ReflectionsHow the Hakka spread in China and beyond, their cuisine reflecting hard lives
A people shaped by centuries of migration, Hakka communities are found across China and are prevalent in Malaysia, Singapore and Thailand
I recently enjoyed a delicious dinner at a restaurant in Kuala Lumpur that specialised in Hakka cuisine. Hakka restaurants have long existed in the city and elsewhere in Malaysia, but anecdotal evidence suggests their numbers have been growing rapidly in recent years.
Less widely known than Cantonese and several other Chinese regional cuisines, Hakka food may be enjoying its moment in the sun, at least in Malaysia, where the Hakka population numbers around 1.25 million. They form the largest Chinese subgroup in East Malaysia and maintain a significant presence in parts of Peninsular Malaysia as well. One of the most prominent figures in the early development of Kuala Lumpur, Yap Ah Loy (1837-85), was Hakka.
The Hakka are a distinctive subgroup of the Han Chinese whose identity was shaped by centuries of migration. Their ancestors originally lived in the Central Plains of northern China but gradually moved south over many centuries, eventually settling in regions including eastern Guangdong, western Fujian and southern Jiangxi.
The term “Hakka” literally means “guest families”, reflecting their status as newcomers among the local populations when they arrived in southern China.
The formation of the Hakka community was closely tied to repeated waves of migration triggered by war, political upheaval and economic pressure. The earliest southward movement can be traced to the period after the unification of China under the First Emperor of the Qin dynasty in the third century BC, when soldiers stationed in the south eventually settled there.
Later and more substantial migrations followed periods of upheaval: the turmoil of the early fourth century AD; the rebellions and warfare of the late Tang dynasty in the eighth and ninth centuries; and the crises surrounding the southward retreat of the Song dynasty and its eventual fall to the Mongols in 1279. Each episode pushed new waves of migrants from the north into the mountainous frontier regions of southern China.