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Feature

Memories of Student Jamboree in Hong Kong

By Diya

They say that in our lives, all the different experiences, the trips we make, the people we meet and the places we see decide who we become in the end. If this is true, for those of us from the Department of Architecture at BRAC University who went to Hong Kong for the ARCASIA Student Jamboree was one such defining experience. We left in a flurry of activity, issuing passports, getting our portfolios together, preparing to speak on Bangladesh and its cultural heritage if called upon. Each one of us had our own ideas of what to expect from the trip, but as defining experiences go, the place had in store for us things quite beyond our imaginations.

The jamboree turned out to be only a small part of the experience that was Hong Kong. Students from all over Asia got together to discuss how development and heritage, two important issues for our common future, can be worked on so that the progress or protection of one does not get in the way of the other. Among other things, an afternoon's workshop with architect Joseph Kwan on Universal Design was especially enlightening, teaching us that a design is truly good only when it has universal accessibility, when it can be accessed by the differentially-abled, children, adults, all races and genders alike. The venue for the jamboree, the Hong Kong University campus, was a lesson in itself on how to make the most difficult of landscapes and contours on a hillside into an inviting and accessible, thriving environment.

From the time we landed in Hong Kong to the time we left again for Bangladesh, the thing that hit us most was the major difference in the scale of things between Hong Kong and Dhaka. The Hong Kong International Airport designed by Sir Norman Foster was the first and prepared us for the scale of the rest of the buildings to come. These buildings stun not only in their large dimensions but also in their minute details. A building that is 80 stories high in Hong Kong would also be miraculous in its minutest details, right down to the doorknobs and stairway railings.

All the buildings in Hong Kong have accessibility for the differentially-abled. Ground floors are left unoccupied and become extensions of the pedestrian ways. This encourages most people to walk instead of drive and these spaces with vendors and colors and people become great urban zones. During an overnight stay in Macau we attended the ACA 11 conference for architects, where we represented our country and culture in collaboration with students from The University of Asia Pacific, Ahsanullah University and Khulna University, all representing the Institute of Architects Bangladesh. Students from the other countries also performed their own songs, dances and plays.

The experience left a pressing question hanging in the air: could any of what we learnt be used constructively in making a difference in the future or would it in time be put aside, while we sink back into safe schedules like so many students do when they grow up?