What continually amazes me about Hong Kong is the speed with which the cost of living is increasing. A friend told me yesterday that his landlord wanted to put up the rent by 30%! In the end, they settled on 13%, which is still a smack in the face. The mainland Chinese continue to get richer and richer (or at least a percentage of them), yet they have nothing to spend their money on. There is really very little to buy there, so they resort to material goods: cars, watches, clothing and handbags. But then why pay a high sales tax on all of those when you can take a trip to Hong Kong where there is no sales tax and the selection is better too? (Plus it’s less likely to be a fake!) And then while you’re here, why not buy an apartment? It’s a tangible asset, which is how most Chinese seem to invest…. Property and Stocks; they may go down in value, but neither of them are going to leave you with nothing, and they’ll likely go up in the long term right?

Yet for many in Hong Kong, they have been mere spectators to the super housing bubble and arrival of retail outlet after retail outlet. In fact, on my street, as I walk out the front door, the first 6 shops are real estate agents, one after another. Then there’s a supermarket (one of the duopoly), before you reach the first real shop, a dry cleaners (or I suppose you could say Chinese Laundry if you wanted to be funny). Old housing is being demolished and being replaced by new right in front of you. The other week I saw scaffolding and boards go up; a week later the boards were down, and so was the entire building. No doubt it will be replaced by some new condo advertising yet more luxury living.

So here is Hong Kong today. A city where new and old live side-by-side. Where you can have extravagant fine dining spots with a bare-bones noodle parlour just next door. Or where you can go for a swim in a beautiful pool, while all of the envious neighbours look on. All you can do is just watch and take it in…