ATTITUDES OF HONGKONGERS
IDENTITY VALUE |
Chinese herbal tea is a representation drinks in Lingnan area. It has a close relationship with Hongkongers’ daily life due to the regional weather with high humidity and the busy life. Besides, it plays a vital role in Hong Kong history. In the late 19th century, there are a lot of coolies worked in foreign countries. Most of them would arrive their destinations by ships through Hong Kong’s seaports. They would usually bring along some simple Chinese medicine so that they can make the herbal tea during the journey when they have illness. In 1950s, there was less western medical clinic in Hong Kong. The ordinary people used Chinese herbal tea as drugs to cure themselves. As a result, the Chinese herbal tea shops at that period were considered as medical clinic (Tse, 2014). In 1960-70s, the Chinese herbal tea shops transformed as time went on. There were gramophone and English songs in the shops, hence, it attracted many young people to come. They usually liked to play the “cha cha” song and the song of Elvis Presley. Therefore, they would drink the Chinese herbal tea, while chatting with their friends, listening music and dancing in the shops (So, 2011).
The Hong Kong Tourism Board promotes Chinese herbal tea under the category “living culture” in their website (Hong Kong Tourism Board, 2015) and the Hong Kong Museum of History introduce the Chinese herbal tea shops and culture in the “Hong Kong Story” exhibition. Hence, we can see that Chinese herbal tea shops are deep rooted in the local identity. Interestingly, when Chinese herbal tea became the Chinese Intangible Cultural Heritage in 2006, the Hongkongers have not given much responses or reactions, especially the young generations (Hui & Kwan & Chui, 2014). It may because of the modern Chinese herbal shops which are more commercialize with losing of community culture and sentiment between shopkeepers and customers. |
CAN IT BE CONSIDERED AS AN INTANGIBLE CULTURAL HERITAGE OF HONG KONG?
After the interviews and the literature review, we think that Chinese herbal tea can be regarded as the cultural heritage of Hong Kong because of its close relationship with our daily life and traditional medical wisdom. However, it do not related to the status quo of our city. Undoubtedly, the evolution of Chinese herbal tea shop expands its group of customers and makes Chinese herbal tea easier to buy than before due to the great number of convenience shops and the modern herbal tea shops. But using United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization's definition towards intangible cultural heritage as reference, an object should not be regarded as cultural heritage with its physical appearance only but without traditions and living expressions (UNESCO, 2012). In this case, the traditions and living expressions should include the interaction of people in the community, and this is also the key for the transmission of knowledges and skills from one generation to the next. Furthermore, it should maintains the cultural diversity under the trend of globalization. By analyzing the information we got, we think that the currently dominant modern Chinese herbal tea shops cannot maintain the sentiment among the shopkeepers and the customers in the past. The shops and the taste of the tea were homogenized since the modern Chinese herbal tea shops like Hung Fook Tong are chain stores. The customers usually will not chat with the staff in the shops and their loyalty towards a particular shop decreased because they can find the shops of the same brand in different places. Although the traditional Chinese medicine wisdom is still the selling point, the taste and the efficiency are greatly affected by the change of formula and additional substances. The “modern Chinese herbal tea” is something like soft drinks or bubble tea rather than a health care drinks to Hongkongers nowadays. With these reasons, Chinese herbal tea can be regarded as the cultural heritage of Hong Kong, yet it should refers to the traditional Chinese herbal tea shops in the past, which is full of sentiment and social connection among people in the same community.