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The first time I visited Hong Kong was in 1987. The ferry rocked into port, foghorn blaring as the city stirred beneath a greasy morning smog. After setting foot on the dock I was dragged into a ten-dollar arm wrestling match by a seamy congregation wearing wife beaters and sucking on cheap cigarettes. Moments later my bag was stolen, prompting me into an amateur parkour trip down alleyways in a bid to retrieve it. No dice. If only I'd taken up an offer ten minutes earlier to pawn all my stuff.That was Shenmue 2 of course, Yu Suzuki's Dreamcast love letter and geographically inaccurate depiction of Asia's foremost economic dragon. Today, Hong Kong is a construct of glass empires, marble flooring and ambient downlighters; a model of capitalist power built on low taxation and free trade. Settled in a sun glittered crescent mountain range, skyscrapers iced with video screens are powered by an engine of sharply suited businessmen in black-rimmed Gucci spectacles, snaking like electrons between a network of overpasses, a tangle of live-wire roads, and dishevelled, crate-stacked backstreets.
Polished corporate landmarks, Prada billboards, and extravagant shopping plazas shape an unparalleled commercial future. Surging across the river from Hong Kong Central and crashing headlong into Kowloon bay, Nathan Road's expensive doorstep is flooded with glitz until Jordan, where the remnants of the China that once was - ancient high-rises caked in fifty years of dirt, stripped light bulbs, and a web of dead steel signs - steadfastly holds its ground.
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