The little storage building on Lai Chi Kok Road initially seems to be unassuming. The outside is just plain blue doors, boring signage, flickering fluorescent lights. Most likely, you would pass it twelve times without looking twice. But enter and it’s like unlocking a secret chapter of the city’s narrative—part museum, half mystery book, and part attic full of unmet aspirations. More help!

You are immediately struck by the silence. Apart from the subtle hum of ancient air conditioners and the sporadic echo of footsteps, the place is absolutely quiet. Every corridor seems to be waiting to exhale. One corridor smells mildly like musty books, the sort you would find in a used bookshop. Still another smells like worn cloth and lost fragrance. Every storage facility offers a different story: some orderly with labeled bins and clean plastic containers, others messy with wayward cables, twisted fairy lights, and neglected present bags pouring out when the door creaks open.

One unit is well-known for being jammed packed to the ceiling. With a dusty Tony Hawk poster fastened to the wall like an adolescent shrine, they are old, weathered, some cracked, others seldom used. Beside it are a variety of cartoon-covered luggage with infant clothing, small shoes, and enough stuffed animals to cover a carnival. The contrast is wild—chaos beside order, memories next to trash.

This serves more than only storage. Holding on and letting go is an emotional tug-of-war. Some people swing often to visit their memories, not to drop off anything. Every Saturday one woman arrives, sits in front of her locker, retrieves old journals, and reads silently while lunch is being eaten. She claims that quiet helps her to think. Recall also. Probably both.

The collectors follow from there. One man in his 60s accumulates manga volumes—complete series, meticulously wrapped while time has yellowed the pages. Although his grandchildren do not yet get it, he promises they will eventually. Another locker once showed a Chewbacca mask protruding from a package marked only ” misc.” Not clear whether it was a Star Wars shrine or a Halloween left-over.

The list of unusual discoveries is long: vinyl recordings in milk cartons, fortunate cat figurines, vintage typewriters, broken fans, and luggage from twelve nations. The building smells like incense on one side, like spilled beer and damp cardboard on another. Every object seems to carry a memory, a tale unspoken in years.

Let’s name him Ken, a staff member believes the most personal things are frequently the craziest. “Once we came upon a small refrigerator loaded with rubber ducks,” he says. People put items here they wouldn’t even show their own relatives.

And for this reason the place is unique. It serves purposes more than only storage. It is a secret repository of human life—what people loved, lost, and could not bear to toss away. Under the flickering lights of Lai Chi Kok, behind one of those blue doors, you may just find the essence of the city.