South Sider - 2016-09-06
Documentary filmed in 1988 about the Kowloon Walled City by an Austrian camera team, with English subtitles. I took it upon myself to re-sub the original video as best as possible, the original version is hard-subbed on a version of this film with very poor quality, the subs are also worded incorrectly in some places. So all I've done I re-subbed the whole thing and put it onto a better quality video clip.
I'm so grateful that footage still exists of Kowloon walled city as a historical reference. It's astonishing to me that it ever happened in the 1st place and that it was kept running (sort of) for so long. Thanks.
Matthew Clark much appreciated
Those pet birds in their small cages, living inside a city made of cages... what an image
Coronavirus would of wiped this city out.
Love this documentary. I watched a british documentary about Kowloon here on youtube but this one is way better. Typical germans and their obsession with mechanical explanations. Now that's what I wanna hear.
Except it’s an Austrian documentary, not a German one :-)
whatever the british one was complete shit
I love these kinds of documentaries. Just comes to show there are still so many mostly unknown places in the world
It was torn down.
It was demolished by the British government in 1994
It's an absolute miracle that a fire never broke out there. That place wouldve gone up like a tinderbox and caused massive casualties.
Yes, aspecially with such a number of drug addicts!
Not exactly. The whole place was riddled with moisture.
No sunlight, lots of water got trapped in those alleys. When it got hot, the air will got really moist as well.
@EPöXY Also no circulation of air for fire to spread quickly
Fires did break out but were extinguished quickly. Kids would play in the open area where the fire happened as open space was a rare sight in the city. I read this in the book I have
"He cut his finger off while working"
Sure, that doesn't sound like 'I walked into a door' at all.
Amazing - it's like looking into the past, present and the future at the same time.
I can't help but be absolutely fascinated and amazed at the ways society organizes itself in such a small place.
Kowloon may be a place filled with filth, crime and poverty, but it had a strange beauty and life to it.
I'm glad we have the internet now to glance at a piece of history and proof of human endeavour like this documentary.
Eduardo Veloso Ikr, can’t help but be fascinated about it, it’s insane to think that there were as much as 50,000 people in just 2.6 Hectares of space
Tbh I would've liked if the government dislodged them but kept the city. I know it isn't aesthetic at all but i just find this place extremely fascinating and full of history.
Acommenter 271 don't worry brother there is a park now that is named kwc park and has the south gate and some features of the city still in place and there is also a miniature structure of what was Kowloon walled city.
the place video games are made of
Pisses me off so much this place is gone.
@ontheedge33371 check out the tower of David in Venezuela...an abandoned skyscraper that was pretty much inhabited by squatters and families with no where to live.
JD Voorhees haven’t checked it out yet, but off the bat it sounds like the peach trees communities from dredd
Those children are in their mid thirties now...I wonder what they are doing these days? When I see junkies, prostitutes and beggars in shady parts of Mong Kok and Prince Edward and I wonder if they are these innocent children...the child at 12:58 broke my heart...
its so beautiful... i fel in love with this place.
Levis Raster me too ..
Levis Raster Mee three guys 😊😊
I can't believe that these were real living conditions...
A very interesting film... It looks like it was a horrible and at the same time like an amazing place to live in. Very dirty, poor and unhygienic but strangely also very cozy... It would've been an interesting place to spend a few night at as a backpacker yet it wouldn't be a place where I could manage to live in for very much longer... Thank you for translating and sharing.
no european backpacker would be let anywhere inside
Most of the people who lived there remember it fondly believe it or not.
I bet it was pretty stinky in there.
DeltaLou yeah probably
there are beauties and unique aesthetics within these destroyed and forgotten things.
Kurtis Chau it's Channels like these that make us see the beauty hidden
Sometimes I wonder who those children from kindergarden are now
What's mind blowing really, is the fact the products made there, like the noodles for example, were sold to high end restaurants and hotels. There also seems to be a discrepancy on the numbers of people crammed in there. Every doc I've seen, has a completely different number.
Empires like the British have a lot to be ashamed of...and a lot to answer for.
14:57 placebo level is over 9000
idiot comment
Thanks so much for uploading and adding the great translation.
Imagine how the city would be today... Hong Kong has a new airport so they could have built even higher
i so would go visit if it still stood. on the other hand, it's probably for the best it got demolished. it's impossible to know if it was stable or if it was a miracle that it didn't have a major collapse/fire/flood/etc
@Taikina considering there's no laws, or news network, collapses could have happened frequently
Buckle up guys, this is gonna be a good one.
thank you for all the work of sharing this and re-subbing it. this is the most complete documentary on KWC I've seen.
