For five months in 2013, I shared a room on the 25th
floor of one of the 1,250 skyscrapers that crowd the Hong
Kong skyline – the most of any city in the world. As a
result, in the most compressed areas Hong Kong has a
population density of 91,500 people per square mile. In
those areas, it feels as though everyone has a veil over
their head, preventing them from seeing the people who
constantly surround them. Perhaps that’s why everyone
runs into and pushes each other. Pushing, always pushing;
onto the bus, into the elevator, into the train – there is no
such thing as personal space in Hong Kong.
It is believable that the first time I found myself alone in
the city, it was an unconscious response to the suffocating
density. As I wandered the streets, searching for these
refuges within the city became a sort of mission. There
was something surreal and mystical about these spaces,
and they provided a brief respite from the crowds and
swarms that could be overwhelming.
Yet they never stayed unoccupied for long. Often I
invaded someone else’s refuge, and the trace of recent
human presence always lingered in the air.