A crumpled tissue dampened with tears lies near Ng Chi Fai as he tells how a routine journey home on the Hong Kong subway landed him in a scene of terrifying chaos.
Business was slow for the chef Saturday night at the restaurant where he boils, steams and fries the Cantonese dishes his customers love. The 53-year-old, a cook since the age of 18, was fretting about getting home, scrolling through the news on his cellphone as protests broke out across the city. Demonstrators were defying a police ban, angered by the arrests of a group of pro-democracy activists.
So he decided to leave early, changed out of his chef’s shirt and hurried to the nearby Lai Chi Kok transit railway station.
A wave of irritation overcame him as he changed trains at Prince Edward station, where he found a platform crammed with an unusually large crowd for late Saturday night: mainly families with small children, older people, and young women dressed in fancy clothes for a night out. He squeezed onto a train with other passengers, including some protesters.
Read the full article here: Los Angeles Times
Text: Los Angeles Times, Robyn Dixon, Ryan Ho Kilpatrick
Photo: Marcus Yam, Los Angeles Times