141
Dr. Waters arrived in Hong Kong in 1954, at the age of 34, not so young but not so old.
"I can remember there used to be parades in the street over in Chatham Road of troops marching, the army marching and there were British types around with bowler hats and furled umbrellas and things like that. And it was then really very colonial and very British. Funnily enough, I never realised it would change so much...I mean I thought things would be like that forever."
He sailed to Hong Kong on a ship and the journey took 31 days. He came to work for the colonial service and right from the beginning, he had come to stay. Waters sold his builder's business back in England to take on a permanent job teaching for the now Hong Kong Polytechnic. Waters met his wife, a local Hong Kong Chinese, in the territory. In his book "Faces of Hong Kong: An Old Hand's Reflection," Waters talks about how his father-in-law never approved of their relationship. His father-in-law died in 1959, and Waters and his wife married in 1960.
His mother-in-law and sisters-in-law welcomed Waters to the family. But it was a time when interracial marriages were not tolerated by many. At work, things were less than comfortable, at times.
"It's got much better," said Waters. "I married on the Queen's birthday in 1960. We were married in the morning and we went to the Governor's garden party at Government House in the afternoon. But, oh yes, there was without a doubt a certain amount of racism and there was a certain amount of ostracism in the institution where I worked. I felt it myself. Now of course, it's very common for mixed marriages."
72
Waters joined the RAS in 1964 but hadn't heard of the society before then. He was invited to join the RAS Council in 1990 and became president in 1996, just before the handover. Since the handover, the RAS is one of the few organisations to have kept the 'Royal' in the name.
"No one has bothered us. We carry on the same way. We make sure our roots are planted here."
Waters very naturally falls into Cantonese when he speaks. Every once in a while, his statements end with 'hai m hai' (isn't that right)?