MUSIC – Clockenflap Festival 2014 Highlights
Clockenflap Festival 2014 continues today. Highlights from day one and two below…
Occupy umbrellas on stage at Chthonic on Friday & Ozamati on Saturday…
Clockenflap Festival 2014 continues today. Highlights from day one and two below…
Occupy umbrellas on stage at Chthonic on Friday & Ozamati on Saturday…
It has been 126 years since the Peak Tram opened in Hong Kong though, technically, it is not even a tram but a ‘cable-hauled funicular railway’. Below is a brief, visual history of one of the city’s most iconic treasures…
The son of Queen Victoria, Alfred, became, the first royal visitor to make a ritual trip to The Peak in 1869. It was noted how His Highness expressed “surprise that the wealthy merchant princes of the colony had not yet availed themselves of the opportunity of the presence in the vicinity of their city of a position offering so bracing a climate, in the hottest time of the year.” Quite.
The ‘Rush to The Peak’ had commenced with Hong Kong’s population rising to 173,475 by 1883. Several dozen of the city’s elite families were now living on The Peak and it was also home to The Peak Hotel. The area remained accessible only by horse or sedan chair. (One local eccentric, E R Belilios, preferred to travel the winding paths by camel, though none of these options were comfortable, especially in HK’s heat).
Thus, Peak Hotel owner and Scotsman Alexander Findlay Smith, planned to open up the area with a new tram system to connect Victoria Gap to Murray Barracks…
Freespace Festival 2014 continues on Sunday at West Kowloon Cultural District. More information here, entrance is free.
Open 11am – 10pm, last entry at 9pm. There is music, dance, art installations, games, craft stalls and food – an ideal warm-up for Clockenflap next weekend.
President Xi Jinping has become an unlikely mascot of the umbrella movement – especially in Mong Kok, where at least seven cardboard cut-outs adorn the occupy camp’s barricades. More than a humorous aside, the mere presence of the life-size Xi’s is said to “deter” pro-China antagonists – or so it is hoped.
Now you can create your own Xi Jinping yellow umbrella art works like this…