As all Hong Kong natives know, a significant part of Central is transformed into not-so-Little Philippines every Sunday.
The first picture showing a covered walkway is finely speckled by the ad-hoc gatherings of Filipino maids - they sleep, play cards, chat, eat and also pray for each other throughout the course of the day. While walking around, I come by several groups of maids practicing their coordinated pop-dancing - with one group having a very stern cantonese instructor.
Central is home to all the top international fashion brands found in Hong Kong - it is utterly incongruous to block out the public roads, so that the maids would have space to congregate. While it is no doubt to the frustration of the fashion boutique managers, there is a wonderful serendipity and respect for the rights of maids in this gesture.
Hong Kong has a certain sense of harmless chaos that does not inconvenience but adds to the cacophony of the city. This is most oft-found in the random aggregation of building and shop types amidst residences, small pockets of building projects in unpredictable spaces, and having an incredible density of people. Sure, non-cantonese speaking people still get ripped off on purchases, but encountering such an imageable manifestation of a sizable foreign population made me think about integrating foreign workers into Singapore.
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