Observations on my trip to Hong Kong

When I lived in Hong Kong, I found it amusing that visitors would often and repeatedly comment on how striking they found the clusters of skyscrapers of housing estates. So I find it amusing, now, that on the ride in from the airport, I, too, found the clusters of 30-plus story skyscrapers notable. The fact that I notice these buildings which I once took for granted shows that I no longer belong in Hong Kong. And yet, everything seems so familiar, like I never left.

The Covid protocols are a mixture of the efficient and nonsensical. I was tested by PCR test 4 times: on arrival, and 2, 4 and 6 days later. Each time, I received the results at around 8:30 pm, which is the time they notify people who have been tested before noon. I don’t know why the notifications are sent out as a batch and are not sent out as they are received. In addition, I had to take a Rapid Test every day and post the results (honor system). Half of these tests, then, were duplicating the PCR test. I tried to make it more useful by doing the Rapid Test in the evening, since I took the PCR test in the morning, but that meant I got the results of both tests at about the same time.

The PCR testing process itself was amazingly fast. I simply walked in, showed the staff member my Hong Kong ID and the appointment confirmation SMS text message on my phone. The staff person, who was behind a plastic barrier, entered my ID number and a code number from the SMS text on their keyboard, and my personal particulars (including my phone number) then appeared on a screen that was set facing me (none of the silly swiveling of the screen as in doctors’ offices in St Louis). She gave me a vial, which I then took down a line about 20 meters, and a “dispatcher” told me which of about 20 cubicles (temporary cloth medical stations) to go to for my test. Each time I arrived, the tester was still finishing up from the previous test and putting on new gloves. They took a swab of both sides of my nose, and with a second swab took a sample from my throat (“Say ‘Ah’”), and then, “You’re done, thank you” and I could leave. I don’t think it even took 3 minutes.

In theory, everyone entering a store or building has to scan a QR code on their “LeaveHomeSafe” app, which brings up the visitor’s health status in a QR code. Until a person’s QR code is blue, one cannot eat in a restaurant. (A friend who has resisted getting a cell phone for years was finally forced to get a smart phone!) I found that while restaurants followed this faithfully, most stores and buildings ignored it. I entered a Watson’s pharmacy and saw the QR code and scanner at the door but noticed that no one was using it. On the other hand, when I entered the Chinese University Library, a staff member was at the barrier where you scan your university ID to enter, and she gently called me back to have me sanitize my hands. (In my defense, I did not recognize the new, alcohol-spraying hand sanitizer as a sanitizer, and plus, didn’t we discover that Covid spreads not from contact by in the air?).

Surgical mask holder

Everyone, and I mean everyone, wears a mask. The only exception is when exercising, and on the beach. People walking on a promenade along the water, which could technically be considered exercising, were wearing masks.

Hong Kong residents also have a handy plastic mask holder, which allows you to fold a surgical mask and put it in your purse or pocket while you eat in a restaurant. I also discovered a "touchless elevator pad" 

Days before leaving for HK, I received the Congressional-ExecutiveCommission on China  report on human rights in Hong Kong titled Hong Kong’s Civil Society: From an Open City to a City of Fear. As a cover letter put it:

The report, entitled Hong Kong’s Civil Society: From an Open City to a City of Fear, draws on interviews with 42 current and former members of Hong Kong’s civil society and details how the draconian enforcement of the National Security Law crushed democratic institutions and a once vibrant civil society in Hong Kong.

The report is depressing reading, describing the jailing of politicians and activists for organizing a primary (which the government claims is “subversion”), the disbanding of many NGOs, children coming home saying their teachers told them to report if parents criticized China’s flag, and journalists forced to leave because of police harassment.

Touchless elevator pad

In contrast to the report, which focuses on the worst cases, I found people trying to live a normal life. Some professors have left Hong Kong because of the political situation and the National Security Law, but it has not been a mass exodus. Recent statistics show 1.6% of HK’s population (116,000people) left HK in the past 12 months (see here for more analysis on emigration and Covid departures). Professors that remain try to continue teaching as before; since they taught critical thinking and presented different sides of issues, and not one side, they see no need to change their approach. Especially because many courses still have to be offered on Zoom, and so are recorded, teachers also warn students to be cautious, but one colleague noted that some students do not hesitate to talk about what they did in the protests, despite teachers' warnings.

