Freedom Fighters

Behind Hong Kong’s Protesters, an Army of Volunteer Pastors, Doctors and Artists
By Andrew Jacobs

Volunteers with the group Protect the Children at a protest in Hong Kong last month.

HONG KONG — The pastor pulled on his respirator and ran directly into the fog of tear gas in central Hong Kong. 

He was trailed by a homemaker, a retired accountant and a middle-school teacher.
Undaunted by the pandemonium of gasping protesters, they pointed people to safety and poured saline into the eyes of those overcome by the fumes.
With their yellow vests and portable loudspeakers, Pastor Ka-Kit Ao and his volunteers are an unmistakable presence at the antigovernment protests that have upended this semiautonomous Chinese territory. 

They form human cordons between protesters and advancing police. 

They beg baton-swinging officers to go easy. 

And they solicit the names of those being hustled away in handcuffs so pro bono lawyers can follow up with assistance.
“I sometimes wonder whether we are doing anything of value, but we can’t just sit at home,” Pastor Ao, 34, said one recent afternoon before heading into the maelstrom with members of his group, Protect the Children.
Now entering their sixth month, Hong Kong’s protests have been notable for their longevity, and for the huge throngs willing to defy the authorities with their demands for democracy and police accountability. 

Thousands of protesters, including office workers, descended Tuesday on Central, the main business and shopping district, forcing businesses to close and paralyzing traffic and the city’s fabled tram service.

Volunteers treated an injured woman at a shopping mall in July. Protesters there had clashed with the police.

Behind the scenes, this largely leaderless movement has been sustained by a vast network of ordinary people who hand out bottled water and red bean soup at marches, drive home stranded protesters late at night and donate the gas masks that fortify demonstrators during their pitched battles with police. Hong Kong professionals have been especially vital.
Graphic artists create the eye-catching protest posters across the city. 

Psychologists provide free counseling to the emotionally distressed. 

And emergency room doctors, working in clandestine clinics, set shattered bones.
One measure of community spirit can be heard many nights at 10 p.m., when residents in densely packed neighborhoods open their windows and shout protest slogans to the heavens. 

Another is expressed through the crowdfunding campaigns that have raised millions of dollars for medical treatment, legal defense funds and other expenses.
“Without this public support, the movement would have lost steam a lot sooner,” said Victoria Hui, a political scientist at the University of Notre Dame and the author of a book about the Umbrella Movement, the 2014 pro-democracy protests that fizzled after 10 weeks. 

“It encourages young people to keep going, giving them the sense they are not alone and that what they are doing is righteous.”
Although actions like setting the man on fire risk eroding support, the protest movement so far has enjoyed broad backing among Hong Kong’s seven million people. 

A recent survey by the Chinese University of Hong Kong found that nearly 60 percent of respondents approved of the protesters’ violent tactics, agreeing that they were justified in the face of an increasingly aggressive police response and a government unwilling to compromise.

Posters and protest-themed art on a wall in the Ma On Shan neighborhood.

This public support presents a thorny challenge to the authorities, who have been hoping to quell the protests by driving a wedge between the increasingly radical agitators and those sympathetic to their cause.
“The more the government suppresses this movement and tries to scare people, the more people will step out and stand up,” said Pastor Roy Chan, a founder of Protect the Children, which has nearly 200 members.
The encrypted messaging app Telegram serves as the town hall for the support network, with dozens of channels that match volunteers to those in need. 

Most prolific are the channels offering rides to protesters affected by the subway shutdowns that the authorities impose to dampen protest turnout. 

The rides also help protesters avoid the police sweeps that target public buses.
Like many drivers, Patrick Chan, 38, a garment factory manager, said fear of arrest kept him away from the protests, most of which the police have deemed illegal.

Guilt and shame, though, are powerful motivators.
Mr. Chan spends hours in his beat-up BMW sedan ferrying weary, sweat-drenched protesters to housing complexes across the city.

“These young people are trying to right the wrongs that we have long been avoiding,” he said, referring to Beijing’s two-decade effort to chip away at the vaunted liberties that differentiate this former British colony from mainland China. 

“They are paying with their futures, risking the possibility of being locked up for years. We owe them.”
The sense of public service has also mobilized dozens of doctors, nurses and medics. 

Much of their work takes place in secret. 

That is because all but the most grievously injured protesters avoid Hong Kong’s hospitals following the arrest in June of several people who had sought care for broken bones and blunt trauma. 

These days, the injured are sometimes treated at clandestine clinics that provide X-rays and rudimentary surgery.
Dr. Tim Wong works the protests after his regular hospital shift. 

An emergency room doctor, he decided to act after the police made a number of arrests at his hospital, which he declined to name for fear that it might endanger his employment.
“Since then, no one has come to our emergency room for treatment, unless they are escorted by the police,” he said. 

