Sick of eco-warriors' ridiculous antics
Vivien Jones and Cecilia Chu (South China Morning Post, August 1 and 3) replied to my letter of July 29 on the proposed harbour redevelopment project in Yung Shue Wan, Lamma.
The letters clearly demonstrate the vast differences in the thinking of the local Chinese environmental activists and their Western counterparts.
Ms Chu offers a well-balanced opinion and agrees that the current harbour front is a mess, but wants further dialogue with the government before more work continues.
Ms Jones, on the other hand, claims that the part of the project that has already been completed covered up a row of village houses and a beach.
She fails to mention that this beach was under around two metres of household and construction waste and had been for as long as I remember in the seven years I have lived on the island.
Although both letters talked of dialogue with officials, most Western eco-warriors I have spoken to on the island tend to practise a sort of environmental fundamentalism which would leave no room for compromise at all.
In fact due to their ridiculous antics in the past, they have become a bit of a joke amongst the Western community on the island. Let me give some examples:
The government sent a tree surgeon to trim the large banyan tree in the main high street. These eco-activists saw him heading towards the tree with his equipment and before asking him what he was doing chained themselves to the tree.
Someone had a great idea to start a garden right on the seafront. However, they used plants which are susceptible to sea water and the dead plants made the location look even worse than it did before the garden was planted.
Another badly-planned project was the 'plant 1,000 trees campaign', which resulted in all the trees planted being blown away the next day.
One last point which I think is important, these are the same people who campaigned against the pumping of raw sewage straight into the sea. The government built a treatment works on Lamma as part of phase I of the redevelopment project. It is a little hypocritical to complain about it now.
GARY KNIGHT
Lamma
