THE GARDEN OF HOPE AND HAPPINESS: BECAUSE IT’S TIME.
- 9 hours ago
- 4 min read
Firstly, and just to get boring and repetitive, around a couple of decades ago, the then-government’s almost token gweilo mouthpiece-Duncan Pescod- announced to Hong Kong, and I guess, the world, how there would be a “worldwide search” for the “right person” to head up what was something called CreateHK.
The search for this very special someone to lead the much anticipated launch of CreateHK through the marshes ended up being someone named Jerry something or another from, I think, the Hong Kong Trade Development Council and whom I first saw introduce/present this new initiative to upgrade and support the local creative community at some marketing event at the Grand Hyatt.
Whatever, “Jer” might have said that night doesn’t really matter, because much has been promised over the years to support and encourage and upgrade the quality of the creative product in Hong Kong, but, and forgetting the politics, apart from the brilliant street art displayed during the Umbrella Movement, nothing has yielded much fruit.
Gawd knows, there have been any number of exhibitions and one-off this and that half assed opportunities to improve the standards creativity in Hong Kong, but for one reason or another, things have gone belly up with nothing that would make anyone go Wah, let alone Wow.
For a while there, the most creative thing Hong Kong had going was the Spicy Game Hen served at the brilliant Wyndham Street Thai and the paella served across the road at La Bodega.
Fast forward to today and though there are scattered showers of activity for the creative community, this often becomes yet another exhibition or something where the opportunity to showcase the fluidity of creativity becomes caught up in bureaucratic bollocks and almost red tape propaganda pushing the creative product in the same old direction, where one starts seeing variations of the same old themes.
I look at something like the almost moribund and vibeless former police station known as Tai Kwun being managed and marketed by the Hong Kong Jockey Club, and recall the various plans Euan Upston, below, someone very well known in the arts from Sydney, had for the heritage building and cultural centre after arriving in Hong Kong to take on its leadership.
Alas, he didn’t last the distance, and like many before and after him, cut short his contract and left to enjoy “garden leave”.
The point is that you eventually outgrow certain things and people and you want to reap what you sow- good things filled with positivity and inspiration and something that travels fluidly without coming up against crashing waves.
This leads me to the Garden Of Hope and with the first seeds having already been planted in my head for almost three years, but this now finding fertile ground at a private get together with friends at the Poolside Restaurant of the Grand Hyatt Hotel in Hong Kong next week.
If I were to take an inventory of my “assets”, I would think that someone was working to a timetable for me that had to do with me planting Acorns For Peace for John and Yoko, when a young reporter, decades later being given permission by Yoko to remix “Give Peace A Chance” and produce an album of demos and outtakes by John.
Together with my friend Morton, we remixed tracks by David Bowie, Placebo and other international artists, and slowly, but surely, I was moving away from who and what I was involved with and which had been taking up too much of my time for way too long.
That’s all in the rear view mirror along with those who once played a role in my life. It comes down to knowing what one really needs out of life and how and when you know what this is. It can’t be something done in half measures.
You deep dive into who or whatever is guiding you and keep making that garden grow by sowing seeds, because it’s what the next generation is going to inherit, and this is a gift for them filled with hope and happiness and inspiration and something that’s helping to set the wheels in motion and absolutely enjoying seeing something that was a vague idea become a reality.
If this “garden” of everything positive helps to ignite a chain reaction of hope and understanding and drowning out the negative, my work has started and I know that I will be enjoying it far too much for it to end.
ABOUT HANS EBERT
When he arrived by ship from what was then known as Ceylon to the British colony of Hong Kong, the Dutch Burgher- it’s a long story-thought he had arrived in Melbourne because that’s what his parents had told him- it’s an even longer story- until he saw all the rickshaws, women wearing cheongsams with slits up to their arse, and was given a pair of chopsticks during his first lunch in the city.
He had never eaten dim sum, but then again, no one told him that as a fledgling journalist, he would meet and interview everyone from Peter Sellers, Roman Polanski and George Harrison to Billy Joel, Norah Jones, Gorillaz, David Bowie and Quincy Jones, create the Happy Wednesday brand for the Hong Kong Jockey Club, win the Gold Award at the London Advertising Awards for his “Right Of Abode campaign, coin the term “Canto Pop” when writing for the American trade publication Billboard, and when in advertising not only helped launch McDonald’s in Hong Kong and work on the business as Director of Creative Services for over two decades, and was very much involved in the launch of STARTV, MTV Asia and PCCW.
He has written hits for some of the biggest names in Chinese popular music and wooed and married the model who was the Wrangler Girl.
These days, he is rewriting his journography and working on introducing the world to his imaginary friend Muzi and their search for everything that leads to positivity by leaving the dullards behind to pursue nutworking.
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