Hen_gai_gai is a photographic documentation project by photographer Lavina Lim and artist William Lim, centred on Gai Gai, a ceramic chicken they collected in Mexico in 2023. Since then, Gai Gai has travelled on over 50 trips across more than 35 countries, documenting global togetherness and solidarity despite geopolitical polarisation. We asked Gai Gai to share their adventures around Hong Kong in a new series of articles.
As a sentient porcelain chicken with a taste for culture but no functional arms and thumbs to hold a physical book, audiobooks provide an accessible way for me to read anything I want. It took me a while, but I finally finished listening to all 100 chapters of the Ming dynasty novel Journey to the West, first published in 1592, and my conclusion is that the Monkey King deserves so much better.
The Monkey King, also known as Chai Tin Tai Shing (齊天大聖 cai4 tin1 daai6 sing3), is a beloved character in the Chinese diaspora and beyond. He has been popular since his appearance in Journey to the West, where Sun Wukong, the rebellious Monkey King, is reluctantly sent by the Buddha to accompany the monk Xuanzang on his way to India to bring Buddhist scriptures to China. The long and arduous mission is the Monkey King’s chance of redemption from his sins of wreaking havoc in heaven, and a magical band is placed on his head by the Buddha to keep him in line when he behaves badly. Armed with magical powers, the Monkey King fights off demons and keeps everyone in the journey safe from various perils. After completing 81 tribulations, Xuangzong, the Monkey King, and all of the travel companions successfully obtain the scriptures, and Sun Wukong is granted Buddhahood for his service and bravery.
To me, the Monkey King is the most interesting character of the novel, not the boss of the expedition Xuanzang, who frankly behaves like a cowardly and self-righteous liability more often than I can count. There are so many times during their journey when the Monkey King correctly warns his master of life-threatening dangers, but his warnings are brushed aside or used against him by their travel companions, even driving him away from the expedition because they didn’t believe in him. Still, the loyal Monkey King always returns to save them from monsters who wanted to gain immortality by eating Xuanzang alive. He deserves so much better, which was why I made sure to have my human guardian bring me to the Tai Shing Temple in Sau Mau Ping to wish the Monkey King a happy birthday.
The Monkey King’s birthday is a major event for the local Chiu Chow community in Hong Kong, but it often passes unnoticed by outsiders, overshadowed by the Mid-Autumn Festival the day before. While there are a number of temples of major deities in Hong Kong that houses shrines for the Monkey King, there is only one temple in Sau Mau Ping fully dedicated to the Monkey King with his own devoted medium: Master Chan, who was supposedly chosen by the god in 1964. The Monkey King demanded a temple and Tai Shing Miu was finished within four years. In 2008, the temple was demolished as part of the area’s redevelopment, and a temporary site was set up beside Po Tat Estate in Sau Mau Ping and the new Tai Shing Temple was finally completed on Po Lam Road in 2013.
On the festival days of the Monkey King’s Birthday, the temple comes alive with incense burning, paper offerings and Taoist ceremonies, alongside dramatic performances honouring the Monkey King’s legendary spirit. In addition to the ritual performance arranged to entertain the deities and a parade, a jitong, the man chosen by the Monkey King as a spirit medium, leads the parade to pray for blessings and the elimination of disease in the area. As is common in Chiu Chow culture, the Monkey King communicates to his followers through spirit mediums. In the past, the jitong also washed his face with hot bubbling oil, climbed ladders made of knives, and ran barefoot across a bed of hot coals.
These rituals channel the Monkey King’s mischievous spirit, bridging the sacred with the theatrical, but I chose to come to the Temple a few days before his actual birthday for a moment of quiet tribute. Of course I would’ve loved to see the spectacular birthday celebrations in real life, but I didn’t want my human guardian to be burdened with having to protect me, a fragile porcelain chicken without functional limbs, in a crowd full of visitors eager to get a good look of the action-packed rituals. Like Xuanzhong, I’m less than useless in saving myself in perilous situations, and rely entirely on my companions to protect me and physically carry me on my journey through Hong Kong. On the day of celebrating the faithful and dependable bodyguard that is the Monkey King, I want to at least not make life more difficult for my own faithful and dependable bodyguards.
As my human guardian held me up on his shoulder so I could get a better look at the likeness of the Monkey King, his travel companions, and various other deities sharing his shrine, I found myself feeling ever more grateful to my human guardians’ service and companionship. I don’t really know where I was born, who created me, or how I came into the world, but I know that my human guardians chose me when we first met, and continue to choose to have me in their lives day after day. Their constant protection and care of me is incredibly noble, yet they ask for so little recognition that they wouldn’t even show their faces in photos of our various expeditions so that I would always have the spotlight to myself.
My hollow porcelain body was filled with gratitude, and I made a secret promise to the Monkey King that I will honour him by showing my appreciation to my human guardians. Perhaps I can get them audiobook subscriptions so they can join me in appreciating Journey To The West without having to lift a 100-chapter book each time? The Monkey King wasn’t opposed to the idea, so shhh, don’t tell my human guardians what they’ll be getting for their birthdays this year.