This Is Hong Kong

Turning the pages of M. Sasek’s classic This is Hong Kong, with its evocative, detailed illustrations, is like stepping into history, to a time when the city’s streets were teeming: with rickshaws, hawkers and labourers carrying dried fish, silks or bricks on the end of bamboo poles, stylishly-coiffed ladies in cheongsams, and tourists seeking all manner of exotic goods. While some landmarks — notably the Tiger Balm Garden and Kai Tak Airport — and some sights — floating schools, traffic controllers in gazebos — no longer exist, Sasek’s pictorial ode to Hong Kong will enchant readers of all ages.