The social consciousness of Hong Kong poet Tim Tim Cheng was sparked on a Lunar New Year day in February 2011.
At that time, Cheng – still a teenager – was part of a small group that assembled in Choi Yuen Tsuen for an arts event.festival, known as “Choi Yuen Tsuen Woodstock,” organized by locals, independent musicians, artists, scholars, and advocates to mark the village’s last days.
The village was scheduled for demolition to facilitate a high-speed rail initiative linking Hong Kong with the Chinese mainland, even though locals and advocates strongly opposed it.
That day, Cheng observed the lead singer and songwriter Leung Wing-lai ofHong Kong group An Id Signal, who, without a stage to perform on, stood barefoot in the dry earth and screamed into the microphone as clouds of dust swirled around the crowd.
Until that moment, throughout most of Cheng’s life, Hong Kong had seemed like a blur. “Choi Yuen Tsuen captured moments when Hong Kong became clearer to me,” she said.
Fourteen years later, Cheng, now a published poet dividing her time between Glasgow and Hong Kong, found herself in a much bigger crowd at the band’s album launch in April. Her bond with An Id Signal has also come full circle.
Cheng, who remembered first encountering the band during her secondary school years, is acknowledged for translating the group’s lyrics for their most recent album. “It was a voluntary effort,” she mentioned regarding the translation initiative.
The band’s track “Volatile Consolation” is featured in her most recent English-language poetry book,The Tattoo Collector– the unconventional, jarring cries captured on paper. When writing about those instances, she mentioned it was a method to link with the past.
“I believe one of the most significant lessons I learned from writing this book is about embracing the pain caused by the loss of important elements, such as music venues or major protests,” Cheng said, referring to closed live houses and large demonstrations in Hong Kong.
The Tattoo Collector, Cheng’s second book, was released in 2024 – three years following her relocation to the UK and only a year after she issued a more concise collection,Tapping at Glass.
Two months ago, The Tattoo Collector was longlistedfor the first-ever poetry category of the Jhalak Prize, which recognizes books authored by writers of color in the UK and Ireland.
Earlier this month, Girl Ghosts, one of the poems inThe Tattoo Collector, was shortlistedfor the Forward Prizes in Poetry, one of the most prominent poetry awards in the two nations.
Currently, the poet is expanding her horizons and beginning to believe that translation might enhance her connection to Hong Kong’s literature – in both English and Chinese – as well as the city itself.
New generation
Cheng, 32, belongs to a new wave ofAnglophone Hong Kong poets, continuing a tradition of literary personalities and translators from the city, including Jennifer Wong, Mary Jean Chan, and Nicholas Wong.
English literature from Hong Kong has gained more attention in the last ten years. Due to these authors, there is a rising interest among scholars in this literary field to explore how residents perceive the social and political transformations in the city.
“They created a path for writers like me who focus on Hong Kong,” she stated.
Nevertheless, apart from a few remarks in English, Cheng’s interview was entirely in Cantonese – illustrating her dual cultural identity.
Cheng was raised in a working-class household located in a public housing complex in Tin Shui Wai, situated in the northwestern part of the New Territories.
She was brought up by her Indonesian-Chinese great-grandmother and grandmother, who had relocated to the city from Fujian. She did not learn much about Hong Kong from them or her parents, who spoke Cantonese and Hokkien.
“When I was younger, I wished for my English to be flawless, so I steered clear of Chinese literature. But that was a poor way of thinking,” she remarked, reflecting on an Anglophile phase she experienced during her years at an English-medium secondary school and dismissing it as a sign of the early-2010s British “soft power” influence.
Cheng pursued a double major in English and Education at Hong Kong Baptist University, where she officially studied and composed English poetry. Following her graduation, she worked as an English teacher for several years.
Teacher pay was satisfactory, but eventually led to exhaustion. Her final position as a full-time educator was at the Lee Shau Kee School of Creativity, an unconventional secondary school located in Kowloon City, where students focusing on creative arts are encouraged to pursue their personal passion projects during their free time.
She referenced the motivating impact her students had on her and expressed sorrow over the city’s inability to provide the “nourishment” needed for her writing, so Cheng moved to Edinburgh in 2021 to study for a master’s in creative writing, supported by a loan from a friend.
‘Lived outside, hidden behind’
The poet signed editions ofThe Tattoo CollectorBy striking out her transliterated English name, “Tim Tim Cheng,” and writing the Chinese characters for her name below.
Occasional Cantonese expressions can be found in Cheng’s English poems, which might either distance or attract readers from outside Hong Kong.
She holds a feeling of doubt regarding the English language. Although it is her primary “literary language,” she feels both connected to and distant from it. English is a language she has simultaneously “lived outside” and “[hidden] behind,” she mentions in her book.
Although bilingualism is generally seen as a valuable ability in Hong Kong, the poet offers a more complex perspective. “BYELINGUAL,” Cheng mentioned in a text message to HKFP, describing the condition of being able to speak two languages yet losing fluency in both.
