Memories of a Prominent Clan in Tsang Tai Uk

In the indigenous villages of Hong Kong there is this idea of the “wai,” wherein the villagers built their villages surrounded by a brick wall. “Wai” means a girdle, and these villages are usually referred to as “Wai villages,” or “walled villages.” These walls were meant to be fortifications, chiefly to protect the villagers from both pirates and wild animals. The reasons for Tsang Tai Uk’s unique features in its layout are closely tied to its history. The founder of the village, Tsang Koon Man, built this walled village in 1847 with the typical village layout of his own Hakka hometown in mind. He came from Ng Wah. Proper historic accounts tell the story of Tsang Koon Man, a mason in trade, who had a quarry in Sai Wan Ho and a masonry in Shau Kei Wan. He began his business by serving as an apprentice in the then-thriving quarry businesses in Lei Yue Mun. Then he founded the Sam Li Masonry. At the time, the Hong Kong Government had plans for many infrastructure projects that required granites. As such he prospered greatly from his businesses. Legend has it that one day, some pirates approached Tsang Koon Man with 12 large urns of dried salted fish. They asked for $800 per urn, and so Tsang bought them. He later found out that, beneath the dried salted fish, the urn contained all silver and gold coins. The pirates never returned and he kept these 12 urns of treasures. With enormous wealth, he decided to contribute to the good of his clan by constructing a village. Although the surname Tsang does not belong to one of the “five great clans” of the New Territories, this clan of the Tsang’s have settled down in Hong Kong for 300 years, as early as the 17th century. As residents of Shatin, the Tsang’s were also prominent members of the community. They supported the construction of a few key infrastructures and buildings in the New Territories, including the neighboring Che Kung Temple, the Kwong Fook Bridge in Tai Po, and most importantly, the construction of the Tai Chung Bridge in Shatin, which provided throughway over the Shatin Sea (now Shing Mun River) during the early 20th century. #tsang #tsangtaiuk #shatin #hongkonghistory #hongkongheritage #newterritories #walledvillage #citydaytours#china