At the direction of the Metropol's manager, a small team mounted a daring operation to save the restaurant's iconic neon sign A grai...
A grainy image comes into focus. Shaky interlacing lines coalesce into the vigorous movements of a lion dance. A time stamp reads "1990.8.19", but the clang of cymbals and drums through the tinny output of the camcorder are as clear as if recorded yesterday. "That's our opening day," explains Mamoru Hayashi, who ran the Metropol Restaurant with his family until September 27, when it closed its doors for the final time.
Hong Kong's post-pandemic reality has ended many long-established eateries, often with wages left unpaid. But not so for the Metropol, which gave its staff three months' notice. Its premises, on the fourth floor of the United Centre in Admiralty, had been sold, for HK$354.4 million (US$45.6 million), to the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (HKUST), which will transform the space into its Business School's Executive Master of Business Administration campus.
"We had a remarkable 35-year journey," says Hayashi. "We wanted to do this right, to keep our word from the beginning to the last day. To keep the staff's confidence and trust. They heard it from us and nowhere else before."
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The Metropol was part of Heichinrou, a restaurant group tracing its roots to 1884 in the Chinese diaspora of Yokohama, Japan. Seeing a generation of Hongkongers through good times and bad, the restaurant was famed for its "aunties" who served baskets of steaming dim sum from a parade of carts. Adding their voices to the joyful ambience, they would call out their wares: "Siu mai! Har gow!"
"I have worked here since 2000," says So Yim-ha. "It's hard to accept that we must close. I was very happy here and the boss is good."
With no jobs to keep and no reasons to flatter, the staff of the Metropol remain loyal.
Senior captain Ng King-cho joined Heichinrou in 1988 and worked with the group for 22 years. "The customers were happy and we were treated well," he says, a sentiment echoed by shop manager Jack Chan Kwok-wah, who smiles remembering how his daughter grew up alongside the restaurant, "If they need us, we will return in a heartbeat."
In its final days, the Metropol's banquet hall burst back to life with the soft clinks of chinaware and the aroma of jasmine tea. Long-lost friends returned for a final meal. Having been one of the first to serve dim sum from carts, the Metropol has become one of the last, doggedly safeguarding a tradition that most restaurants cannot sustain, but "the sense of duty remains", says Hayashi. "We can't keep that duty in this location but we will do our best to execute it by relocating the carts to our restaurant in Kwun Tong. It is not as big but we will do our best." With his staff taken care of, Hayashi turned his attention to preserving another part of his restaurant's heritage.
Made in 1990 by Far East Neon Light, the Metropol's neon sign has stood watch over Queensway for decades, softening the impersonal artery between Wan Chai and Central with its red and gold glow. The design is a classic of the art form, with long vertical "ribs" illuminating the background and bold characters commanding the fore. Rendered in the clear yet charismatic regular script, the sign's first character, "名", carries an inflection of the Beiwei script, the rare calligraphic style most associated with Hong Kong.
To remove the sign is a complex task, yet in a city of disappearing things, this is what Hayashi was determined to do. "People come to Hong Kong to see neon, just like they come to see our carts," he says. "The number of neon signs in Hong Kong is not increasing. If we can prevent the loss of one more, it seems we are doing some good. Metropol is going away, but living on in the form of this signage."
Leading this rescue mission was the sign-preservation initiative Streetsignhk and its contractor, Po Wah Neon Light. The Metropol's sign is another casualty from a pool of fewer than 500 functional neon signs remaining in the city today, compared with an estimated 120,000 to 150,000 at its peak.
"These days I spend more time removing signs than fitting new ones," shrugs Elvis Chung Ming-hei, the owner of Po Wah Neon Light. "That's the way it is."
The sign had not been lit up or maintained since 2019, with the Metropol prioritising paying off other costs to stay afloat. The removal operation also presents other challenges: from street level, the sign appears no bigger than a postage stamp, but it is 3.6 metres tall.
"This is one of the largest signs that we have worked on," says Ken Fung Tat-wai, an architect and co-founder of Streetsignhk.
