The Hong Kong is not just a noun, its regulars insist. "`Kong' is definitely a verb, `to Kong,'" says Scocca.
Ellenberg tries it out as an adjective: "`How do you feel?' `Kong.'" Scocca and Hsu immediately veto the suggestion. But, says Scocca, "it can be an imperative. At a party I can go up to Jordan and say, `Kong.'"
But even the regulars say they don't know everything there is to know about the Kong. Many acknowledge there are mysteries in the windowless pink stucco building.
Hsu said the bar upstairs is unfamiliar territory for the typical Harvard undergraduate.
And the third floor?
"Nobody knows. It's all speculation," says Scocca.
"I think that's where you go when you die," Ellenberg answers.
"There could be worse places," Scocca says.
But it is perhaps Peter G. Whang '95 who best summed up the Kong, "The food's nothing great. The service isn't that great. There's just something about the place."