In this two-part series we take a look at Hong Kong’s efforts to boost its tourism industry. Part one examines the government’s moves to reinvent tourism with nine hotspot attractions and whether they will make a difference.
Tourist Jessie Wu was enthralled and swept up in nostalgia as she made her way through an exhibition that transported her to Hong Kong’s past.
Featuring a canopy of criss-crossing electricity cables, the visitor from mainland China paused at a shop that was both a hair salon and a restaurant, and an alleyway kitchen so realistic she could almost smell the fish balls.
The “Kowloon Walled City: A Cinematic Journey” exhibition has been attracting locals and tourists to its replica sets from the 2024 blockbuster martial arts film Twilight of the Warriors: Walled In.
The exhibition opened in May for a three-year run at Kowloon Walled City Park, the location of the densely populated enclave of haphazardly built shops and stacked homes notorious for its lawlessness before it was demolished in 1994.
“I wanted to come here after seeing the film,” said Wu, a biomedical professional in her forties and a regular visitor from Beijing.
“Those of us born in the 1980s on the mainland had a Hong Kong dream, but as I walked through the exhibition, I kept wondering, if I had lived here at that time, would I have survived?”
