Karen Cheung

A boldly rendered—and deeply intimate—account of Hong Kong today, from a resilient young woman whose stories explore what it means to survive in a city teeming with broken promises. “Hums with the thrill of being lost in this massive, haunted, mythologized, neon city, yet finding oneself in the end.”—Hua Hsu, author of A Floating Chinaman Hong Kong is known as a place of extremes: a former colony of the United Kingdom that now exists at the margins of an ascendant China; a city rocked by mass protests, where residents rally—often in vain—against threats to their fundamental freedoms. But it is also misunderstood, and often romanticized. Drawing from her own experience reporting on the politics and culture of her hometown, as well as interviews with musicians, protesters, and writers who have watched their home transform, Karen Cheung gives us a rare insider’s view of this remarkable city at a pivotal moment—for Hong Kong and, ultimately, for herself. Born just before the handover to China in 1997, Cheung grew up questioning what version of Hong Kong she belonged to. Not quite at ease within the middle-class, cosmopolitan identity available to her at her English-speaking international school, she also resisted the conservative values of her deeply traditional, often dysfunctional family. Through vivid and character-rich stories, Cheung braids a dual narrative of her own coming of age alongside that of her generation. With heartbreaking candor, she recounts her yearslong struggle to find reliable mental health care in a city reeling from the traumatic aftermath of recent protests. Cheung also captures moments of miraculous triumph, documenting Hong Kong’s vibrant counterculture and taking us deep into its indie music and creative scenes. Inevitably, she brings us to the protests, where her understanding of what it means to belong to Hong Kong finally crystallized. An exhilarating blend of memoir and reportage, The Impossible City charts the parallel journeys of both a young woman and a city as they navigate the various, sometimes contradictory paths of coming into one’s own.

A Hong Kong Memoir

The Impossible City

Nadine Lee

What does it mean to belong to a place? I grew up knowing what it felt like to be abandoned; in my twenties, I found a home in my neighbors who are making self-funded community papers about our wondrous street corners, in the artists and musicians who are creating works in the most impossible of conditions, in friends who took over the streets and redefined activism. How do I explain the moments that feel so monumental to me: being at a hot-pot dinner with other journalists after a long week of news, a stranger gesturing frantically at me to get away from the police during a clash, passing a beer to an artist in the early hours of the morning at Bound? These are the people who taught me to no longer see a place as transitory, expendable. When we talk about the fight for Hong Kong, we pepper our discussions with keywords like democracy and freedom, or basic moral responsibility, when really we’re just protesting for our friends’ future, for their safety and well-being—especially the ones who will not be able to leave Hong Kong, and whose lives are so inextricably tied up with politics that they never had a choice over whether to care.

Belonging means the pull of a home so strong it will always be a part of you, wherever you are. I don’t want to stand at a distance looking in, talking about how shitty this city is without taking part. I don’t want to marvel at the skyline while refusing to understand the political developments behind the façade. I don’t want to reap the economic benefits of the land only to leave before the storm. I’m still trying to understand what it means to be part of a place that nurtured me, to define what community means to us. But I know I’ve belonged to this city for a long time now.

Look closer at this street corner: The sun is setting. The vendor at the newspaper stand packs up the dailies and puts away the cartons of eggs. Students with laptops in their arms shuffle out of the cha chaan teng. Elderly couples and their poodles take a stroll by the pier. You can still hear the uproar of the crowds that once gathered on the steep slopes for film screenings, festivals, protests. The florists at the wet market put away the last lilies. The last tram slots itself into the station. And then the scene dissolves again. Maybe you can’t save this place; maybe it isn’t even worth saving. But for a moment, there was a sliver of what this city could have become. And that is why we’re still here.

When my friends and I text we have our own language, a mixture of Cantonese and English and internet lingo and typos and everything else. I am homed, a friend tells me after a night out, to let me know they’ve gotten back safe. Homed. As if home is standing at the door begging you to come back indoors as rain runs down the bridge of your nose. And just like that you’re back again, letting the four walls cage you in, like you’ve returned against your will but you couldn’t quite help yourself.

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