Chapter 97

I sat on the floor. Listening closely to the murmurs of the megaphone held by the policemen. They moved around a lot around the entrance. Sometimes getting close to the clinic doors and sometimes getting further away. I figured that since I wasn’t noticed yet and the clinic itself was pretty inconspicuous with all the lights inside being out, I may get a chance to slip away while the policemen were looking elsewhere. 

Sure enough, very quickly it became apparent that the policemen had no interest in anything in my direction. Under the cloudless lunch-hour sky, the clinic was also a bit shaded. There should be no issue with just me moving about. Even then, the fact that I could easily see out the windows of the clinic and observe policemen and their gear in crisp acuity still made me nervous. Looking at this from their perspective, I was just a student on school property. Moreso, I was indistinguishable from the other protesters who were barricading the area.

I must have stayed put in the clinic’s main area for a good 20 minutes or so. Peeking behind the front reception table every now and then to see if the policemen were gone. I couldn’t hear anything they were talking about but from a slew of persons with “press” on their shirts leaving the area at the police instruction, it seems like the policemen were calling for reporters to exit. This was not encouraging news. It doesn’t take a genius to think of reasons why you’d want the neutral parties involved in a conflict gone. 

I need to get out of here. 

The most obvious and probably safest option was to just go out the back door. The clinic had been on the edge of campus and I had figured that it wouldn’t be so hard to find an exit once I made it to the outside. Very carefully, I crouched and moved slowly towards the back of the clinic until eventually, I was out of earshot and definitely out of view of the policemen.

I then explored the back of the clinic for exits away from the main entrance, carefully making sure that whenever I moved, I never got into the sight of anyone on the outside. A few locked doors later, I did find an open one. It was an emergency exit but I really didn’t care about that. I pushed it open, finding that it led to a small lunch courtyard. Only after opening the door did I think about how if the door did activate an alarm, that it would be horrible news for me. 

This was good news but the story doesn’t end here. The courtyard was not a direct link to the road. It was wire-fenced off. While I could have scaled this fence, I didn’t really want to do that with my equipment in my bag. Furthermore, I was almost certain there must be an easier way. Although, to search for better means of exiting campus grounds means I have to move around on the outside, where I was exposed to anyone with binoculars. All the while, I had also dodge even more obstacles and hazards that were put up by protesters.

The lunch courtyard, which was previously just a nice small parkette with outdoor tables for hanging out during down time, was now just like the rest of the campus, full of debris. The trees were all used as a base for saran wrap and rope. To even get to the fence, I would have to traverse a makeshift jungle gym. As fun as that sounds, the ground was also littered with bricks, screws, nails and a whole bunch more detergent just for good measure. One slip and I could be looking at a lot of injuries. Choosing the path of least resistance, I decided to move along the walls of the building.

I kept the fence always in view. As I walked more and more, I kind of knew that at some point I would have to scale it. I wasn’t really concerned too much about that though. Just as long as leaving the area meant not falling into the hands of policemen as soon as I’m out. This was especially concerning as the roofs of the buildings across the street from the campus hosted numerous military personnel with binoculars. It was unsettling as, since the streets were now completely abandoned, I was the only moving target. I mean, it was pretty easy to spot one person walking down the highway when there were no cars anywhere nearby. 

I looked for parts of the fence that had shade. While exploring, I would come to see some of the ingenuity of the students. After the area of saran wrap and trip wires/ropes, there were complete walls erected from bricks and cement. Looks like some of the protesters thought it would be better to use the bricks to make walls instead of just obstructing cars. There were obstacles that looked like pieces of art. Clumps of large couches, tables and chairs held together with chains that felt like it was more of a political symbol than an obstacle. With that said, they were still a nuisance to work around. 

As I kept walking, I eventually made it to the swimming pool area towards the West side of campus. I didn’t want to go too much further as beyond this area there would be no cover. That meant very high visibility from the buildings nearby. I backtracked a tiny bit then took out my white coat from my bag and threw it over the top of the fence. I guess it was time to scale it.

The top of the fence had exposed wires and I didn’t want to be cut anywhere. The white coat helped. After I made it over, I shook it loose from the top and fortunately found that it had not received any tears. I now found myself still on Chatham Rd but a lot more North West than I had previously been. 