It was her word-for-word translation of a Cantonese idiom that literally translates to “neither salty nor bland,” which she had previously used in an interview to explain how she perceived her relationship with the two languages.
The Tattoo Collectorswitches between Hong Kong, the place of her birth and upbringing, and Scotland, where she now resides. It includes discussions about class and privilege with a fellow student in Glasgow and recollections of Hidden Agenda, a former live music venue in Hong Kong’s industrial area that was shut down by police in 2016, along with scenes of countryside, motherhood, migration, and pro-democracy demonstrations..
Meanwhile, Girl GhostsA poem partially influenced by tales shared by her mother and grandmother, it serves as a tribute to the poet’s familial heritage in Indonesia and Fujian.
These mixtures and in-between states have made Cheng feel somewhat like an outsider, never fully engaged in one place or one language. However, her intention to live between Hong Kong and Glasgow has required her to embrace this identity.
“If I’m writing about Hong Kong from the perspective of someone not living in the city, there’s a moment when I must acknowledge that my comprehension cannot entirely capture the reality of those who reside here,” Cheng stated.
“This compilation isn’t really very ‘Hong Kong,’” she remarked regarding her latest book.
There are simply too many specific elements of the city that would still seem unfamiliar or unknown to the general public back home, she said. “Hidden Agenda – who even knows about that?”
However, Cheng, who discusses particular policy matters in her writing, is far from being disconnected from the city’s matters.
Hong Kong’s intense real estate scene, a large creature that was injured on its back two summers prior, and a halted land reclamation mega-project are depicted as brief scenes in her poem “Lantau (Rotten Head),” which alludes to the old Chinese name for the city’s largest island.
Cheng acknowledges that she was somewhat “careless” in choosing her topics. “Once I had the contract from the publisher, I realized I could write about anything,” she mentioned. At one stage, Cheng received feedback suggesting that her poems were difficult to understand or that they depended too much on flashy Chinese characters.
In one respect, she ignored the critiques, claiming that her detractors would have grasped her work more effectively if they had used Google. In another respect, she responded in a favorable manner.
I genuinely enjoy reading these comments, as I began writing with the goal of catering to an audience that is familiar with the events, to express myself in our own language,” she stated. It was about finding a balance between “the audience you wish to reach and the level of success you aim for.
Diaspora
When talking about the places that influence her work, she is reluctant to classify herself as part of Hong Kong’s diaspora.
Certainly, she has not fully relocated abroad. Cheng, who currently resides – and writes – between Hong Kong and Scotland, is already getting ready to begin teaching in the English Department at the Chinese University of Hong Kong in September.
Prior to returning to Glasgow for a four-month period in May, she spent nearly half a year in Hong Kong: instructing, conducting book discussions, editing, and overseeing master’s projects, while gathering money to cover a five-year talent visa, student loans, airfare, and housing costs in the UK.
Still, she is somewhat cautious about Hongkongers living abroad.
“Some people from Hong Kong here don’t like being around other Hong Kong residents because they fear their children won’t be able to adapt and become ‘true UK citizens,’” Cheng said, speaking with a tone of disdain.
Cheng remembers going to a Lunar New Year festival, where Hongkongers—those “who had decided they weren’t returning,” she mentioned—printed out Hong Kong street signs, mailboxes, and vending machines as decorations, as though trying to keep alive the image of the city they were familiar with.
But perhaps Hong Kong’s streets have changed so much that they are no longer the same scene,” she said. “I still want to find out what’s going on both ways; I’m a bit curious like that.
Taking her time to fit into the common stereotypes of “diaspora” poets set by foreign publishers, Cheng doesn’t feel the need to romanticize Hong Kong, unlike some self-proclaimed diaspora poets who might do so for their native countries.
“You had a reason to leave. Your background may not have provided enough, so why mention it as if it’s something impressive?” she questioned.
For Cheng, translation serves as a method to elevate Hong Kong authors’ visibility, without explicitly yielding to the Western perspective.
“I wish to catch up on Chinese content I have missed, but I don’t want to stray too far from my current activities,” she said.
She has recently started translating the essay collection by Hong Kong author Lee Ka-yee.Exposure, under the guidance of literary translator Jennifer Feeley, who has translated the works ofthe city’s late literary icon Xi Xi.
“It’s also a method to challenge my comprehension of Hong Kong,” Cheng added.
“A lot of writing from Hong Kong, particularly works that reach the English-speaking audience, often carries a sense that it was created with the intention of being viewed by others. However, Ka-yee and other local Hong Kong authors approach writing based purely on their own perspective of the world, how Hongkongers perceive it. I aim to connect these different viewpoints through translation,” she said.
Perhaps it’s also a way of communicating with my younger self, who was 12 or 13 years old: You are actually capable of moving between Chinese and English.
