Ryan Ho Kilpatrick

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On the Far Edge of Hong Kong, Unexpectedly Thriving Coral Reefs

  • by Ryan Ho Kilpatrick
  • Posted on July 4, 2018July 4, 2018
  • Eurasians

No Mixed Blood, No Mixed Bones

  • by Ryan Ho Kilpatrick
  • Posted on June 8, 2018
  • Marine conservation

There’s Something Fishy About China’s Salmon

  • by Ryan Ho Kilpatrick
  • Posted on May 30, 2018June 8, 2018
  • Marine conservation

Pressure Mounts to Take Blue Shark Off the Menu

  • by Ryan Ho Kilpatrick
  • Posted on May 24, 2018May 24, 2018
  • Maritime history

Hong Kong’s Lighthouses and Their Eurasian Sentries

  • by Ryan Ho Kilpatrick
  • Posted on April 18, 2018May 1, 2018
  • Marine conservation

Reef Fish Could Disappear Within Our Lifetimes

  • by Ryan Ho Kilpatrick
  • Posted on April 4, 2018May 1, 2018
  • Piracy

Hong Kong the Pirate Capital: Hijacked on the High Seas

  • by Ryan Ho Kilpatrick
  • Posted on February 7, 2018May 1, 2018

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South of Hong Kong Island, guarding the boundary between leisurely Outer Deep Water Bay and the franetic East Lamma shipping lanes, is an island of many names. In Edward Belcher’s inaugural 1841 chart of Hong Kong, the island is labelled “Maskong”: presumably a scrambled transliteration of 媽宮 “ma gung”—“Palace of the Mother”—a name found elsewhere in maritime China to denote the location of a temple to the sea goddess Matsu. But there is no evidence to suggest there was ever a temple on Round Island and Belcher was known to muddle Chinese place names. In all likelihood it was the name of a nearby settlement on shore. Nonetheless, it is a error repeated in subsequent maps of 1896, 1904, 1913, 1915, 1922, and as recently as 1928. Lt Collinson’s superior 1846 ordinance map rechristened the landmass Coin Island—a fanciful translation of it’s correct Chinese name 銀州 “ngan jau”, or “Silver Island.” Since time immemorial, Hongkongers have indulged in a singular fantasy of seeing their isles as imperial ingots of silver: there are close to half a dozen “Silver Islands”s scattered throughout the territory. To avoid confusion, the Chinese often defers to a literal translation what has been the island’s official English name since at least the turn of the century—圓州 “yuhn jau” (Round Island). Unfortunately, however, “Round Island” is about as commonplace a toponym in the English-speaking world as “Silver Island” is in the Cantonese. If all this weren’t confusing enough, yet another name has been thrown into the mix lately. Young sailors who set out from the yacht clubs at Middle Island to visit the island’s sandy, isolated beach have taken to calling it Shoe Island, imagining it’s contours more redolent of a loafer than a piece of historical currency. I’m partial to Collinson’s vaguely piratical Coin Island personally, but could be persuaded to compromise—Silver Shoe Island, anyone?
In the darkening twilight I saw a lone star hover, gem-like above the bay.
This is Hong Kong, our island home. Enjoy it, treasure it, celebrate it, and most important of all, take care of it. Treat every day as if it were #WorldOceansDay.
Two views from Sharp Peak and the Mai Fan Teng ridge on the most brutally hot day of 2018 so far—en route to Tai Long Wan for a much-needed dip after 12 hours hiking overnight from Sai Kung town. The best thing about hitting the trails in the dead of night, besides avoiding the worst of the heat, is the hours upon hours of uninterrupted solitude and silence broken only by the sounds of wildlife and, in this case, an audiobook of Billy Budd, Sailor. Melville’s words have a way of sticking with you no matter what, but listening to the scene of Billy’s early morning execution just as the first embers of dawn crept over the mountain tops stopped me in my tracks: “The hull deliberately recovering from the periodic roll to leeward was just regaining an even keel, when the last signal, a preconcerted dumb one, was given. At the same moment it chanced that the vapory fleece hanging low in the East, was shot thro' with a soft glory as of the fleece of the Lamb of God seen in mystical vision, and simultaneously therewith, watched by the wedged mass of upturned faces, Billy ascended; and, ascending, took the full rose of the dawn.”
心如止水，不動如山
Urmston Road, the channel between Lantau and Tuen Mun, is named after a man who called Hong Kong "an utterly useless island." Once the East India Company's China chief, Sir James Urmston was one voice in a chorus of condemnation against Charles Eliot after he accepted the cessation of Hong Kong in the First Opium War. Eliot's critics believed that Britain should have seized an established port to the north, near the tea-producing regions of Fujian or in the Chusan archipelego off the mouth of the Yangtze River, China's greatest shipping artery. "Nothing can be more futile, indeed, I may say preposterous," than Hong Kong becoming an emporium of trade, Urmston wrote in a contemporary pamphlet. Nonetheless, he is still remembered here, in the sheltered waters where East India Company ships would ride at anchor when foul weather disrupted the Canton run. He didn't think much of this place, and I'd like to say it doesn't think much of him either—but how many people in this "utterly useless" metropolis of millions has even heard of Supercargo James Brabazon Urmston?

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