. However, we usually had to wait for a long time, sometimes up to half an hour.

We have fond memories of Po’s Store. Located next to Ching Po School, the store sold soft drinks and candies, among other items. They also sold something called “lottery draw”, which was basically a big scratch-off lottery card. On each card, there are many squares, and when you scratch off each square, you have a chance to exchange it for different prizes.

A villager said, “There are still lottery draws at these stores nowadays, but the rules have changed. You can place bets on a number of your choice to stand a chance for winning first prize, second prize or third prize.” It’s like redeeming a prize with a popsicle stick or a soda cap. Back then, these games were inexpensive and would only cost 10 or 20 cents.

Besides going to class, we as kids also played different games. We played hopscotch, where we drew numbered grids on the floor. We also played Double Dutch and Chinese Jump Rope. Girls often played Five Stones with small bean bags. In this game, there were several (about seven) bean bags in their hand. While they tossed one up bean bag, they would immediately catch another, creating a cycle of tossing and catching. Boys sometimes played marbles on the playground, and some played football.

Back in the day, our teachers really poured their heart and soul to educating us. We were physically punished whenever we misbehaved. I had a brilliant math teacher. She had a way of explaining things that made us understand it instantly. That’s why everyone in my grade — though there weren’t very many of us — we all passed the Primary 6 exams. My teacher’s name was Cheung Ah Nam(transliteration). She really left an impression on me, as she was a great teacher and helped us all pass.

There were two football fields on Yim Tin Tsai. One was located in front of the cemetery.

“There was a flat ground covered with planted grass in front of the cemetery near the bushes. It used to be a football field. During summer, usually in the evening, young villagers played soccer here. It became our playground." - Principal Nicholas Chan.*

The other football field was located below St. Joseph’s Chapel, next to the vegetable garden of Ching Po School. It was only used by the students of the school. During physical education class, we would pull out weeds, pick up pebbles or partake in running races on the field. In fact, the field was mainly used for this purpose.

*This paragraph is an excerpt from “天主作客鹽田仔 – 香港西貢鹽田仔百年史蹟”  Source: Louis Ha (2010). “天主作客鹽田仔—香港西貢鹽田仔百年史蹟”. Book Series on Catholic Studies – Fourth Series on Historical Materials and Tools (First Edition). Hong Kong: Centre for Catholic Studies, The Chinese University of Hong Kong

Perhaps what I am about to tell you is something you've never heard of, but if you observe carefully while you're on Yim Tin Tsai, you might see it. There used to be Myrobalan trees here. If one of the straight branches suddenly became curved and began to swell, that would indicate the presence of worms in the tree. It was horrifying, but some boys in our village had the courage to eat these worms. Because of my pride, I also followed suit and swallowed them whole. Maybe it’s because I ate these high-protein worms that I am quite healthy to this day.

There's another thing – wasp's nests. A wasp's nest has many holes with larvae inside, and I would also eat them because I didn't want to lose face. My younger sister claimed she could even feel the larva wriggling on her tongue as she ate it. Meanwhile, I preferred to swallow it whole because I was really scared to chew.

There was a toy we used to play with when we were young called a ‘crackling bamboo gun’. The principle of it was to use two bamboo sticks, one thicker and the other thinner (comparable to the thickness of the worms we would eat). We would thread the thinner stick through the hole on the thicker stick, and then add a bang snap bullet inside. With a push of the thinner stick, the bullet would pop out with a bang. I'm not sure if they still make bang snap bullets nowadays.

Boys used to shoot fish with a bow and arrow. Do you know what the bow and arrow were made of? They were made from an umbrella frame and were strong enough to shoot the fish dead. Shooting fish helped train our eyesight and was a great childhood memory for us, but some might find it boring. I didn't know how to shoot fish, so I went to catch them instead. We used fake ‘fish vines’ to fish because we didn't have money to buy real ones. First, we would flatten them and soak them in water, which would turn milky white. Then, we would pour the water in plastic tape and put them in cracks between rocks. The fish, still alive, would then turn upside-down. That's when we could catch them.

Do you know what a "Dutch soda cap" is? Everyone knows what a soda cap is, but why do we call it a "Dutch soda cap" or "Dutch soda"? I know it's because soda was shipped over from the Netherlands, but I'm not sure about the specifics. That’s just what we called it. We would make our own toys from flattening the soda cap, making a hole in the middle, and then putting a string through the caps with a rope. It didn’t cost anything, but it was fun.

What I want to talk about is something that no longer exists. There is no way to go down into the well now because it has been sealed off. Our village is an island that has relatively small hills, so there is little water collected in the winter. With limited spring water in the winter, adults had to carry buckets on a shoulder pole and line up to get water at the well. Because they had to reach the bottom of the well for water, the kids had to go down like spiderman to scoop it up. It was actually quite fun, and nobody ever fell. There were originally three wells in the village; two were saltwater wells and could only be used for irrigation. The third one was a fresh water well and the water was very clear and tasty.

In the past, winters were very cold and dry, so there was very little water in the spring well. Because fewer people went to fetch water at night, my mother would ask me to go then. Children had to go down into the well to fetch water. Like myself, my mother often called me to fetch water because I was an obedient child. One time, I felt sleepy as I was going down into the well and started dozing off. Then I heard my mother shouting loudly from above, "Ah Sze, what are you doing?" She kept calling until I woke up, and then I said, "I am sleeping." My mother asked, "Do you remember that you're fetching water right now?" Only then did I realized: Oh right, I'm fetching water. It's really cold. So, I climbed up immediately. Most of the time, it was children who had to fetch water because the cracks in the well were narrow, and children's hands and feet could reach in and hold on to them, so it was safer than if adults had to do it.

