"Welcome To Hong Kong"

"Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you didn't do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines, sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover." - Mark Twain

When Chris and I decided to move to Hong Kong we were sitting in our favorite window seat at a pub called Stormies in Lan Kwai Fang. It was the Fall of 2005, and we had been living and working for the past two years in Fuzhou, a Tier C city of about 9 million people situated along the Taiwan Straits in Mainland China. Fuzhou is a tough place to live and an endlessly challenging place to work, so the company, recognizing our need for more Western lifestyle options, offered us the opportunity of keeping a place in either Shanghai or Hong Kong where we could "escape" on weekends and holidays to enjoy a more international urban environment.

Although we've always enjoyed spending time in Shanghai and have several friends and colleagues working there, the lure of Hong Kong was hard to resist, and we quickly opted to locate our "escape hatch" here on the harbor. Having lived for so long in New York, the sophisticated international flavor of Hong Kong was a tremendous draw; like New York, there are people living, working and visiting here from all over the world. The city was "returned" to China in 1998, but the British influence still lingers over the city's culture, giving it an immediate connection to the Western world. Add to that, its setting on one of the most spectacular harbors in the world, and the choice for us was easy.

Speaking of New York, for those of you following along on my East Coast Dash Diaries of last month, here are three entries from my visit to New York that might provide an interesting glimpse of city life on the other side of the globe:

June 12 - Empire State Building
June 13 - Kura-Belle
June 14 - Times Square, NYC

Today's shot was taken from my seat on the ferry crossing the harbor. Hong Kong is divided by Victoria Harbor into two main sections: Hong Kong Island and Kowloon. This skyline shot is the sweeping urban coastline along the Hong Kong Island side. Kowloon is behind me and across the harbor. Attached to the Mainland, Kowloon is the most densely populated place on the planet, consisting of ancient neighborhoods, winding streets and some of the most renowned shopping areas in the world - definitely a blip for another day!

The Hong Kong Island side is where we live, and although it's crowded, it's much more normal than Kowloon in terms of urban living conditions. Hong Kong Island is divided up into neighborhoods much like New York: Soho, Wyndham, Central, Wanchai, Northpoint, Causeway Bay, Victoria Peak, Mid-Levels are just a few of the neighborhoods just on the other side of this beautiful sweeping skyline. After spending so many years in New York, I often wondered where else I could ever live that would give me as many options, but once I started exploring Hong Kong, the answer was clear.

Chris and I still talk about what it felt like to walk into our tiny perch on the harbor for the first time. Neither of us could quite believe it was actually ours! But as we stood looking out across the lights of the harbor that evening, suddenly a circling neon sign lit up on a building across the way and we knew we were meant to be here. The sign said simply: "Welcome To Hong Kong."