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.
I don’t know about you, but as a one-of-a-kind non-binary porcelain chicken with no legs and no job, dating is hard. It doesn’t help that there aren’t any dating apps out there for chickens like me: all of the apps are made by humans for other humans, and no offense, humans are really not my thing. Even in this age of technology, dating apps is still a no-chicken-land, so I guess the only other option would be to seek help from the supernatural world.
I didn’t tell my human guardians the real reason why I wanted to visit the Lovers’ Rock, known in Chinese as “Marriage Destiny Rock,” along the Wan Chai section of Bowen Road. Instead, I told him it was the Seven Sisters Festival soon, and what better way to celebrate it than to go somewhere related to supernatural powers that bring love to the people? Besides, it would help me tick the Ox off our list of Chinese Zodiac animals to visit in Hong Kong without having to go all the way out to the New Territories or the outlying islands to catch a glimpse of a water buffalo in the wild.
The Seven Sisters Festival, or the Qixi Festival, falls on the seventh day of the seventh lunar month each year. The festival originates from a legend of two lovers: Niulang the Cowherd, represented by the star Altair, and Zhinu the Weaver Girl of clouds and rainbows, represented by Vega, a fairy and the seventh daughter of the Goddess of Heaven. In the legend, Niulang had saved an ill ox who was once the star of Taurus, but was demoted to life as an ox in the mortal world as punishment for stealing seeds from heaven to give to the humans. To show its appreciation to Niulang, the ox decided to play matchmaker and told him to go to a secret forest pool at a certain time. When he got to the pool, he saw the seven sisters bathing there, including Zhinu who had escaped from heaven to find excitement on earth among humans.
Niulang fell in love with Zhinu immediately, and decided to steal her clothes in hopes of keeping her here on Earth. When the other sisters discovered his presence, they grabbed their clothes and fled back to heaven. Zhinu asked for her clothes back, but Niulang asked for her hand in marriage instead. The two fell in love, married and had two children together. After a year on earth which translates to only a day in heaven, Niulang’s father the Jade Emperor noticed she was missing. Furious that his daughter had married a mere mortal, he immediately had her brought back to heaven and she returned sadly to her loom.
Left alone in their home on earth, Niulang was devastated that his wife was gone. The ox decided to sacrifice itself to help the lovers reunite in Heaven. It told Niulang to kill it and put on its hide, so that he can go up to Heaven and find his wife. The plan worked, but Zhinu’s mother, the Goddess of Heaven, would not stand for it. She scratched the sky with her hairpin to stop the lovers being reunited, forming the Milky Way between Altair and Vega. Luckily, the story did not end there: a flock of magpies, moved by the purity of the couple’s devotion, joined together to form a bridge across the Milky Way. Even the Goddess of Heaven was touched, and she agreed to allow Niulang and their children to remain in heaven, to be reunited with Zhinu only once a year on the seventh day of the seventh lunar month with the help of the magpies.
In the past, during the Seven Sisters Festival, young girls would pray for excellence in “feminine” skills such as weaving and sewing so that they could find a husband, extracting from the legend both its romantic element and its connection to traditional crafts. Nowadays, weaving and sewing have become obscure, but the festival retains its romantic elements with brands churning out Qixi-themed products, and couples lining up to get married on the auspicious Chinese Valentine’s Day. Singles and young couples also celebrated the festival by visiting the Lovers’ Rock: young couples come to make offerings of incense and flowers, praying for a lasting relationship and a fruitful marriage. Single women visit in hopes of finding a husband, while men offer bottles of rice wine to pray for virility and the blessings of sons.
For me, a non-binary porcelain chicken looking for love, I came here under the guise of admiring the spectacular rock protruding into the sky, and its adornment of crimson paint, small shrines and colourful banners crowning the rock a beacon of hope for lovers, in hopes of finding my one true love. No one ever said there’s anything wrong with wishing upon a rock or any supernatural powers; it’s just a little embarrassing to have to admit that I was so desperate for love and so incapable of finding it on my own. Perched on top of the hill next to the nine-foot-tall rock overlooking the crowded city, I couldn’t help but feel a little sorry for myself: the world is so big and filled with so many beautiful souls, why haven’t I, a perfectly fine porcelain chicken, found my perfect match yet? Was there something inherently wrong with me? Am I unlovable? Am I destined to be alone for the rest of my life?
A cool breeze hit my porcelain skin, prompting me to look up at the Lovers’ Rock standing perfectly still with certainty against the blue sky. It looked sort of like a chicken with its neck extended to the heavens, as if telling me to point my beak to the sky to see for myself that Altair, Vega, Taurus and the Milky Way are all up there, painting a tale that proves love is possible against all odds. Angry gods can be moved by the dedication of lovers, the distance between Heaven and Earth can be bridged by an altruistic ox and a group of magpies, love is a wish that can come true if you wish upon a rock hard enough.
As such, I bowed my porcelain chicken head, and made three not entirely selfish wishes: one, that fellow non-binary souls like mine can have their identities and loves formally recognised in this world; two, that the love between my happily married human guardians last forever; three, that the right lover will come along soon, perhaps through the help of an ox and some magpies, perhaps by me taking matters into my non-existent hands and putting myself out there.
The rock didn’t move after I had made the wishes, but I felt something shift inside of me: not so much butterflies in my stomach, more like the fluttering of magpie wings that tells me love is possible. I know that someday I will find my perfect match, and when I do, I will bring them here and have the rock and the stars witness our love.