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LOCAL EXPOSURES AND REFLECTIONS:

Following the input on Hong Kong the group was divided into three teams to visit different sectors in Hong Kong. The visit and study were spread over a period of three days and all the three teams had opportunities to visit all the sectors identified by the local organising committee. The local organising committee for the visits was led by the members of the Hong Kong Student Christian Movement (SCM) and they sought the cooperation of the Hong Kong Christian Council, the Christian Industrial Community and the Society for Community Organisation.

The different sectors identified were the industrial sector, the housing situation and the religious institutions. Some were able to find time to visit the University campuses in Hong Kong and talk with the academic community about the educational system in Hong Kong.

The visits to the industries were supplemented by visits to an Association that supports the victims of industrial accidents. It was discovered that the rate of industrial accidents in Hong Kong is one of the highest in the world and that the safety precautions and social security were at a minimum. One of the activities of the Association is to visit the hospitals to find individual cases of victims and to organise from into a group to petition the Government for the redress of their rights. They also undertake visits to the families of those victims to lend them the support and fellowship at a time of crisis like this and to provide, if possible, recreation facilities for the young in their families. Politically, they act as a pressure group to exercise pressure on the Government to change the laws regarding industrial safety and accidents. The teams of participants were able to visit some of the families and to engage in conversations with them to understand the working condition in Hong Kong.

In the housing sector the teams were able to visit many public housing schemes provided by the Government and also the temporary housing facilities. While the former has a more permanent nature the latter, though temporarily, seems to be of a long range arrangement since most people evicted from the crowded city slums have to wait for an unspecified period for housing. In both cases it was discovered that the facilities offered were inadequate and that the surrounding conditions were unhygienic and unhealthy for the growth of children. While it seems to be the reality of the majority of the people, luxury housing estates are being promoted by real estate developers to suit the comforts and needs of the few rich. It was also discovered that most of the industrial workers and hawkers or individual traders in Hong Kong live in crowded slums. Some members of the group were also able to visit

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Local Exposure Programme

"the boat people". These people have been living for generations on boats that float in the South China Sea and for various seasons they have not been able to find a place on the land where either the temporary accommodation or the government housing facility can be availed.

The teams also visited some of the major shrines and temples in Hong Kong. Despite the cosmopolitan outlook and apparent well-being of the people of Hong Kong there are strange super-situations attached to their religious life. The visit to the churches brought out the dismal factor of the privileged status of their existence under the colonial government in Hong Kong. It was observed that the churches had a major say in the educational matters and in setting up of educational institutions in the colony. The character and composition of the congregation of these churches in Hong Kong are positively of a middle and upper middle class nature. Due to this factor, Christians who belong to the working class or of a low economic status do not feel comfortable in being part of these conversations. To overcome this and to bring them into the fellowship, the Christian Industrial Committee in the recent years have organised, with the help of these workers, a new community calling them the "workers' churches". The priorities and programmes and discussions in this congregation are of an entirely different nature than from the other congregations in Hong Kong. Here they discuss their critical participation in production and also problems related to the industries in Hong Kong.

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The reflection sessions following the team visits, while highlighting some of the points observed above also observed that the capitalist nature of Hong Kong's economy is stifling to the growth of the totality of the human being. Due to the mad race for catching up with the economic pressures in the society, the average person did not or could not have the time for his or her own fellow beings. The callousness attached to this type of system is seen in the problems related to housing and industry. As one group observed "since people's participation in the decision making processes of Hong Kong are at a minimum due to the colonial status of the government, the representation of people's voice are often left in the hands of smaller and individual social action groups which can be called pressure groups. The limitations of this group are that it is primarily oriented to tackling a particular issue within a particular sector, and that there is no alliance or a territory-wide level of these pressure groups". One has to give credit to the growing awareness of the people to the problems of the society and also to the efforts made by these pressure groups in organising. In the words of the team report: "Groups like these continue to spread the message of the Gospel to unshackle the chains of oppressive structures that have caused the sufferings of the people".

It was the general feeling among all participants that Hong Kong is not an isolated case in Asia and that similar situations of varying degrees exist in their own countries. But the peculiarity of the situation in Hong Kong is that it is a colonial government which most of the Asian countries once had and it was a revelation for the participants who are from the post-colonial generation to rediscover the historicity of colonialism and to feel once again how their own nations have suffered and had been exploited.

A Sharing/Reflection on Exposure