Atlas
Page 13
Later, the nautical chart of Hong Kong drawn up by Captain Belcher in 1841 adopted the “landform hatching” method, which shows changes in gradient by means of hatches of different degrees of fineness and length together with unevenly placed blank patches, according to the shading of light rays cast on the earth’s surface. Just as a sketch creates a three-dimensional space on paper with different shades of gray and varying line densities, this method of hatching makes for the first time the topography appear like a detailed and meticulous portrait of a girl, showing a high-bridged nose, a prominent facial contour, and a curvaceous body. We feel above all the dubious allure of height.
A topographic (relief) map of Hong Kong drawn up by Lieutenant Collinson in 1845 was the first map of Hong Kong to use contour, and it was also one of the earliest contour maps issued by the British Ordnance Survey, since it was only in 1839 that British military surveyors grasped the technique of regular contours to show topography. This is a set of four maps on a scale of 1:15,840 displaying the topography with contour lines marking every one hundred feet of elevation, but since it was in monochrome, the contour lines could not overcome the limitation of the flat surface to create a more vivid effect. In fact, transcending elevation did not by any means result from a determination exclusive to Westerners. In China, the “six principles of cartography” mentioned in the preface to “A Map of the Region of the Tribute of Yu,” by Pei Xiu (224–271) back in the Jin dynasty, includes as one of its principles the concept of “higher and lower.” Further, as researchers have pointed out, a kind of primitive contour lines can be seen in the Tang dynasty “A Map of the True Shape of the Five Peaks.” Thereafter, however, China was obviously overtaken by the West in the competition over height on paper and left far behind.
At the end of the twentieth century, the crystallization of the visualization of elevation can be seen in any topographic map on the scale of 1:20,000. By means of separate color layers, or contour lines at sixty-five feet vertical distance, and aided by the three-dimensional (shadow) effect created by the shaded-relief method, we seem to see the elevation of the surface, convinced that a place in the completely flat map has mountains rising to a height of almost three thousand feet and assured that there is a towering peak on this small island, with its area of only thirty square miles, with dense contours and steep gradients bearing witness to sharply rising desires and an arduous course of upward striving.
According to Hong Kong geographical materials issued by the Hong Kong Lands Department in April 1996, all land elevations are given in relation to the Hong Kong Principal Datum, and this datum is four feet lower than the mean sea level. Hong Kong’s actual elevation is perhaps a little lower than the one of our imagination.
47
GEOLOGICAL DISCRIMINATION
From a geological map of Hong Kong completed in 1986 by the Geotechnical Engineering Office, we can find clues about the exploration of indigenous culture that was supposed to have been ardently pursued in Hong Kong in the 1980s and 1990s. In this geological map (identified by serial number 11), whose scope covers Hong Kong Island and the Kowloon Peninsula, the geological formations shown in the map can be roughly divided into four kinds: (1) igneous rock (indicated on the map by colors in shades of crimson), which is concentrated in central and northern Hong Kong Island and the main part of the Kowloon Peninsula and consists mainly of semideveloped hill slopes, with only the original shore of Central and Sheung Wan and the area of Tsim Sha Tsui developed into central urban areas; (2) volcanic rock (indicated on the map by shades of green), which is concentrated in western, southern, and eastern Hong Kong Island, with its center in Victoria Peak, and consists mainly of mountainous land unsuitable for development; (3) sediment (indicated on the map by shades of light gray), which includes sedimentary rock, gravel, silt, and clay, which is distributed along the harborside of northern Hong Kong Island and the foreshores of the Kowloon Peninsula and has been developed mainly into urban areas; and (4) rubble and landfill (indicated on the map by irregular crossed lines), the main formation along the shores of urban Hong Kong Island and Kowloon, occupying almost one-third of the total urban area.
