Something new: out of the extraordinary

Former South China Morning Post journalist Chloe Lai Wing-sze's Urban Diary project might be more accurately described as a catalogue of encounters with colourful Hongkongers - the ordinary, the eccentric, even the heroic.

Many of her subjects, she says - from the urban farmer to the female drummer at the male-dominated traditional Tai Hang Fire Dragon dance and the flash-mob street artist - inject colour into Hong Kong's often uniformly capitalist society.

Others - such as the civil engineer who repairs roads and bridges at night and the late-night bus driver, both of whom featured in Lai's April issue - are among the city's "unsung heroes".

"All the interviewees are ordinary people," says Lai. "We walk past [them] without realising their brave attempts to make Hong Kong sustainable.

"We document the interviewee's way of life … in order to promote the different faces of Hong Kong."