Stories in the 'Matchbox'

A few years after I was born, the shanty home my grandparents built with their bare hands was burned down. It happened not long after the government failed to reclaim the land. We were later allocated a public housing flat in Yuen Long.

For the next seven years, my mother, my brother, my sister, and I shared a 350-square-foot unit. Space was tight, but life felt open. Doors were rarely closed. Neighbours looked out for one another. The bonds we formed there felt closer to brotherhood than anything I have experienced in the private building I live in today, where doors stay shut and security guards stand watch. I still don’t know who lives next door.

Today, around 750,000 families — nearly two million people — live in public rental housing in Hong Kong. Over decades, these estates have changed in architecture, rhythm, and culture. But they remain one of the city’s most shared experiences: a collective story shaped by proximity, necessity, and care.

I didn’t grow up in the “twin-tower” style of public housing. Still, when I see children playing in the corridors, I recognise something familiar. It brings me back to my own childhood — playing marbles in the hallways, flying kites made from plastic bags during typhoons, lighting small fires with melted candles, setting off firecrackers during festivals. These were small freedoms, shaped by limited space but expanded by shared ground.
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Those corridors were not just passages between flats. They were places where life happened, where childhood unfolded, and where a sense of belonging quietly took root.