Sometimes it seems as if Madiba never walked out of prison , writes Michael Weeder
Queen Victoria, in a letter to her uncle, King Leopold of Belgium, noted her husband Albert’s amusement “at my having got the island of Hong Kong”.
The remote settlement of a few fishing villages at the southern edge of the Chinese Empire was apparently a haven for pirates, which was probably the reason for a royal chuckle.
But its value was its deep, natural harbour named hèung-gáwng, Cantonese for “fragrant harbour” because of the scent from the sandalwood incense factory set at the western part of the island.
This week that smell of sandalwood still prevailed on the streets of Hong Kong where I attended an International Deans and Rectors Conference.
Although the British left in 1997, having ceded the island to China, traces of their presence remain evident, especially in the street names and businesses.
For instance I stayed at the Pottinger Hotel, probably named after Hong Kong’s first governor, Sir Henry Pottinger.
On Wednesday, April 27, our Freedom Day and my first day in Hong Kong, I walked through the neighbourhood near my hotel. I chanced upon Hollywood Road Park.
Some elderly folk were quietly doing tai-chi in one corner. A man was playfully hiding from his little daughter.
Apparently there were huge tortoises about but perhaps they were having a mid-morning siesta. I sat near the koi pond in the centre of the park.
There is no sign that this was the very spot where the British took formal possession of the island in 1841.
It reminded me of Cape Town’s botanical garden, considerably larger but equally silent about its colonial past. I thought of the enslaved who toiled in the land below Table Mountain to provide the food for the Dutch trading ships heading on to the East Indies.
This Freedom Day brought into sharp focus the struggles of our recent and distant past, blurred it would be seem by the excesses and betrayals that mark our recent times. Sometimes it seems as if Madiba never walked out of prison and perhaps we were seduced by the euphoria of the moment or an understandable longing to rest after a long and wearying walk to this freedom.
But resting, wrote the one who not only showed us, but led us on the way to freedom, is for a temporary but necessary moment of reflection, review: “But I can only rest for a moment, for with freedom come responsibilities and I dare not linger, for my long walk is not ended.”
Nor has ours.
revolution
she is loved by the fierce and the meek
and those who think that she is whom they seek
but, as you embrace her, do take care
‘cause if you are seeking saints, do beware
of her wizards, her promenading priests,
the pious and the slew of seducing beasts
who follow her from Jerusalem
to the hills of public martyrdom
where they would die for her with as much zeal
as they would strive with her even as they steal
your tomorrows, slamming heaven’s door
against the will of the desperate poor.
yet, no greater joy than having fought
alongside angels and the fallen, easily bought,
to have felt that freeing burst of blessedness,
albeit momentary, to have witnessed
the dancing, singing certainty
of marching into your time in history
on the long road of freedom
* The Very Rev Michael Weeder is the current Dean of St George's Cathedral.
** The views expressed here are not necessarily those of Independent Media.
Weekend Argus
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