“It’s outrageous. Hospitals should be sanctuaries.”
One recent evening, he hovered near the front lines of a skirmish as Molotov cocktails, bricks and tear gas canisters arced overhead. 

Many of those needing medical treatment were bystanders caught up in the mayhem.

Medical workers staged an anti-government protest in the lobby of Queen Elizabeth Hospital in September.

Just then, Pastor Ao and another member of his group rushed by carrying a man injured by a tear-gas canister. 

All three of them were weeping. 

“I can’t believe this is happening to our city,” the pastor wailed as they dragged the man to a first aid clinic inside a Methodist Church that has become a beacon for protesters.
Earlier that afternoon, Pastor Ao and scores of volunteers had gathered at a subway station to plot the day’s movements. 

After dividing up into teams of seven, he reminded everyone to refrain from chanting slogans and urged them to be polite to law enforcement authorities.
“They might call us cockroaches but we should refer to them as police officers,” he said. 

Then everyone bowed their heads in prayer. 

“May we have God’s protection and the patience, love and wisdom to deal with the police,” Pastor Ao said.
Volunteers say the police rarely return the favor, treating them as antagonists. 

In September, the police were widely criticized after a video emerged that appeared to show a knot of officers kicking a Protect the Children member as he lay on the ground. 

The man, wearing the group’s trademark yellow vest, was later arrested.
At a news conference, a senior police official dismissed allegations of abuse, suggesting that the video had been doctored and that what many saw as a person was actually “a yellow object.” 

In the weeks that followed, the group’s ranks swelled with new recruits, Pastor Ao said.

A volunteer driver is stopped at a roadblock set up by protesters in September.

Many of the group’s volunteers are retirees like Ah Lin He. 

A fiery, reed-thin woman, Ms. He, 68, was born in the Chinese city of Guangzhou and swam to Hong Kong in 1972 to escape the chaos of the Cultural Revolution. 

She doggy-paddled for 10 hours with five other people. 

Only three of them made it to shore.
“I’ve seen the repression and madness that can be unleashed by the Communists in China,” she said as the group trudged to a protest that had turned violent.
Walking beside her was Joe Pao, a 29-year-old pastor, who joined the group after a brief stint as a protester. 

“I realized I could do something more useful than throwing bricks,” Pastor Pao said.
He acknowledged that his role as a putative peacemaker was rarely gratifying. 

Most of his work involves urging the police to exercise restraint. 

“When they catch people, we tell them to please respect the powers they have and not abuse them,” he said. 

“The impact is definitely small.”
The majority of protest supporters operate more independently. 

Nam Kwan, a cultural foundation administrator, has fed, housed and comforted scores of youths whose parents, enraged by their participation in the protests, tossed them out of their homes.
She traces her transformation from silent sympathizer to frenetic den mother to June 12, when the police escalated their tactics by firing rubber bullets and beanbag rounds at unarmed protesters.
“When I heard the first gunshot, a bell rang inside me and I automatically found my place,” she said. “Nowadays my phone is on 24 hours a day because I’m afraid I might miss urgent messages or calls for help.”
In addition to buying protective gear for protesters, she coordinates financial support and car pools from wealthy friends eager to help but reluctant to do so publicly. 

Oftentimes, she finds herself on the street, dispensing hugs or patiently listening to the worries of young protesters.
“Every time these kids go to the front lines, they fear for their lives,” she said. 

“But what they fear more is abandonment, that one day we will all turn our backs and leave them alone.”

'I'll take the blow for them': the volunteers protecting Hong Kong protesters

Informal group including social workers, pastors, lawyers and medics have banded together to support demonstrators

By Lily Kuo in Hong Kong

Uncle Wong, 82: protecting Hong Kong protesters with his walking stick 

Last Saturday, as Hong Kong braced for another weekend of youth-led mass pro-democracy protests, a group of middle-aged and elderly volunteers prepared for their own rebellion.
Gathered in a metro station, they put on bright yellow vests and fumbled with goggles and gas masks. They listened attentively as an organiser went over tactics for slowing the police down and letting protesters escape: distract the officers by asking for change, to borrow their phone, or even by pretending to faint.
“All we need to do is buy them a few minutes so the youngsters can get away,” said Wong, 82, who has been placing himself between the protesters and the police over the last several months. 

“We tell the police: ‘Please don’t beat them up. Let them go. Maybe you could advance a little slower.’”

Hong Kong: ‘Revolution is war, and no war is without bloodshed’

Wong’s group, known as the Guardians, whose stated mission is “protect the children”, is one of many that have formed in response to pro-democracy protests. 

