Hong Kong Young Writers Anthologies Fiction 2020 | Page 13

Hong Kong Young Writers Awards 2020
Future Adventure of the Greater
Bay Area
Ching Chung Hau Po Woon Primary School, Lum, Wai Jing Sophie Claire – 11
Dear me of the past,
Hi me! It’s you! Not you you, but future you. You’re probably wondering how this is
possible, and I’ll explain that later.
The first thing I want to tell you is that the GBA thing from the long conversations
our parents had at the dinner table is turning out awesomely! The GBA is an official name
that stuffy adults use, but our part is called the KAZAM, an extremely strained acronym
for “Kong Au Zhu Amalgamated Metropolis”. That was made up by bored teenagers and
adopted by adults when the teenagers refused to call it anything else. The GBA and KAZAM
are bringing together the best of China and the rest of the world and it’s a blast!
This is the year 2025, and I just started university. I attend the School of Literature and
Art at Bay West University, in downtown Macau, and I’m studying art and fantasy literature.
Nowadays in the KAZAM, Macau is the center for culture, arts and recreation, Zhuhai is
a technology and engineering hub, and Hong Kong is an international finance and business
center. Although we live in Hong Kong, I love hanging out in Macau!
This morning, I woke up at 8:00 am sharp by the reliable method of being startled
awake by our AI home assistant beeping insistently while it opened the smart curtains to
my bedroom. I hopped out of bed and gazed out of the solar window at the blue ocean and
watched the gleaming solar panels on the green mountainside and the steadily spinning blades
of the wind farm down near the harbor. I took a deep breath and enjoyed the morning air.
Cleantech has made KAZAM one of the world’s cleanest and greenest city areas with greatly
improved air quality.
As my mind regained consciousness, I got excited because today was going to be a
big day! I would be meeting dozens of friends as I participated in an exchange program to
welcome our regular visitors from elsewhere in the GBA. That was the BEST excuse to shop,
watch a movie, and eat out!
I freshened up quickly, changed and headed out for my favorite breakfast from our
autochef, a grilled veggie cheese sandwich with veggie sausages, plus mixed fruit juice and
jelly, all made from the healthiest organic ingredients grown right in our neighborhood.
While the GBA was a big source of advanced agricultural products for export, most of the
fresh produce for KAZAM came from neighborhood solar-powered vertical farms.
After that, I went down and hopped onto a self-guided Solarbus which took me to the
local hypertrain station. Even though the KAZAM is so huge, everything is so close by
since the various districts are now connected by high speed transportation powered by clean,
renewable energy. Eighteen minutes and I can go door to door from home in Hong Kong to
school in Macau!
I brought my cyberpet to school today, like I did most days. Yes, I/we are still obsessed
with cats! My cybercat was engineered in Zhuhai, manufactured in Guangzhou, and sold
at the company’s showroom in Hong Kong, where most GBA companies launched their
products to customers around the world.
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