Then & Now | How Hongkongers observed Christmas under Japanese occupation and kept hope alive
After Hong Kong fell, on Christmas Day 1941, those interned in the colony learned to make festive feasts from their meagre supplies
Ever since the Japanese invasion in December 1941, and the colony’s surrender on Christmas Night, seasonal festivities here have been overshadowed by that date’s larger events. Later generations did their best to sidestep unhappy memories, or otherwise leave them in the past, as far as possible, for their children’s sake. For a generation who came to Hong Kong after the war – whether from elsewhere in China or further afield – Hong Kong’s “Captive Christmas” was an historical footnote, with minimal personal relevance.
But how was Christmas 1941 celebrated as the city went quiet, and in the years that followed? Little remembered today, Hong Kong’s shops and markets were bursting with imported produce when the Japanese invaded, and sizeable quantities remained available – for a price – for the next couple of years. Whatever overly-cautious, present-day “Best Before” dates on packaging might suggest, most tinned, bottled, salted and preserved food items are safe to eat for years – sometimes decades. That, after all, was their point.
Like any other religious celebration, Christmas has its own array of seasonally specific foods, which come into the shops long before the actual day, so householders can stock up, and various home-made items can be baked or prepared.
Dried fruit and nuts were a Christmas staple; any household with a domestic reputation to maintain made their own cakes and puddings to closely guarded family recipes. And so it remains today, among more traditionally minded, discerning persons of taste. For other individuals, recourse to tinned Christmas puddings was an easy option, especially for those without adequate kitchen facilities.
Imported products have always enjoyed a cachet in Hong Kong, even when the foreign import – mass-produced, tinned and transported for several months in the hold of a freighter – was inferior to something produced locally from fresh ingredients. And so it was with Christmas cakes and puddings; in this regard, 1941 – like any other year – was no different.