THE FINALE OF the five days of orientation at Lee Shau Kee Hall, one of 13 halls of residence at the University of Hong Kong, was a roaring success as a group of freshmen chanted in unison: 'We are not going home today! You are not going home are you? We must try our best to cheer until our throats sore . . . not going home today!'
The students, who called themselves 'Not Going Home Today', were one of 10 groups of enthusiastic freshmen who created their own slogans to support the hall and acted them out with the help of props and costumes.
'The name of each group had to consist of the word 'family' or 'home' because the hall is like a family,' said Cindy Sun Yubei, a second-year student at HKU. 'The cheering contest is important because of the process of coming up with the slogan and practising fosters team spirit.'
The new academic year is under way, with students across Hong Kong this week taking up university residence ready to embark on their degree studies. But those before them have mixed feelings about the demands of communal student living Hong Kong style.
Six years on, former HKU student Wong Ho-yan still resents how hall life impinged on her freedom and privacy. 'I hated living in the hall. People there always had hall spirit on their lips and forced others to take part in meaningless activities,' she said.
Then a first-year student majoring in architecture, she could not believe her ears when she was told the day she moved into St John's College, a hall with a history of nearly a century, that newcomers were expected to turn up at every inter-hall sporting event to cheer for their teams. Meeting the expectation meant sacrificing three to four afternoons a week. Absence was deeply frowned upon.