There was a fresh water well across from my house, but some reason, it was not drinkable, possibly because it contained certain minerals or heavy metals. I remember how we used this water to wash ourselves after swimming, and how we would use small frogs as bait to catch big bullfrogs in the well. They weighed almost half a catty and tasted delicious! But it’s a different story now; the bullfrogs these days don't taste the same as before. We also caught bullfrogs during harvests using bamboo fishing poles with small frogs as bait.

Getting to Yim Tin Tsai back then was not as easy and convenient as it is now. We had to take a minibus from Lung Kong Road or a bus from Kowloon City. The bus number was 22 back then, which has now changed to 92. When we got off the bus, we had to take a sailboat to get to the island. This was a long time ago, probably in the 1970s. Riding on a sailboat was also an experience. If you didn't sit properly, you would get scolded by others. Of course, if the boat was sailing with the wind, it was ideal. But if the wind blew in other directions, you had to know how move the boat sideways to sail through. Cooperation was needed to make this happen, especially when the boat was off course and needed to be corrected. A boat could only carry about eight to ten passengers, and the ride back to Yim Tin Tsai took at least half an hour. Oftentimes two people worked together to sail the boat: one person was in charge of rowing, also known as ‘the scull’, and the other was in charge of steering, also called ‘the oar’. The boatmen’s coordination made the ride faster.

Back then, there were two methods of spearfishing. One involved lighting a gas lamp on the beach and shining it on fish, shrimp, and crabs as the tide receded. The other method was to ride on a boat with a gas lamp hanging at the bow. One person was responsible for rowing while the other used a fish fork and basket to hunt for fish in waters around 10 feet deep. The water was very clear, and people were very skilled in spearfishing with high accuracy and precision. Because of refraction, it was generally not easy to spear prey in the water. The best season to go spearfishing was around Christmas time. We would use a boat to fish, and with the light you could see a lot of big rabbitfish lying along the rocks. This would make the perfect time to drive the fish into a net.

Sometimes we would also shoot fish using an umbrella frame as bow and arrow. We usually targeted fish that didn’t move much, such as groupers, false kelpfish, and scorpionfish. Because the arrow had no line or barbs on its tail, if you shot at fast-swimming fish such as candlefish, they would pull the arrow away.

There used to be many pirates in the past, and many villages around Yim Tin Tsai were ‘visited’ by pirates. One time, when pirates came to our village, they saw a big, bearded man poking around with a walking stick on very high mountain. They worried that there were many people like him in the village, so they didn't dare to set foot on the island. However, these pirates were disgruntled and planned to get on the island from the beach in the back. As they arrived on the beach, they couldn't wait to jump off the boat one by one. But because they were not familiar with the geographical features of Yim Tin Tsai, they stepped on oyster shells under water and bled. Not knowing what would happen next, they started feeling ominous about Yim Tin Tsai, left, and never came back again. The people in nearby villages were naturally displeased not understanding why Yim Tin Tsai was never robbed by pirates. This story was passed on by the pirates to other villages before reaching Yim Tin Tsai. When we heard this story, we deduced that the bearded man was Saint Joseph’s apparition. So, the village donated that piece of land and built a chapel on it, thus the chapel of St. Joseph was built.

The Japanese people did come to our village, so we went into hiding. They slashed the grass to open up a path. In the old days, the roads were not well built and were full of thorns. When they got to the camphor tree (now in front of the village office), they wanted to chop it thinking it got in their way. So the then village chief went to negotiate with them: “Our tree is a Fung Shui tree. If you want to chop it down, you will have to kill me first.” I don’t know what happened next, but the Japanese didn’t chop the tree. The village chief was so brave.

We were told to answer the call of nature at home, not in the pit latrines of others, otherwise we would get told off by our mother. There were two boards for you to squat on the toilet. After getting the business done, we covered the waste with ash. Faeces is nutritious and can be used as fertiliser for fruit that are harvested annually, such as sugar cane, bananas, longans, pomelos, oranges and tangerines. With human waste, you can grow large, sweet and crunchy sugar canes as well as big bananas.

Urine is the fertiliser for vegetables. Before using it, you have to mix it with boiling water upon the evaporation of ammonia. Vegetables die off very soon if urine is directly poured over them. Harvest can be reaped only two weeks after the fertilisation, or you will taste your own waste.

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Some children were very naughty. You know greed is human nature. You may steal sugar cane and bananas even if you plant your own. You may think what others grow is tastier. But how did children manage to pick bananas when the fruit was so high up? A shoulder ride would do. The rider peeled and ate a banana, and swapped the position with the carrier who got to pick and eat. It is important not to get caught or you would be beaten up badly by your mother – no one would like their children to steal. But they were just naughty. They could not help stealing things they already had.

We used to plant mostly vegetables, such as sweet potato leaves, for sale. They were sold to vegetable sellers in Sai Kung Town who might, for example, ask for ten catties of pak choy from us. We sold sweet potato leaves to many swineherds in Sai Kung Town as they did not grow the greens themselves.

We also earned our own pocket money. For example, we cut off and lighted cotton-grass (literal translation) for breaming after scraping off oyster shells attached to the lower part of a boat and repainted it. With the burning cotton-grass, the boat could be cleaned slowly over a weak and prolonged fire. I guess the purpose of breaming with heated cotton-grass was to kill all the bacteria. Afterwards, sandpaper was used to rub the surface for subsequent repainting work. I saw boat dwellers doing the same.

Apart from cutting off cotton-grass for pocket money, we hammered to harvest oysters or Sinotaia for sale. On a hot day, we picked rose myrtle fruit and stored them in a milk tin. One tin could be sold for ten cents at the Sai Kung Pier.