The demonstrations have led to more than 1,000 arrests and severely strained relations between Hong Kong authorities and the public.
Observers say the informal groups of volunteers – from social workers and pastors to lawyers, doctors and first-aid medics – are a testament to the far-reaching impact of the demonstrations.
Ma Ngok, an associate professor at the Chinese University of Hong Kong, said: “This is part of the spirit of the whole movement that different sectors of people are trying to see how they can contribute to the cause. A lot of people are still unhappy about the situation so they try to figure out what they can do by their own means.”
Later on Saturday, Uncle Wong and his group found a standoff between protesters and police near the airport. 

As soon as they arrived, Wong moved quickly to the front, armed with a pair of swimming goggles and his walking stick held aloft in front of him as a barrier. 

A few hours later, when the police charged at protesters, he did not flinch. 

One young demonstrator ran past and patted him on the shoulder.
“I have no regrets,” Wong said. 

“I’m willing to take the blow for them. This whole protest needs everyone’s support. If you don’t come out today there may not be a tomorrow.”
Hong Kong’s leader, Carrie Lam, has said she will withdraw an extradition bill that first triggered protests in June. 

But protesters have vowed to continue demonstrating until all their demands are met, including direct democratic elections and an independent inquiry into police conduct.
As the Guardians put themselves between police and protesters last weekend, teams of first-aid workers were sent to various locations of potential clashes throughout the city. 

Social workers monitored social media, looking for signs of self-harm or severe emotional distress among protesters. 

Others patrolled the streets, carrying megaphones to call out the names and identification numbers of demonstrators being arrested so that lawyers could find and help them.
Hammond Tang, 16, a former Scout, was part of a team of first-aid volunteers in Causeway Bay, a shopping district where the police were rumoured to be preparing to move on protesters. 

Equipped with walkie-talkies and packs of medical supplies, they were on high alert for “TG” – teargas.

Observers say the volunteers are a testament to the far-reaching impact of the demonstrations. 

During the last three months, Tang’s responsibilities have shifted from pouring saline over those hit by teargas to tending to patients hit by rubber bullets and beanbag rounds. 

“We didn’t expect this many injuries,” he said.
Tang’s responsibilities also include breaking up fights between protesters and critics – altercations that happened almost daily, he said. 

This month a middle-aged man threw a brick at a protester outside Hong Kong airport and was soon surrounded by protesters kicking and hitting him. 

Tang, a stocky rugby player, raced over and covered the man with his body.
A secondary school student, Tang is not always emotionally prepared for the amount of violence he encounters. 

“Seeing everyone safe is our energy. To save more people … the thank you from those patients is what keeps me going to the frontline.”
Many of these groups are building on Hong Kong’s increasingly active civil society, boosted in 2014 during a wave of pro-democracy protests known as the umbrella movement, a precursor to the current demonstrations.
Victoria Hui, an associate professor of political science at Notre Dame University, said: “They were already there to jump into action. As the protests have evolved, preexisting groups and new groups have emerged to fill new needs.”

In some ways they are also a reaction to what some see as the creeping politicisation of civil society, as pro-Beijing figures are appointed to head different public sectors. 

Hui said: “The worry is that Beijing already encroached on the civil service in the aftermath of the umbrella movement.”
Unlike formal civil society organisations, these groups are loosely organised and often started by individual calls for action online, mirroring how the protesters have operated. 

A group of Christians maintain a 24-hour channel on Telegram for protesters to share their feelings. Supporters organise supply collections, leaving money, food vouchers, and clothes in metro stations for protesters to change into from their signature all-black outfits.

The groups are loosely organised and often started by individual calls for action online. 

Observers say the growth of these satellite protest groups is evidence of the public sympathy demonstrators still command, even after months of political unrest that has damaged one of the strongest economies in the region.
On 1 September, as protesters paralysed traffic links between the airport and the city and demonstrators began a seven-mile (12km) walk back to the city, Daniel, 42, was one of hundreds of volunteer drivers who had arrived to ferry stranded protesters home.
Daniel, a government worker who had never volunteered before, was watching a livestream on Facebook when he saw the call for drivers. 

After discussing it with his wife, he arrived at a nearby bridge where dozens of drivers had converged and a volunteer told him where to go. 

Daniel stayed out until almost 2am, waiting in case he could be of assistance.
He said: “They are Hong Kong’s future. I want to do something to help them. We have to trust each other and stick together.”
As the protests have divided society, some groups have sought to act as objective observers. 

Since mid-August, the Hong Kong Neutral Legal Observers Group, a group of about 50 volunteers from the legal sector, have been attending the protests.
In green vests identifying themselves as neutral, they attend the protests in shifts, documenting their observations for reports to be published later. 

They also hold public workshops educating residents on their legal rights and obligations.
“Our purpose is to observe public gatherings and defend the rule of law,” said one of the conveners of the group, a partner in the Hong Kong office of an international law firm, who asked not to be named out of concern of possible retribution. 

“We hope that the presence of lawyers might serve as a reminder of how important it is to respect the law and the rule of law.”