Hong Kong Young Writers Anthologies Fiction 2020complete | Page 342

Across the Greater Bay Area
Ying Wa Primary School, Yuen, Yik Hin - 11
It was 2050 as I journeyed across the Greater Bay Area – that was once the glory of China, a high-tech
megalopolis compromising Macau, Hong Kong and the whole region of Guangdong, that was meant to
develop an ideal bay of living and travelling.
In case you haven’t been there, the technology and buildings there were wicked cool and seriously
advanced. There were flying spaceships everywhere in the clear sky, which has been purified from dust and
harmful gases. People don’t use smartphones anymore, they have hologram gadgets (I know what they were
called originally, but it was too complicated, so I would rather stick to ‘hologram gadgets’) in which is
accessible anytime, with a tap on the surface. It was oval-shaped, and with a touch of silver on it. And if
you will take the express elevator to the top of the Macau Tower, which has multi-functional robots
zipping around the industrial- themed Observation Deck, you will have a lovely view of the newly-built
floating city, named FC1, connected by expressway trains. It was like the Cloud Forest in Singapore, with
millions of lush green plants growing on the air-propelled podium. It was recent, about a year away from
now on, that the three regions involved in this action was morphed into one, and it made travelling
between these areas a great deal easier. There was no president to control the three, they put their trust
deeply into each other and work as a highly-efficient team. All of that are awesome, but these are all the
past.
You see, when the US president, by now a stocky old man, witnessed that China’s finance has been way
stronger than his country, he vowed to find the reason once and for all. He went to a great deal of
searching, and finally rested his piggy eyes on the Greater Bay Area. He caused a financial crisis in it, starting
at Hong Kong, which he made the prices of every product rise. The governments around the area have
already started to betray each other. And the Greater Bay Area...I’m afraid it will start to break apart.
I couldn’t, I just couldn't bear to watch the Greater Bay Area fall apart. No, I couldn’t. It was like just
yesterday that the cities involved in this action had to sign the framework agreement on Deepening
Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Cooperation in the development of the Greater Bay Area. So I, by then a
forty-year-old man living in Hong Kong, made the great journey to and fro across Greater Bay Area,
making good time as I stood at the double doors of the enormous floating home of the Hong Kong Chief
Executive, a young man from Hong Kong in his thirties named Carl in the morning of November
Thirteenth, 2049.
I was a low man on the totem pole as I wasn’t the important officers of the jury in Hong Kong, but I tried
my best to tell him that it was important to repair the trust of the two others, and only then can Greater Bay
Area survive the financial crisis and gain back the cooperation that we have done for the past ten years. It
was very unlikely that I was about to persuade him to do the big changes I have requested above, in the
grand visitor’s hall full of Louis XVI furniture, with a great wall of crystal-made windows complete with
auto-closing blinders. But Carl was quite a nice man, in his long black tuxedo (he was quite tall) and his
navy haircut. He took a moment to consider, and I have to remind him again that his decision was critically
important.
But what Carl had in mind was totally set apart from my idea. He told me that since they both betrayed
others, he should keep the situation like this. As for the Greater Bay Area, he said that it doesn't matter
much, compared to the financial crisis which they have now. We had an intense discussion about whether
to follow my suggestions or not, and it ended with no result. He decided to discuss with the jury the next
day and compare the pros and cons before deciding.