We burned incense and prayed during our ancestral rituals. The purpose of burning incense was that the smoke from incense could convey our messages over the sky to those living above. We also prayed. We didn’t actually worship gods, but we used incense to honour our ancestors. This had been passed to us, so we Catholics could use incense to worship our ancestors. I don’t know if it was the same case in other religions, but burning incense was a way to convey our wishes and voices to those over there.

What exactly is a “rotationally raised pig”? It means a pig raised by two families together. When it grew up, the families would slaughter and share it.

There were few occasions when the whole village gathered to eat. For example, our family would pay respect to our ancestors. When we slaughtered dogs and chickens, we would eat them ourselves. Other families would pay respect to their own ancestors. Each family would do that on their own and prepare their own food.

All our villagers became Catholic. Given the hardship at that time, being ordained as a priest was considered a family glory. That was the case for my uncle, Joachim Chan Tang-Shue, who was perhaps gifted enough to receive such a holy call. I remember that he was the first Chinese priest in Hong Kong, having done missionary work in Shantou. He was familiar with renowned painter Gao Jianfu. Upon retirement, he joined the Precious Blood in Fanling, conducting Mass with sisters and hearing confessions. I am not sure if it is still there. It should be. In my memory, my uncle was kind, well-educated with good manners. He visited us sometimes.

When we drank “Dutch soda”, we would poke two holes in the bottle cap and put a string through them. When you pulled the string, the cap would spin like a diabolo. When the string was pulled, energy would store up and the cap would be tangled; when you released the string, the cap would hold back and spin. How could you tell the winner? It is the one who first cut the other’s string. The one whose string broke first lost. We would also hollow out water chestnuts (a kind of aquatic plant) and make a pinwheel out of it. It was also played with a string. These were all our childhood memories.

When I was a kid, I would go to Yim Tin Tsai with my father only during summer holiday, staying for about a month each time. When I went to the village, my grandma would sit under the big camphor tree near the pier waiting for me. She was almost 80 years old. I was nervous because I did not her often. I saw her as soon as I went there, so I remember her very well. That’s when my grandma would wait for me and hug me.

Every Hakka village house shares the same layout. As you get into the house, there must be a toilet and a gorgeous bathroom on the left, with the cooking range and a large wok on the right. That is the basic for all houses, with the left designed for shower and the right for cooking. Moreover, there is also a hole for small dogs and cats to get in the house.

In 1963, I attended Primary One at Ching Po School but was only there for less than a year. After the school’s closure in the 1990s, I visited the village again and noticed it being abandoned over the years. Despite staying on this island for a short period of time, I recall seeing a lot of bibles in the attic of the chapel and called this place “Yim Tim Tsz” instead of “Yim Tin Tsai”. I also remember my first time arriving on the island as a five-year-old kid. When I first attended school, my teacher asked me for my father’s name. Innocently, I answered “Szeto B”, not knowing that it was just my father’s nickname that I was familiar with. Looking back on this brings me a lot of joy.

Talking about my school life, I remember my teacher brought us to the fields to catch frogs on an autumn day. Besides this interesting activity, there was a pitch in our school and we also had religious classes in Primary One. Just like the rest of the Sai Kung residents, playing marble games was one of our leisure. Moreover, we loved sneaking around the farmland near the beach we used to play on, and stole the sweet potatoes from it! We always made a stove from the wet sand and started a fire with wooden logs before we started our stealing ‘mission’. If we were spotted, we would just hide into the farm. We also caught sea crabs from the beach by kicking the water and spearing them. Last but not least, we celebrated festivals with Poon Choi, and we ended up eating it for a few days.

Back in my time, we had to take a boat to get to school every day. There were not many passengers on the boats and the boat first stopped on Sharp Island before Yim Tin Tsai. Before the ship arrived the pier at around 7am, I usually woke up at 5am, boiled water at my neighbours’ house and played around, preparing to get on the ship . To me, the scariest thing about riding a boat was to take it during typhoon season as I did not know how to swim. Since the boat would still be in service unless Typhoon Signal No. 1 or No. 3 was hosted, I had to take the risky ride to the school even when the weather was bad. The boat we took was like a “Walla Walla” motorboat with a large cabin and noisy engine.

Based on my memories, I do not remember seeing a priest in Yim Tin Tsai, but I do recall receiving presents from the different churches in Sai Kung during Christmas. I remember that the present from the church in Tsung Tsin was the most impressive one. Every time we went to the church, we could collect a stamp (a star-shaped sticker) on a card which we could use to redeem a large gift during Christmas. It was a 3D paper cut-out that was constructed to make a house. That brought me a lot of joy during Christmas season.

Although I am from High Island and thus not an indigenous resident of Yim Tin Tsai, I studied at Ching Po School for two and a half years from 1972 to 1974. During this time, as my family was poor, I received the help of an anonymous sponsor to pay my tuition fees which I could not afford. Although there was a school uniform, most students had no money to buy it and would just wear their own clothes. Thinking back about our times as students on the island, I associate it with good memories and the freedom to explore it once we were done with classes. Because the school only had two classrooms, like other village schools, Primary 1 and 2 lessons were held in the morning and Primary 3 to 6 lessons were held in the afternoon. One classroom would sometimes accommodate two classes, for example, Primary 3 on the left and Primary 5 on the right. The two classes would also sometimes have different lessons ongoing simultaneously such as Mathematics and General Knowledge.

