One of the best things about Hong Kong is the wide choice of public transport that is available. Taxis are cheap and easy to find (unlike, say, Singapore, where there always seem to be queues of people waiting for taxis), the MTR and KCR are fast and very frequent (much better than London), and we…

The chairman of Hopewell Holdings said students and residents may be prevented from using the lifts at his firm’s headquarters, apparently in response to a protest against a plan to build two hotels in Wan Chai. Sir Gordon Wu Ying-sheung said, however, that he was not threatening anyone. The lifts have been used as a…

One thing I love about the South China Morning Post is that they always seem to find room to publish letters from mad people. Not so many these days, but you still get a few: I refer to the letter “Right denied” (November 21). The correspondent must know that she is living in China. Surely…

I was reading this in the SCMP, and I’m not sure what to make of it: Men who go to the mainland to find a wife have characteristics that make them more likely than most to become wife beaters … most of these men have strong egos and want an obedient wife. They apparently feel…

Phil has found an article about domestic helpers attending computer courses at the YMCA in Tsim Tsa Tsui. A few things strike me as odd about this piece: The idea that maids could earn more money in Hong Kong by virtue of their computer skills. There is a so-called minimum wage for domestic helpers, and…

Further to the recent theft of some DVDs from my mail box, the Post Office do seem genuinely concerned and even sent a bloke round to take a look and to apologize again. The management company keep calling my wife and apologizing but are too scared to speak to me directly. However, Amazon are the…

Visiting the doctor in Hong Kong is quite an experience. I tend to avoid going unless I think it’s something serious, but my wife was brought up to believe that the doctor can help even if you’ve just got the common cold (or “flu” as it mysteriously seems to be known by most people). Patients…

Coming to Hong Kong after living in London for so many years, one of the positive differences is the much lower level of crime and the general feeling that it is a safe place to live. It was therefore a rather rude shock to find that someone had stolen a package of DVDs that I…

Monday 17 November It’s the middle of November, but the outdoor swimming pool is still open. Perhaps this is compensation for the delayed opening at the start of summer caused by the panic over SARS, but very welcome nonetheless. Swimming in the open air is much better than being inside. Most people think its too…

The Guardian has been losing columnists at an alarming rate – mostly to The Times, which apparently pays twice as much. This seems to have prompted them to employ an 84 year-old woman to bleat about how some bad people in Hong Kong stole money out of her bank account. This is more of a…