Then & Now | Street food hawkers in Hong Kong: a tale of corruption, crackdowns and the black comedy of the food truck fiasco
- Once an integral part of urban life, the food hawkers who walk the streets of Hong Kong selling simple, popular food items are a dying breed
- Food trucks, a foreign import, were recently launched, but interfering bureaucrats with no knowledge of the business stifled owners’ chances of success
Buzzing, multifaceted street-side activities are a well-established, colourful feature in any large urban centre. Ambulant food hawkers were a noted facet of life in all Asian cities, including Hong Kong, until recent times.
Their declining numbers are seen by many – with some truth – as part of the ongoing homogenisation of local street culture, and a loss of distinctiveness, character and charm, as malls the size of city blocks inexorably take over.
Depending on the time and season, foods on offer might have been bowls of soup noodles, sweet broths, steamed buns, candied fruit, roast sweet potatoes – anything that was popular. Individual hawkers with particular specialities would be sought after whenever their call was heard around the neighbourhood.
Like much else in the recent local past, distinctive street vendor’s cries are now something heard mostly on recorded loops within static museum displays, rather than as part of everyday life.
Less happily, hawker licences gave ample opportunity for petty corruption to flourish; low-level, poorly paid officials could be – and routinely were – bribed to speed up an application.
For decades, Police and Urban Services staff in Hong Kong routinely accepted “tips” to look the other way with regard to unlicensed activities and petty infractions; there are those who still fondly choose to think that these practices are now extinct.
