Drive down Tai Po Road from the hills of Sha Tin and suddenly you're in the thick of the city, Hong Kong proper, a neighbourhood that thrives and bustles with street commerce. Life bursts out of small apartments in walk-up buildings and onto the roadside, thick with foot traffic.
Sham Shui Po (or 'deep water pier') was once close to the water's edge. It's long been one of Hong Kong's poorer neighbourhoods, full of recent immigrants making a living through small-scale commerce - and more than a few dreaming of becoming the next Li Ka-shing. Li is originally from Chaozhou, in northeastern Guangdong, and Sham Shui Po still has a sizeable number of Chaozhou immigrants, famed for their hard-working ways. Li started out in a small plastics-trading company and the industry still has a strong presence here.
Along Fuk Wing Street, there's a mass of toy stores selling brand-name goods at half the price of those at department stores - and no-name toys at half that again. Kanto Hobby (52 Fuk Wing Street, tel: 2361 4949) stocks everything from HK$30 Brave Battle Warrior figurines to a HK$900 radio-controlled Japanese bus with working doors and lights.
Nearby, you'll find self-proclaimed 'professional fisherman' Chung Hong, ponytailed, bare-chested and wearing blue shorts on a hot summer's day. He runs the fishing-tackle store at 38 Fuk Wing Street, which his father opened in 1965. Snapshots on the wall show various battles between the man and the sea, including one showing a 270kg marlin he caught in Thailand in 1994.
Opposite, at 87 Fuk Wing Street, you'll see a second-floor sign marking the offices of the Hong Kong Kowloon Bamboo Plaiting Industry Union. The group is made up of the workers who produce Hong Kong's ubiquitous wicker baskets - an icon from perhaps one of the city's most iconic neighbourhoods.
While most streets in Sham Shui Po take their names from places on the mainland, Fuk Wing ('blessing of glory') and Fuk Wa ('blessing for prosperity') are all business.
Around Fuk Wing Street