Wheels of fortune and freedom
Doris Leung found it so difficult to travel around Hong Kong with her wheelchair-bound mother that she decided to take matters into her own hands. Out of sheer frustration, she set up her own taxi company, Diamond Cab (HK), and now has a fleet of five wheelchair-accessible vehicles.
But mobilising the city's disabled community was not as easy as Leung had hoped. Her first problem was finding the right type of cars.
"I couldn't find any model of vehicle that suited my need in Hong Kong, so I had to contact Toyota in Japan and request five tailor-made cabs," she says.
The Hong Kong taxi industry was also a source of irritation. "It was like mission impossible trying to change the existing norm of the taxi industry. Most people in the industry put profit in first place. To provide a cab service for people in need seemed like a weird and crazy idea to the