Diamond Hill

The harsh but colorful world in which Feng grew up is no more, and the great value of his book is that his story is also, in large part, the story of Hong Kong. ... While Feng certainly does not lament the physical loss of the ramshackle villages in which he and other children of his generation came of age, his memoir invokes a toughness and a can-do spirit that he finds lacking in the Hong Kong of today. It is that spirit, not the slums of Diamond Hill, that he would like the city to recapture.

Diamond Hill is an excellent and fast read for those who want an honest depiction of life for a majority of Hong Kong denizens in the 1950s-60s.

Feng gives a frank and candid recollection of his teenage upbringing in Diamond Hill from 1956 to 1966. He proudly proclaims in the story’s prologue that the people, places and events he describes are real, and that he has “no reason to refrain from writing about them.” Indeed, the stories he shares with his readers tell all, including sad stories of childhood friends whose futures succumbed to gambling or drug addiction, and the desperate ways in which the poorer townspeople went about making ends meet.

Equal parts interesting, entertaining and informative, Diamond Hill opens the floodgates of nostalgia for anyone who lived near the mouth of the Pearl River in the 1950s and '60s. But not all the memories are pleasant. Author Feng Chi-shun spent his childhood coping with poverty. His memoirs show the value of perseverance, street smarts and good luck.