As pointed out in a PhD thesis in the Geography Department at the University of Hong Kong at that time, “From Postcolonial Theory to Postgeology” (representing the peak of agitation for indigenous cultural exploration), cartographical circles, in the light of the chaotic condition of the local land surface created by rapid urban development, brought forward a proposal for getting to the source by laying bare the intrinsic nature of geography. The timely completion of geological maps of Hong Kong has indeed helped us to discover the channels hidden underneath urban formations and to reflect on the implications of developmental tendencies. Cartography thus turned into a brand-new category of cultural studies, and the art of map reading became a competitive skill in study and practice among cultural studies researchers. Among different kinds of maps, geological maps are obviously most suitable for making all kinds of comparisons that are ingenious, exaggerated, and yet not lacking in internal logic, since the term “indigenous” in Chinese means literally “native soil,” which in turn signifies roughly the “substance of the earth” or “geology” in Chinese.
The arguments of the indigenous chauvinists are focused on the distribution and relative position of different geological strata. From this perspective, the establishment of the city of Victoria, that is, the growth of local culture, was not built on igneous rock and volcanic rock from the distant past (from the Jurassic to the Cretaceous periods) but on comparatively recent sediment, even reclaimed land less than a hundred years old. Igneous rock and volcanic rock were distributed on plane surfaces at the margins of urban areas and on elevated rough ground belonging to the category of wasteland, unsuitable for housing and not much good either for cultivation. Earth used for reclamation, in contrast, although it is not a naturally occurring substance, can give rise to a unique ecosystem out of artificial materials; this is a phenomenon that cannot be lightly written off. Since the constituents of reclamation material are heterogeneous, including all kinds of organic and inorganic materials such as soil, gravel, and refuse, indigenous chauvinists like to stress its hybridity, claiming it to be a special characteristic of being “indigenous.”
However, the meaning of signs can actually be reversed following changes in reading strategies. At the end of the 1990s there appeared a group of cultural studies map readers known as the Granite school who upheld the preservation of tradition, namely, the long-standing and well-established historical value of granite (a kind of igneous rock). Targeting the flat-surface viewpoint of indigenous chauvinism, they emphasize a vertical and historical excavation, presenting rock strata in three-dimensional sections and thereby exposing granite as the vast foundation at the deepest underground level. As well, the solidity and density of granite and the glittering crystals it embeds gain their unreserved praise. The rock cover on the earth’s surface, which is loose, fragile, and subject to erosion, will eventually collapse and disappear under the unrelenting onslaught of time, while granite will fearlessly stand its ground, impervious to wind and rain. In contrast to granite, as mighty as mother earth in all her majesty, the little heap of piled-up earth along the shore will turn into margins within margins even less negligible than negligible. Not even a product of some geologic period, it is just a junkyard formed out of dumped waste material within just a hundred years. What kind of “roots” could we hope to find beneath this “native soil”?
In the indistinct rumbling at the earth’s deepest strata, in the underfoot vibrations of faint enquiry, indigenous chauvinist map readers still diligently trace the chronological growth rings of urban shoreline reclamation on geological maps: 1985, 1982, 1964, 1904, 1863.
48
NORTH-ORIENTED DECLINATION
If we view maps as the perplexed expression of people’s search for direction and their own position, then it follows that we believe the directional indicator on a map is like
the North Star, indicating by its radiance (which although not necessarily overwhelmingly lustrous is nonetheless honest and reliable) the road leading to existence or extinction to each person who has gone astray. In fact, in the history of cartography, directional signs or compass images have taken magnificent forms, bestowed on them by cartographers blessed with a vivid imagination, such as star shapes, spearheads, or ship’s anchors; but decorativeness in the symbols on local maps has gradually been replaced by functionalism, and compasses have been reduced to uniform arrows.
