Chinese & Colonial Contrast: Hong Kong In My Eyes

For nearly the entirety of my childhood, my connection to my family’s geographic heritage was pictures, stories, and food. Other than the occasional family vacation to international waters, I had never even left the United States. I had, however, learned about Hong Kong and its bustling streets, innumerable bakeries, barbeque joints, and beautiful architecture. My grandparents both lived in Hong Kong, and my mother had visited multiple times as a young adult. To me, however, Hong Kong was as foreign as any other international city. When I got the opportunity last summer to travel to Hong Kong with my friends and family, I was elated to finally connect fantasy to reality. 

There were other perspectives at play going into the trip, however. I was keen to see the extreme economic inequality and historical influence inherited from British colonialism, especially in the context of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) beginning to dissolve the “One Country, Two Systems” relationship between Hong Kong and mainland China. 

Though most of its development occurred under British rule, Hong Kong shares many characteristics of Chinese metacities. Extreme density and mixed-use zoning were ubiquitous; we would often hear clamoring of apartment residents above while eating at restaurants. High Speed Rail signs indicated connections to Shenzhen at major stops along Hong Kong’s world class mass transit rail system. Similarly to mainland China, we saw how Hong Kong’s urban/suburban/rural divide was not characterized by sprawl familiar to Western cities, rather, the city seemed to give way to complete rural area once we rode the train far enough out. This was also a product of geographical challenges, namely large hills and slopes. 

Of course, explicitly Chinese symbology, culture and history were commonplace. For example, beautiful Kowloon park featured banyan trees and wide spaces for Tai Chi practitioners, as well as a literal heritage center. One of my favorite pictures from the trip was taken in Nan Lian Garden - a classical Chinese garden attached to a Buddhist temple. In places like these, I saw how Hong Kong blends historical beauty with modern practicality. Just behind the trees, towering apartment complexes and public housing centers provide homes to thousands of Hong Kongers in the Chinese equivalent of suburbia. From what I understand, Modernist theory likely influenced much of Hong Kong’s development as it filled out land constrained by mountains and seas.

Nan Lian Garden. Taken during my 2025 trip.

An interesting dynamic I hope to explore further is Hong Kong vs mainland Chinese preservation; during the Cultural Revolution, temples, religious sites and building practices were destroyed or abandoned as China looked aggressively to the future. As Hong Kong was not under CCP control, it didn’t face this problem. I hope someday to travel across China and see for myself how this dynamic actually manifested.

Nonetheless, Hong Kong’s relationship with England, colonization, and capitalism is inextricable from its character. Under British rule, the formerly rural and poor area became an international financial center and commercial port, transforming business across the region and the world. As it has in every colony and former colony, however, the cost of this expansion was rampant inequality. We saw Hong Kong’s wealth gap firsthand walking through tunnels connecting metro stations, where unhoused/low-income Hong Kongers begged for food or cash. One man asked for money to finance a medical condition that turned his leg black and shriveled. Just a block away, there was the biggest Gucci store I had ever seen. 

A map I made in QGIS displaying Hong Kong economic inequality. Looking at the data now, it’s clear that what I saw in Kowloon and Central was only a taste of the true divide.*

In a way, I see Hong Kong and its design in the same way I see myself. It is a city composed of both internal Chinese heritage and external Western influence. It fits cleanly into neither category, and it benefits from colonial history, economy, and infrastructure while being laden with the guilt that time wrought. Hong Kong is where nature lies with concrete, British tea is sold in Dim Sum restaurants, and a religion brought by Western missionaries is proclaimed in Chinese characters. It is a city of coexistence, where contrast is weaved into the fabric of its design.

A building in Kowloon. Taken during my 2025 trip.

* Note: certain areas of southern Kowloon are so commercialized that very little housing of any kind exists there, leading to the white areas. This map also does not show all of Hong Kong; it focuses on the general area I traveled to.