Be water, my friend: Hong Kong protesters take Bruce Lee’s wise saying to heart and go with the flow
- In an apparently leaderless movement, tech-savvy demonstrators moved in unexpected waves rolling from one spot to another
- Learning from Occupy movement of 2014, they traded prolonged mass sit-ins for spontaneous road blockades and circling of buildings
Tech-savvy demonstrators – who had been deliberating their tactics on online forums and encrypted channel Telegram in an apparently leaderless movement – moved in unexpected waves.
They rolled from one spot to another as the day wore on to occupy several key thoroughfares, police headquarters and government offices, forcing thousands of civil servants to end their work early.
Learning from the lessons of the Occupy movement of 2014, they traded the strategy of prolonged mass sit-ins for spontaneous road blockades and circling of buildings – a “formless” protest in Lee’s words – to sustain their momentum and secure the continued goodwill of the public.
A pair of 24-year-old friends, who gave their names only as Agnes and Maggie, joined the protest at 11am and moved up and down between government offices near Harcourt Road and police headquarters the entire day.
At first, the duo did worry whether the protest would be directionless without leaders to instruct them, compared with when they took part in Occupy and students stayed on the streets for 79 days.
