Breaking News: Occupy Hong Kong takes to the streets for Halloween

I was doing some errands when I suddenly heard a whole lot of shouting. Upon further investigation, I found out that the heavier than normal police presence on Nathan Road today was caused by a protest staged by Occupy Hong Kong. (See my last post when I visited about two weeks ago here.) I joined the protesters for a bit as they were walking down the street.

Coincidentally, I was at the HSBC building yesterday, waiting for a friend who was going to the Michaelmas fair at St. John's church (I'll post something about this soon). I was surprised that two weeks after Occupy Hong Kong started, there were more or bigger tents, a common area with couches and bookshelves, a cooking area and a bulletin board with a schedule of activities and events. (Sadly, I couldn't decipher all the characters. If I did, I think the writing in black for the 30th of October is about the protest today.) Also coincidentally, the friend who was with me had mentioned that media interest was waning though I guess that statement will be thrown out the window in light of today's protests as there were many reporters, photographers and cameras running around.

Here are some pictures from yesterday:







Pictures from the protest today:

I think the people on that sign are candidates for Chief Executive in the upcoming elections.



This guy was "eating" the hand. I couldn't help but think of Lu Xun's "A Madman's Diary" (you can click the title to read the story).


I'm not exactly sure why there are pictures of people dressed as buildings but an educated guess would be because Hong Kong has a huge housing issue and it also happens to have the highest real estate prices for housing, especially when one considers low-income housing in cage houses.


V for Vendetta masks are a part of Occupy Hong Kong as well. There are other pictures of the mask wearers but I find this one poetic for some reason.


More V for Vendetta masks.


The mask wearers at the front of the protest were throwing spirit money that's burned for dead people.


At this point, a girl at the front was shouting about how they're young people who decided to do this because it's Halloween and they can take this time to dress up and show everyone the horrors that are happening in Hong Kong society today. Protesters were distributing these pamphlets and stickers. I wish I was more apt to read it.


The media was there as well. At one point, a chunk of protestors behind the white ifc thing stopped en route because they were being interviewed by reporters. There were also journalists walking with the protesters, tablets and recorders on hand. I couldn't quite get pictures of this while in the fray but I got this:


I wonder if this will come up on the news tonight. The protest was too late to be broadcast on the evening news.