From what I can remember, we used to take the boat to school. Every morning, I would wait at the pier with my schoolbag on my shoulder for the 7.30am boat that arrived at Yim Tin Tsai at about 7.45am. The boat was usually filled with other students and teachers such as Mr Mak, Mr Kwong and the Principal, Mr Wu. Because the boat got crowded easily, the boatman would ask us to hide in the cabin from the police officers who came to check licenses, which I did twice. Although the boat was not a “Tai Fei” speedboat, it was slightly bigger than a “Kaito” ferry and had high mobility in the waters. It was similar to a tourist boat but could not fit that many people and also had a cover in case of rain or shine. It also had many facilities and equipment such as a large cabin with many seats, a stove, water storage, a toilet, etc. During peak hours in the afternoon, many students would be going home while residents would go shopping. What’s special was that we did not have to take it to school if there was a Typhoon Signal No. 3 or worse as it was dangerous. Also, other than taking the boat, some students had different transport methods such as rowing to school themselves.

When I was a student, the morning class usually started at 8 am and ended at 12:35 or 12:40 while the afternoon class finished at 5 to 6 pm. Nobody liked afternoon lessons because the irregular boat schedules would waste the entire day. Even if we had time after school, we would not stay behind on the island to play as we were scared of missing the boat to get back to the mainland. Of course, big events were an exception. As children, we knew nothing about the boat schedules, so we just waited for the boat at the pier along with our teachers or adults. If no teachers were present, the mischievous children would play with the boat’s controls and mechanisms. Fortunately, no one ever fell into the sea. I once met “Sai Gwa Pau”, who played Buck Teeth So in the movie “Once Upon a Time in China”, on the boat. Initially, I thought he went to Yim Tin Tsai for Guanyin’s Birthday but then I realised he was going to take the red boat to perform Cantonese opera. This was because the people of Yim Tin Tsai were Catholics and therefore did not celebrate events like Guanyin’s Birthday and the Cheung Chau Bun Festival.

In the past, we had a sports day every year or so that took place on the field in front of the church that made us run around the mountain. Inside the school, there was a staircase between two classrooms that led up to the church. There was a tree with a hole for the gong (school bell) which the janitors often forgot to ring. Whenever the teacher dismissed the class, four or five students would rush out of the classroom, fighting to be the first to ring the bell. There were quite a lot of students in Primary 1 as there were around 20 to 30 of them in a class. As my report card shows, there were 30 students in my class. I think around one-third of us did not live in the village because I took the boat with a dozen of them. Alas, during the fishing season, many fishermen’s children missed school to help their family. Many girls also did not go to school because they had to help with housework while some students, as young as Primary 2, also had to skip class to help with fishing or tending to the fields. Hence, even if a Primary One or Two class was full, the number of students would dwindle for the above reasons.

An interesting story about my school is that physical punishment, such as hitting with a ruler and pinching the ear, was allowed. There were only two female teachers left, the younger being Miss Mak and the older being Miss Chan. I remember that Miss Chan taught me to sing the new version of The Lord’s Prayer (Chinese) which we had to perform a few lines of to pass the music exam. As far as I remember, the topics taught in school were quite simple. We began to learn English in the first term of Primary 2. Towards the end of the year, we learnt the word “open”, but the teacher said it should be pronounced as “oh” and “pen”. Meanwhile, in the second term, we only learnt a few vocabularies. The headmaster, Mr Wu, was in-charge of teaching us Bible Studies. In my school, teachers had to teach all subjects and thus be familiar with everything. When students could not control their bladders and needed the janitors to help them wash up, we would laugh at them from the side. Personally, I was always daydreaming at school. I remember that the ceiling was so hot, and that I went to school with a green fabric crossbody bag.

At the back of the church, there was a sacristy which we seldom went to as it was the staff office on weekdays. From my memory, apart from the priest, Principal Mr Wu also smoked and flicked the ashes like an old man in those Cantonese movies. The happiest time was Christmas or the St. Joseph's Feast Day because the priest would come and there were no classes. Back then, Father Fan said there weren’t enough people so he asked me and my brother to be the altar servers. It was a lively environment as the villagers were also there. I remember participating in one or two sports days and running on the field in Yim Tin Tsai. We once had a Christmas party that celebrated late into the night and I received many presents from other people. The priest also gave us Italian sweet bread, candies and toys. There was a store on the island but it had a limited variety of products. There was also a salt field on the island that I only learnt was used for salt production when I got older.

Kids living in Yim Tin Tsai had good manners as they were well brought up and they rarely wandered off the island. Sometimes they were occupied with fishing, leaving little opportunity for me to play with them. I remember an anecdote in Ching Po or Sung Tsun, there was a classmate of mine who won some money from marble games but hesitated to take it back home, fearing his mother’s scolding. What he did instead was to hide the money under a tree. In those days, you could get a bowl of pig blood curd congee for just five cents. So we decided to hide the money in a tree cavity and took it back later. Back then, the boys enjoyed betting on marble games, whereas the girls were keen on playing hopscotch and bean bag toss. The old ladies there would gather and play card games. The orange ones, called “Sap Ng Wu”, are played among the Hakkas, while the black ones, such as "Tien Gow”, were popular among all. There was another interesting game called “Cim Ye”, in which players picked one sticker out of many attached to a cardboard.

When I was there in the village, there was no electricity, it had nothing like that. There were no toilet facilities or running water. During the day we would do things like help in the rice field, go up the mountain and bring firewood back in winter, and we also sometimes fished with my grandmother at night. I remember especially carrying the logs: the wood was so heavy. I used to put them on my shoulder and cry because it is too heavy for me. Then of course I needed to go to the well to collect water too. Imagine! No running water, no electricity, and no television. We just lay down on the floor and gazed at the stars. My grandmother used to tell me: just look up at the stars and think, you have two sisters in England right at this moment, something like that. Those are my memories. And that was my childhood.

