All language subtitles for Kowloon Walled City Documentary

This has become an incredible city,

where one house is attached to the next house, no road is visible.

The old walls may have crumbled...

but the outer facade is more imposing than it ever was back then.

The Walled City is still no-man's land,

without authorities, without law, without police.

The population is estimated to be 50,000.

To accommodate this number, house was built upon house,

as the entire city is built on just an area of 2.5 hectares,

only a few hundreds of tennants are fortunate enough

to live on the outer edge of the city.

They've fixed cages onto their dwellings.

Behind these cages lies one single room

that's between 10 to a maximum size of 20 square meters.

Living space in the walled city, is precious.

He who manages to live here has at least one benefit,

he stands outside of the law.

No administration knows of him.

No Police will ever call at his door.

But still there is a law in the walled city

and a strict one at that...

The Triads

A criminal organisation who manage life in the city

that became a labyrinth long ago.

A labyrinth for fifty thousand people who,

for whatever reason, want to avoid

the bright lights of Hong Kong.

Our camera team are one of the few to navigate deep into this labyrinth.

This is what they look like...the streets of the city,

once in broad day light,

today they are subterranean corridors,

the walls of which continuously drip with water,

but still they are streets. There are shops, and even electricity,

the electricity is not legal,

only few are paying for it,

tapped in from somewhere in the "outer world".

Illegally installed with cables

that are constantly disconnected and replaced with new ones.

Their thick cover is visibly present above the streets,

layer over layer like everything else here.

Water often breaks through the walls in cascades.

The true secret of this city lies in its production facilities.

Since people don't just live here, they, above all, work here

far from laws and authorities

yet often, the illegal goods are mostly ordinary things...

This is a noodle factory

Noodles are made here in this small space,

with a single machine and three people.

The bandaged hand reveals the work conditions,

the man cut off one of his fingers.

He works 12 hours a day and 7 days a week,

he's an outlaw, so no law protects him.

The same goes for the woman who works the same hours.

They do so year in, year out

inside this space without windows or ventilation,

and also without any hygiene.

Mice and rats live here, and a lot of roaches.

Production is cheap though,

without regulations or inspections.

The noodles produced here go to well-known Hong-Kong restaurants.

It pays off too,

since nowhere else is production as cheap as in the walled city.

Along the way...a forgotten cannon from the colonial era

when the walled city had its defense walls and open streets.

Further on, we go through the dark roads dripping with moisture

where nonetheless, almost normal life tke place,

along with many other small production sites

in the small cave-like openings.

This man makes dough-sheets for the popular Chinese spring rolls.

A one man business,

but the man functions like a computer-controlled robot,

applying dough onto the hot plates with utmost dexterity.

As thin and as delicate as desired every time,

and doing this ceaselessly hour after hour.

He too, works 12 hours a day.

The man is cheaper than a robot

he lives, for whatever reason, illegally in the illegal city,

because of this, the goods he produces are extraordinarily cheap

and noble restaurants are buyers of this product

they won't miss out on any extra profit.

Using this method the man processes a lot

of dough into thousands of wafers

for spring rolls in the course of half a day.

The cohabitants got accustomed to him long ago,

and he to them.

The next place also prepares delicacies,

also for well known restaurants of the city.

It's fish,

also a one man business

the work requires just simple hand movements.

The fish is cleaned, carved and later processed into fish balls

that end up on the tables of gourmets as a speciality.

For this kind of production the principle is always the same,

no regulations have to be met.

Since neither social security taxes nor hygiene taxes are demanded,

production is the cheapest here.

This makes the contribution of the walled city

to Hong Kong's economic miracle

a rather considerable one.

A resevoir of 50,000 people who will work for minimal pay

under barely conceivable conditions.

Open drains. This is the sewage system of the walled city.

There are also automatic machines,

a weaving mill,

the weaving mill is also operated by one man.

The machinery used here is also primitive,

here, cloth lining for textiles is made.

The tailors in Hong Kong are known to be cheap,

quite a few of them aquire the materials for their cheap suits

from the workshops of the walled city.

The machines are as old as they look, pre-war products,

they come from Shanghai,

their owner managed to bring them with him

when he fled from the communists.

Something drove him into the anonymity of the walled city.

This is him, he doesn't work, he has stayed a mini-capitalist,

he lets people work.

Production is also the most cheapest here,

however, everybody here has to pay one fee,

the protection money for the regulatory force of the city;

the Triads, the secret criminal MOB, Hong Kong's Chinese mafia.

Only he who pays may continue working here in peace.

"Plastic Factory", is how this man refers to his production shop.

In the walled city it's quite a large firm,

there's several machines with seven women working on them

they make plastic packages of all kinds.

A small workshop like this one can meet the demand on plastic bags

of many supermarkets,

hey also make plastic cases for video cassettes.

