The Yellow Agent from Hong Kong

We took a taxi from Chek Lap Kok airport, which was built on land reclaimed off Lantau Island to the west of Hong Kong Island. I had been here once before in 1996, and recalled my shock when the plane literally grazed the rooftops of Kowloon on approach at the old Kai Tak airport before the British ceded their leases back to the Chinese. I had spoken with the pilot disembarking at the time, who told me the former Kai Tak Airport runway was one of the shortest in the world; required the steepest angle of descent; and, was one of, if not the, most difficult landings in the world for any pilot.

On this and every morning, crowds of Chinese, and a dwindling number of expats, jostle for space along sidewalks overflowing with shops selling their meats, fish, and fowl. Ramshackle huts, and stores that seem to sell assortments of everything, mix with glitzy high-end purveyors wedged into the ground floors of modern stone and glass skyscrapers. All manner of merchants pushing carts, reminds one the culture has always been Chinese dominated.

The taxi driver almost killed us making a U-turn by the Star Ferry Terminal, when swinging us around to the Mandarin Hotel entrance on Connaught Road – the main commercial road, running through Hong Kong’s Central District along the harborside. Christine, as with all locals accustomed to Hong Kong taxi drivers, whose credentials seem to be purchased rather than requiring a test, wasn’t fazed by a near miss of a truck piggy backing two Lorries of live chickens.