From the vantage point of the sign, Fung scans the neighbouring rooftops, observing that Admiralty is "a desert of signage". Designed for cars rather than people, its streetscape is barren. "We are surrounded by new buildings clad with curtain walls, the biggest enemy of signs. You can't drill into glass," he says.
"It was probably the only outdoor neon in the whole of Admiralty," adds Fung's collaborator, Kevin Mak King-huai.
Timing was crucial. The sign had to be removed by the restaurant's closing day, and to complicate matters, Super Typhoon Ragasa had ripped through the city on the day that the operation was due to take place, laying waste to careful plans. With two days left, Po Wah Neon mounted an audacious effort.
It's half past six on the morning of September 26, and in the kitchen at the Metropol, deft fingers are already wrapping dumplings. Cantopop blares from a radio and bamboo steamers sit stacked at the ready. On the roof, more bamboo is arrayed. A fierce-eyed scaffolder clambers over the parapet, lowering himself down the side of the United Centre. Signalling with whistles that echo off the surrounding canyon of glass, his crew lowers a drill to their foreman.
Vibrations are soon felt through the building's structure, base brackets have been installed, and within hours the scaffold clings like a limpet to the marble-clad building. This distinctive scaffolding augurs the end of neon signs, itself under threat from steel alternatives. For now the scaffold forms a protective cocoon, bamboo and glass entwined within a shroud of white netting.
On the exposed roof, the sun's arc marks precious minutes. Po Wah Neon Light's Chung straps in and sets to work. Shouting over the edge, he calls for a "hook", a metal rod twisted into an "S", and a moment later, emerges with the hook now laden with neon tubes.
Sweating from the exertion, he lifts them like an angler with his catch. Another man, taking them softly with both hands, hauls the glass to safety. These are the ribs, vital parts of the sign. Some have broken, shards tinkling onto the floor. Glinting in the sun, each tube is an assemblage of glass, electrodes and neon gas, components difficult to replace now that Hong Kong has lost so many neon makers. In an age of thrift, many of those masters retired or were made redundant with the city's move to LED signage.
Working methodically, the crew removes the many ribs, leaving the heart of the sign. Hurling coils of rope over the edge, the men secure the giant ideographs. The sound of disc grinders can be heard. And then, a shout.
"Hold fast! Now ... pull!"
One after another, the enormous characters rise from the brink, casting shadows as they are gently recovered. Finally, they are safe.
Last to go is the sign's enormous backboard. Freed of its metal frame, it is heartbreakingly fragile, a zinc skin that's withstood three decades of rain and storms. Guided by ropes, it flaps solemnly in the breeze and gives the impression of a flag being lowered. The job is done, and only just in time.
As the sun sets over Hong Kong on September 27, the Metropol's final banquet begins. The kitchen is a tightly coordinated scene of industry. As though choreographed to some unseen routine, waitstaff whirl around the opulent dining room, delivering dish after dish to lazy Susans that spin like carousels. Steamed grouper, crispy-skinned chicken and the juiciest roast pork are received by the crowd who rejoice in a rising crescendo. Just like the old days, the magic has returned.
"Thank you to our customers. To our staff and suppliers, to this building," says Hayashi. "Thank you to Hong Kong. We are grateful to have contributed something meaningful." As the clock strikes 10, the masses decamp to the Metropol's entrance, where the press corps waits. With the clatter of rolling shutters, 35 years come to an end.
When all is quiet, the chinaware collected and the chairs stacked, a single light falls on a lone figure. Sitting upon an empty stage, the moment weighs on Hayashi. The future is uncertain. His family's business has been secured but at great cost. The sign, at least, may have found a home; HKUST will consider housing it within the United Centre.
"We very much treasure the spirit of the Metropol," says Professor Hui Kai-lung, acting dean of the university's Business and Management School. "It is a place of legacy and we share a common vision in continuing that legacy. Hong Kong is a metropole, and regardless of whether we serve it through food or through education, we hope to keep it a metropole forever."
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This article originally appeared on the South China Morning Post (www.scmp.com), the leading news media reporting on China and Asia.
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