Comparing Hong Kong to Bangkok
Wednesday, 31 Jan 2007 | Life in Asia
After having been in Bangkok for so long, it was all the more interesting to be in Hong Kong from a western point of view. While some people claim all asian cities are the same (with the exception of Singapore), I really disagree with that view. I’ve gotten used to being in Bangkok, so here are a few things I noticed when I was in Hong Kong.
- People in Hong Kong are rude. And that is not a nice thing to experience when you’re used to the soft and gentle nature of the Thai. People seemingly don’t care about anything, service in restaurants can get quite bad and nobody seems to smile in that city. It was strange, coming from the land of smiles.
- Hong Kong is a true melting pot. There are people from all over the world and the city seemingly has been succesful in mixing cultural aspects from both the east and the west. In Bangkok, anybody who is not Thai is more an outsider and certainly not part of the system.
- Bangkok is warmer. And I don’t mean this in the temperature sense. It is really easy to connect with people in Thailand, even Thai people. While perhaps they are not the deepest of friendships, they are very nice. From what I’ve seen so far I think it would be really difficult to meet people in Hong Kong, although I guess the highly active expat societies will certainly help in that sense.
- Expat embracement. We all know (right?) Hong Kong was until recently ofcourse a British colony. It is also seen as the gateway to China. As a result, there are people from all over the world and they are there to stay. It seems expat life has settled more into society than it has in Thailand. People relocate here and stay for countless years, while people tend to leave Bangkok after a few years.
- Cars are newer. And I don’t just mean the Mercedes driving elite. All cars are newer and to find an old truck with thick black clouds of exhaust fumes is quite a task, while they can not be missed in Bangkok.
- People have more money. Cars are an example of it, but in general it is pretty obvious that this is a much wealthier city than Bangkok is. While there are big groups of people slaving away for meager wages in Hong Kong too, there is a much larger middle class and higher class.
- No chaos in traffic. It is such a relief to see cars just steadily flowing around the streets and not having to worry (or just having been lucky) about getting stuck in traffic somewhere.
- Things are more organized. Not just traffic, but everything seems more organized and better taken care off than in Thailand. Which I guess you can do in a more affluent city.
As a final note, I want to state my amazement at the incredible percentage of people wearing glasses. My own non-scientific and hardly credible research (it consisted on guestimating based on a sample group of about 20 people I passed) says that at least 50-60% of Hong Kongers wear glasses. I think I have read somewhere that this has something to do with the MSG food additive, but I don’t know for sure.