Email from a long-time Lammaite (who wants to remain anonymous, for obvious reasons):

"The whole class-based thing about Lamma is rapidly evaporating. There are guys on the ferries who make no secret, these days, of the fact that they are stock market types. Or maybe they are pretending.

Pls don't take any of my more cynical remarks about Lamma too seriously. But seriously, these days so many business suit types on the ferry, all of them ready with that "You're fired!" look. It's like a cheaper and nastier version of DBay.

The opposite, the potty-mouthed brigades in Lamma's not-so-great pubs, are worse.

The Lamma spirit? I don't really get it. A lot of the Western people on Lamma these days have no spirit at all. I don't think any of them have any interest in a community website with items like Artwork of the Day, purely bank balance of the day.

Nobody really gives a shit about Lamma. There I've said it."

Agree? Disagree?

_________________
Click here for Lamma-zine stories and recent Lamma Spotlights of the Week:
Photo, Video, Person, Wildlife, Bird, Artwork.

Disagree!

Yes, the work background of those who live in Lamma has probably diversified (there is only so many teachers that can be in one place at one time), and some people have really quite highflying jobs, but that does not mean that they are not appreciating the community feel and the spirit of Lamma.

Move to DB then - why settle for the cheap and nastier version when you can have it all?

_________________
T. Clipper

I think there is plenty of room on Lamma for diversity, even room for some good old fashioned inverted snobbery

_________________
Your Life is a product of your thinking

I have lived here for 18 years - change is inevitable - but this guy sounds like one of the whingeing hippies who expect the world to conform to their personal view of how how it should be

I agree rents are getting stupid, property prices are rising, but isnt that also inevitable up to a point ? does this guy really expect to rent a flat for the same price as he did 10 years ago - good luck with that anywhere in the world never mind in one of the most densly populated cities on earth. They do make a good point with regard to the live out helpers - I used to pay the rent of my helper when we had one - they get paid little enough as it is so its the decent thing to do.

I think the mix of people changed quite a bit after the handover as most brits could not just come here and work without a visa, I miss all the plumbers, painters chippies etc down to earth blokes who all added to the mix of people who lived here. to be frank though - I was glad to see the back of the upper middle class mummy & daddy funded plastic hippies who seemed to believe that they had some god given right to tell everyone else how to live and behave on the island.

i wonder why this guy thinks that the people wearing suits on the ferry should make a secret of their professions though ? and trust me there are probably two stockbrokers on the island - the rest of the suits are often clerks or similar and they are trying to get by, maybe raising families just like the rest of us .

I enjoy the artiscic acomplishments of Lamma's resident artists, photographers, sculptors etc I think the island still has a great community spirit, - look at the many community events listed on this site alone - I suspect it just does not fit into this guys idea of what that should mean .

If you want the old hippy type community - yes that is gone I think - maybe this guy would be better off living in Goa or something ?

As a lamma newbie with a husband who works in that sector (though by no means a banker) I have to say that the community on Lamma is what keeps us here. The 7" centipede in my house nearly had me running for mid levels but I can't think of a better place to raise my girls, if we are in HK. People in Lamma are real, which is the thing I hated about DB (never lived ere, but we did look, and we got a very fakey vibe from most, though certainly not all people there)

Well, to a point.

I agree the mix changed post 97. The people who stayed tended to be a little older, and a bit more settled - with visas, and suddenly we have hordes of school age kids underfoot everywhere. But I was quite ok to lose a lot of the aggro and Saturday night fights that went with some of the 'down to earth' types in town to build the airport and convention centre.

As for the original post - I think it says more about the poster than about Lamma and DB. Lamma remains a village where the majority of the population is non-gweilo, and most of us have other things to do than count suits on the ferries.

I like being in a place where I know the people who both own and run the shops and pubs and where I can walk down the street and greet a score of people (Asian and Euro) whom I've known for a decade. I like the wandering dogs and barefoot kids and bonfires on the beach and psycho VVs which is why I live on Lamma.
If you prefer tidy chain-pubs and supermarkets, anonymous wait-persons, kids and dogs on their leads by the pool and electric golf carts - then DB's your place.

I don't mind "cheaper" and if by "nastier" he/she means less sterile then sure! I've been to DBay and I think it's too sterile, kinda like Disney Land. The lack of 24-hour ferry also self-selects for what we think of as the Lamma type.

When I take the morning ferry to Central I walk to the bus stop outside DBay pier and always notice the people running and rushing (even in heels!). Not that common for Lammaites.

I wonder if we have stereotypes within Lammaites, the Pak Kok type, the Sok Kwu Wan type, etc...

A popular game might be watching the crowds on the flyover from the IFC to the Outlying Islands ferry pier, trying to guess if a person or group is going to Lamma or DBay.

After guessing, follow them with your eyes to the end of the flyover and see in which direction they're going, left to DBay or right down the escalator to the Lamma ferry. Keep a tally and see how many percent you get right! For best results. try times of day when you don't get so many tourists, for example rush hours when the ferry crowds are mostly commuters.

After a while you might get surprisingly good at guessing correctly.
Try it, it's easier than you think!

_________________
Click here for Lamma-zine stories and recent Lamma Spotlights of the Week:
Photo, Video, Person, Wildlife, Bird, Artwork.

Well, of course! But they're not defined at all by where they live, but to which social groups they belong to. Most groups overlap a lot which others, most people being members of several groups, or stereotypes (not a good word to use as most people would take offense). So many groups on Lamma, where to begin!

Try sitting out anywhere on Main Street and start identifying them and guess to which groups the locals passing by belong to. Quit easy to keep locals and visitors apart, a favourite activity of the lucky people who have time to engage in leisure activities like this.

_________________
Click here for Lamma-zine stories and recent Lamma Spotlights of the Week:
Photo, Video, Person, Wildlife, Bird, Artwork.

There is an unwritten seating arrangement on the ferry too...beer in hand folks (outside), school kids (top/middle), young families (bottom/middle), pet owners (bottom/front), SE Asians (bottom/right)

_________________
Sabe 1

Well, it WAS unwritten and all-secretive ... till you just wrote it down!

Now people might feel obliged to follow the unofficial seating arrangements that have evolved over several years, well beyond the upper and lower deck/class sections, plus the lowest-class section (outdoors), usually the most fun part of the ferry for multiple reasons.

_________________
Click here for Lamma-zine stories and recent Lamma Spotlights of the Week:
Photo, Video, Person, Wildlife, Bird, Artwork.

On the HYF double deckers, the only way to get the afterdeck was to pay the "upper class" surcharge, for the upper deck, which was airconditioned.

The afterdeck was also the semi-official smoking section, before that became completely illegal.

Three years later, how has the Lamma community evolved since then? Or not?

https://www.facebook.com/Lamma.Gung/posts/488679597810343

_________________
Click here for Lamma-zine stories and recent Lamma Spotlights of the Week:
Photo, Video, Person, Wildlife, Bird, Artwork.