MISSING: THE SAI KUNG MYSTERY
CHRIS SAUNDERS investigates a spate of mysterious disappearances and deaths in a Hong Kong beauty spot and asks if Sai Kung Country Park – and its fabled enchantment – represents a kind of Bermuda Triangle for the region’s hikers…
CHRIS SAUNDERS investigates a spate of mysterious disappearances and deaths in a Hong Kong beauty spot and asks if Sai Kung Country Park – and its fabled enchantment – represents a kind of Bermuda Triangle for the region’s hikers…
Not so long ago, Hong Kong was a sparsely populated collection of fishing villages. Then, after the first Opium War in 1842, it was made a colony of the British Empire and became a unique melting pot of Eastern and Western ideologies, rising to become one of the world’s most significant financial hubs. After being handed back to China in 1997, Hong Kong vowed to maintain a degree of independence and endeavoured to subsist on a principle of “one country, two systems”. That didn’t work out so well, and mainland China has spent the last quarter of a century trying to reassert itself.
That particular political maelstrom is still up in the air, but some things are more clearly defined. Hong Kong is now one of the most congested and densely populated regions on the planet with almost 7.5 million people crammed into an area of barely 426 square miles (1,104km2). It’s only natural that, when circumstances allow, residents would want to get away from it all and perhaps go for a hike in the countryside.
However, if you do this in an area called Sai Kung, you’d better keep your wits about you…
THE SAI KUNG ENCHANTMENT
Sai Kung district is made up of the southern half of Sai Kung Peninsula, Sai Kung town, Clear Water Bay, Hong King Global Geopark, a strip of land to the east of Kowloon, and over 70 islands of varying sizes. Often dubbed “the back garden of Hong Kong” it is known for its picturesque fishing villages, beautiful scenery, wildlife, beaches and hiking trails. Providing a welcome contrast to the hustle and bustle of urban life, it attracts Hong Kongers keen to unwind and get back to nature. A common phrase one hears is “Sai Kung enchantment”, which is normally used to describe people who visit the place and fall under its spell. But as with most things in Chinese culture, there is a deeper, more sinister meaning.
Over the years there have been multiple reports of weird occurrences in Sai Kung. People disappear, usually while out hiking, and are never seen again. Others are found dead in mysterious circumstances, often after displaying bizarre or erratic behaviour. There have also been survivors, who emerge from the wilderness wide-eyed and full of incredible stories. The strange events have prompted some to compare Sai Kung to the fabled Bermuda Triangle, and there has been a lot of Internet chat pertaining to some kind of portal that enables people to flit between worlds or dimensions. Other theories to explain the disappearances range from a deranged killer on the loose to the place being haunted or simply having “bad feng shui”, which in Chinese superstition is
tantamount to being cursed.
The most recent incident occurred on 16 March this year, when 58-year old construction worker Lam Wing-chun left his apartment on the Yee Ming Estate to go hiking alone in Sai Kung. When he failed to return, his family contacted police and within 24 hours an 80-strong search team had been mobilised. They scoured the area, with the help of a helicopter, but the search yielded no results. At around 3pm on 18 March a member of the public stumbled upon a body wedged between rocks on Sheung Sze Wan beach, which was soon identified as that of Wingchun. At the time of writing, an official cause of death has not been made public, but the assumption is that he died from drowning. 1 As tragic as it may be, Wing-chun’s death, taken in isolation, is not very remarkable. Accidents happen, and some of the hiking trails in
Sai Kung are extremely challenging if not downright dangerous.
But scratch the surface and there are several things that don’t quite add up. Wingchun was an experienced, well-prepared hiker familiar with the area, so probably wouldn’t be surprised by much. The last position indicated by his mobile phone signal was a place called Yuen Ng Fan, 6.02 miles (9.7km) away from where he was found – so how did he get from A to B?
Whatever fate befell him, it must have happened suddenly, leaving no opportunity to call for help. Given that the route between Yuen Ng Fan and Sheung Sze Wan is a rough horseshoe shape along coastal paths, it’s conceivable he may have fallen in the water and been carried by the current, but that seems just a little too neat and tidy. When he was found, he still had his backpack, phone, wallet, identity documents and other personal effects with him. If he’d been carried along by a current for more than six miles, wouldn’t some of his belongings have been lost along
SCRATCH THE SURFACE AND SEVERAL THINGS DON’T ADD UP
the way? Anyway, how did the search teams fail to locate the body in what is a relatively small area?