Do I remember anything about foreigners coming to our island? Well, I was only four years old, so I can’t really remember clearly. One thing was, the helicopter used to land and brings us all the charity clothes, so we will line up to get ourselves the charity clothes, and that was good. Besides that…there were the foreign people, you know, like the British people who came along in the small boat. They were coming to visit: I guess they must have been expats or something living in Hong Kong at the time. However, my friends and I just ran away, because they looked so strange to us and I did not really understand what they said anyway at that time. They were offering our sweets, but we just ran away and did not get the sweets.

About Christmas in the village, I remember walking into the church and I can smell the Christmas Tree. And even now, when I have Christmas in my home, I get real pine trees and smell them, and it brings back exactly my memory of the church. Where did they come from? Umm, well, they were definitely fresh trees. I’m not sure where the trees came from; they might have been cut from the mountain. But when the trees were placed in the church, the smell was pretty intense. Because the priest will take you to light up the candles and cover with cotton wool and decorate it. It was a good memory for me being inside the church.

We had a store in our village, and I think I purchased candies sometimes, but I couldn’t buy too many because I didn’t have much money at that time. I mean back in the day, there was nothing much there at all in the village. I remember having a slice of white bread with some condensed milk on it and that was my treat. And then when we were having our birthdays, we had boiled egg to celebrate the day and that was it. Of course there were some things we could get for free: we used to pick berries, and some people will grow mangrove trees, or litchi trees. So actually they weren’t exactly free, since you needed to steal them from one of the trees. Oh, as well as Dimocarpus longan (lung4 ngaan5). As for other holidays…during the Chinese New Year, my family will make “Cha Kwo”. Do you know about “Cha Kwo”? It’s like a Chinese rice cake, and looks just like an English treacle cake, or round cake. They used to make it in an “oven”, with a big coal in the middle, just like we do BBQ right now. So, I remembered that, it was very nice.

Any big events? Well, there were some huge celebrations that happened in the village before, such as people getting married. They would come round with a cart round the streets, like a wedding cart. The bride used to throw pennies out and all the children will run after to collect these pennies. Then they would put a pig in a makeshift cage, running around the street with it…and then they would kill it, right there and then. It’s kind of scary to think about that sort of thing happening now. Then everyone would dig into a big shared meal.

How would I help out around the house? I remember being asked to put these little plastic flowers together. My aunt, she used to work from home, making plastic flowers, so we all needed to help out. She got them from Sai Kung, across the river/sea. And I remember sewing beads on some sort of fabric material, probably a wedding dress or something like that. It was hard work.

I once witnessed a wedding in the village that lasted for three days. The celebrations on the first and the last days were quite modest, but the village spared no expense when it came to the ceremony and grand banquet on the second day. A makeshift kitchen with a few temporary stoves was set up by the villagers near the host’s house for the chef to prepare a delicious feast. The dishes prepared were mostly Hakka dishes, such as braised pork with preserved vegetables, sweet deep-fried tofu puff and braised pork on pickled bamboo shoots. The villagers actively pitched in to help with the wedding by working in the kitchen, even the children were expected to lend a helping hand. I remember that my great grandfather had a vast collection of ceramics, including bowls, dishes, basins, jars, chopsticks and cooking ware, sufficient for accommodating one to two hundred people. The chef would fill each jar with delicious food to be served on dishes or basins before the guests were seated. Throughout the banquet, the jars would be refilled. The unique feature of our village is that we had these feasts instead of serving poon choi.

The Catholic Church has all my respect and gratitude for the aid they provided to our village. In return, the only expectation was to join the Church and become a devoted Catholic. The support to us included essential living goods such as clothing, rice, flour and oil. The most significant contribution, in my opinion, was that the Church supported the development of our village’s primary school, Ching Po School, as it was crucial for providing our generation with opportunities for the future.

I remember that the Italian priest was very nice to us- Other than holding Mass and teaching altar servers, he also took time to play games with us. He would also bring along with him some fascinating gadgets or toys. A game we liked to play was Bingo and we were familiar with its rules and winning strategies by the time we were 10 years old. We played it like how people play Bingo Hall now. If we completed a line, we would win biscuits, while the grand prize for completing the square was rosary beads or sometimes even a can of luncheon meat. The priest also taught us to be altar servers and I got to do it once. I still remember feeling so proud, having a censer (with frankincense) in my hands and wearing a cassock with a white shirt and a red robe.

We used to recite prayers in the chapel for about 30 minutes – once in the morning and once at night. We did it as a group, and every time there would be someone ringing the bell to gather the villagers. After the morning prayer at around 7, we would either head out to herd cattle or attend classes. Then in the afternoon at around 4, we would herd the cattle again, and after dinner, we would wait for our second prayer.

Normally, the villagers worked from sunrise until sunset. The women were very busy from day to night, cutting grass; splitting wood, farming, growing vegetables and retrieving water are all their duties on top of doing daily chores. Their only break came if it started to rain. Some of the menfolk would give them a hand, but only a few; While children like us enjoyed greater leisure, commonly playing games to pass the time rather than assisting with the chores that our mothers or grandmothers did.

As children, we did not have lots of games to play, and the ones we did have were simple, with marble games and portrait card games being the most popular. The rules of portrait card games were very straightforward: each player would place an equal number of portrait picture cards in a circle drawn on the ground, and then we'd take turns trying to bat the cards out of the circle without actually touching them. If you managed to knock some cards out, they were yours to keep. Unfortunately, I can't remember the rules for marble games because I wasn't very good at it and my aim was terrible.