One friend, who had been quite supportive of the protests when I saw him three years ago (and probably would still be considered “yellow”), has traveled to the UK for work and commented that the Hong Kong friends who have emigrated are, in his view, overly negative on Hong Kong. It seems everyone needs to justify their choice: those who stay say it is not so bad, those who left emphasize how much it’s changed and how bad it’s become.

Now that the protests have been suppressed, perhaps it is easier to add some nuance, and not see them in simple bipolar terms of good versus evil, or democracy versus autocracy. Already in 2020, a special section in the anthropology journal HAU (issue 10[2]) offered some nuance on the protests. Many of the protesters were xenophobic and anti-Mainland Chinese, and a large number loved Trump (because of his anti-China stance). And though authorities will not admit it (because they “won”), much of the violence was caused by the government’s intransigence and by the police. The violence from a minority of the protesters probably doomed the protest movement.

I can see that people who, for family or work or other reasons cannot or do not want to emigrate, are coming to terms with the new reality. One Chinese friend (who is my age and who had emigrated to Australia in the 1990s to get his citizenship and then returned to Hong Kong) was surprised that his sons’ friends all supported the protests. He is relatively moderate and sympathized with aspects of the protests, but the protest movement appealed especially to youths. Yet, neither he, nor his sons (who graduated from university in Australia) are considering moving to Australia. My friend said he is disgusted with the “Mainlandization” of the government, with officials now speaking like CCP officials. He commented that because they did not do so right after 1997, when perhaps it could have been logical to make such a change, the patriotic language and public service announcements on TV in 2022 are quite jarring. But he’s not leaving.

Another young friend, educated in the US, complained bitterly of the government bureaucracy and rigidity with Covid regulations, but he admitted he would not leave Hong Kong, because his skills and bilingualism are only an advantage in Hong Kong.

The fact is, we all live in flawed societies. I live in a city that still has a gaping racial divide, where White kids in the suburbs go to excellent public and private schools while Black kids in north St Louis go to schools that in the recent past were so bad that the state had to take themover. Guns are so common that I sometimes hear shots fired at night. On the social network NextDoor, I read last week that two teenagers drove up to a gas station near my neighborhood, and one of them jumped into a car and stole it (here is a video of a similar incident at the same station). One of the first replies on NextDoor was that the owner should have had a gun! (Right, so she could shoot her own car and perhaps kill the teenager and maybe some innocent person walking by.) Today there was a mass shooting in a St Louis high school: three dead, six injured. I live in a country that is also entering a deeply xenophobic phase, where minorities are attacked and immigrants who have worked here (usually also paid income taxes) for decades have no path to citizenship. I live in a country where supposedly intelligent people continue to assert, without any evidence, that the 2020 election was stolen from Trump (despite the fact that Republicans did well in all the other races). I live in a country that claims to be a democracy and yet corporations and the wealthy can spend unlimited amounts in political ads and lobbying (see e.g. Leonard Leo’s $1.6 billion fund). And I live in a country where most people are going to vote for their tribe (red or blue) rather than based on the qualifications and policy proposals of candidates.

Americans like to think that the US is such a great country that everyone wants to come here, but according to a report titled Caught in the Crossfire: Fears of Chinese-American Scientists, government harassment of scholars of Chinese descent has led to an exodus: 

“The China Initiative caused panic and an exodus of senior academic researchers of Chinese descent in the US.” The number who dropped their American academic or corporate affiliation in 2021 in favor of a move back to a Chinese institution jumped by 23 percent over 2020. In 2021, 1,500 Chinese scholars who were educated in the United States left to go back to China."

Many Americans seem to believe the political rhetoric that the US is the greatest country in the world, and believe everyone wants to come to America. In fact, the vast majority of people want to stay home close to family and friends, and most refugees who come to America are driven out by violence and other problems at home.

It is easy, from the US, to imagine it is hard to live in an authoritarian place like Hong Kong. Yet many Americans are perfectly willing to retire to an autocracy like Dubai:

A sunshine-filled city, Dubai offers an outstanding quality of life for retirees. The city is famed for its friendly, multicultural population and array of lifestyle experiences that put convenience at the forefront – think on-demand home services and food delivery at the touch of a button. (From Retire in Dubai website)

Retire amid sunshine and cheap labor; all you need is US$500,000 in the bank, and an income of at least US$60,000 per year. Why worry about freedom?

