HOTEL HONG KONG
KAI TAK is a brutal little valve. The revolving door at the entrance to Hotel Hong Kong, it is continually turning - drawing people in, propelling others out. The problem is that lately it has been spinning in the wrong direction. This year, it is my friends who seem to be checking out.
Kai Tak is slaughtering my address book. When I transferred diaries at the beginning of the year, I discovered that something like a third of names in my phone number section had pocketed their annual bonus and passed through departures for the last time- back to Britain, Australia, Canada, America, with nothing more than a miserable farewell dinner and a postcard. Gone for ever. It is an epidemic.
Of course, there are plenty of new people to replace them. The revolving door is doing its stuff. Visit Lan Kwai Fong, Mid-levels, Lamma, Discovery Bay and the air is practically rancid with the smell of airline-issue, lemon wet-wipes. Hong Kong is crawling with jet-fresh, nouveaux expatriates from the recession-hit wastelands of Sloane Square, the City of London, Wall Street, Sydney and LA, together with an exodus of earnest ABCs and BBCs 'locating' their Chinese heritage.
You can't miss them, even after they have changed out of their airline socks. There is something desperate, almost deranged about them. Behind their Phileas Fogg masks of charm and optimism, pound the frightened hearts of the drowning. 'Where can I geta job?', 'How much rent should I pay?'. Their hands jab with a crushing handshake and a $25 machine-printed business card (address: a friend's couch, telephone number 1081).
Conversation with them is impossible. They only want to know one thing. One big question that seems to have burned their otherwise normal brains to a spinal stump. Allow the slightest gap into the conversation, the shortest pause, the most infinitesimal silence and they slot it in: 'So, how long have you been in Hong Kong?' Now, in Hong Kong you can stop any Westerner in the street and interrogate them on income, apartment size and shoe cost. This is perfectly acceptable behaviour. But to ask long-term residents how long they have been here is the height of rudeness because it implies that one day they will have to leave. It is an attack on the central myth upon which they build their lives - namely that Hong Kong is their home. You might as well ask a cancer victim: 'So, how long have you got left?' Of course, it was all so different when you arrived, heroically dragging your backpack from guesthouse to guesthouse. Then, there was something faintly ridiculous about long-term expatriate residents, embalmed by barbecue smoke and generally lobotomised by the colonial life. How could they ever go back to the motherland when their only obvious skills were bossing amahs, organising junk parties and guessing the weight of the charity ball cake.
But gradually you got sucked in: you found work, stopped getting furniture out of the bin and started worrying about the dining room colours. You stopped collecting name cards, hired an amah, exchanged your video for a laser disc player and began to believe the solitary perfectionist in the Kenwood advertisement was having a good time. You sacked people, invited only celebrity brand names to the colourful party in your wardrobe and decided that everything you owned had to be functional and beautiful.
In short you bought the hype.
Then, one day, you find your backpack. That little emblem of freedom, optimism and youth - crushed beneath a Louis Vuitton suitcase set and a box of unwanted PR gifts. It smells like Mike Tyson's untouched sports kit. It is furry with mould. It is ugly, nylon and - above all - it is cheap. You pop it in a bin bag, wait until nightfall, then carry it to an Urban Council incinerator. You are not the person you used to be.
It is about this time that the revolving door suddenly switches into reverse. Your friends start leaving - a few have managed to face their old backpacks but most leave with freight containers and a pit-stop in Bali before drowning themselves in an anonymous world of cable TV, Sunday soccer and nappies. It is about this time the question: 'How long have you been here?' starts to sound a lot like: 'How much longer are you going to be sticking around?' WHEN TO LEAVE WITH this in mind, I took the trouble of conducting an exhaustive poll of exhausted expats. Provided you have saved enough to pay the tax bill, when should you leave Hong Kong? These were the results. It is time to leave Hong Kong when: * The barman at the Neptune gives you a drink on the house.
* You say: 'There's some good stuff on telly tonight.' * You automatically judge the square footage within moments of entering any apartment.
* Your cute 'friend' in the Express Bar becomes the mamasan.
* Construction work in your building ceases.
* You realise that the only time you are experiencing warmth from another source is when you take a shower.
* Your sheets have a brand name.
* You find canapes 'awfully samey'.
* You realise there is such a thing as a free lunch.
* You complain about Filipina amahs using your lift.
* You are upset at not being invited to a David S. Davies' roof-top jacuzzi session.
* You subscribe to Hong Kong Tatler.
* Your only letters are bills and the Dinner for Six newsletter.
* You understand the Container Terminal Nine dispute.
* Your passport is only two years old, but full.
* All the gweilos start looking the same.
LIFE AFTER HONG KONG AS for what to do if you haven't saved enough to get ahead of the taxman, I took advice from Dr Marc Faber, the celebrated investment analyst. Normally a consultation with the pessimistic Dr Doom costs the equivalent of a couple of Mid-levels car park spaces. But for you, dear reader, I am going to pass on his hot investment tips absolutely free. Hey, I like you.
Presuming you can afford to put aside $10,000 a month, the good doctor recommends channelling the cash into a savings account for one year. 'Then,' he says, 'take out the lump sum, buy a collection of good books and travel the world for two years. Hong Kong is an unhealthy place. Everyone talks about investing in stocks when surely the most important thing we should be doing is investing in knowledge and experience.' And if you haven't thrown away your backpack - that's money saved.
