night of terror in Yuen Long
•The takeover of Hong Kong’s airport
•October 1: Celebrations in the capital, clashes in the city
•Campus battlegrounds: Five days that changed Chinese University
•The siege of Polytechnic University
THE MOBILIZED AND THE MARGINALIZED
•Epilogue: Tear gas soldier reviews university ambitions
•#ProtestToo: Women on the front lines
•We are all Hongkongers ... even ethnic minorities?
•Migrant workers in the danger zone
•A song, slogans and Lennon Walls
•Unpacking ‘Liberate Hong Kong, revolution of our times’
•The unwelcome mat for mainlanders
•‘Renovation’ and ‘decoration’: Mainland-linked firms under attack
•Tycoons caught in a political tempest
•Not the Michelin Guide: When restaurants are labeled ‘yellow’ or ‘blue’
•Frustration and anger on the front lines
•New police commissioner, new strategy
•Tear gas: Legitimate crowd-control measure, or menace?
•Who’s watching over the police?
•Hong Kong’s division sows unity in Washington
•What’s to stop Hong Kong’s ‘well water’ mixing with Beijing’s ‘river water’?
•Where the next revolution may take place in Hong Kong
•No silent majority, only a terrified minority
•The furthest distance between ‘one country’ and ‘two systems’
•Mask ban an ineffective stick. Where’s the carrot for moderate protesters?
•Forget Lam’s extradition U-turn, Xi’s channeling of Mao shows he’s about to get tough on Hong Kong
•Is it safe to be in Hong Kong? Against all odds, the answer is still a strange ‘yes’
•Hong Kong risks being condemned to its own circle of hell
FOREWORD
I am proud of this book and yet humbled by it. It is a chronicle of the greatest social and political upheaval that Hong Kong has undergone in our times, a non-partisan account of the events of 2019 encapsulating the blood, sweat and tears of a world city at a crossroads.
It’s also a fact-based attempt to explain all the contradictions, nuances and complexities of the story of the anti-government protest movement that was triggered by the ill-fated extradition bill,