As I research things about Chungking Mansion (CKM) to do my analysis, I've came a cross some websites that do a pretty good job at characterizing CKM. Here are some excerpts:
Best Example of Globalization in Action
" But the housing and commercial complex is visited daily by an estimated 10,000 who trade in everything from secondhand mobile phones to old clothing. Many come from Kolkata (formerly Calcutta) and Dhaka, and a good proportion have overstayed their visas in order to make quick money as restaurant workers or peddlers of counterfeit watches and bags. " —by Liam Fitzpatrick
Hope and Squalor at Chungking Mansion
"Take everything that Disney’s Epcot Center represents—the squeaky-clean, child-safe, good-natured cheer of painless globalism—and then cover it in mutton fat, dope resin and human excrement and you’ll get Chungking Mansion. Known as “The Armpit of Asia,” Chungking Mansion is the claustrophobic home for about 20,000 residents from all over the globe. Yet the Mansion also provides a glimpse into one possible over-populated, multi-ethnic future for all of us. This 17-story bazaar of curry stalls, discount electronics vendors, pirated CD and video CD stores, brothels, meth dens and guest houses, provides a glimpse of a dystopian, post-technology future where tribes, cultures and races co-exist in bustling, jumbled squalor. ... No one seems to remember the building’s architect, and the Hong Kong Land Development Corporation has no record of the original design. Perhaps the architect would prefer to remain anonymous, for among the structure’s foibles is that all public space, ... it would be geometrically impossible to create a darker building. " - by Karl T. Greenfeld
"Take everything that Disney’s Epcot Center represents—the squeaky-clean, child-safe, good-natured cheer of painless globalism—and then cover it in mutton fat, dope resin and human excrement and you’ll get Chungking Mansion. Known as “The Armpit of Asia,” Chungking Mansion is the claustrophobic home for about 20,000 residents from all over the globe. Yet the Mansion also provides a glimpse into one possible over-populated, multi-ethnic future for all of us. This 17-story bazaar of curry stalls, discount electronics vendors, pirated CD and video CD stores, brothels, meth dens and guest houses, provides a glimpse of a dystopian, post-technology future where tribes, cultures and races co-exist in bustling, jumbled squalor. ... No one seems to remember the building’s architect, and the Hong Kong Land Development Corporation has no record of the original design. Perhaps the architect would prefer to remain anonymous, for among the structure’s foibles is that all public space, ... it would be geometrically impossible to create a darker building. " - by Karl T. Greenfeld
" the initial first impression leaves you breathless and without any real understanding of what you have got yourself into and where you are. ...We arrived on the 15th floor to a random small desk and an Afro-Caribbean guy asking my name and requesting 2500 HK dollars for the room...we were given a room on the right hand side, no bigger than the interior of a large square car with white tiles from floor to ceiling - very much like a prison cell. When I saw the window and it was blank and white, I realised that it was decorative and gave us a view of the plaster that separated our room from the next ...Eventually, the ‘hotel’ moved us 3 floors down in the building to the ‘Lucky Hotel’. Lucky Hotel, is a 7 roomed 'hotel' that was once an apartment. All of the hotels in ChungKing mansions have evolved from residential apartments. We were greeted by the ever cheery, Henry, who manages the ‘hotel’ and we now have a room with two windows..." - by Tracey Doxey
http://everything-everywhere.com/2007/12/15/chungking-mansion
http://everything-everywhere.com/2007/12/15/chungking-mansion
"I woke up in the middle of the night to this loud banging and screaming. Once at the corridor it was revealed that the immigration authorities were making a raid on the complex searching for illegal immigrants in the area. ...a Bangladeshi family staying next door was taken away by the officials. Women were screaming in the corridors and terrified children were crying and running around on the scene. It wouldn't have been much of a surprise if a goat and some poultry had come running around there too....when left alone with this African guy in the elevator you could just feel him staring and then saying "Niiiii-cccc-eeeee..." in a way only someone from East-Africa is able to do. Moreover there was a certain sexual connotation in his pronouncing too, so to avoid him being able to offer a blowjob or something. Still a few floors left to go, managed to make it all the way up without any physical harassment. "
oh I just found a great youtube made of the chungking mansion.
Check It! CKM
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