Hong Kong
First impressions: Gleaming white skyscrapers leap out of jungle canopy. Verdant, steep hills rising out of the sea, Vancouver island transplanted to the tropics. I have never seen a city so in love with capitalism. On Hong King island, shiny steel towers proclaim their creators in 10 story letters: Philips, Samsung, HSBC. Giant LCD billboards play 30 second advertisements on a continuous loop. There are shopping malls everywhere, filled with familiar stores. The streets are packed with shop after shop, with even restaurants and bars hard to find. Kowloon stores advertise with signs suspended seven feet above the sidewalk and stretching across the street; it feels like a permanent street festival.
The heat is unbearable. I am envious of the tourists with hats, the locals with umbrellas. People slowly jog along the promenade at 7 am, completely covered in sweat. Locals practice tai chi, moving slowly in loose, flowing clothes.
The city wakes later and stays up later than Boston or Paris. The commute doesn’t pick up until 9 am. After dinner the stores are still open and people are still shopping. We go to the Kowloon markets at noon, mini-neighborhoods filled with flowers, birds, goldfish. The streets near our hotel are lined with food stalls, very similar to Paris except perhaps less refined – Paris in the 1800s. The smells are powerful and not entirely pleasant.
But elsewhere, the city is ultra-modern. The subway is speedy, quiet, and extremely well organized. Underground tunnels that are very clean, well-lit, and frigidly air-conditioned lead to numerous exits at every stop. It feels very safe; early in the morning, no one bothered an obviously confused tourist, and there are tons of police throughout the markets. Thus far I have seen only one person begging, which seems shocking in a city of this size and with so many tourists.
Today we’ll seek out the old Hong Kong, though it’s hard to find anything older than the colonial period. Then we go to China; I’m curious to see the differences, now that the mainland has embraced capitalism.