Now, all I could do was act like a normal pedestrian and walk along the road heading back towards the North entrance of the campus. I hid in the shade as much as I could but in the end, I don’t think it did anything. A few meters ahead, I looked back to see that the military personnel on the roof tops were still looking into the university, not around it. I was not of any interest it seemed. After noticing this, I walked with much more ease until I eventually made it to the North entrance, and then subsequently, my student residence. As I walked into my student residence, I started to recount how surprisingly uneventful this entire ordeal has been. 

This was a win. I got all my stuff and got out. 

When I made it back to my room, I sighed with a big breath of relief. But then that thought came back again. Was there really any major danger? I mean, surely it couldn’t have been that bad right? I got my stuff and walked away unscathed? No one really stopped me in my tracks. I kept thinking about this as I packed the last of my things and then emptied my optometry equipment into my suitcase. Regardless of how it all did play out, I can’t think about all that. We’re not done here yet. I still have to leave the country. 

Once done with all the packing, I took all my stuff and headed for the student residence main office on the first floor. Very fortunately, they were giving me back some of my deposit for the residence since the school announced the official closure. When I got my refund, I felt like my very shallow roots in Hong Kong had been lifted. With that, I took the bus towards the airport. 

I recall this bus ride. It was a nice ride. I knew I wasn’t technically done with Hong Kong as my flight plans for after Vietnam required a layover here again for about 16-18 hours but I wouldn’t step foot off of Hong Kong Island. 

At this point, it was hard not to think a little politically. In my eyes and the eyes of a lot of the neutral parties in Hong Kong, the protesters are the cause of a lot of headaches. They stopped the rails and forced us into more expensive means of travel, then they stopped my school from continuing and prevented me from really living it up as an international student. All of this for a cause that still remained kind of unclear to me. 

That’s right. To let you in on a secret. A lot of the international students, when we hung out and drank that time, did bring up the protests in our conversations. But most of the conversations revolved around our lack of interest in it all. We weren’t going to stick around Hong Kong for long and in the eyes of the world, and more importantly in the eyes of social media, the images of unrest were so rampant it had lost all meaning. 

This, however, does bring up a point that I do think is worth pointing out. What do I feel about all of this as someone who is Chinese? For this question, I realized that since I have nothing at stake here and also didn’t follow closely, I can only relate this from the perspective of someone who has a family that follows politics closely and was raised in the environment. Of course, by this, I was referring to my mom’s political side. While this may seem a bit random to mention, trust me, the theme of her political affinity will play a much larger role in the future. 

My mom was on the side of the protesters. She kind of hates China. Like…A lot. Sure, there are good points she brings up from time to time but the thing is…She has spewed so much Anti-Chinese propaganda on me that whenever something happens in real life around China, it pales in comparison to her narrative. Furthermore, my mom is easily the most politically aggressive person I know. Being so politically aggressive in the age of social media means she at some times can feel like a radical. I wouldn’t be lying if I didn’t say that this was starting to wedge a bit into our relationship too. There’s only so much text you can take someone, even a family member, about politics before it’s too pushy.

The part of my mom that I dread the most is when she speaks about how the people in China are all mindless drones. She keeps saying how the people in China are so easily radicalized because they are brainwashed by the government and Big Data. It was all degenerate to the core. The irony here is that she is probably the most radical person I know. It also doesn’t really help that I met her childhood friend recently who does live in China and is by all accounts, a well adjusted individual. 

Furthermore, seeing as how easy it was to get a rise out of her politically, I’d say she was herself predisposed to be brainwashed. She is by far the most easily swayed by politics and while, yes, sure there is more freedom of information in the West, that is wasted on a person who simply chooses to ignore it. She would often then argue that the best part of it all was that she has the option of ignoring information whereas in China, you wouldn’t get the choice. Honestly, it’s just a headache. Family and politics really don’t work well together. 

I tried not to think too much more about this and luckily, I didn’t have to. While lost in thought, my bus had made it to the airport. There, I chucked my suitcase into a locker since I wouldn’t really need to take that much with me to Vietnam. Then I boarded my flight headed for Phu Quoc, Vietnam. 

It was time for a vacation.