Fear not the wall: wheelchair climber motivates Hongkongers to ride out difficulties
- Former professional climber Lai Chi-wai became paralysed from the waist down after a road accident in 2011
- His motivational work for people facing adversities has earned him a nomination for a Spirit of Hong Kong award
Lai Chi-wai hopes everyone can scale new heights like he does, even though that could mean surmounting countless walls or odds emerging ahead of them.
In a wheelchair, the avid climber urged his fellow Hongkongers to follow their dreams, noting that all they needed to do was to unleash the can-do spirit rooted in themselves all along.
“Fear not the wall,” the 38-year-old said, comparing challenges in life to “walls”. “Be honest with yourself, [identify] and get over the wall in your mind.”
He cited his own experience of overcoming obstacles in life.
Lai is a former professional climber and was ranked eighth in the world. A four-time winner of the Asian Rock Climbing Championship, he is also well known in the city for winning an annual contest that requires racing to the top of a bamboo tower to snatch buns on Cheung Chau.
His athletic career ended on the night of December 9, 2011, when he had a car accident that rendered him paralysed from the waist down. But even after losing the use of his legs, he climbed up the Lion Rock, the iconic Hong Kong mountain, which made him famous.
“I did it on the fifth anniversary of the traffic accident in 2016,” Lai said.
