Hongkongers searching for some room to breathe in most expensive city to purchase a home
Pursuit for living space grows arduous as flat prices soar, incomes fall further behind and the wait for public housing climbs to more than four years
A small patch of land of about 300 sq ft is hidden in an obscure alleyway in a trendy part of Central, surrounded by old walk-ups and wire fences. It is designed to be a pocket park for pedestrians to rest in, but it looks like a prison cell.
Angil Ng, a 72-year-old security guard, is half an hour early for his shift and sits on the bench reading a newspaper as the pipes, ventilation fans and cooling systems give off a rather industrial buzz.
The branches of a tree outside the fence reach into the otherwise barren park, providing a bit of shade for anyone venturing inside. A single long bench is placed with its back against narrow Chung Wo Lane off Staunton Street. Those who sit on it will face the light-blue wall of a building packed with pipes and air conditioners.
“This is the smallest park I’ve ever been to,” Ng says. “If I just happen to walk past, I never come in. You don’t get any fresh air here.”
Ng and his wife live in a government-subsidised rental flat on the Shek Pai Wan Estate in Aberdeen, but their daughter, in her 40s, has been struggling with the city’s skyrocketing rents. She pays HK$5,000 a month for a 200 sq ft subdivided unit in rural Yuen Long. Five years ago that sort of money would have got a place of at least 400 sq ft.
