The Zhongshan Building

I remember feeling emotional the first time I saw The Zhongshan Building: it was April 2021, after interviewing Red Hongyi in her old studio, I stepped out into the narrow hallway and looked down below from where I stood on the mezzanine.

There were people in the cosy courtyard on the lower floor, chattering as they waved their glasses of coffee excitedly in their hands, some with their cigarettes pinched precariously between their fingers. I recognise some of them to be tenants of the building.

Before it became known as The Zhongshan Building, this 1950s establishment was once a family-owned butchery and a residential space comprising three shophouses. It was also a communal space that hosted the Selangor Zhongshan Association and several small merchants before turning into a hostel for foreign workers in the early 2000s.

After getting the