Back in our teenage days, selling jumping spiders used to be kind of a source of income for us. Each spider went for just five cents, though, but still it was enough to put a smile on our faces. These jumping spiders, about the size of fermented black beans, we used them in our own little matches, just like how people do cricket fighting. But catching those little critters was not easy at all, requiring a detailed search in the mountain and a keen pair of eyes. We had to make a cage for them using thorny "Leoi ceoi (擂槌)” leaves, and that required some practical skills. After we kids caught the spiders, we handed them over to the collector in our village, who probably passed them on to buyers from Sai Kung.

Farming is the most important thing throughout the entire year in the village. To harvest a new batch of crops, it took us four to five months to go through various stages: germination, seedlings, planting, and then finally it was time to harvest. We cut the straw with a scythe to get the grain which grew on its tip, after which we tied them into bundles.

The next step was to remove the grains from the straw. We would tie up the straw and secure it in a large barrel, surrounded by a large bamboo screen that covered about three-quarters of it. There was a gap left, and that was where we beat the grains from the straw. Underneath, we would have a little wooden ladder. I did this once, and that was my only time doing it.

After that, it was time to dry those grains. We would spread them out neatly in the straw yard, a big open area in front of my house. After having them dried for some time, we would need to turn them over with our bare feet under the scorching sun, while making sure not to crush the grains. I did that for a few seasons. Upon being dried completely, the grains were sealed in a jar or bag for preservation.

When we needed rice, we would take those grains to Sai Kung for processing. They would remove the husks to turn them into rice, while the leftover chaff, which we would add in brown rice to make feed for chickens or pigs. That is why I always remind my daughter how rice is made and why we should not waste it.

I remember falling down a well once when I was young, probably under 10 years old. It happened on a day when I went to the well with Wai Keung and Rose after swimming to wash our hair with the well water. By accident or whatever reasons, I lost my balance and fell into the well, which was over 10 feet deep with walls made of stone. Thankfully, the water was only about a foot deep and I managed to climb back up myself. Even now still I thought to myself, "Was it because I was a gecko or something?" Of course not. The only thing I want to say is thank God- I had nothing but Him to thank for the survival.

Even today, the well is still there, although it has been closed off. I don’t think that was because of my accident. So what’s the real reason behind? I don't know.

After the straw had dried completely, it would be bundled together in rectangular bales and be piled around the office of the Rural Committee like a fortress. Children like us, usually shirtless and wearing shorts (or so-called boxer shorts in the present day), would run around the “fortress”, and the straw would cause our bodies to feel itchy and have scratches all over.

Later on, the straw would be acquired by vendors, including Dairy Farm in Hong Kong, for the manufacturing of drinking straws.

Back in the 1960s, when I first started school, Mr Wu was the only teacher in Ching Po School. He was a full-time staff member who single-handedly taught all six classes in the same classroom. If my memory serves me right, in Primary 1 and 2, we learned The Ballad of Mulan in the Hakka language. But from Primary 3 onwards, we switched to Cantonese. That was also when Mr. Tong joined the school as an English teacher. At first, he taught at Ching Po School for only a few days a week, and for the rest of the week, he headed over to Pak Tam Chung to teach students there. However, after a year or two, the education system in our school had to follow the schemes of the Hong Kong Government, it was this time when Mr. Tong became a full-time teacher at Ching Po School.

There were some academic years where certain grades were missing. For example, we might have had Primary 1, 2, 4, 5, and 6, but no Primary 3. This could either be because we didn't have enough students or because some students had to repeat a grade.

She was my Mathematics teacher who probably joined the school when I was in Primary 5 or 4. I remember that she was very dedicated and patient, such that even if she was displeased with us, she would hide her agitation and instead express her emotions privately. Because of our weak knowledge of Mathematics, every time she raised a question, we usually would fail to give a correct answer, or even no one answered at all. However, there was a time when she asked a question regarding prime numbers and I actually had the courage to answer it. Did I get it right? I can’t remember now. But what I do know is that I'm always grateful to her for being my Mathematics teacher because I've come a long way since then. I even completed my postgraduate degree in Numerical Analysis.

Mr. Wu was not only my teacher; he is also my guardian, and a caregiver in the village. With a simple first-aid kit, he completed first-aid treatment to me at least three times.

For the first incident, I remember I was playing with my elder sister-I was trying to snatch the knife in her hands. Such dangerous play of course led to an accident, my left middle fingertip was almost completely cut off. Mr Wu bandaged my finger with his first-aid supplies. Although the fingertip turned out to be pointing towards the palm at 90 degrees after recovery, still it is better than losing the entire finger.

On the second occasion, I fainted to the ground during a lesson at around 10 in the morning. I woke up after 3pm in Mr Wu’s bed.

On the third time, I hurt my head and bled a lot after falling into a well. I believe that it was Mr Wu who stopped the bleeding with his first-aid kit as there were scarcely any people in our village who had medical supplies like merbromin or gauze. When I realised that I was bleeding, I passed out until the next morning and my aunt took me to a doctor in Sai Kung by boat. Back then there was no hospital in Sai Kung apart from a clinic near Sung Tsun Secondary School. As we arrived at Sai Kung very early, my aunt got me congee and rice rolls for breakfast, but during the treatment, the nurse stitched my wound using a staple for three times without anaesthesia. What a bittersweet memory it was!

Embelia ribes fruit-This kind of wild fruit grows in bushes and requires effort to be found. It does not wither throughout the whole year. So, in summer, the fruit is very sweet and tasty, like a cherry, and can appear as either red or black. Whereas for winter, you can also eat the leaves which are nice and tart. Therefore, looking for embelia ribes was one of our must-dos when we were herding cattle. If you are lucky, they show themselves to you. Even when I was back in Hong Kong and went for hiking, I usually would try to look for them there.

