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Name-calling feud escalates between Hong Kong and mainland China

Insults swirl as Hong Kong residents say mainland tourists bring bad manners and women on the verge of childbirth into the territory, and mainlanders accuse their neighbors of snobbery.

February 04, 2012|By Jonathan Kaiman and Barbara Demick | Los Angeles Times

Also in January, 1,500 Hong Kong women stood in a pouring rain outside a maternity clinic calling for the government to stem the tide of "double negatives," their term for children whose parents are both mainlanders. Another anti-mainland demonstration is scheduled for Feb. 12 to protest plans to allow motorists from neighboring Guangdong province to drive their cars into Hong Kong.

Last year, an Internet music video called "Locust World" enumerated Hong Kong natives' complaints in the form of a saccharine Cantonese pop song. Against a black-and-white video of swarms of locusts devouring a field, the singer painted a portrait of mainland tourists spitting in public, yelling into cellphones and allowing their children to defecate on the streets.

"The locusts will stop at nothing," he croons. "Inch by inch, Hong Kong is being taken over by these pests."

For some mainlanders, the best response is to keep shopping.

Li Yanying, 26, a human resources manager from Beijing who recently was standing outside a Hermes outlet in Hong Kong, said she was unconcerned about differences between mainlanders and Hong Kong residents.

"When I come to Hong Kong, it's usually just to buy things," she said. "The only Hong Kong people I really talk to are cab drivers and tour guides."

Special correspondent Kaiman reported from Hong Kong and Times staff writer Demick from Beijing. Tommy Yang of The Times' Beijing bureau contributed to this report.

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