The biggest and most luxurious restaurant in West Quarry had to be Kam Ling Restaurant which was located in front of the tram terminal at Whitty Street!

You know, in the 1910s, Kam Ling first coined the word “Restaurant”. It was probably inspired by a line in the verse, “ Anchoring at Qinhuai River at night in the vicinity of restaurants (literally meaning “wine house)”. From then on, wine houses and food eateries in Hong Kong followed the trend by calling themselves “Restaurants”. At its opening, Kam Ling openly solicited couplets, with “Kam” (which means gold) and “Ling” (which means mountain) as the headwords. Many intellectuals in Hong Kong pitched their contribution, and it was rumoured that the most praised couplet was the one written by Wu Ting Fang, the first Chinese barrister in history and also the first Chinese member of the Legislative Council of Hong Kong (by the time, he had already gone to the North to become a senior diplomatic officer of the Government of the Republic of China). The couplet he wrote was: “Two lines of gold dust with the beauties offering wine; at a corner of the mountain range was the moon prying into the house”. How wonderful!

In those days, be it an occasion of businessmen socializing or young masters’ entertaining, the drinkers liked to have fun for a whole night in a private room. All night long, there were “Cheong Kirk” (Singing Artists) and “Lo Wan” (Musicians) performing to entertain the guests. Sometimes, even the popular star actors were invited to put on a show. Many of the singing artists were the daughters, nieces or adopted daughters of the bawds. They were especially trained and groomed to try their luck in the music circle. If they were lucky, they would ascend the social ladder and became artists. Otherwise, they would eventually join the erotic circle. Besides female artists, there were quite a number of blind male artists who specialized in singing “Naamyam”. Their songs were sometimes sad and touching, and the lyrics sometimes humorous and obscene.