Source:
https://scmp.com/lifestyle/travel-leisure/article/3020996/kings-park-memories-soccer-tennis-hockey-rugby-and-cricket
Lifestyle/ Travel & Leisure

King’s Park, Hong Kong memories: of soccer, tennis, hockey, rugby and cricket, private clubs, and a few public spaces

  • One of Kowloon’s ‘green lungs’, King’s Park is a patchwork quilt of public and private spaces, the legacy of a hands-off colonial government
  • Initially a hunting ground for army officers, its tenants include the People’s Liberation Army; 50 years ago it was a place where children grew up and ran wild
King’s Park is book-ended by Mong Kok to the north, Yau Ma Tei to the west, Tsim Sha Tsui to the south and the steep slopes of Ho Man Tin to the east. Photo: Christopher DeWolf

For more than 20 years, Benjamin Chiu has been going to King’s Park. It is where he has played soccer and rugby over the years, and where he began playing with Hong Kong’s youth field hockey squad at 13 years old, winning the final, before moving on to play for the men’s national team.

“A lot of my memories there have merged into a blur,” he says. “The walk to and from the hockey ground on sore legs from a good training session is a rather nostalgic one. I think in a city like Hong Kong the value of having good sporting facilities can often be overlooked.”