Xiangjiang Shangsheng

When he was born, no one stayed. In the winter of 1862, the fog in Victoria Harbor locked the Victoria Peak. At the end of Dejili Street, a thatched hut was leaking from the wind, and the oil lamp was about to go out. A mixed-race baby opened his eyes—the only light in the world reflected in his pupils. His father was a Dutch businessman and left behind a few silver coins and a crack in the door. His mother, a woman from Bao'an, gave him a surname and a sentence: "You are Chinese." No identity, no place to stand. The Chinese call him Fanguizai, but the foreigners think of him as a shadow. He was born in the cracks and will grow up in the cracks. No one believed that this child, who almost didn't even have a surname, would one day become the richest man in Hong Kong and a recipient of the Knight Commander of the Order of the British Empire, the highest medal in the British honors system. He would expand in various economic fields such as trade, industry, real estate, shipping, insurance, and finance. He would buck the trend during the Great Depression, mediate during strikes in the province and Hong Kong, refuse to cooperate with the Japanese army when Hong Kong fell, donate to build schools, hospitals, and charities, and become a symbol of a city. No one believed it. Except himself. Ninety-four years. A long journey in which a person and a city shape each other. How does a man abandoned by the world become the world again. How can a person without roots live his life as the root of others and the soul of the city? This is not a success story, success is too light. This is the story of a man who stood in the cracks of fate and spent ninety-four years living his life into a light with every word and deed. It is a legendary story of an international city that combines China and the West.