“Stepping into Choi Hung”

Tyler Sit

Minneapolis, MN | Bi-Racial & Chinese | He/him/his

During the Summer of 2019, my family took a trip to China and Hong Kong. It was the first time for many of us. For dad, it was his first time back after 37 years. One of the most impactful experiences during the trip was when we visited Choi Hung, Hong Kong. Choi Hung translates to rainbow, which I still laugh about sometimes, because now my father has a gay son – me!

We took the subway to the place where dad grew up. When we got off, we walked down a sweltering hot street with thirsty-looking palm trees. The private Catholic school dad attended seemed randomly placed at the end of the street. There were discolored fliers about church relief work plastered everywhere. We eventually arrived at a building with a huge grid of rainbow colors where dad had lived decades ago.

We were determined to get inside the building, but realized we couldn’t enter the building without a key. There was a security desk at the entrance, so we couldn’t just walk in. We decided to sneak in behind a resident. We whispered, “It’s fine, it’s fine, it’s fine; just breaking the law in Hong Kong. No problem here.”

As a resident entered, we quickly followed behind. We got in and casually smiled at the security guard. What we didn’t anticipate was the fleet of Chinese grandmas sitting in a line of plastic chairs. We evaded the security guard, but all of a sudden, the grandmas yelled, “Those guys snuck in! Don’t let them in!”

The security guard looked at the grandmas and at us, and replied, “Ok, you tripped the wire. I’m sorry folks, the alarm is going off.”

Dad stepped up and said, “Listen, this is where I grew up as a kid. My family has never seen this, and I’d love to show it to them.”

The security guard eventually let us in on one account. He said, “Don’t mess anything up.”

We got into a rickety elevator, praying it wouldn’t trap us in. Since there were so many floors, the elevator only stopped on odd numbers. We needed to get to the 18th floor, so we got off on the 19th floor and walked down one floor.

As we entered the 18th floor, all I noticed was concrete. There were no decorative elements on any of the walls. Concrete walls lined the long hallway in this huge, cold building. Dad finally spoke and said, “This is where I played as a kid. This was my childhood.”

There were only grates on the windows; nothing else. With so much concrete, one needed to have a lot of imagination to play there. We continued walking down the hallway.

Mom, who is deeply spiritual, stopped to breathe. She said, “I know that right now your grandparents are with us. Yeye and Mama are with us.”

Both of my Chinese grandparents passed away a long time ago. Mom was adamant that they were there with us. No one responded, and we shuffled quietly down the hallway until we reached an apartment and dad blurted out, “This is it! This is where I grew up.”

There was something so familiar. I felt as if this was a place that had been a part of me my entire life. This concrete space had shaped dad, and he created the world that I live in. Even though I had never lived there, it has also shaped me and my childhood. I just didn’t know it till I was present in it. I started seeing all the pieces and understood why my dad was the way he was – why he was so good at racing up the stairs; why he loved the outdoors, the fresh air of Minnesota; and, even why he was reluctant to return to Hong Kong.

I will always be grateful for that time with my family in Choi Hung. Now as a pastor, it is my job to create space for people to weave all their stories together into the larger stories about God, about the world, and about what it means to be human. This brief visit to Choi Hung with my family was a discovery about a part of my family’s story. Every step I took in my dad’s old stomping grounds was a way to weave my story into our family tapestry.

On our way out of the building, the Chinese grandmas smiled and waved goodbye. The only thing I knew to say in Cantonese was fortunately the only thing I was feeling at that moment. I said, “Thank you!”

#MinneAsianStories Series