The CECC report quotes an anonymous professor as saying “Hong Kong has changed from an open society to one in which people are gripped by fear. And the fear is encompassing.” This is certainly true for some. But most people are not activists or directly involved in politics. It is startling to realize that for many people, life seems to go on as before. Even if they are not happy about the National Security Law, what can they do?

Science Park: new buildings

Because many people are carrying on as before, the changes to Hong Kong will be gradual. Several people mentioned the way pro-Beijing papers identify an issue or a person and then attack them in concert. That riles up pro-Beijing supporters who add to the attacks online. That is how Beijing tries to bring about change. It is a bit reminiscent of the Cultural Revolution, though less intense (although it is plenty intense if you are the target). But most Hong Kong residents are not involved in politics and do not fear being attacked. The authorities have created a flag raising ceremony at schools, and added required patriotic education, but I heard ways that people get around them (e.g. by assigning a few Mainland students to attend on behalf of a department). Over time, these ritual may have an effect, or they may become empty rituals. Beijing is making Hong Kong students sing the national anthem; Americans sing the national anthem before all sports events. Does it have an effect?

People get used to almost anything. My sense is that people in Hong Kong will adapt. Like many in China, they will continue to hope that the government will reform, will open up. They will push at the margins; no street protests, but passive resistance, like the non-compliance with scanning the QR code in entering buildings. Hong Kong survived fairly draconian crackdowns under the British. Many hope it will survive this round of crackdowns, too.

Back in Hong Kong

This entry is about details of travel to Hong Kong, and about airport/airline efficiency, and may be of limited interest to readers, since it is written mostly to record my experiences and to help me get over jet-lag. Mostly “1^st World Problems.” Feel free to skip it, unless you want the details.

I came back to Hong Kong for a brief visit; I need to set foot in the SAR at least once every three years to maintain my “permanent” resident rights (this requirement only applies to “non-Chinese,” a concept that one could write an article about—American-born Chinese technically are “non-Chinese” because they are “born American” but in fact many manage to get the real permanent ID). I was already looking into how to fly back to HK when the government reduced the quarantine from three days in a hotel and four at home to just three at home, so I quickly bought my ticket. The website was so busy that I was not able get into the Cathay Pacific website to select my seats until the following day.

Repulse Bay

I flew on Cathay Pacific because 1) my accumulated miles would have expired on Dec. 31 if I did not fly a leg on the airline, 2) it was the only direct flight from the US to HKG, 3) I like Cathay’s service (politeness and efficiency—you’ll see below). But of course, Cathay does not fly to St Louis, so I had to fly STL to LAX on a code-shared flight operated by American Airlines (AA).

 My flight was supposed to leave STL at 19:45, and at 15:45 I got an email telling me my flight was on time. To make sure there were no problems (and because CX was not able to assign me a seat on the first leg, which was run by AA), I arrived at the airport more than 2 hours early. I tried to check in at the kiosk, but it did not work. The attendant came over, also tried, and then sent me to the service desk. No problem: I got two boarding passes, one STL-LAX, and the other LAX-HKG. So far, pretty smooth (except that CX does not participate in TSA PreCheck, so I had to do the shoes-off computer-out routine).

Change or no change?

Shortly after I got to my gate, C6, I thought to check where my plane was. My Flight Aware app then told me that my flight was going to be two hours late, but there was no indication on the monitor. Finally, about a half hour later, the monitor indicated the late departure, but it said we would only be 1:15 hr late, leaving at 21:00. But an email they sent at 18:02 said that we would depart at 20:29. (Before that email arrived, they sent me at 17:34 an email that my seat had changed from 17D to 17D—yes, that is not a typo! See screenshot.) Since I had a three hour layover, I was not too worried. 

At 20:26, they said they would start boarding in four minutes, so I got up and went to the restroom, about 30 yards up the hallway. When I came back a few minutes later, I was stunned to see that gate C6 was completely empty! Everyone had left, and the monitors at gate C6 still had my flight to LAX displayed.

