Life inside the coffin homes of Hong Kong

An estimated 200,000 inhabitants of Hong Kong are living in so-called coffin homes.

Coffin homes are tiny apartments in a country that has been unable to process the waves of people moving to its big cities. Looking for a better future, they reside in these improvised houses.

The increasing demand for apartments has caused the country to face a serious crisis. It has made Hong Kong one of the most expensive cities per square meter in the world.

The Asiatic city has been the location with the highest apartment rents for years now. The average time to obtain a house in Hong Kong is estimated at four years and eight months.

With its sky-high rental costs, Hong Kong has gained a questionable fame for its coffin homes. Even though the world's richest people are living in some parts of Hong Kong, the desolate coffin homes taint the city's overall prestige.

While Hong Kong appears like a place of luxury and wealth, there is an estimated number of 200,000 persons living in tiny coffin homes. Among them are 40,000 children.

The scarcity of apartments for people with low incomes is one of the biggest problems the government faces. Research has shown that one in seven Hong Kong residents lives below the poverty level. This is the income a person would need to provide adequately for the most basic amenities like food, lodging, and hygiene.

Coffin homes (or cage homes) are tiny cubicles in which people have to live with only the bare basics. Their size is between 1.5 and 9 square meters (16 to 97 square feet).

Illegal huts and coffin homes in large office spaces tend to offer shared toilets for up to 20 persons. It's a health problem as well as a social one.

Some coffin homes are so small that their inhabitants cannot even stretch their legs entirely. They are forced to spend most of their days outside of the home in public spaces.

To give you an idea, in the space of 46 square meters (495 square feet) there may be living up to 30 persons. Each of them has a cubicle that could be as little as 60 centimeters wide and 170 centimeters long; in inches, that's 23 by 67.

Researchers and journalists have found that living in these circumstances can create both mental and physical problems. It has to do with the lack of space, the strong bodily odors everywhere, the darkness, bed bugs, and other hygienic problems.

Various NGOs have started hygiene campaigns and are trying to desinfect the coffin homes. This way, they try to diminish the health risks.

Despite their unattractive appearance and lack of space, coffin homes can actually be quite expensive. For some Hong Kong residents, a monthly rent of 200 to 500 Hong Kong dollars (about 24-50 US dollars) is a steep price.

Retirees, workers, drug addicts, ex-convicts.... these are the kinds of people you will find in coffin homes.

Entire families with small children find themselves forced to live life in these miniscule spaces. People are forced to share the most intimate moments of their everyday lives with neighbors.

Coffin homes began to appear in the 1950s. Their first occupants were Chinese immigrants whose bosses assigned these places to them.

Originally, the coffin homes were made from bamboo bars, shaped to form a bed.

Income inequality has contributed to the precarious lifestyle that much of Hong Kong's population is forced to endure.

Although the government is offering rental subsidies, they've turned out to be insufficient and the problem persists.

For a part of the population, even these small cubicles are too expensive. According to surveys of their inhabitants, many spend more than half of their salaries on the rental of these cages.

In coffin homes you may find the same kinds of electronic devices as in other types of apartments. It's not the smartphone that's barely attainable for a Hong Kong inhabitant; it's the bedroom.

A big part of the problem is that these extremely small apartments have become normalized. The precariousness of life is taken as a given, even though Hong Kong is one of the richest places in the world.