Just SayingWhy Hong Kong is no place to grow old
Yonden Lhatoo contemplates how the city has failed its elderly population after a chance encounter with a hyperaggressive senior citizen
Coming out of the turnstile at Central MTR station the other day, I accidentally bumped into someone.
It happens a dozen times a day to anyone trying to navigate a safe passage through the crowds on the concourse at rush hour, so imagine my surprise when I felt a feeble punch and an elbow jab in my side.
I looked down, two feet below, to see a little old lady glaring up at me over the top of her spectacles. She had her fists cocked and looked ready for round two in this totally unprovoked, one-sided confrontation that I couldn’t believe was happening.
I offered a bewildered apology in English and Cantonese, which had no effect whatsoever on her, and walked away.
With granny adopting that intimidating Mixed Martial Arts fighter’s stance, I wasn’t about to cause a scene in the middle of the train station. I would have looked ridiculous anyway, being beaten up by someone less than half my size and old enough to be my mum.
Where was all that anger and aggression coming from, I asked myself, as I beat a hasty retreat from the battlefield. After all, considering what my own mother is like, aren’t elderly people supposed to be gentle and wise peacemakers in their twilight years?