Teddy Artschwager thank you, much appreciated!
This place influenced ghost in a shell and many other great masterpieces
Watching this docu sitting in the Park where this walled chity has been removed years ago.
Removed some years after my birth. Also, I was just there as a tourist
that park is a joke
fuck the commie who destroy out culture, history and memory
glad you could visit the park it's a shame that it had to be destroyed but kinda necessary.
i could imagine this kind of dense complex in a future mars colony where living space is limited.
Imagine the disease in such a compact, damp, pest infested place.
I wonder what the people who lived there thought of it, and especially those born/that grew up there.
Bro imagine living there your whole life and never seeing the outside.
It's hard to believe that cholera or any of a number of other diseases didn't break out and also that apparenrly there was never a catastrophic fire with all the jury rigged electrics and open flame cooking...
depressing
Und solche Orte gibt es in Hongkong immer noch, nicht in der Größe aber nach bald 40 Jahren hat sich nicht viel gebessert für arme Menschen. *sfz
So fascinating
Asians as always hardworking people. Whatever the condutions
Thank you. This was very interesting. Thanks for taking the time to sub it.
Someone should really seek out those who lived there and do a proper documentary on kwc. with all the hype about docu series in the last decade I'm surprised that there hasn't been one (well one properly funded, edited, etc. on Hulu or Netflix or the like). The juxtaposition between footage then and footage now- we take for granted how everything now is captured on smartphones, cctv, dash footage, - it's interesting to watch.
The Wall Street Journal, of all places, has a few good bits of documentary, like interviews with former residents.
I reckon it’s worth you looking into the book by Ian Lambot and Greg Girard. City of darkness revisited it’s called. It has lots of high quality photos and interviews with locals from the city. I bought the book myself and wasn’t disappointed. I still haven’t read through them all.
Thank you @South Sider , I have the book too.i agree its a great read.
Exactly. I wanna know what happened to the people who lived there after the city was demolished. And why they chose to live in that city in the first place.
The KWC was demolished in 1993 and the area turned into multi-storey apartment blocks.
There's just a small park there now with a few mementos and plaques with information about the Walled city.
It's heartening to see that the old man takes good care of the birds he keeps them as a pet when he is living in a place like that.
What's the point in making good money when you spend literally all of your time in a roach infested closet?
Well, maybe to have a chance to escape this "roach infested closet"?
our western points of view may be contaminated with our notions of communities, living standards, socialization, i.e., culture in general. there's something funny about KWC: despite the fact that many of these residents were willing to move somewhere else in order to achieve better living conditions, many others (most of them? who knows) used to report to KWC fondly. there are sources for that. I get that roaches, for many, is a symbol of repulsion that has to be eliminated at all cost (at least from the place we are); but this view may not be the same to eastern civilizations: they can coexist and, even if it is a problem, it is not the biggest problem. even if KWC is down, Hong Kong is still struggling with housing problems: people can even make good money, but rentals, taxes and fees are suffocating enough to push these people to coffin-like houses, even worst than the seen in KWC (btw, sorry about my english)
imagine how if this wallet city still exists and e-commerce delivery-man send the package to here, it would cry inside. sorry for my English
It was demolished in 1994. There is a park now.
Some people got mail in it and the mail carriers were essentially the only ones who could navigate.
Thanks for your efforts with the subs and upload. Fascinating documentary on an incredible place.
Kris L thanks much appreciated
I saw this a while ago because of real life lord and he made another video on it
I only remember Kowloon from CoD BO1
this was gone from dailymotion thanks for uploading it.
Noodle king was missing his pinky. Gangster. Tiny houses, the rage.
the most densely populated area on earth while it existed.
Jeff Cockmann exactly but now the most densely populated area is Manila Philippines , but it comes no where near Kowloon walled city.
The walled city is still the densest place in history. By far.
Amazing, thanks for recovering this.
Judge Dredd is in there somewhere.
thank you for ptting it out with english subtitles ! great work ! I've watched it a long time ago, and it's been very useful to understand better the city.
Silean Pavrolo thanks a lot 👍
Shenmue 2
19:43
"A shared predicament and the hardship that all put up with equally, this doesn't unite the people in the labyrinth into a closely committed group. Everyone here fights for survival alone."
;'(
girlsocksfinder - 2019-08-13
Real Life Lore anyone?
Epy Chaneru - 2019-08-13
yep
jhil S - 2019-08-13
Yep
Oemah Kucing - 2019-08-15
hello