Check out that building with a hole in it.
Here in Hong Kong there are dragons floating everywhere. You can't really see
them, because you know they're dragons. They actually live up in the mountains
and they come down into the water and when you block them from entering the
water you end up really messing up your luck.
So they have accommodated this
situation by putting holes in the buildings so that the dragons can fly
through.
These are called dragon gates and they are one of many examples of how
Feng Shui, the ancient Chinese practice, is affecting the skyline of Hong Kong.
So Feng Shui is this ancient Chinese belief, superstition. The basic idea is
that there is good energy out there floating around, good luck, good fortune
called Qi and if you arrange your physical environment in an optimal way,
you can channel that good luck in the best way and things will go good for you.
This usually takes the form of like furniture, interior design but here in
Hong Kong, it has affected the skyline.
Alright, first let's look at this HSBC building.
The Hong Kong Shanghai Bank was
founded back in the days of pirates and opium barons.
First thing you'll notice is
that it's nicely squared off, with the mountains in the back and harbor in the
front.
This is really good composition for the
Qi to flow.
Not only is the lobby elevated but it's also the escalators
are at this angle. It's kind of a weird looking angle. That's intentional as well,
because it's actually meant to fend off the bad luck as it's coming through this
hole in the bottom of the building.
And then of course the opposite is true; if
you don't arrange your physical environment in an optimal way, then bad
luck will befall you.
Right next door is the Communist Bank of Red China.
The developers of this building explicitly ignored the Feng Shui masters who were
concerned that the sharp angles of this design would cut the good Qi and create
bad luck for all of the surrounding buildings.
The people who thought this
had their suspicions reinforced when shortly after the building was complete,
bad stuff started happening around it.
Like to this neighboring building, which
has been riddled with financial insecurity, corporate collapse, bankruptcies,
since it's very beginning. And Feng Shui masters have come out and cited the bad
Feng Shui of the area as a major cause for these events.
Governor of Hong Kong
at the time, whose house sits in the shadow of this building, died of a fatal
heart attack just one year after this building was complete.
So the HSBC
building, in response, put up these maintenance cranes that actually look
like cannons and they're pointed right at the Bank of China, in order to combat
all of this bad luck that's coming from this sharp building.
When developers are designing and putting up these buildings, they hire
these Feng Shui consultants. They spend millions of dollars on consultants who
will give them advice and approve their design decisions, to make sure that
they're in keeping with good Feng Shui.
Out here in Disneyland Hong Kong, the
Feng Shui masters said that the entrance was in a bad position for keeping good
luck in the park.
So they shifted the entrance by 12
degrees in order to create a blockade from the good luck escaping the park and
ruining the prosperity of this place.
Feng Shui comes from China, mainland
China, but during the Cultural Revolution China kind of stamped out some of these
old practices that they believed were holding the society back. And Feng Shui
fell victim to that, but Hong Kong at that time was ruled by the British. It
was a British colony, so it didn't fall subject to that Cultural Revolution and
Feng Shui was preserved in a very mainstream way.
Check out this building,
it's the Hopewell Center.
When this thing went up, people freaked out because it
kind of looked like a candle or like a smoking cigarette. They put a swimming
pool on the top, in order to extinguish the fire and make sure that it didn't
mess with the good luck of the city.
The government takes this stuff really
seriously too. Between 2011 and 2016 they paid out $1.1 million dollars in
Feng Shui disturbance subsidies.
This is paid out to people who complain that new
constructions disrupt their Fung Shui and they get compensated by the
government. So next time you are crossing this harbor to look at these beautiful
buildings, just remember that Feng Shui is at is at play in Hong Kong's skyline.