News about infringements by the Chinese government on life in Hong Kong is a daily feat now. We read the news and shake our heads, perhaps even protest against it. Still, many of us on the margins cannot imagine that it could interfere with our own lives. I am writing this article to share my story and my concern about the ways in which Beijing politics has changed my life.

After I received my PhD in Comparative Literature in July 2014, I applied for jobs at various universities. In December 2014, I was offered a teaching position in Modern Chinese Literature at Beijing Normal University (BNU). I accepted the offer and turned down another teaching position for this. Everything except for housing was finalised, and BNU communicated the urgency of arriving in Beijing as early as possible. Shortly after this, I launched my new novel Closed Gate on January 25 at the June 4^th Museum in Tsim Sha Tsui. The novel partially addresses the Chinese student demonstration and the Tian’anmen crackdown in 1989, as well as the Palestinian first intifada during the same year. Although the novel was in no way meant to be a political statement of any kind, to my surprise, it attracted a lot of attention from the Chinese media. Inadvertently, instead of focusing on the story proper, I was almost exclusively asked about the Tian’anmen issue. Having been there myself at the time, I naturally shared my experience and some of my photos. I also gave a few interviews. Since I did not feel I had anything to hide after all this time, I willingly and honestly answered all the questions. However, one week after the launch of the novel, BNU suddenly rescinded the job offer on the pretext that they could not issue a work visa for a Hong Kong passport holder. They were also not open to other suggestions and further inquiries did not yield anything.  It is not difficult to comprehend that the Chinese government forced the decision. Their decision, though absurd and deplorable, is not unexpected considering the recent political climate and growing infringements on freedom of speech in China. 

What is much harder to understand is what happened to me subsequently. I was introduced to the Hong Kong campus of Upper Iowa University (UIU) and was interviewed for a part-time teaching position by Ms Tracy Lai, the Assistant Director of the UIU Hong Kong Centre, on March 2. Ms Lai offered me to teach a course starting in June. She gave me her name card and a schedule of the current term and explained the course organization at UIU, the pay scheme, and other details. She said she would send me the schedule of the new term within a week or two. After four weeks of not hearing from her, I wrote to her on March 30, but received no reply. I called her office on March 31, but I was told that she was not in the office and that the staff himself did not know when she would be there. I suspected at that time that her silence might have something to do with my novel, and that it became an issue after she looked at my CV. But I gave her the benefit of doubt and, on April 2, wrote instead to her senior supervisor, Ms Alice Hung, Vice President of UIU in Hong Kong. I asked her to tell me the new term schedule because I had planned to participate in an academic conference in Australia in July and needed to know my schedule in order to book my flight tickets. There was no reply from her either for more than eight days. I called again, but again I was told that they both were not on campus and the receptionist did not know when they would ever come to work. They had suddenly fallen silent for more than six weeks without answering my emails and phone calls, as though they had never interviewed me or offered me a job. This unprofessional and irresponsible attitude confirmed my suspicion that their sudden silence is related to the publication of my novel. It is reminiscent of the typical response by the Chinese government to the Tian’anmen massacre and many other events in the past and in the present. 

By then, I had no more interest teaching at UIU, but considering that UIU is an American university and prides itself in freedom of speech, I decided to expose what seems to me a strong pro-Beijing policy. I wrote to Dr Ismael Betancourt, the Vice President for International Education of UIU on April 14, expecting him to clear up the issue right away. Eight days passed until he replied, stating that this delay is an exception in their administration and that they do value freedom of speech. He apologised and asked Ms Lai to reply to my emails. Why did it take eight days to reply? Naturally, it seems to me that they took the time to figure out how to take back their offer without causing suspicion that their decision is political. Ms Lai finally wrote to me with exactly the answer I had expected from her—that there was no available course for me now and that she would contact me in the future. I just had to smile to myself.

While it is unthinkable that an American university should be controlled and monitored by the Chinese government, this unthinkable seems to have become a fact. The implications of this Communist hegemony are more serious than just controlling university job recruitments. It means that soon enough, this Communist hegemony will infiltrate into every aspect of our lives here in Hong Kong, whether we like it or not.

When an American university that is supposed to be independent and supportive of freedom of speech, kowtows to Beijing, one has to ask, ‘What does the future hold for Hong Kong people? What power does the Hong Kong government have to protect the rights of its people when even an American pilot campus seems to be under the spell of pro-Beijing censorship?’ We have recently seen how Hong Kong police used excessive force to supress the peaceful demonstrators during the Umbrella Revolution, and how the Hong Kong government has completely taken the side of the Chinese government. We have seen how Hong Kong is being bought up piece by piece by China, and how some local newspapers are gradually giving in to censorship. When Hong Kong loses freedom of speech and democracy, and when we have to submit to Beijing’s will in every detail of our life, what is left to remind us that this is Hong Kong, the city that was once an icon of freedom of speech, democracy, and human rights?

To some people, freedom of speech means very little, so long as their business is flourishing. However, one does not know the value of what one has until it is lost; and one does not know what one misses if one never had it in the first place.

On April 13, Varsity published an English article about me entitle ‘Sayed Gouda—The Poet Who Will Not Be Silenced!’ A week later, my website, which is only for literature and has nothing to do with politics, was blocked not only in China, but its main page does not open any more even here in Hong Kong. On the same day, a police officer rang my home bell authoritatively. He showed me a sketch of a Chinese man and asked if I have seen him before. He asked me some strange and unrelated questions about my home life and left without asking my neighbours the same questions. Obviously, I was the only one he came to visit—in a building with hundreds of families!

By spying on my email accounts, blocking my literary website, taking away job opportunities, and inflicting some other harassments that I do not wish to disclose now, the Chinese government tries to silence me and deny me my right to freedom of speech. According to the Basic Law, Article 27 states that ‘Hong Kong residents shall have freedom of speech, of the press and of publication; freedom of association, of assembly, of procession and of demonstration; and the right and freedom to form and join trade unions, and to strike’. Article 34 states that ‘Hong Kong residents shall have freedom to engage in academic research, literary and artistic creation, and other cultural activities’. I insist on exercising my rights in accordance with the law. I can only remind Hong Kong people of what John F. Kennedy once said: ‘The rights of every man are diminished when the rights of one man are threatened!’