I knew there was no way everyone boarded the plane that quickly, so I looked around, and I could see a family that had sat next to me was walking down the corridor. It turned out AA had changed our gate to C10. I got there after everyone had found places to sit, and so decided to stand, thinking we were about to board, but it took another 30 minutes, because people had to get off the airplane first, and then they had to clean it. All this time, there was not a single announcement about what was going on. The only announcements were that there was only space for 45 roller bags, and so everyone in groups 7-9 had better check them in now, to avoid further delaying our flight.

Finally, at about 21:00, they asked us to board. I got in my group (#4 of 9!) and once we were in the jetway, we just stopped. We waited in line in the jetway for 10-15 minutes. I heard staff in the front talking, asking passengers if the jetway was full, if people were still coming. One passenger went up and asked the staff woman at the head of the jetway and I heard them saying something about the pilot not having enough hours left to complete the flight. She sent an assistant to get a wheelchair (oh no, are we now disembarking the wheel-chair assisted passengers who are already on the plane?!) but just as the assistant was returning with the wheelchair, the staff woman said we could board, and told her assistant she did not need the wheelchair. Whew!

 Again, at no point did they announce what was going on. By now it was getting to 21:40, and I was worried about making my connection. The flight was scheduled to be 3:50 hrs, so would land around 23:30 LA time, and my CX flight was supposed to board at 23:50.

The flight itself was fine. I did, however, ask a flight attendant if they would make an announcement to ask passengers to let travelers with tight connections get off first, and she replied that they can do it, but that it depends on whether other passengers will cooperate. In my mind, I was thinking that passenger cooperation depends a lot on how the announcement is phrased, but, whatever. In fact, however, they did not make any announcement. I timed the disembarkation: the plane doors opened at 23:13, and I got off at 23:18 (since I was in row 17). Not bad. But again, pretty poor service. I’ve noticed AA does this; they seem to agree to do things to get a customer off their back, but then don’t follow through.

I was worried I would have to go through security again to get to the international terminal (like at Chicago’s ORD), which could take time since I did not have TSA PreCheck, but I did not, so I arrived to my CX flight gate with plenty of time. I was astonished to see that Cathay did not use the boarding passes for boarding the airplane: they used face recognition. You can see in the video below. Passengers are told to step on two green footprints on the ground and look at the monitor. The program identifies the face and then turns green and opens the gate. I was shocked that they used it, and that it seemed to work. In my case, the screen did not recognize me; it said to take off my mask (it was already off! Did they want me to take off my beard?) or see an attendant. The attendant was very patient as she dealt with me, and with a French passenger who had done something wrong with his quarantine statement and might not be allowed to board. She multitasked, and calmed him down, and took care of my my problem. I think the issue was that I had bought the ticket using my passport, but had submitted the quarantine information using my HK ID. After showing the ground staff my passport, ID and green quarantine QR code, she told me I was being upgraded to business class and gave me a new boarding pass, which I did not need to use, because now the computer recognized my face. I do wonder what picture(s) they have of me. And why are they doing this? Are people sneaking into Hong Kong with fake documents? One thing is for sure: this does remind every traveler to Hong Kong that Big Brother knows what you are doing. On the other hand, it is not just Hong Kong; today's NY Times has an article that says of the US, "Around 85 percent of the 221,000 daily visitors arriving from abroad are now verified by face, according to C.B.P. [Customs and Border Patrol] officials." In fact, it may be the US that wants Cathay Pacific to use facial recognition, not Hong Kong!

It is not fair to compare economy class on AA to business class on CX, but I do want to point out that my reading light on the AA flight did not work (it was not that they were all off; the reading light over the boy at the window seat did work). Not everything on my CX flight was perfect; if I plugged in my phone charger, the headphones had a loud buzz. But I have to say that the Airbus 350-1000 was so quiet that I could hear people near me crinkling a bag of potato chips or the flimsy water bottles; the crinkling made an annoyingly loud noise. (OK, now we are really descending in 1^st World Problems.) In a moment of boredom, I decided to measure the background sound of the airplane, and it was only 70-71 db, which the app says is the sound of traffic. (For comparison, “Conversation in restaurant, office, background music” are 60 db, which is half as loud as 70 db, and a garbage disposal is 80 db [twice as loud, though that would depend on the model; see quiet Insinkerators here]).  