Taking turns the women also bring their children to work,

as young as they may be they still contribute.

They do it well too, pulling plastic bags from the stamped stencils,

mimicking their Mothers.

The workshop, with its machines and employees,

fits on less than twenty square meters.

In the next workshop, sturdier materials are worked with,

iron and steel.

What looks rather chaotic actually serves elaborate causes,

raw materials are produced that in further processing,

are used to imitate high quality brand products.

It's the illegality of such doings, that drives a workshop like this one

into the labyrinth of the walled city.

Otherwise the work at the two turning lathes

under these conditions would make little sense.

We were only able to film the beginning of this production chain,

we were then pushed aside into another street

of the subterranean labyrinth.

The nomenclature originates from a time

when one could still glance at the sky from here.

Today no beam of light reaches into this road anymore.

In every little opening along the streets, people are working,

In the right cube, a child studies, his Mother working behind him,

In the right cube, a child studies, his Mother working behind him,
In the right cube, a child studies, his Mother working behind him,

In the right cube, a child studies, his Mother working behind him.

Homework is done here, writing is practiced,

one of the many thousands of Chinese characters,

practiced through endless repetition.

Endlessley repeated also, are the

hand movements of the Mother at her machine.

The woman assembles metal wristbands for watches,

in this case they are wristbands for low priced watches.

We were not allowed to film wristands for imitation brand watches

of which the highest price class are made,

done in a very similar manner as these and on very similar machines.

This child has a devotional Mother,

despite her 12 hour day of work,

she takes him to school everyday in Hong Kong.

Most other childen stay home,

in the walled city there aren't really any schools.

That's why many children are left alone during the day,

because there are no extended families anymore

as it was tradition in China,

in apartments of 10-20 square meters, there's no space for relatives,

the children are on their own.

There is one, if small, kindergarten though,

in the center of the labyrinth,

that the Salvation Army has forged together,

taking care of the poorest of the children.

Two nursery teachers work here,

they play with the children.

teach them basic rules of personal hygiene,

and ensure that they're sufficiently fed.

What's unique in this kindergarten,

is the shift operation here.

While one group's shift eats,

the other sleeps in the back of the same room,

outside they make as little sound as possible,

they know that these ones have to sleep now.

After a while these are awakened and the others are put to bed.

A fan circulates the moist, mouldy air around the room,

there is no window,

as the kindergarten is situated in the midst of the labyrinth.

But only a fraction of the children in the walled city

can be accommodated here,

despite the shift operation.

The kindergarten of the Salvation Army is small,

at the front is the day room, in the back you sleep.

The labyrinth still holds many surprises,

It is of course, a hub for drug trafficking

and yet people are also fighting against drugs here.

Amidst the labyrinth, we come across a center for curing drug addicts.

Founded by an English woman named Jackie Pullinger.

She executes her astounding healing powers here.

Solely by spiritual means, Pullinger and her helpers

try to free the sick from their addictions.

Here is Jackie Pullinger during one of her healing attempts.

Pullinger conjures the addict and puts him in some form of trance,

the hands begin to shake,

finally, the trance affects the whole body.

In these moments everybody assists.

Under Pullinger's guidance the attendees concentrate

their mental and spiritual powers toward their recovery.

Meanwhile, the young man has collapsed, deep in trance.

The witnessing of such a healing attempt

is a preparation and warm-up for other addicts' own healing process.

They are all heroin addicts.

Pullinger is their last hope.

Almost all addicts in this room work, or used to work for the Triads.

Quite a few have been small-time drug dealers themselves up until now.

Hence the drug mafia considered Jackie Pullinger their enemy

when she entered the walled city with her missionary quest.

The true wonder Pullinger worked was her ability

to convince even this stone cold criminal gang to tolerate her center,

and had them agree to release every

person Pullinger cured from the Triads.

We talked with Pullinger about her mentees,

"Well they've all either been drug addicts, or are drug addicts"

"So, let's just say 80% of those who are Chinese, are actually on heroin,

and they've come from all over Hong Kong."

"They don't care about the work, so long as it helps,"

"and they've seen their friends "change", so they want to have the privilege as well"

so they want to have the privilege as well"

"they've all tried to get off drugs...

I've seen some around or about 10 times"

"in other drug centers and prisons."

"They've all been on drugs, average, 15 years....heroin."

Pullinger herself lives within the labyrinth

and has done for 20 years.

"It's a very unhealthy place I mean,"

" I live here and my room's wet all the time,"

"I don't know if it's night or day when I wake up."

"Sometimes I have to telephone somebody to find out the weather,

"you can't tell in my room."

"It's an unhealthy place and I think it'll be wonderful if

everybody has the opportunity of a home,

of course it's sad for some people,

because they've lived here for 1 or 2 generations..."

