How Man Wong is done taking pictures of vanishing places and things. Now he wants to save them
Hong Kong photojournalist How Man Wong isn't thinking about the National Geographic expeditions he used to lead as he greets visitors at the Banyan Tree Hotel on South Sathorn Road.
He's thinking about the village in China he saved from demolition - using a decidedly radical approach.
And beyond that, he's wondering how can he get people in the six countries through which the mekong River flows to realise how crucial it is to them?
Meanwhile the founder of the non-profit China Exploration and Research Society (CERS) is "hiding out" in Bangkok.
"I need to catch up on some work quietly. I need to concentrate on my writing," says the 61-year-old. "I have a couple of books coming out this winter, so I'm here basically to relax and write after a long expedition."
Wong launched CERS in 1974, moving "from exploration and research into conservation", he says, "because I didn't want to keep recording things that are eclipsing us".
It began as a mission to preserve nature in remote parts of China, but in the three decades since, China has come out of its closet to wield a financial power that doesn't always bode well for nature - or for tradition.
One of CERS' most recent aims was to the save the last remaining traditional village on Hainan Island, a job that Wong believes should have been tackled by the government or some of its wealthy citizens.
"It's almost a shame to have a tiny organisation like ours step in to do it," he says.
Hong Shui - where the houses have roofs of thatched straw and the women wear tattoos designed to fend off invading Japanese troops - was threatened by the resorts springing up all over the holiday island.
The government wanted all the homes torn down and replaced with cement-block abodes. Given the daunting red tape and expense, Wong says on his group's website, "a wise person would choose to leave it alone.
"CERS, unfortunately, is cursed with many unwise individuals."
It intervened, ironically enough, by modernising many of the village's mud houses. "Some can be used as museums," Wong says in Bangkok, "and for others we can find ways to breathe life into them.
"Because, let's face it, young people want to be fashionable. Only older people appreciate their heritage and culture - though there are exceptions: young people who are totally respectful of their culture."
Applying a "business mentality" to conservation makes a project more engaging and intellectual, thus improving its chance of success, Wong says.
"We impact conservation in ways other than just the traditional.
"Tattoos are now fashionable in the West, but the younger villagers consider them primitive because of the reasons for the tattooing. But now a Harley-Davidson club can cruise down there and get tattoos from the villagers - there are ways to arbitrate!"
The "arbitration" of inviting motorcycle gangs to patronise the village's tattoo artists certainly seems fanciful, but the income ought to help the residents - and they still have their old homes.
Wong is not nearly so "arbitrary" about the much grander project on his plate at the moment.
"I've been working on the mekong River for a number of years, from marking its source in China to working with it in Myanmar and Laos and on the Vietnam delta," he says (referring to Burma as Myanmar, the name preferred by the ruling junta).
But Wong has yet to document the river's course along Thailand's border and into Cambodia. That's next, he says.
"I just want to understand better the implications of the mekong on Southeast Asian countries.
"This huge stretch in Thailand is near the Golden Triangle, where you can see four countries merge together. And China controls the navigation down toward the Golden Triangle."
Asked what projects he might consider for the Thai stretch of the Mekong, Wong smiles.
"The good part about being an explorer is I expect surprises," he says.
"But, ideally, if I have an opportunity to study the Thai part of the Mekong, I'll try to turn things around so that everybody can use it as an equitable resource."
For now he's keeping an open mind, lest his curiosity lead him to something else interesting and unexpected that the CERS team can help preserve.
Wong waxes poetic about rivers, noting that they're referred to in most languages as female, often specifically as mothers, because they represent the womb, the source of life.
"They are the arteries of the people and the country. Before people had roads they used rivers for transportation. Now countries have to talk about harnessing the rivers because either you have too much water when there's a flood or too little when there's a drought."
Wong frets about the effects of global warming on mankind's sources of water. The worrying signs are in the Himalayas' vanishing glaciers.
"I used to call Tibet 'the backyard of China'," he says, "but in reality it's the backyard of Asia, because the major rivers - the Mekong, the Yellow, the Ganges, the Indus - all start from the glaciers on the Tibetan plateau.
"They are our lifelines, our water sources, and the glaciers hold the reservoir. Once the glaciers have melted, they're never going to be replenished."
Ideas online
- Read more about the China Exploration and Research Society at www.CERS.org.hk.