When we set free what remains of our historical imagination, then it is not hard to perceive how “The Outer Approaches to Hong Kong,” produced by the British Institute of Hydrology in 1990, presented in a timely fashion a period of disorientation as experienced in this locality. Searching for orientation in a state of disorientation is in fact no different from adjusting oneself after losing one’s balance in a global magnetic field, and this kind of adjustment needs realization precisely through systematic surveying and planning, in order to comfort those who lose their way in their journey through time and space. This waterways map assembled many years of British and Chinese government survey materials from the region surrounding Hong Kong and clearly outlined water-based movements into and out of Hong Kong, as well as various barriers, in a topographical map on the scale of 1:50,000 prepared by the Survey and Mapping Office of the Hong Kong Lands Department. In this map, which is drawn to a Mercator projection along a transversal axis, our attention is unavoidably caught by two directional signs, one on the sea surface southeast of Hong Kong Island and the other on the Pearl River estuary to the west of Lantao Island. These are both directional signs read in degrees, using large circular signs divided into 360 degrees, within which the needle points toward magnetic north.
Cultural anthropologists have pointed out that the composition of symbols in maps and their explanation are the result of observing and narrating reality, but it might be better to say that they are the projection of a given society’s collective consciousness. From this perspective, some map readers consider that the ulterior title of “The Outer Approaches to Hong Kong” is “The Outer Approaches to China.” Its real purpose is to explore possible entry points from Hong Kong on the outside to the mainland on the inside, and these shipping lanes must be north oriented. Therefore the direction signs are also a guide for the Hong Kong region to gaze up at the Pole Star, and what the compass points to is a destination to which consciousness strives. But what is obvious and easily seen is that the compass and the meridian lines in the rectangular grid are not aligned, and the degree number indicated is not actually true north (i.e., zero degrees). It can be seen from the map that the position of the Hong Kong region with respect to magnetic north deviates by 2.05 degrees to the west of true north. This is explained in geography as due to the declination between the two true poles (i.e., the earth’s axis and the northern and southern points where it meets the earth’s surface) and the two magnetic poles (i.e., the north and south points indicated by a compass under the influence of the earth’s magnetic field); and this declination can also be seen from the fact that the true meridian lines through the true pole and the magnetic meridian lines through the magnetic pole do not overlap. For the same reason, a locality’s true position and magnetic position will naturally differ.
Cultural anthropologists have read all kinds of possibilities into the narrow 2.05 degree angle declination between true north and magnetic north, which can be roughly divided into two schools of thought: the true north school and the magnetic north school. The true north school insisted on the general authority of the true north pole in determining geographical direction, taking as its reason the longitude and latitude positions on maps both being determined by the true north pole, and also the true north pole’s position being determined by astronomical observations. This school maintained that true north pole orientation was in the orthodox tradition of “beholding the model in heaven and adopting the model from earth,” while the magnetic field’s erratic and unstable pull reflected in the magnetic north pole thus was due to harmful external interference. The magnetic north school, for its part, put forward an opposing opinion on the question of orthodox tradition; its adherents believed that the magnetic field’s internal attraction was closer to the principle of intrinsic quality than the external limits of the earth’s movement were, and that the attraction itself is the concrete manifestation of the dominance of magnetic north. Magnetic north is the hidden, intangible, intrinsic, and effective guiding spiritual strength; it is the ultimate destination of the north-oriented attachment, although this “destination” is in fact nonexistent. From this point of view, true north is by no means true.
Some radical map reformers challenged the grounds on which map direction signs pointed north. They believed it reflected how the history of cartography and the history of the evolution of human civilization conspired to rationalize the hugely disparate and unevenly distributed power between north and south. Apart from proposing a south-oriented compass as a counterstrategy, the reformers also advocated omnidirectional pluralism in cartography (for example, taking south as up and north as down, or east as up and west as down), the reason being very simple—there is no distinction in natural logic between up and down in the globe itself. In an omnidirectional field of vision, any kind of debate on the north-oriented declination in Hong Kong’s waterways is itself a kind of declination.
