Gweilo: Memories of a Hong Kong Childhood. Martin Booth

by Martin Booth

Book Overview

Martin Booth died in February 2004, shortly after finishing the book that would be his epitaph - this wonderfully remembered, beautifully told memoir of a childhood lived to the full in a far-flung outpost of the British Empire...

An inquisitive seven-year-old, Martin Booth found himself with the whole of Hong Kong at his feet when his father was posted there in the early 1950s. Unrestricted by parental control and blessed with bright blond...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0553816721
• ISBN13: 9780553816723
• Release Date: September 2005
• Publisher: Bantam Press
• Length: 269 Pages
• Weight: 1.25 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.9" x 5.1" x 7.8"

Customer Reviews

Thumbs up from a "local"

Although I've been living in the States for years now, I am a Hong Kong "local" who grew up not too far away from the Fourseas Hotel where young Booth began his adventures in Hong Kong. Booth's memoir brought me right back to Hong Kong, as if I could see the foggy harbor, smell the joss sticks burning in a temple and hear the chatter from busy dai-pai-dongs. Booth's description of Hong Kong is so vivid and lively that I felt I was right there with him roaming all over Kowloon and the Peak. The way Booth intertwined the story with his adventures in Hong Kong and his parents strained marriage makes the book a very interesting read. I can feel Booth's love for Hong Kong throughout his writing, and as a local, I'm proud to know that a Gweilo loves my hometown as much as I do. For the curious folks out there, I checked with my Dad, who informed me that the Fourseas Hotel was remodeled into a bowling alley, and then got torn down and rebuilt as another hotel which is still in operation nowadays, called The Metropole. "Coronation Road" mentioned in the book has been renamed "Nathan Road", the hill behind Fourseas with the refugee squatters is present-day residential area "Ho Man Tin", dai-pai-dongs are still gourmet of street food, and no, people don't eat dogs anymore (I believe it's illegal), but yes, snake is still a wintertime favourite! I highly recommend this book!

Growing up in Hong Kong

For an excellent review of the same book, albeit under the name of "Golden Boy: Memories of a Hong Kong Childhood" and at a higher price than 'Gweilo' (it's the same book) see the review by Lynn Harnett. It was a pleasure for me to read Martin Booth's childhood memories while sitting in far-away arid and cold Denver, Colorado and through Martin's detailed descriptions to relive my own colorful childhood in humid Hong Kong in the 60ies and 70ies. Although I was the protagonist's age about 20 years after Martin, did not have the 'lucky' golden hair but 'uninteresting' auburn hair that the locals did not touch for good luck, and as a girl did not have Martin's freedom to roam around alone, his book evoked many similar memories. Growing up 20 years after Martin provided some detachment and distance from dead Japanese soldiers, and by the '60ies water shortages made us fill the bathtubs and every empty receptacle with water rather than soap up at the beach. Little Martin's description of Hong Kong and Chinese culture is insightful and accurate. Martin's children are most fortunate to have been left such a vivid, detailed and succinct memoir of Martin's early childhood and I hope their experience of their father was a far more positive one than Martin's experience with his father. I hope for Martin's father's sake that the old man was not as narrow-minded, insecure and unjust as he was portrayed in the book; on the other hand the man's meanness and pettiness made for some pretty amusing reading. His mother's positive and helpful demeanor and openness to absorbing a new culture was a very refreshing contrast to the father's dullness. The tone between the parents and the mother's affection for the son is set on the journey to Hong Kong - dad shares a cabin with another man while mom shares her cabin with her only child. I strongly recommend this book to 1. anyone who wishes to gain a better understanding of Hong Kong in the 50ies 2. anyone who would like a better understanding of how an intelligent, intellectually curious 7 to 10 year old perceives a new culture and his own parent's farcical marriage. As stated before, for more on the contents of book see the review of Golden Boy by Harnett - or just read the book.

