Population:

Size:

Hong Kong is...

• almost twice as big and twice as populous as Singapore (and twice as dirty!)
• the world’s most highly developed service economy (nearly 90% of GDP is accounted for by services such as banking, insurance, shipping, movie-making, advertising, tourism, etc.)
• the world’s third largest financial centre (as measured in the number of banks)
• Asia’s largest teleport (15 communication satellites)
• probably the most corruption-free Asian society thanks to the vigorous Independent Commission Against Corruption (ICAC) whose exploits have been dramatized in a popular Cantonese TV show
• home to the world’s largest (800m) escalator

Hong Kong has;

• one of the highest standards of living in the world
• the most Rolls Royces/person in the world
• one restaurant/cafe for every 650 people
• among the world’s lowest taxes (17%)
• a cosmopolitan population (1.7 billion minutes of international phonecalls/year compared with Japan’s 1.6b and Singapore’s 0.7b)
• an informed (or gossip-minded?) population (43 local newspapers compared with Singapore’s 14)

Cool Things About Hong Kong

• 17 public holidays/year thanks to our Sino-British heritage
• safe streets
• the 235 Outlying Islands - easy escapes from city madness;
• Lamma - artsy and hippie
• Lantau - countryside
• Cheung Chau - bustling village life
• the clean, fast, and cheap public transport system (especially the MTR)
• restaurants specialising in all the major Chinese cuisines - Cantonese, Shanghainese, Pekingese, Chiu Chow, and Szechuanese – plus every other major cuisine
• Melvis - pay this famous local busker $20 and he’ll sing your favourite Elvis number
• Chow Yun-fat, Jackie Chan, & Michelle Yeoh
• cool buildings like the Hong Kong Bank in Central and the colour-changing Center in Sheung Wan (right above the church!)
• great hikes (believe it or not!)

Uncool Things About Hong Kong

• public toilets - Singapore this ain’t!
• wall-to-wall people and roadside pollution in Causeway Bay & Mongkok
• the world’s most bizarre crimes and suicides (read the newspaper sometime!)
• sky-high property prices (which means sky-high rents, overheads, and goodbye to the “Shopper’s Paradise” label)