Hong Kong, Sweet & Sour

Somewhere between a travel journal and satirical cartoons, this series of snapshots depicts daily life in 1960s Hong Kong with warmth and humour, showing us a city still human-sized despite rapid urban development, overwhelming swarms of people and an invasion of tourists and climate-controlled modernity. A city where a romantic--worse, an eccentric Frenchman--sees his illusions given a hard time without losing his sympathetic view of humanity, his cheerful demeanour and his desire to make us laugh. From Hong Kong's unforgettable street scenes to its tradition-minded rural hinterlands, its colourful characters, the beauties and the not-so-beautiful, East meets West, faked chinoiseries, Hong Kong Sweet & Sour has it all. The cartoons published in this electronic edition appeared for the first time in the South China Sunday Post-Herald and in a French-English book compilation entitled Hong Kong Sweet & Sour, Dollars billets doux.

Zabo is traveler who nearly never left home. Departing Paris on 13 April 1960 through Porte d’Italie, prepared to tour the wide world, encouraged by his fellow workers from French TV, he set up his tent for the night... 30 km away. As it rained cats and dogs around him, he was close to returning home. But no humourist can tolerate sneers...! Eventually he found his way to bustling, crazy, wonderful Hong Kong. In 1967, the young thirty-something finally said farewell to his home of two years, where he'd scraped out living with his drawing skills, leaving them--and us--with this timeless, warm-hearted and hilarious book.