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Archi-social Community Urban Project
Domestic helpers working in Hong Kong have the short end of the
stick. They not only have to live in a city that is foreign to them, but they
also have to be away from home and their loved ones. They don’t really
have a place that resembles their homes in Hong Kong. They therefore
lack a sense of belonging which every person should have. Many factors
contribute to this: there is the obvious language barrier, they only earn
minimum wage; entertainments and leisure activities are expensive
in Hong Kong, they have limited access to educational, cultural,
recreational, professional and social facilities, resources and information
relative to other residents of Hong Kong. In addition, they face constant
discrimination and irrational anger or dislike from the local community
i.e. as a result of the Hong Kong Tourist hostage crisis in Manila which
has lead the locals to associate domestic helpers with the Philippine
Government and incidences of physical abuse by employers toward domestic helpers. These cumulative factors inevitably result in domestic
helpers feeling isolated from and being isolated by the local community.
The thesis project aims to provide a space where domestic helpers
can come together and avail themselves of their rights of education,
religion, use of public space, human rights. It is also hoped that this
space can serve as the melting pot or merging center of different
communities of the minority groups in Hong Kong. Through this space,
a multi-cultural neighbourhood can temporarily exist and reinforces
Hong Kong’s reputation as Asia’s world city. It is hoped that this space
can educate its target visitors/users by giving them more information on
various topics such as current events, laws, languages or even simply
general knowledge. The space is also intended to entertainment its users
by providing them with more activities to do. Hopefully, this helps them
grow and explore their potentials as individuals and give them a sense of
self-worth. More importantly, it is hoped that the space gives them a safe
haven or refuge from local discrimination and isolation. Here they can be
free from criticisms or judgment. They can be themselves as well as give
them some sense of ‘home’ where they belong.
I wanted to create an installation and/or make use of abandoned
places such as spaces under bridges that serves or provides equal
opportunities to the domestic helpers without doors or borders which
caters to all these existing issues. It will not only make better use of the
space but also benefit domestic helpers.
There are three types of approach for my thesis. Firstly, a
temporary installation may be designed that could be set up and taken
down every weekends. Secondly, an improvement can be made to their
existing resources or places they use and thirdly, proposing to make
better use of the abandoned places in Hong Kong i.e. left over spaces in
Hong.
There are three types of approach for my thesis. Firstly, a
temporary installation may be designed that could be set up and taken
down every weekends. Secondly, an improvement can be made to their
existing resources or places they use and thirdly, proposing to make
better use of the abandoned places in Hong Kong i.e. left over spaces in parks, road, under the bridges and many more.
A temporary installation may be set up every weekends i.e.
Sundays when most of the domestic helpers have their day offs, on
different locations such as in the ground floor of the HSBC main building
in Central; the football pitch in Victoria Park in Causeway Bay; Kowloon
Park in Tsim Sha Tsui. These are the prime locations where domestic
helpers gather or which has space big enough to accommodate domestic
helpers who gather in groups amongst themselves. This installation
would include spaces for religion, education – language corner / books /
law and legal rights, food – their local delicacies, activities such as yoga.
As mentioned before, this installation will be located where domestic
helpers in Hong Kong congregate during weekends or during their dayoffs
in order to show that we are reaching out to them.
Most of the existing resources of these domestic helpers are not
put into good or maximum use. It is unclear why and I am curious why. I
will investigate into this to ascertain how to improve or help resolve these
issues and improve their existing conditions.
In addition, we can physically see that domestic helpers do not
have or have limited access to the resources or public facilities of Hong
Kong. We could also observe that many awkward, unused or deliberated
blocked spaces in Hong Kong. If this is the case, why don’t we propose to
the government to make better use of the space. This could be a starting
point for different ideas to apply to those spaces.
All of the proposed projects will be run by voluntary groups and/or
NGOs including voluntary domestic helpers themselves. These domestic
helpers have been serving people of Hong Kong directly or indirectly
without anyone giving them any favour in return. I think this would also be
a great opportunity to serve or help them back.
This thesis highly involves the input and the feedback of the
subjects. The methodological process starts from interviewing the subject
groups about their existing problems as well as their needs. I would need
to understand and ask them about their suggested solution(s) to the
issue(s) they have. Furthermore, I could start mapping out the activities,
places, fundings and possible resources that they have and compare it directly to what activities, resources and places they actually use. This
could reflect whether or not they are limited on what they could have
or do, and why. This ‘why’ could be a solution to help them with their
issue(s).
As mentioned in my thesis statement, I would like to make an
installation (permanent or temporary), therefore, I would be looking at
existing laws and regulations to allow this type of installation to be built
as well as to allow such installation to operate. Assuming that I could set
up an installation somewhere, I would be looking for volunteers in Hong
Kong such as non-government organisations, churches, law firms, yoga
instructors, language tutors, catering services and many more to help and
provide services to domestic helpers in Hong Kong. This hopefully would
allow them to have more resources, education and activities. In addition,
I would apply for fundings from different embassies and organisations to
continuously support the programme.
If everything works, I would assess the programme by direct feedback
from the domestic helpers, observations, and by the number of people
using the services that we provide, either increasing or decreasing. Also,
if more and more funding would be provided by different organisations.
After this, whatever outcome it may reflect, then there will be necessary
further action(s) or step(s) to be considered.
One of my inspiration came from the Garden Library by Yoav Meiri.
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