Mong Kok is a favorite spot for visitors and shoppers in Hong Kong. Today, it has become the battlefield for politicians with different ideologies and point of views. In the past couple of days, international media had been using "umbrella revolution" to describe the recent situations of Hong Kong. From the locals' point of view, we find the name to be a bit strange, and are perhaps uncomfortable with that description.

From day one, events in Hong Kong have clearly been a political game with two groups of political parties having different ideologies, battling for their respective target audiences.

Expectations for political reform vary among the locals, as they are from different backgrounds. The so-called "umbrella revolution," however, is nothing more than a normal process of interest aggregation, the same political game that takes place in democratic societies elsewhere.

Hong Kong society is discussing and negotiating the future development of its political system, hence recent events; they can hardly be described as civil disobedience, but just merely a normal political game.

As the reform might involve changes in political system, mass demonstrations for and against the reform are somewhat inevitable.

Conflicts and destruction are to be expected during the reform period. However, if one defines the ordinary twists and turns of a democratic society as a revolution, it may well then twist the original definition of revolution: a usually violent attempt to end the rule of one government and start a new one, in the quest for freedom.

The "umbrella revolution" is definitely not a revolution. This message has also been clearly stated in Facebook posts from the participants, who call it a "movement." Similarly, I trust most New Yorkers would not call "Occupy Wall Street" a revolution, but just a protest movement for economic equality.

Simon-Hoey Lee, visiting fellow (2013), the Centre for Comparative and Public Law in the Faculty of Law at the University of Hong Kong