Party on the beach

In the first installment of her series on Hong Kong's outlying islands, Faye Bradley revisits some of the time-honored island festivals and finds out about newer ones that celebrate local traditions and environments.

By Faye Bradley | HK EDITION | Updated: 2024-11-01 14:43

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Lingnan University academic Roger Lee is part of the team behind the project meant to raise awareness of the natural habitat of bees and the installation of a bee hotel in progress. [PROVIDED TO CHINA DAILY]

Green thoughts

Ten years ago, Kit Chan and a few like-minded friends chose to set up home on one of the three islands covered by the festival. Besides being inspired by the interconnectedness between them, they felt strongly about conserving the distinct art traditions and cultural communities of each island. "It was important for us to strengthen and celebrate the vibrant lifestyles of these places, and make residents, both old and new, aware of this rich heritage that we could build on in our own ways," Chan says.

For its past two editions, Inter-Island Festival organizers have collaborated with people from various creative fields to come up with diverse programs. The range stretches from thought-provoking workshops where participants learn the nitty-gritty of generating images by using artificial intelligence, to screenings of short documentaries like Daphne Wong's Sea of Noise, on how sound pollution is causing harm to endangered white dolphins in Hong Kong's seas.