Ella Ma | Playground in the woods

Ella has been living at Conduit Road, Mid-levels for 15 years since she moved away from Taikoo Shing. She had been spending every effort working and taking care of her family. Now with her 3 children are all grown up means she could retire and indulge in voluntary work. This leads her to join the family of Lung Fu Shan Education Ambassador.

Ella: We started hiking because I didn’t want my kids to play video games indoor, so I tried to arrange outdoor activities for them. When we lived in Taikoo Shing I would bring them to Quarry Bay Park, after we moved to Mid-levels we hiked Lung Fu Shan. A well-organised city park provides a safe place for babies to play around, it is trusted among mothers; Lung Fu Shan is THE nature, the experience is completely different.

Every time we went hiking I was busy arranging this and that for the kids, when they threw a tantrum because of tiredness, I had to encourage them to go on. (Laughs) I didn’t really have the chance to look around, that’s why I had been hiking the mountain for so many years without knowing the existence of the centre! It wasn’t until my daughter, who started working at HKU in 2017, recommended me to join their mosquito cream workshop did I first visit the centre.

When I first came here, my reaction was - wow, colonial architecture, garden and pond, there has been such a beautiful place right next to my home all along! I got to know more about the surroundings after I became an ambassador - never did I know there is a Lo Pan Temple on Pok Fu Lam Road and a boundary stone on mid-levels… I wasn’t used to the remoteness when I first moved from the city to the mid-levels, my sense of belonging started to grow day-by-day as I learn more about this place.

Ella’s Recommendation: Lung Fu Streams