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Heritage is a precious legacy that can easily die unless it is kept alive in the context of an ever-changing world. A case in point is Cheung Chau's colourful Bun Festival, which for too long lost its rationale until it became a moribund relic of the ritual it once celebrated.
To understand the origins of this festival, we have to go back to the 19th Century when pirate Cheung Po Tsai was the scourge of the Pearl River estuary.
Hong Kong has always had a soft spot for raffish and quirky renegades who pit themselves against established order, and few have appealed more than this outlaw of the South China Sea, who surrendered only when the combined navies of China, Britain and Portugal joined forces against him.
Cheung made his primary base on Cheung Chau, and at the height of his notoriety is said to have commanded 40,000 followers and a fleet of 600 junks.
Understandably, on an island as small as his, he was accorded the awe and respect due to a latter-day Mafia Godfather.
Bun festival's background
Legend had it that an epidemic hit the island in 1894 after a British occupancy. The soldiers dug out the bones of the pirates that spread the epidemic. A festival was held to cast away the devils that later turned into a string of festive events.
Some historians, however, were of the view that the festival started after a Hong Kong resident of Chiu Chow origin brought a Pak Tai (The Emperor of the North - a Taoist deity) statue to the island and made a public obeisance there for the end of the plague on Hong Kong island.
The phallic shape of the three bun towers - whose central and tallest rises about 50 feet in height - reinforced the symbolism of this rite of passage that pitted virile young men in a contest which only the fastest, strongest and most reckless could hope to win.
Constructed of bamboo frames, the towers were covered in buns, baked as offerings to Pak Tai but in practice serving only as toeholds in the race up to the red-coloured topmost bun, which constituted the much disputed trophy of the entire exercise.
Scramble excitement
The signal for the scramble might come at any hour of the day or night, determined by auspicious auguries divined by priests and sounded by a gong that brought contestants running from their homes, or perhaps their fitful slumbers, to scale the highest and most central of the three towers erected before the Pak Tai Temple, built in 1783 and dedicated to the island's patron saint.
The first to seize the topmost bun was not necessarily the winner of the race, for he then had to run the gauntlet of his fellow contestants and return to headquarters to bring honour to his clan. While fellow clan members might do their best to aid him, everyone else would be out to thwart him - violently if necessary - to take possession of his precious and by now probably thoroughly inedible cargo.
The later stages of the race, following the would-be winner's course home, would resemble a version of Chinese rugby, with the bun replacing the ball.
Scramble event halted
A tragic accident in 1978 caused one of the towers to collapse and forced authorities to cancel the annual competition, so that ever since the towers have remained only as museum pieces of their ancient inheritance.
Last year the villagers of Cheung Chau appealed to the Government to remove the ban on the contest and once more allow the festival its full and proper significance.
We reviewed the case and concluded that there was merit in reviving a tradition so enthusiastically advocated by its supporters, provided:
*the scaffolding supporting the towers was safe from any danger of collapsing;
*there were adequate safeguards against injury to contestants; and
*crowd control was properly enforced to protect spectators.
Revival formula
We believe we have come up with a formula that meets these requirements and revives the so-called bun tower "scramble" in a way that ensures there is a proper degree of fair play and nobody gets hurt.
The tower is founded on firmly anchored steel frames and contestants are selected by a series of qualifying heats to determine they are properly trained and equipped.
In this way we believe we have rescued a heritage in danger of losing its meaning, replacing the original tradition with a further refined form of activity that preserves the spirit of competition it was intended to satisfy. The best way to protect a heritage is to permit its evolution to accord with changing circumstance.
This article was published in local newspapers on May 13.
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