Hong Kong still tests everyone arriving in the SAR. There are temporary stations set up in the airport arrival hallway, with plenty of people directing passengers. At the first station, I was given a green lanyard with a green card with a bar code on it (there were twelve desks for this, and the entire procedure of submitting travel document and receiving the lanyard took half a minute. Then I went to the next station, where there are over 30 cubicle’s separated by temporary sheets, like in a hospital. I sat down, pulled my mask down, and they took a sample from both nostrils with one medical swab and a sample from the throat with a second swab (the first one did not go that deep, but the second one nearly made me gag). Then I was given the samples in a bag (I don’t remember whether there were two vials or only one) and I went further down the hall and handed them to another team that took them, and scanned the bar code. And I was done! Granted, I was among the first off the plane, but there were so many stations and so many helpers, I’m sure everyone got through very quickly.

Efficiency in moving people is one thing that Hong Kong excels in. The plane touched down at 5:55 am, and I got off the plane at about 6:05. I was at the luggage claim area by 6:19, and that includes taking a train from the far end of the terminal to the arrivals area (and a 5 minute wait for the train). The luggage came out right away (I’ve never understood why it is so fast in this enormous airport, and so slow in STL, which is very small). I was in a taxi on my way to my friend’s apartment at 6:40. Amazing: 45 minutes from wheels on the ground to in taxi, even with all the quarantine protocols.

And I received a text that my covid test was negative at 10:10. I now have to do a rapid test daily, for seven days, and go to a health center for a PCR test in two, four, and six days. It seems a bit extreme (especially doing a rapid and PCR test on the same day) but Hong Kong authorities can be a bit enthusiastic about safety. I've always wondered how many people actually get injured on escalators, because in Hong Kong (including today in the airport), there are announcements that say "Please hold the handrail and don't walk." Not "Stand on the right and walk on the left" as in the Taipei subway system.

One thing that Hong Kong does is load 8 taxis at once. The taxis pull up in 8 spots, and staff guide passengers from the single queue to load at the 8 spots, so people don’t have to wait as long. After experiencing the HK system, I get impatient when I go to other airports and I have to watch one or at most 3 people get into their taxi, while we just wait. When you are as crowded as Hong Kong is, you develop tools to move crowds more quickly and efficiently. The assistants even ask you where you are going, and give you a “Taxi information card” with an estimate of what it should cost, to help avoid cheating. (I noticed that I paid a $3 “Airport fee” on my Uber ride to the STL airport, but I don’t see that I got anything from that; it looks more like a troll fee).

I don’t mean to complain. It is a thrill to be able to travel again. And when you are in a place, you read and learn about things you would never hear about while outside HK, because there, you are paying attention to a different place's local news. The SCMP (which I don’t usually trust, but often does have interesting information) has an article about Beijing’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs asking all HK consulates to provide a list of their properties in Hong Kong, and when and how they bought it. Apparently, many consulates have ignored the missive, which had a Sept. 22 deadline. Most consulates declined to comment, so this part of the article caught my attention:

A former Asian diplomat said the request was ‘clumsy’ and could be ‘counterproductive’.

‘I think it is probably to intimidate and unsettle the diplomatic community and as a not-so-gentle reminder that Hong Kong’s boundaries of acceptable conduct by diplomats have changed.’ The envoy said. ‘I doubt it will work—those very few, mainly Western consulates, inclined to behave in the way the Chinese fear are not going to stop supporting ‘democracy’ or calling out Chinese violations of human rights in Hong Kong, while the majority of consulates who never had any intention of doing so will just get irritated.’ (Ng Kang-chung and Jeffie Lam, “Beijing seeks details on HK assets owned by consulates.” Oct. 6, 2022, p. A3)

HK taxi, with multiple phones, and sanitizer. Orange box is air purifier. 

The article right next to it (“Slight increase in arrivals since easing of restrictions” by Rachel Yeo) notes that on Oct. 3, 768 tourists arrived in Hong Kong, and 471 left (this would not include me, since I enter with a HK ID). On January 24, 2020, before the coronavirus crisis, 22,872 visitors arrived. The article concludes with an economist saying that

It is possible to see air passenger capacity rebounding around 10 per cent at the moment to 30 percent of the pre-pandemic level by year-end. Still, there is a long way to go for Hong Kong to catch up as Singapore will reach 80 per cent soon.

Hong Kong is always competing with Singapore. And now, the terms of the competition are much less in its favor.