Hung Shing Bay, Kau Sai Chau used to be a bustling harbour. Every year there was a big Cantonese opera event. I went there once, not by boat but by walking in the mountains. Looking back now, I wonder if all the effort was truly worthwhile. Back then we started from the village, passed the Jade-Girdle Bridge, which has now been transformed into a golf course, went up to Cannon Hill, and then made our way down a long path. The downside was that we had to wait until dawn to get back to the village after the show.

When I was a child, I inspected the chicken coop every day to see if there were any eggs laid. However, eggs were considered a luxury at that time and were too precious for us to eat. It was because of the high price they fetched at $1 each when the vendors came to make up for the unhatched eggs in the urban areas. I once saw doctor Cheung Chong Suk caponising roosters and the roasters still look fine afterwards. Although caponisation was needed due to the insufficient space of our small-sized chicken coop, I still felt sorry for the roosters' loss.

When we were small, we already knew how to make different kinds of snacks with food provided by priests. Let me introduce some of my recipes to you all.

The first way is to make a dough by mixing flour with oil and water and dividing it into several portions. If you roll it into a round shape, it will become a thin pancake after pan-frying, which is similar to a pizza base nowadays. If you roll it into a square, it will become a cracker after pan-frying or deep-frying, and it tastes just like Jacob's Crackers.

Another way is to add water to the flour, which follows by rolling and flattening it. With these simple steps, dough (about 1-2 cm thick) is made and it can be further made into several layers, one on top of the other. The layers are then cut into strips that look like noodles and are simmered in peanut broth afterwards. This is my family's “knife-cut noodles”, which looks like udon noodles. My cousin once made it in London for my partner to try it, but even though my cousin wasn't a bad cook, she didn’t like it.

There are two “salty ponds” in the village, which are leftovers of the salt production that terminated a century ago. On the other hand, the shallow pond is used for salt production nowadays. When the crops were not yet matured and rain poured, many pink crabs were washed away and remained at the gate of the deep pond. This was a great chance for us to catch the hairy crabs and cook them, as they were really delicious.

It is the best time to catch shrimps and crabs when the water level lowers after a falling tide, or when the weather is humid. Still, you should not go with bare hands and feet, or you may get pinched by the crabs. The smaller the crab is, the more painful you will feel! Tiny crabs always have sharp claws that can hurt you deep.

Herding cattle wasn’t always a chore and it could be fun sometimes. We children, who were in charge of looking after them, always split into two groups: one group would watch over the cattle and the other would catch crabs and clams. After a busy day, we would have a nice picnic together. During the harvest season, we dragged the cattle along the ridge and let them enjoy themselves while watching over them to stop them from eating any seedlings or vegetables. Even under the hot sun or heavy rain, we had no choice but had to look after the cattle. After the harvest season, the cattle were deported to Kau Sai Chau so that they could take a break. What a joy for them to have a vacation!

Construction of Jade-Girdle Bridge had already been completed since I was a kid. In the past, we had no name for it and literally referred to as “the bridge”. At that time, since our fishpond area was too small to satisfy the village’s needs for food, most of our farmlands were located in Kau Sai Chau. While women were generally in charge of farming, the bridge had helped them to cross the sea and reach Kau Sai Chau safely. From what I have heard, the bridge was built on stone blocks at first, then additional works were gradually carried out with support of the Kadoorie family and the government.

There used to be two piers – the Tin Suk Gong Pier (which has been out of use already) and the pier we have nowadays. It was built by my grandfather to facilitate his fishing gun business.

My ancestral home was originally located amongst the innermost houses in the village, right behind Uncle Wang Tat’s. After renting out other village houses for several times, my grandfather continued his business by building two main houses, two kitchens and a rather short pier at the current site, as well as an open yard on the beach.

This pier was already in use when I was a kid. As I recall, it went through maintenance and several extension works, likely with the sponsorship of the Kadoorie family. Throughout the past two decades, the government took over the construction works, added a T-shaped structure and covered the original pier with marbles.

I was not born and raised in the village, but sometimes I came back for camping and stayed in the ancestral home. There was a courtyard at the front of the house, where we always cooked our meals on a stove. The toilet was also located there. Besides that, we grew sweet potatoes and peanuts in our farm which was near the current Prayer Corner, so we picked them whenever we were there. If we did not bake the sweet potatoes, my aunt would use them for feeding pigs instead of selling them. The sweet potatoes, which looked like vines, had to be hand-picked, and the whole chunk would be pulled out in one go. It had a yellow or purple flesh, and was sweet with a strong aftertaste. It was really a pleasant and comfortable experience staying on this island, so I also brought my friend along to enjoy life in the village.

When I returned to the village, I was still quite young, probably under the age of 10. It was a different time back then, instead of taking the “Kaito” ferry from a pier in Sai Kung as everyone does now, we had to walk through an old street to reach the ferry. Usually we return to the village during the summer holidays, and we all enjoyed it. This was because there was not much to eat at home when I was a kid, so returning there meant we could have some time of simple pleasures. Like we would swim around the pier and eat sweet potatoes and chicken. This was very special as in the past; chicken was only served for festive occasions. But there in the village we can have it even for non-festival days. Our eldest aunt would kindly set aside chicken thighs specifically for my younger brother and me. Also, because we lived in Taikoo Lau, where the school and the church were located, we rarely left our home. Therefore, every time after I returned to Yim Tin Tsai with my mother and brother, we would bring back home a lot of food, such as sweet potatoes, peanuts, and Hakka dumplings. We would also have Chinese New Year puddings for pan-frying if the festival was around the corner.