A colorful, adventurous and exotic childhood

Running free among the tiny, crowded markets, opium dens and shantytowns of 1952 Hong Kong, British writer Martin Booth had the sort of idyllic, adventurous childhood that is scarcely conceivable now. At age 8 Booth roamed the streets almost at will, confined only by school hours and his mother's direct prohibitions, which were few and usually circumvented at the first opportunity. Booth's father, Ken, was posted to Hong Kong as a mid-level functionary in the provisioning of the British army. While young Booth and his mother, Joyce, were drawn to the culture and beauty of the place immediately, Ken remained resolutely standoffish, the epitome of the clichéd British colonial. Booth began this book near the end of his life at the request of his children, after being diagnosed with an inoperable brain tumor. Though there's undoubtedly a certain amount of nostalgia in these vivid memories, it's not all dazzle and wonder. In a place so teeming with refugees, there are many stories of cruelty and tragedy. Several fires engulf the squatter shantytowns of impoverished Mainland Chinese who had already lost everything in their flight from the communists. And, more personally, Booth's parents seldom exchange a civil word. His father comes across as a humorless, small-minded bigot, a man who detests England, but encases himself in his British identity, despising all that's foreign. His mother, who had lost her father young and known much sadness and privation, blossoms in Hong Kong. She learns Cantonese, cultivates Chinese friends from all walks of life, and takes Martin all over the island to Chinese festivals and Russian bakeries and old colonial hotels for tea. But Martin's real education is all on his own. On their first day in Hong Kong, a friendly officer introduces him to shrimp and gives him some advice: "As long as you are in Hong Kong, whenever someone offers you something to eat, accept it." A naturally adventurous boy, Martin has recourse to this advice numerous times. Once a boy in the hotel, after teaching him how to fly beetles on a string, offers him a boiled one to eat: "It tasted slightly muddy, yet the overriding flavour was like the smell of stagnant freshwater ponds mixed with smoked fish." His willingness to eat anything and go anywhere makes him many friends among the street stalls in the city. His age and instinctive respect for other cultures allows him entry to places where foreign adults cannot go, while his blond hair, seen as a bringer of luck, makes him a welcome attraction. During the three years of his father's posting, the family lived in several different areas and Martin explored every nook and cranny, on foot at first, then by tram as well. When the Booths moved to their first flat, his mother warned him against Kowloon's nearby Walled City, a place of the criminal Triads, opium dens and prostitution, though he was not to know that until later. Naturally he makes a beeline for the place at his first opportunity and

Gold

Martin Booth, as a youngster from England, resides in 1950s Hong Kong with his father, a plodding minor civil servant, and mother, Joyce. The boy is fully alive and open to all opportunities offered up by this great city and is blessed with a spirited, supportive mother. A wonderful memoir. Those interested in Hong Kong and the interplay between cultures of the East and West will especially enjoy this very human book. Its author, sadly now dead, was a gifted writer of English prose and a wise man

And Who Are We Today Ken?

As a long-term Hongkong resident and sentimental fool, I'm almost bound to say that Gweilo and my adopted home are utter magic. Sadly, I live in London right now and, like me, those with a tendency to homesickness will probably read Gweilo and immediately want to get on the first Cathay flight home. For Gweilo is a terrific story with intimate glimpses of Hongkong in the fifties seen through the eyes of a curious little boy called Martin and his ill-suited, warring parents. It gets five stars just for the author's enviable ability to conjure up unforgettable images in a splendid pacy style. `Memories of a Hong Kong Childhood' is only half memories though, with much of it reading like a novel. Yet the plot is extremely simple; young boy and open-minded mother have the life-changing experience of leaving post-war Blighty for somewhere exotic while insecure, racist father does everything in his power to undermine their attempts to fit in with the locals and learn something new. An eventful tug of war between cultures and enlightenment, it will undoubtedly invite empty-headed complaints from the usual suspects that these are the memories of a privileged set that lived in a world far above the toil and filth of the great unwashed. But, as always, this would miss the point. Gweilo is a celebration of life through the eyes of a little boy, unburdened by guilt or irony. In fact, somewhat perversely, the book's only real weak point is Booth's revelling in Daddy-bashing. Even though the tales of Pop's sycophantic attempts to ape the naval officers he would never become are hilarious, it is worth remembering that both mother and boy might never have had their opportunity were it not for Booth senior. (Booth's description of his father dressing up as a naval officer, but without epaulets, is very funny). Even so, Booth's memories shine with an exotic cast of characters that his parents possibly never knew about - in particular, his slipper-wielding pink gin Dad. Along the way we meet triad gangsters, temple monks, opium smokers, soothing mama-sans, snake charmers, fortune tellers, tram drivers, scary dentists and whitey policemen barking out orders in Cantonese. There are household cooks who could make flans levitate, hotel gardeners with murder on their minds and an English naval officer who even liked Cantonese food (Ye gods!). There are great little nuggets of colonial and Cantonese culture too; like the horrors of the Shek Kip Mei squatter fire & WW2 resistance, the colourful spectacle that is Cantonese opera and the fabulous beaches, mountains and nature trails that make up 60% of the territory. The cast of characters in the employ of Mrs Booth are a lasting example of humanity at its best, even in the midst of appalling poverty. Readers also learn why the Booths were responsible for laws which prohibit cars from turning in front of trams or why the lions outside HSBC in Queen's Road, Central are called Stewart and Stitt an