Interestingly, one of the things that has drawn comparisons between Sai Kung and the Bermuda Triangle is the way that compasses, mobile phones, and other electronic devices seem to malfunction there, which could not only adversely affect hikers’ equipment but also hinder search operations. Scholars who have analysed the area from a geological perspective have claimed that as a result of significant seismic disturbances in the past, up to 85 per cent of the land mass is now covered with volcanic rock. 2 It’s said this magma has disrupted the natural magnetic field and can cause tourists to lose their bearings or even faint. This is the other, darker meaning of the term “Sai Kung enchantment”.
If this is true, perhaps the effect on visitors might be more pronounced than on people native to the area who might have built up some sort of tolerance to changes in the magnetic field.
THE VANISHING OF TING LI-WAH
I’d have less trouble believing what happened to Lam Wing-chun was just an unfortunate accident if this was an isolated incident. But it isn’t. Things like this happen in Sai Kung with alarming regularity. By all accounts, there has always been something a bit sketchy about the place, but it didn’t start making its mark in the public consciousness until 11 September 2005 when what is now seen as the area’s most famous incident occurred.
At 1.30pm, off-duty policeman Ting Li-wah called emergency services and requested an ambulance. The 45-year-old said he did not know exactly where he was, only that his current location was a twohour walk from Pak Tam Chung, a beauty spot in south Sai Kung. Hong Kong hiking trails have been numbered and signposted using the HK1980 coordinate system since
the 1990s, 3 but when Li-wah was asked to give his coordinates the ones provided didn’t correspond with the government registry. Even if injured or distressed, it’s unthinkable that a trained police officer would make such a basic error. The call was then abruptly cut off, and despite an exhaustive search lasting five days and involving hundreds of personnel across multiple government agencies, no trace of Li-wah was ever found.
Li-wah was a member of the anti-triad squad, which might have something to do with his disappearance. But he wasn’t very high ranking, so it would seem unlikely that the triads would go so far as to risk bumping him off – bribery is more their thing. Even if he was assassinated, it wouldn’t explain the lack of a body or the confused phone call. The story made such an impact that in 2019 it was the inspiration behind a Chinese-language movie called (in English) Missing. 4 Described as a drama/thriller, the plot follows a social worker who goes in search of her father, who had disappeared in Sai Kung seven years earlier, when a hiker finds his police badge.
Less than a month later, on 4 October 2005, the body of another man was found in a wooded area near Lo Fu Kei Shek (aka Shek Uk San), at 1,578 feet (481m), the highest peak in Sai Kung. According to an article in the South China Morning Post, 5 the body was that of 22-year-old Yuen Chi-yung, 6 an experienced outdoorsman who had been leading a team of four female hikers as part of a training course. The hike was just 4.3 miles (7km) long and should have taken around three hours. However, shortly after their excursion began – coincidentally, or not, near where Li-wah had disappeared – Chi-yung said he felt unwell and stopped to rest, sending the rest of the team on ahead without him. When he failed to catch them up, the group reported him missing. It took a 200-strong search team three days to find his body, by which time he had been dead for “at least 24 hours”.
So what happened to him?
Police suspected he’d tripped and hit his head on some rocks. But, again, questions remain. Like Li-wah, Chi-yung was an experienced hiker and climber, and there’s a near 36-hour disparity between when he was reported missing and his estimated time of death. What was he doing during that time? If he was in distress, why didn’t he try to call for help? Furthermore, the place Chi-yung’s body was eventually found was just metres away from a route the search and rescue team, who were equipped with dogs and life detectors, took. How did they fail to locate him?
Then, in 2009, a 49-year-old bus driver called Zelong Huang vanished while out hiking. His family called his cell phone, which was picked up by a fisherman who said he’d found a bag containing the phone in the sea and repurposed the SIM card. When pressed for more information, he hung up. The authorities determined that the last place Zelong Huang used his phone was Big Wave Bay, but even after extensive searches lasting many days, he was never seen again and no body was ever found.
In 2019 yet another hiker, 45-year-old Xu Xinxian, went missing and was later found dead. This time, his death was ruled “suspicious”. The trend continued into 2020 when another man was found lying dead on a hiking trail. It was assumed he too had fallen and hit his head, in what would be almost an exact re-enactment of the Chi-yung case. Could it be a mere coincidence?
IF HE WAS IN DISTRESS, WHY DIDN’T HE TRY TO CALL FOR HELP?
Sandwiched between these two events was the disappearance of a 64-year-old who went fishing alone on Nai Chung pier and vanished into thin air. It would be easy to assume he simply fell in the sea and drowned – but, again, what happened to the body?
