Photos: Hong Kong protests ebb but rock on, under the gaze of Umbrella Man (and police)

Protesters install a statue with a yellow umbrella as other demonstrators block the main street to the financial Central district outside of the government headquarters building in Hong Kong October 5, 2014. [Reuters]

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Pro-democracy demonstrations in Hong Kong have ebbed in numbers, but continued into early Tuesday. Thousands of participants, many of whom are students, are still gathered the city center.

After more than a week of protests, there are signs that suggest modest signs of progress.

“There was a sense on Monday of a winding down and, after 11 days of overnight street protests, a dissipation of energy,” reports the NYT. “I’m very, very, very tired,” Dennis Chan, 28, told the paper, letting out a sigh as he prepared to go home to sleep after 10 days at the sit-in near the government center. “We all are.”

Photos from Reuters photographers follow.

A protester of the Occupy Central movement carries a shield from the 'Captain America' comic book series as he stands on a main road at the Mong Kok shopping district in Hong Kong. [Reuters]

A woman places a piece of paper with a message of support for pro-democracy protesters in Hong Kong next to hundreds of others outside of the Hong Kong House in central Sydney October 5, 2014. [Reuters]

Yau, 22, gets down to his knees and proposes to his girlfriend Chen, 21, both university students and pro-democracy protesters. on a main street which they occupied, at Mongkok shopping district in Hong Kong October 5, 2014. [Reuters]

A pro-democracy protester cries after a scuffle with anti-Occupy Central protesters as they try to remove a barricade at a main street at Hong Kong's Mongkok shopping district October 4, 2014. [Reuters]

A man, who a witness said started a fight with several pro-democracy protesters, lies on the ground with hands tied by the protesters near a barricade on a main street in Hong Kong's Mongkok shopping district October 4, 2014. [Reuters]