Yim Tin Tsai has been known to people for many years. I recall that when I was around ten years old and returned to the village, there were already foreigners visiting, probably came here for a hike to escape the hustle and bustle of the city. Although the Jade-Girdle Bridge was not as beautiful as it is now, every time we came back, we would definitely gather at the bridge and sing “Dream Garden” which was always a delightful experience.

In Yim Tin Tsai, deep-fried food was always served during the Chinese New Year. We had these enormous frying pans that served multiple purposes—they could boil water and cook food. I was truly impressed by how well-maintained they were, as the boiled water never appeared greasy with oil floating on the surface, showing how thoroughly they were cleaned. If someone was getting married, the villagers would help to prepare the feast most of the time. There would be some chicken and braised pork, served on large plates, and everyone would make their way to the feast.

Strangely, we didn’t know much about the legends of this village. The only one I heard of was from my mum: In times of war, people saw a bearded man in the sky. If a bomb was about to hit the village, he would brush it away and make it disappear. After that, we agreed that this might be an apparition of St. Joseph. On the other hand, Tai Koo Lau shared a similar legend: During World War II, a foreign woman was spotted near the clock on the top of the church. She also drove the bombs away with her scarf and kept the church intact. It was again believed to be an apparition of the Virgin Mary.

My parents and I used to live beyond the village (Yuen Long) during my childhood, and would only head back during the summer holiday to learn about Hakka culture. There was one year when I returned to Yim Tin Tsai as usual. I swam at the beach first, and then took a bath at Fo Siu Leng (somewhere further up the road from the toilet, according to the villagers). Suddenly, it started to rain while I was taking a bath. Meanwhile, my aunt was cooking in the kitchen, so she asked my uncle to take the clothes inside. He got them all except for my aunt’s underwear, which made her furious. Why did he do that? Because it was taboo for a man to touch women’s underwear. In the end, my uncle had no choice but to pick it up using a pair of fire tongs!

Although my parents and I used to live beyond the village (Yuen Long) during my childhood, we would still head back for a few days during the summer holidays to learn about Hakka culture. We loved shining large lamps into the waters at night, and speared fishes with harpoons while they were in a deep sleep. Aside from fishes, we also enjoyed catching crabs. However, we realised that if we used spears on the crabs, they would easily be split into half, so we herded them all into fishnets instead. There was one time when a crab was stuck in the netting. As I tried to untangle it by hand, it clamped on my finger like a vice. In a desperate attempt to save my finger, I had to walk towards the shore and smash its pincers loose with a rock I found.

During the Japanese Occupation, my family members were persecuted. My father was forced to flee towards the Sha Tau Kok area (at Ma Mei Ha). He then moved out, settled in Yuen Long, and then founded Kwong Ming School. On the other hand, my two eldest uncles, who stayed in the village, went preaching in Sai Kung with the priest. Unfortunately, they were captured by guerrillas and were even suspected of being spies. Later on, my family knew about the news of his passing and that their remains went missing. It was only until 1970 that justice was finally done to my uncles, and their names were even etched on Memorial of the Guangdong East River Column.

It was not easy to get to the village (in Sai Kung) back then. I remember that if we headed to Jordan Road Ferry Pier from Yuen Long by Bus 16, it would take around one hour and 20 minutes. From there we changed to Bus 13 to arrive at Ngau Chi Wan. From there, we had to time ourselves wisely. Why? Because the bus from Ngau Chi Wan to Sai Kung (which should be KMB Bus 22) came every hour or one and a half hour, or somewhere around that duration. If we arrived earlier at Ngau Chi Wan, we would visit our grand-aunts (relatives) at the retirement home there. We would then wait for the right time to take the bus. After boarding, it would take us more than an hour to arrive at Sai Kung. That’s why we would head off early at around 7 or 8 o’clock in the morning. It would already be 12, almost 1 o’clock by the time we arrived at Sai Kung. If we took the ferry from Sai Kung Pier back to Yim Tin Tsai, it would already be 2 o’clock or half past 2. So my brother, who is 10 years older than me, used to take Bus 22 from Jordan Road back then.

We weren’t living in the village, and only stayed there for a week or two during the summer holiday. I can recall the rich variety of activities we had at night. The priest would bring some games to play with us, like when Father Man played Bingo with the kids at his hostel (located behind the chapel) at night. There was a booklet of “tickets.” We had to draw 40 numbers and Father Man would hand us tear-off tickets. We also had to roll a dice, sometimes even two or three of them. Of course, three dice would give a bigger number. Those who filled in all numbers would receive candies. Father Chan Chi Yan also taught us how to play Tien Gow, which was quite fun.

There’s more to crab catching (shining bright lights into the waters) than meets the eye. At first, I only knew to look under stones because they were bigger and easier to find. Later on, one of my brothers said, “There’s no need to do that. I see two crabs here already.” We called those flower crabs “green crabs” (because they were green in colour, with a longish body and two pointy tips for the head). These crabs would breathe while lying down, and air bubbles could be seen while they were doing so. We’d get two crabs in one catch. There was no need to turn stones over and still we’d catch them easily. As long as you knew how to find them, you could even get two in one go.

Do you know what a “sparrow fish” is? One time I went to the beach with my brother, we saw a fish swimming here and there, so we got it surrounded. The fish looked pretty interesting; it was tiny and shaped like a box. Its tiny tail kept flicking left and right. Later on, my brother ate the fish. I asked if it was tasty, and he said no, and that the entire fish tasted of gelatin and nothing else. I then asked him what fish it was, and he told me that’s a sparrow fish. With its small mouth and short tail, it did look quite like a sparrow, come to think of it.