There are several underlying patterns across many of these cases that could be indicative of a serial killer at work, not least all the ‘victims’ being of the same demographic. But could a serial killer really function undetected for such a prolonged period? Technological advances and modern policing techniques make it doubtful, but not impossible. Any public talk involving such a theory would probably be suppressed by the mainstream Chinese media, which heavily favours more positive, nationalistic stories. Even the (theoretically) free Hong Kong press abide by this ethos to a large extent in order to avoid the territory being seen in a negative light.
ZHANG SHANPENG’S STORY
To understand more about what we might be dealing with, it’s worth looking outside the box and examining a few close calls. On 3 February 2019, the DimSumDaily briefly reported that two missing hikers had been found by police after an overnight search. 7 The brief article states that the duo were reported missing when a mutual friend realised they hadn’t returned home and both their phones were dead. They were located alive and well near Lai Chi Ching.
But wait a moment – both their phones had died? Sure, we all forget to charge our phones and unexpectedly run out of juice, usually at the most inconvenient times… but two people in the same place at the same time? In the age of battery packs and portable chargers, and when most young people would rather lose a limb than see their mobile phone run below 25%, this strikes me as extremely far-fetched. Unless, of course, some external force caused the phones to malfunction.
Stranger still is an incident that befell climber Zhang Shanpeng – and which could hold the key to the whole mystery. On 18 June 2016, he set off on a hike from Pak Tam Chung to Pak Tam Au. At around 10am he posted a selfie on Facebook and added another message a few minutes later saying he thought it looked like rain. That was his last interaction, and his worried family contacted the authorities the next day. The initial search uncovered a blue sun visor similar to that worn by Zhang Shanpeng in his last selfie, but no trace of the man himself. Then the search range was expanded, helicopters were dispatched, and finally on 21 June, a team of police officers spotted a man on the Ham Tin Bay Highway. It turned out to be Zhang Shanpeng. And that’s when the weirdness started.
On 3 July, Zhang Shanpeng took to Facebook again to describe in detail what had happened to him while he was missing. The post said that on the first day, when the sky turned overcast, he had set out down the mountain, but that when he passed through a bush he suddenly lost consciousness. After waking up, he tried to continue his journey but found himself going around in circles and was forced to spend the night in the mountains.
Upon waking the next day, he tried again to find his way down the mountain. Seeing two travellers near a stream, he called out for help; they didn’t hear him, and when he approached them they suddenly disappeared. Tired and hungry, he passed out next to the stream, and when he woke up again was somehow in a completely different place. He walked near some woods until he found a cemetery. Not recognising the place, he panicked and fled. Shortly afterwards he again saw someone near a mountain stream, but when he tried to approach them, they also disappeared. When he woke on the fourth day, he found himself in another unfamiliar location. This time, he decided to climb to higher ground and was finally able to make his escape.
Public reaction to Zhang Shanpeng’s account was mixed. Some Internet commenters put his experiences down to hallucinations brought on by fatigue and dehydration, while others flatly accused him of being a fantasist. I don’t believe he made the whole thing up. After all, what would he stand to gain from doing so? The Chinese are very pragmatic by nature and wouldn’t willingly set themselves up for public ridicule. While the jury might still be out on exactly what happened, it’s clear that something happened to him during the four days he was missing. And if you believe this, you might argue that Zhang Shanpeng’s story is the perfect example of “Sai Kung enchantment” in action – and that he is simply one of the few people lucky enough to survive it.
NOTES
1 https://hongkongbuzz.hk/2021/03/body-found-insheung-sze-wan-confirmed-as-missing-hiker
2 https://min.news/en/travel/ f19147d82414820f719c93e52e044fce.html
3 This system uses six digits to represent the horizontal and vertical coordinates of any given hiking trail, the aim being to stop people getting lost.
4 www.imdb.com/title/tt12043620/
5 www.scmp.com/article/519107/hiker-gone-missingsai-kung-found-dead
6 In some reports, the name given is Yuan Zhiyong, which appears to be a different Anglicisation of the same Chinese characters.
7 www.dimsumdaily.hk/two-hikers-who-went-missingduring-hiking-in-sai-kung-yesterday-finally-found-by-police/
8 Facebook and most other Western social networking platforms are blocked in mainland China (where savvy netizens use VPNs to access them), but not in Hong Kong.
Translation & additional research by Xin Zhou, Yushan Liu and Liu Yiming.