49
THE TRAVEL OF NUMBERS
Archaeologists have made an attempt to re-create Hong Kong’s urban appearance on the basis of a tourist map dated 1997. The map marks the main tourist attractions, such as scenic spots, art galleries, museums, open-air markets, entertainment areas, parks, and communication facilities, using numbered red circles; further, green circles show cinemas and theaters, and blue ones show hotels. Since tourist maps cover the main cityscape, representing a mode of that city’s self-imaging and also carrying value judgments in regard to its geographical landmarks, archaeologists believe that tourist maps can to some degree reflect the true circumstances of a place. Using simulation software, they have reconstructed this twentieth-century urban space along the lines of the tourist map; what is more, they have also built a re-creation on the same scale as the original on a broad stretch of desert, in which the harbor area is replaced by sandy desert owing to the lack of water.
We can easily see at a glance how the circles in different colors are distributed on the map. On Hong Kong Island, the red circles are concentrated in Central District and Sheung Wan, including the Man Mo Temple (36), Cat Street (85), the old Sheung Wan street market (64), Lan Kwai Fong (26), City Hall (7), the Legislative Council (27) and Government House (13). The distribution of red circles in Kowloon is comparatively sparse, lying mainly in Tsim Sha Tsui and along Nathan Road; they include the old Railway Clock Tower (8), the Cultural Center (16), the Art Museum (72), the Space Museum (81), the Science Museum (79), the Museum of History (75), Temple Street (90), and the Ladies’ Market (87). The blue circles, which outnumber the red ones, are most densely located between Admiralty and Causeway Bay on Hong Kong Island and in Tsim Sha Tsui in Kowloon. The map also shows “buildings of use to tourists” marked in purple, with roughly the same distribution as above.
One person who had gone by plane to the interior to take part in the urban restoration tour made the following notes:
After we arrived at our destination, we stayed at the Peninsula Hotel in Tsim Sha Tsui, having heard that it was one of the oldest and most highly ranked hotels in the city’s history. Looking out from the hotel window, apart from Victoria Harbor (paved with sand), we saw an area for cultural activities occupying the harbor front and a mass of hotels towering like a forest on all sides. All the hotel buildings rose from flat ground with nothing in the space between them, so that from a distance it looked like a city of hotels, with only a few so-called scenic spots and historical sites squatting between them. The next day the tour took us aboard a large co
ach resembling a ferry to cross the “harbor” to Cat Street in Central on the “opposite shore,” for sightseeing and shopping for replicas of heritage objects from the city’s past: for example, broken plastic and metal toys, moldy faded martial arts novels with missing pages and pornographic magazines, nonfunctioning transistor radios, electric fans and typewriters, corroded copper kettles, tarnished silver ornaments, makeup cases made of rotten wood, out-of-date calendars, pocket watches that had stopped, and tattered and torn maps. We all returned loaded with purchases. In the afternoon we made another frantic shopping trip to the authentic atmosphere of Temple Street and the Ladies’ Market in Kowloon. On the way we observed that the only people we saw in the streets apart from tourists were people who served in the tourist industry. We did not see anyone playing the role of residents (whether this was due to a management oversight or what, it was not clear), but it is hard to imagine that this reflected the true situation of the city in those years. The high-rise hotel towers in the evening sun were like lonely leafless trees in the wilderness, and we seemed to be walking from (8) to (16) and on to (75) on an extremely simplified tourist map on a scale of 1:1, searching for the sights that had been arranged for us beforehand, imitating the past that had been arranged for us in advance. We came to a profound realization that this was a city that belonged completely to tourists, and, for this reason, we were also in the end obliged to leave bearing with us the tourist’s easily satisfied greed and quickly exhausted curiosity.
50
THE TOMB OF SIGNS
The only intact set of Hong Kong digital map materials still in existence is the one purchased by a businessman in 1997 from the Information Center of the Lands Department’s Survey and Mapping Office. This set of materials is based on more than three thousand geomorphological map sheets on a scale of 1:1,000 resulting from surveys from the 1970s on and frequently updated and revised, so as to follow up geomorphological changes with the greatest speed.