27th May 2020
I do not know anyone as obsessed with classification, and labelling as human. All other animals, living things and objects in the nature are oblivious of their existence. Unlike humankind, they are simply there without asking why and how, or for how long, let alone what it is called. A stone did not have a name until perhaps one day, someone stepped on one and fell down. The naming moment came because it would be convenient for her to explain why she was covered with scratches and bruises. Equipped with a newly-invented name, she was able to explain the cause of injury. This small success could have motivated the name-giver to explore objects of the same and similar kind. That was perhaps how she came up with other names: pebble, rock, boulder, etc., all of which were quite neutral and based only on size and location of her find, except for the one that she tripped over. I am not sure if she gave that stone a special name other than perhaps calling it a bad stone. Modern-day associations I can think of are headstone, tombstone, gravestone, all of which are related to death.
To develop a system of classification for any branch of studies, an enormous amount of time and effort is required. Don’t get me wrong. I have nothing but admiration for those who take up the painstaking task that could last a life’s time. It would have been fine if we had left the researchers alone and let them do the job. But for reasons none other than vanity and ambition, people sometimes are eager to add to the list. Worse still, they associate certain labels according to personal likes and dislikes. We have been dealing with a rather concrete example so far. Let us now turn to real-life examples.
At dinner parties, I seldom told others my profession. It was not because I was ashamed of my job; I simply found it unnecessary to explain what I did. I am sure you also find it a laborious task to explain, for instance, what sort of accountant you are, the line of business of your company, the type of clients you deal with, and so on and so forth. It would be worse if you began to sense that your conversation partner was forming personal judgement every time you enriched your answer. Recently, I felt excited to transform my identity from being a teacher to a writer. The new identity almost always induces excitement, only if I can introduce myself as one who writes in all genres. Even though my first publications are novels, the last thing I want is to be pigeonholed as a novelist. Why can’t I write essays, verses, plays, TV scripts, reviews, etc.? The list is endless. Don’t forget that most writers in the past simply carried out the task of writing, and would seldom confine to one genre. I find a definite distinction rather troubling. It is as though people are ashamed of fiction, suddenly, everyone says she is reading non-fiction. Similarly, writers proudly call themselves non-fiction writers? Why? It’s probably because non-fiction writing requires some hard-core research which requires more brainwork than pure imagination. True, but let me point out a contradiction. Even though my PhD thesis required eight years of research, its completion did not make me a writer (though I must admit that one external reviewer of my thesis commented that he had a genuine interest in finding out what would happen to my subjects). On the other hand, my first novel that was inspired by personal experience would not be complete without research. This is an important step to make a story convincing. So you see, I disagree with a division of fiction and non-fiction which I think will kill our creativity.
Another personal identity that I did not readily reveal to my new acquaintances was the place where I came from. Again, it wasn’t because it had a bad reputation. On the contrary, Hong Kong used to be a city of envy, particularly among the neighbouring countries in South East Asia in the 1980s. While others were still developing in all domains including economy, education, and judiciary systems, Hong Kong was already thriving under the British ruling. My years of studying in Canada witnessed a glorious period of the city where I was born. My pride as a Hongkonger was slowly eroded after the handover. As the line between a Hongkonger and a Chinese began to blur, I became less and less willing to associate myself with the city. For a decade or two, people, both local and overseas didn’t seem to be able to tell how a Hongkonger differs from a Chinese, or they didn’t seem to care about the labelling, until some young people in Hong Kong began to make a strong statement of such a need. It was as though they started a new trend. People who follow world news can now tell a Chinese is not necessarily a Hongkonger. On arrival at the airport in South Korea in June, 2014, I wrote “Chinese” on my arrival card only to be crossed out by the immigration officer over the counter. Instead, he wrote “Hong Kong” as my nationality. I think voices both within and beyond are guiding me to treasure my identity as a Hongkonger again. The word appears in Wikipedia and Oxford Reference but not yet in all dictionaries. But who knows? Perhaps one day, the term will become such a household name that nobody could imagine the issue was once in contention.
Let’s now go back to our stone that still remained silent of its power. Does it matter whether it was labelled a stone or something else? Not really. Reading back the narration makes me realise that I missed out a minor detail. I forgot to mention that the name-giver did not step on the stone by accident; she meant to crumble it to pieces. For some reason, she wanted to destroy it. Acting out of her animal instinct, she ended up hurting herself rather than the stone which turned out to be in the size of a rock.