Roads and Bridges

Just as the church and school serve as monuments to the growth of the village, roads, bridges, walls, and fences also elicit stories about the history of the community. As Pang wrote, "There was once a dispute concerning the blockage of the road. It is worth recording so as to reveal the malicious ways of the world and how cruel people can be" (1934:13).

The people of Shung Him Tong were actively involved in improving their community. Besides the church and school there were other projects—such as building an embankment along the edge of the river to protect the area from floods during the typhoon season—which were geared toward improving their lives. Roads and bridges were constructed to facilitate the journey to and from market, to bring students to the school, and to bring more worshipers to the church. But such projects were also the grounds for dispute, especially with non-Christian, non-Hakka neighbors in the surrounding communities.^[16]

The road connecting Shung Him Tong to the outside world presented several challenges to Hakka Christian leaders. After Chung Him School was established, Pang Lok Sam went to the Tai Po district board to ask that the narrow wooden bridge crossing Phoenix River into Shung Him Tong be replaced. He received no response until a young Teng boy drowned in the river during

the typhoon season at the dragon boat festival. The government then approved the request and contributed 900 Hong Kong dollars to the project.

The main route connecting Shung Him Tong with the larger market town of Sheung Shui had always passed through land that later became On Lok village. In the 1920s, across the river from Shung Him Tong, On Lok was developed into a posh residential community of "country homes" for wealthy Chinese businessmen and professionals, most of them Cantonese. By the late 1920s, the conflict between residents of Shung Him Tong and the Cantonese developers of On Lok came to a climax.

Throughout the 1920s there had been trouble all over the New Territories with bandits and thieves, so Pang and the heads of about twenty wealthy families from Shung Him Tong, On Lok, and other nearby villages organized Luen On Tong (United Peace Association) for mutual aid and protection. The organization included both Hakka Christians and non-Christians, some of them relatively recent Cantonese immigrants to Hong Kong, and possibly one or two older Punti families. The members kept gongs in their homes to sound in case of trouble and arranged for guards around their homes and fields. The association also arranged that the villagers be allowed to keep firearms to protect their property. Luen On Tong held four banquets a year for its members. At one banquet in 1928, Fung, a landlord from On Lok village, asked Pang if Shung Him Tong villagers could take a different route to the Fanling train station rather than through On Lok. Pang answered no and sensed that there would be trouble over this issue in the future.

Shortly after, Fung declared that Shung Him Tong villagers should find an alternate route and that the people of On Lok would not allow them to cross their property. They erected a barrier around their village and placed guards at the gates. These entrances were closed at 9:00 P.M. and only reopened again at 9:00 A.M. When Pang first learned of this, he assumed it concerned the safety of the On Lok villagers and made no objection. But the next year on January 1, the path from On Lok to Shung Him Tong was blocked, and Pang reported it to the Tai Po District Office. The district officer assigned a police inspector to investigate. It turned out that the On Lok villagers had bought the land along which the path ran from the government a year earlier. The district office recommended that the Shung Him Tong and On Lok village leaders negotiate. Ling Sin Yuen, Cheung Wo Ban, Pang Lok Sam, and Tsui Yan Sau invited the On Lok village leaders to hold a meeting, but two meetings later, still no agreement had been reached. A few months later a lawyer from On Lok arranged a meeting in the Tai Po District Office and offered the following conditions:

1. Only students and villagers can use the path;

2. An annual one-dollar fee should be paid by each user;

3. Passage is allowed in both directions;

4. The path is open during daylight hours only;

5. People must pass on foot;

6. No cows are allowed;

7. No funeral processions are allowed;

8. The route must be agreed on in a contract.

Shung Him Tong representatives objected to the conditions. A month later Fung decided to block the path. The next evening On Lok guards fired several shots and claimed that Shung Him Tong villagers had tried to clear the obstructed path at night; they discovered them, fired a warning shot, and Shung Him Tong people allegedly returned fire. The following day the police inspector sent someone to bring Pang Lok Sam with his two rifles and pistol to the police station to be examined.

A European Basel missionary from Switzerland who was studying Hakka language in Shung Him Tong at the time of the incident wrote a letter to attest to the fact that Pang Lok Sam did not fire the shots.^[17] A week later Pang and Ling again met with the On Lok lawyer but they reached no settlement. The district commissioner recommended that Shung Him Tong hire a lawyer. Pang, concerned that this would mean a great financial burden for the village, decided to take a different tack.

The next day, Pang arranged for a meeting of Shung Him Tong leaders and advocates at Chung Him School. Reverend Ho and Pastor Tsang of the Sai Ying Pun Basel mission church also joined the meeting and helped the Shung Him Tong representatives plan how to lodge their appeal. The following day they went to discuss the case with three members of the Heung Yee Kuk (Rural Consultative Committee), the organization of rural representatives that had been set up to serve the interests of the people of the New Territories. They finally agreed that Pang, who had been influential in founding the Kuk and was then the chairman, would send a letter to the Tai Po District Office and request that it be forwarded to the governor (Pang 1934).

Pang Lok Sam is thought to have been very effective in his way of approaching the government. In the letter to the Tai Po District Office dated April 1930, Pang Lok Sam and Ling Sin Yuen wrote:

For several decades our villagers have gone to Fanling, Sheung Shui, Shen Zhen, etc., by way of the bridge to On Lok that leads to the main road. All along there was no problem…. In 1913, seeing that there were many school-aged children in the area, Pang Lok Sam contributed money to build a temporary school. In 1914, with a grant of HK$2,000 from the government, we built Chung Him lower and higher primary schools…. The total ex-

penditure was HK$10,000…. Later, since the wooden bridge had decayed, the government gave us a grant of HK$990 to repair it…. HK$1,976 were spent in the construction of the bridge, with HK$280 contributed by five wealthy families of On Lok village. Clearly, the construction of the bridge was considered important by the government; and the bridge was considered necessary by both the government and the villagers of On Lok. For the past twenty-five years worshipers have taken this path to church. Once people live in a place, they need roads. Where there are roads, there are also bridges. This is why the government has the good policy of providing financial support for people who need to build bridges…. In fact the government provided funds to build the bridge because it is along the route that children take to go to school. So the bridge is for the school, which contributes to education. If the bridge is abandoned, the school is also, indirectly, abandoned. (From letter from Heung Yee Kuk to the governor, in Pang 1934).

Quickly and unexpectedly, the matter was resolved. No doubt Pang's political clout and his relationship with the Kuk was a major factor. By order of the government, the police inspector sent a detective sergeant to On Lok the next day. Fung was instructed to make the path accessible, and Pang Lok Sam was informed that the dispute would be settled by the government in due course. By the end of the year, the government decided to buy back four acres of land in On Lok for public access. The land was bought from the On Lok Investment Company for eighty-seven Hong Kong dollars. As Pang wrote, "With the blessing of God we could finally come to a satisfactory conclusion after a series of twists and turns" (1934:16; see also Hong Kong Government 1930). The construction of the road and the bridge is still a matter of pride for the villagers of Shung Him Tong. The list of donations and the plaque commemorating the new road and the bridge still stand. Since then three additional bridges have been built connecting Shung Him Tong to the main road, the most recent completed in 1987.