The Learning Cantonese blog went for a long time without any new content (there were no posts between May 15th and October 22nd last year) and it’s possible that people stopped checking the site.  In my RSS, I never deleted it, I simply moved it into a different folder.  And I’m glad I did.

You might think that from the title of the blog, the content is simply language lessons.  Actually, it’s a very political blog.  “DM,” whomever that may be, counts Long Hair among her friends and often provides front row coverage of events in Hong Kong far better than any of our two English language dailies.

The latest entry, The Siege of Legco, is one of the few English language blog entries covering the recent protest in any real depth.  It’s a long post, punctuated with photos and YouTube videos.  At the end, there’s this pungent bit of analysis:

A more PR savvy government might have called a moratorium to reconsider the project cost, or directly spoken to the protesters. But Chief Executive Donald Tsang stayed behind the walls of his mansion, and sent out his government flunky, transport secretary Eva Cheng, to handle the job instead.

Cheng answered some questions, but stonewalled most, and that undoubtedly accounts for some of the slip in public support. But it was her attitude that really sealed it. With her stiff expression, her thin lips curling in irritation, she personified the arrogance of the Hong Kong’s elite civil servant class. Even watching her on TV I could practically hear her sniffing in disdain. “Who do you think you are?! Just give us the money. We aren’t going to let a bunch of riffraff tell us what to do, and who cares if they were democratically elected..WE know what’s best for the people of Hong Kong!”

But they don’t. And the Hong Kong people want some accountability. And accountability means only one thing: un-game the stacked political system, and give all Hong Kong people an equal vote.  As the dust settles, it’s looks like the pan-Democrats won’t have to struggle to make the argument for real political reform in Hong Kong when they resign in the five district referendum scheme later this month. The Siege of Legco–and the inspired, tactically savvy troops of the baat sap hauh–have done the heavy lifting for them.

Check it out.

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