Market Scene : Bamboo Holds Up a High and Mighty Tradition : In Hong Kong, the scaffolding that dominates the ever-changing skyline is not made of steel but of the sturdy, plentiful reed.

HONG KONG — The 26-foot bamboo shaft that B. K. Lee bends with the aid of his feet and hands is so flexible that for a moment he resembles a pole vaulter about to be catapulted across the room.

But it’s also strong enough to form the basis for one of Hong Kong’s more unusual businesses--erection of the bamboo scaffolding that, much to the surprise of many Western visitors, dominates virtually every building site in the city.

While steel scaffolding is used to reach the highest floors of such structures as Hong Kong’s 76-story Central Plaza, traditional bamboo scaffolding, with a history reaching back about 2,500 years, remains dominant here.

“Scaffolding companies here use bamboo because it’s relatively cheap, easy to put up and strong enough to support many workers,” says Lee, 58, whose Wo Kee Bamboo Co. imports the hollow, woody stems from the rural hills of China’s Guangdong province to this urban construction zone. “Bamboo-scaffolded buildings can be seen everywhere in Hong Kong.”

Lee, who has been in the business for 46 years, says the demand for raw bamboo poles by the colony’s scaffolding companies is fairly constant. He imports an average of 90,000 poles--nearly $40,000 worth--per month, which are loaded onto ships or trains in China for the 100-mile trip to Hong Kong’s construction sites.

*

Scaffolding firms act as subcontractors to the construction companies, responsible not only for material but also for hiring the workers to assemble the bamboo webs.

These fearless workers, almost like human spiders, can often be seen dangling hundreds of feet above the city’s traffic as they fabricate the skeletal scaffolds, which support wooden planks or platforms that plasterers and painters must use to reach the upper stories of new buildings.

Working in teams of two, the scaffolders design a pattern of vertical and horizontal bamboo poles in such a way that they conform to the shape of the building while providing maximum support for the workers who must use them. The bamboo poles are tied together with special plastic strips.

This is not a job for someone suffering from acrophobia, or a fear of heights. “I’m not afraid of anything,” said 31-year-old Chan Ka Kung, one of 10 bamboo scaffolders working on a residential estate project for the Shui On Construction Co., Ltd. “If I was, I wouldn’t last in this profession.”

The craft of bamboo scaffolding was reputedly first employed in China during the Zhou Dynasty’s Spring and Autumn Period (770-476 BC), when the legendary Lu Pan came up with some basic rules of structural engineering that remain the foundation of the trade.

The skill is passed down from generation to generation here. Ng Kim Yeung, 65, is a master scaffolder who has shared his skills over the years. “I work with apprentices for a period of three years before they are upgraded to the master level,” said Ng, who was introduced to the trade in 1946 when he left war-torn China for Hong Kong in search of a better life.

“It was very difficult to find work in Hong Kong at that time,” he explained. “I was lucky, though, because many of my fellow countrymen from Canton (Guangdong’s provincial capital) were working as bamboo scaffolders, so they helped me to enter the trade.”

As a master, Ng can earn the equivalent of up to $90 per day compared to $39 for an apprentice. Most of his earnings are sent back to his family in China, whom he visits every six months. Only a small part goes toward a bed in a local bamboo scaffolders’ trade union hall and his daily meals.

Ng shares his accommodations with 40 other elderly scaffolders, who like to recall superstitions connected with their trade. One, for example, holds that the sight of a woman combing her hair in the morning is an omen of death.

Younger bamboo scaffolders, more interested in money than superstition, dismiss such tales. Wong Tak Sing, 18, for example, joined an 11-month basic training course in bamboo scaffolding at Hong Kong’s Construction Industry Training Authority (CITA), an independent vocational training institute, after he was expelled from school and had to find a job.

“I heard this type of work rewards its employees with high pay, and I want to make a lot of money,” Wong said.

CITA, established in 1975, is the only school in the colony to offer such a course, which is available to students 14 years old and over. There are spots for 20 students at each of CITA’s three centers, but enrollment is less in part because many parents consider the trade to be too dangerous.

“Fall of person” ranks as the most common cause of serious occupational injuries in Hong Kong. Last year, 3,362 construction workers fell on the job. Twenty-four died of their injuries.

The problem isn’t bamboo scaffolding, construction companies maintain. The companies, who are liable for workers’ safety, say most of the workers who fall from scaffolds are careless painters and plasterers--not the more cautious and skilled scaffold builders.

*

In addition to the danger, fewer Hong Kong young people are entering the trade because they have more opportunities to land less strenuous jobs. The Labor Department estimates that as a result, the colony has “imported” 13,000 manual laborers, including scaffolders, from China and Southeast Asia. Still, Hong Kong builders prefer the traditional method.

“Bamboo scaffolding is flexible, easy to erect and is more versatile (than its steel counterpart),” said Martin Lane, director of Paul Y. Construction Co. Ltd. “I don’t believe Hong Kong will stop using bamboo scaffolding purely because of safety and technical problems. Maybe there will be a shortage in supply of bamboo in the future, but that’s another aspect.”