| Tang Yu Kai |
Mr. Tang has served Lo Wai Village for eighteen years, developing different community activities, so that people can find their own joys and cope with the changing times when the village is faced with relocation. When Tang first came, he saw fifty year-old women still able to farm in the fields, but by the early 1990s, many farm owners were dispossessed of their lands by the Government under the Resumption Ordinance, for reasons of urban development. Many farmers were forced to abandon their work. Even though they used to be cheerful optimistic folks, elderly people forced to stay at home for long stretches of times will often become depressed.
“Starting from 1994, we organised tours to the mainland for our elderly folks, taking them for trips around Guangdong Province. The elderly had much fun! Once an old grandma stopped by a chicken farm when the tours for that day ended, and she chose a live chicken which was raised naturally on farm lands. She bought it and took it back to the hotel, and later that night cooked chicken congee for all of us as night-snack! When little children of those days are now parents themselves, it gives me the greatest pleasure, and they will bring their kids around to the centre. Sometimes I cannot recognise them anymore, but they can recognise me.”
