Jackhammers were going on the main street of Kowloon, Nathan Road, and on the main streets of Hong Kong Island. The contrasts get to you. Huge, modern apartment complexes and, from all the windows, bamboo poles from which hang laundry and plants. Incredible poverty, like the squatters' shacks built of driftwood, tin, and cardboard by refugees from the mainland, just down the hill from the magnificent mansions of Victoria Peak and the exquisite estates on Causeway Bay. Hong Kong can be the best and the worst place to be.
People spend their entire lives on boats, never knowing what it feels like to live on land.
The land is crowded. The Chinese are used to living five, eight, or more in one tiny room. Enormous quantities of the goods sold in Hong Kong are from the mainland, which may be one of the reasons why Hong Kong, unlike Taiwan, seems unworried about the giant next door. China needs the outlet. Hong Kong's water supply comes from the mainland.