Place:Tai Wai, Hong Kong, People's Republic of China

the text in this section is copied from an article in Wikipedia

Tai Wai is an area in the New Territories, Hong Kong, located between Sha Tin and the Lion Rock, within the Sha Tin District.

With three rapid transit stations, one of which an interchange station serving two lines, five bus termini and several trunk roads and tunnels connecting it to other parts of the New Territories, such as Tsuen Wan, and Kowloon, Tai Wai is an important transport node in Hong Kong.

History

the text in this section is copied from an article in Wikipedia

Sprouting from traditional farming villages growing rice, vegetables and fruits, such as choy sum, Chinese broccoli, bamboo, banana, peach, and lychee, Tai Wai area once functioned as a light suburban industrial park in the 1970s. Few factory buildings are still in use, mostly as warehouses. The current urbanization of the area is the consequence of the development of Sha Tin New Town that started in the 1970s.

Tai Wai Village, where the name of the area came from, was the largest and oldest walled village in Sha Tin. It was built in 1574 during the Ming Dynasty, and was called Chik Chuen Wai at the time. It was originally made up of 16 families, Wai, Chan, Ng, Yeung, Wong, Lee, Hui, Cheng, Tong, Yuen, Yau, Lam, Lok, Tam, Mok and Choy.

The Wai family, being the largest family, is thought to be the direct descendants of the famous founder general of the Han Dynasty, Han Xin, who purportedly fled there to escape executions ordered by Emperor Gao of Han's empress Empress Lü Zhi. The Han descendants changed their surname into Wai by splitting the word Han in two halves and took up the character on the right hand side.

The Cheng family, on the other hand, originated from a place called Xingyang in Zhengzhou, Henan which is the place where Chang'e supposedly flew to the Moon. It is also the birthplace of Li Shangyin, one of the most famous poets in the late Tang Dynasty.

Tai Wai appears on the "Map of the San-On District", published in 1866 by Simeone Volonteri.

The first public housing estate built in the area was Mei Lam Estate, with the first two blocks of its Phase 1 completed in 1981. Tai Wai station opened in August 1983.

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