"it's been their village...their birthplace."

The labyrinth is home to around 50,000 people,

where there's seeping rain water down all the walls,

no rays of sunshine penetrates the walls,

the air stays hot and musty in the cable-shrouded cave passages

which are still called streets here.

A lot of the street names are a reminder of apparently better times.

"Bright Street" is the literal translation of "Kwong Ming Street"

Through the cascades the inhabitants of the labyrinth know

when there's a rain storm outside.

Water for personal use is found only in a few places in the labyrinth.

Officially there are only 6 water connections,

the influential and rich in the labyrinth have tapped these stand-posts,

with hoses that lead to their workshops and domiciles.

All others have to get their water at the filling stations.

A shared predicament and the hardship that all put up with equally,

this doesn't unite the people in the labyrinth

into a closely committed group,

everyone in here fights for survival alone.

The loneliness is grievous in the labyrinth.

If there is laundry to do

it's not worth the trouble of carrying the water up the stairs,

washing is done right at the stand-post.

Plastic canisters are used to transport large amounts of water

using a yoke, the Chinese style.

A part of everyday life in the walled city,

the city provides shelter for many, who with good reason

cannot live or work elsewhere.

The labyrinth is also home to even poorer people

who would not find a place to stay elsewhere,

and yet, they still make a living in here...

like here,

this woman collects scrap metal.

There's quite a lot of it in the labyrinth,

each phase of construction leaves behind rubble and also scrap.

These old rods won't earn her much,

maybe just 1 or 2 Hong Kong dollars.

Quite a few live from hand-to-mouth like this.

There are also some people who are better off,

they even have access to the official electrical supply

and have actual mailboxes with postal delivery.

The apartments in the walled city are arranged on top of each other,

up to fifteen floors

with no lift of course.

This elderly woman lives on the tenth floor,

she covers this distance several times a day.

As little as she possesses, she still fears the work of thieves,

the apartment is locked twice.

With these hand gestures the evil spirits are supposed to be prevented

from entering the apartment too.

Behind the door lies 16 square meters of living space,

divided into a room, kitchen and open bathroom.

Only the kitchen is available to the woman,

Here, she keeps all here belongings.

The tiny room next to it, with its bed accommodates a subtenant,

their rent is just enough for the elderly woman to live off of.

Cast out by her only son, so she says,

she's never left the walled city ever since.

These people constitute the counterpart to the other dwellers

of the walled city, so to speak,

as is this old man also on the ground floor.

They are honest people, neither profiteers nor criminals,

once their status as refugees drove them into the labyrinth,

and there, they were stranded as politically created waifs.

These 2 have lived here for 25 years,

despite the lack of daylight, they do pretty well.

The man makes a living modelling molds for doll's heads.

Dolls from Hong Kong are purchased from all over the world,

because they are so cheap.

However, here lies part of the reason why these dolls are so cheap,

and not just the dolls from Hong Kong.

In the most humble surroundings for

minimal pay and with endless sedulity,

these people work in the walled city.

The labyrinth also has its homeless, it's tramps.

outcasts who find themselves somewhere partly dry to sleep

and are often enough displaced from there.

Life in the labyrinth passes over them

in the same way as over the rats that no one gives a care for.

A resident of a different kind.

They are also found in the walled city....

he who once belonged to a drug cartel can expect an old age pension,

even if it's very little.

This man occupies just 4 square meters of living space,

with a sink, and board that is placed across the room at night for his bed.

In addition a bottle of rice-wine and cigarettes,

a pension property reserved at the side of the road.

Who can afford it keeps a pet in the labyrinth.

Mostly birds,

and they are Chinese nightingales for a reason.

Other birds would probably forget how to sing in the constant darkness.

This man takes out his birds,

bringing the cages onto the roof for air and sunshine.

Here we have Chinese nightingales,

accustomed to singing in the dark.

Here in daylight the man prepares a bath for the birds.

He modifies one of the cages into a bathroom

then shoos the birds into it.

Such a bath is more than most people down in the labyrinth can afford.

There is light up here but the air is still bad

and full of noise.

Every 5 minutes a plane passes over the roofs at low altitude,

because the walled city lies directly beneath

the entry lane of the Hong Kong airport.

the pigeons by the way, are also residents of the walled city,

or rather, they are bred here by this man.

the man is one of the profiteers of this city's illegality,

because the birds in his aviary are no ordinary pigeons.

what the man breeds here, are racing pigeons.

trained and capable of flying from Hong Kong to Shanghai.

That in itself would not be a business,

but bets are placed on these pigeons

like on racing horses,

and high amounts, at that.

because in the pigeon races it's about which is the fastest pigeon.

This gambling is forbidden.

