Thread: Kite Flying on the Rooftop in Crowded Hong Kong

I have two brothers, 4 and 6 years older than me. During our childhood in Hong Kong, they sometimes went up to our 4-storey building's flat rooftop to fly kites. And of course I followed them. Sometimes I was given the chance to fly these kites.

We had to be skillful to avoid the kites plunging down or even flying low. Not being in an open field, the roof tops of neighboring buildings with its many antenna poles and laundry wires could get our kite entangled. Even at our own roof top there were obstacles to just lifting our kites into the air after catching the wind.

To avoid these obstacles, we climbed further up to the smaller flat rooftop of our building's main staircase. This could be dangerous. This small rooftop had no edge fences or railings. A fall from here could be nasty or even deadly. One of its edges was not far from the edge of our 4-storey building. Thus falling from here and rolling further could mean death. Gosh!

Our kites were diamond shaped, simple and cheap. They were made of thin paper stretched by crossing two thin bamboo sticks. As this diamond shaped kite was not too stable in the wind, we often added a tail to stabilize it.

Kite flying was popular among the kids. Thus there were often other kites flying nearby. The problem was that the kite lines could sometimes cross each other. When two kites got entangled the kids at the two ends would pull the lines back. Finally only one kid would get his kite back.

To add to the excitement and sense of competition, some lines were armed with glued-on ground glass pieces. When these lines were pulled back or released, the sharp glass pieces could slice to break other lines when they crossed each other. At that time, our kite lines were made of cotton, not the much stronger nylon now commonly used.

We could buy such glass-armed lines. But to save the extra cost, we sometimes tried to make them ourselves at home. We first crush glass bottles into tiny pieces that were still sharp. We then mixed them into wet rice made into a paste. The cotton line would then be pulled through the mixture and then dried under the sun. The dried rice paste had become glue like.

Glass-armed lines could be a danger when they were near ground level. They could cut and injure people, especially motor cyclists or people at the beach.

The old Hong Kong Kaitek airport was next to heavily populated areas. Thus for safety, kite flying was prohibited around the airport.

Such a fascinating story, thank you John. Have sometimes tried to fly kites but never reaally matered the technique, much more difficult than it looks.

Good bit of remembrance.

Kaitek was dangerous enough without kites.

John -- my ownly issue with this is that you left me wanting more... Good job.

That raised a few memories of Kite flying myself.
If you flew without a tail sometimes, you must have made the cross strut into a bow, to give the kite a dihedral which holds it to the wind. A totally flat kite will never fly without one.
Bow kites are really touchy to fly though and need a steady wind. In Northern India they hold a kite festival once a year when a particular steady wind starts. People go onto their roof tops, just as you have described, and every year a dozen or so of them die on the first day, walking backwards off a roof trying to get a kite to rise.
It must be nice flying where there is a steady warm wind, kite flying, of necessity, means standing in an exposed place with your back to the wind, it is not often you can do that with comfort in England, though a hood and thermal underwear helps.
When the Dutch first started trading with China competitive kite flying with strings coated with ground porcelain was a big thing, glass gave competitors a terrific edge and Dutch sailors found they could exchange their old gin bottles weight for weight for gold. You can tell people who fly kites like this regularly, their thumb and forefinger are cut to ribbons from letting out the string.
You should look at the designs Coyne came up with in Chicago, they fly beautifully in almost any wind, also those of Hargreaves in Australia, they are super elegant and will fly almost directly overhead.

I love this story John. I didn't know about the glass. It's an interesting story. Did girls fly them too? If not, what did girls play with?

Thanks Mile, Garza, ClosetWriter, Olly, and Shirley.

@Olly, we would avoid pulling the sharp kite line with hands and fingers. At that time, we all use simple reels made of wood and bamboo, a simpler version of this .

That's okay for kids John, but to get maximum control for really competitive kite fighting you have to hold the line directly.

Olly, I think you are referring to big kites that require thick lines. My story talks about poor kids 60 years ago using thin cotton threads that, even without attached broken glass, can slice into the hand.

I don't think the kites were especially big, for kite fighting it is manoeuvrability that counts and the bigger the kite the more stable it is. Mind you a little size increase makes a big difference because it is area to the wind that counts so a kite that was on foot each way would only have one square foot of sail, one that was two foot each way would have four square feet, double the dimensions and you quadruple the lift.