Because of this the walled city s the only place

for them to be bred without interference.

A top class pigeon can fetch for prices of half a million Hong Kong dollars.

Every pigeon is banded and given a number.

Their performances in the race dictate the price of the pigeons.

These pigeons are brought to Canton or Shanghai

and sent into the race there

back to Hong Kong.

The illegal city knows no bounds.

A dog on the roof guards the pigeonry.

In the only open-area of the walled city,

exists gambling on the smallest scale.

Not around a roulette table, but a game of cards on small soap boxes

is what the passionate gambling women meet up here for.

The game is about small to minimal amounts,

but the types of the gambling women don't differ much

from the professional women at European casino tables.

This game is almost exclusively reserved to women,

the men play different games for higher stakes.

Those who want to try their luck head to

a nearby shrine and consult the spirits.

The falling of the shells indicates whether good or bad luck awaits.

But the throw can be repeated, therefore luck can be forced...

...one has to thank the spirits for that.

Superstition is widely spread in the labyrinth of the walled city.

Here, a different kind...

a bird pulls the predictions from a box like a lottery ticket.

What it means is elaborately explained

to the customer by the fortune teller.

Fate, read from one's hands, this is common in the labyrinth.

Augers, chiromancers, miracle healers,

their little businesses are doing well in the

small, wet cavern streets of the walled city.

where so much undeserved poverty exists

along with so much illegal profit.

Something else is profitable in the walled city,

the "offices" of dental practitioners.

They are neither medical doctors nor dentists,

the dental treatment, the moulding of dentures,

was learned from the Father or Uncle,

from an early age, since childhood.

No schooling, or clinical experience,

they've no diploma

and therefore not licenced dental practitioners.

Only in a city without authorities or

law can they persevere...

but they do know their trade well,

and also know how to advertise it,

by displaying their work in cabinets.

Medicines made from dried animals

are a part of traditional Chinese medicine.

Like these dried seahorses for example,

and lots of other animals.

Pharmacies of traditional Chinese medicine

are available in the walled city.

The customers describe the symptoms,

the pharmacist prepares and adequate mixture

of herbal and animal medicine.

Medicinal herbs are among these, but also,

if necessary, dried caterpillars or woodlice.

This is all boiled, and either drunken, rubbed in

or applied accordingly, as the case may be.

The pharmacist knows his customers,

As a kind gesture he gives 2 fortune cookies with the medicine packet.

But death cannot always be avoided,

and in the damp apartments of the walled city,

it comes sooner rather than later.

In memory of the dead person, a family alter is built

with a picture of the deceased in the center.

The departed is remembered with prayers and incense sticks are lit.

The person, who died young, was an important man,

he could provide housing space in the walled city,

and thereby grant refuge or refuse to do so.

On the altar sacrificial offerings according to ancient customs,

provisions for the "walk home"...

from fruit, to Lucky Strike,

everything the deceased liked and the bereaved can afford.

The evening is approaching.

Even in this city without daylight,

12 hours is how long the work day lasts.

The factories are being closed.

One goes home.

The streets, usually full of life begin to clear.

Now that it starts to get dark outside too,

people are rushing outside and in front of the walls of the walled city.

Into the restaurants, into the restaurants on the open street.

Whoever can afford it, will treat themselves

to a meal like the Chinese love it,

not like what is pre-produced in the walled city for foreigner restaurants.

What one eats must be guaranteed fresh.

And thereby still being alive before it is boiled and fried.

The shrimp, the crab,

the frogs,

the snails,

cooked only in the presence of the guests.

Among the guests, those from the walled city stand out,

if one looks into their faces, one is tempted to believe that time stood still,

for they look like the pirates in yonder village behind

the walls a hundred years ago,

segregated from England and China,

and therefore unfamiliar with authorities and law.

Just like in those days, people gather around the street opera,

the instruments are still the same,

and the ballads sung here are the same

ones sang here a hundred years ago.

Of what these songs tell, remains valid today, just as it was back then.

they tell of the mighty and the helpless, the rich and the poor,

the haunter, and the haunted,

and that each and every person is still just

a pawn in the game of the powers that be.

These songs were already a source of solace back then,

they still are today for the people from the labyrinth.

The street opera ends, the songs fade away,

but when one looks around on the night street

in front of the walls of the walled city,

all the people that the songs spoke about are there,

the rich and the poor,

the mighty, and the helpless,

and also the haunter and the haunted.

In front of the walls, now and then, the Police patrol.

The village has become a city.

It still lies behind walls

although they are much higher today,

and are draped with cages...

cages for people

illuminated by lamps at night.

These walls still provide protection,

for the innocent, as well as for the guilty.

Behind them lies Hong Kong's secret city.

Here lies a labyrinth for 50,000 people.