In this city, it’s all about the connections, which is why it’s not uncommon to come across ‘interior designers’ with few formal qualifications beyond family ties.

The city was previously among the most civil of societies, its law-abiding citizens famously averse to confrontation. Pushed too far, however, sections of society have turned to disorder, supported by the public at large.

With Wi-fi now instantly connecting the planet, we look back at the various ways mankind has sought to converse

So close, so similar, and yet so beguilingly different. Hong Kong’s neighbour looked like the British colony but had its own social issues, including slavery in the form of the ‘coolie trade’.

Right-wing politics and outright racism towards other ‘Asians’ are often ignored by modern post-colonial academics.

Muslim seamen from around Asia, many of them stereotypical drunken sailors, are remembered in Hong Kong road names.

With much of the population repulsed by milk, dairy products have long been considered luxury items.

Denis Pritt represented Ho Chi Minh in Hong Kong, Jomo Kenyatta in Kenya, and worked with Singapore’s Lee Kuan Yew.

Although largely a matter of cleanliness, you wouldn’t want to track ‘bad luck’ into your house, would you?

The late writer and TV presenter’s father, a one-time Japanese POW, is buried in Sai Wan Bay.

The disappearance of identification markers during the current civil unrest has helped fuel loss of confidence in the police force.

From the mid-19th century onwards all licensed brothels in Hong Kong were run by women.

Wartime food shortages undoubtedly drove the starving to eat human flesh, even if there are no first-hand, verifiable accounts.

When it comes to their people and politics, the two Chinese special administrative regions flanking the Pearl River delta could hardly be more different.

Amateur dramatics provided a welcome relief from the malaise of boredom that gripped colonial life in Hong Kong and elsewhere.

Viewed as a parallel police force, the use of gangsters to enforce public policy is not without precedent.

The former colonial chief secretary’s genuine friendships with Hong Kong Chinese baffled many a European, with a Hong Kong governor, David Trench, once exclaiming ‘Whose side are you f***ing on?’

During the Vietnam war, regular press conferences were held at the roof terrace bar in Saigon’s Rex Hotel when a breakdown of the day’s hostilities, casualties and ‘successes’ were given

Days on the water are the perfect setting for discreet dalliances but beware – once you’ve set off, you’re stuck with whoever else is on board.

Hong Kong-based New Zealander Brian Brake shot images of Peking between the Great Leap Forward and the Cultural Revolution, including candid photos of Mao Zedong, but it was his Indian monsoon series that became his best-known work.

While tycoons cried racism, their ships were breaking the UN embargo on trading with China – and their mainland families were under threat.

Japanese linguist Cyril Wild and Anglo-Irish poet and translator Arthur Cooper helped monitor signal traffic throughout the Pacific from Allied wireless facilities in Hong Kong and Singapore.

The draconian laws being mooted to deal with Hong Kong’s civil unrest were first enacted by a competent leadership – unlike that of today.

The practice might seem like a relic of the past, but it is still fairly common in many parts of the world, including Hong Kong and mainland China.

The two instances when China opened itself up to criticism were swiftly followed by a crackdown on critics who stepped forward, something Hong Kong needs to be wary of.

From Lennon Wall equivalents to a largely absent leadership, there are several striking similarities between the 1967 riots and the current unrest in Hong Kong.

Kenelm Digby sought solace from early-uttered, ill-considered words in Asia, and then New Zealand, but could never completely escape the nightmares of the past.

The prolific British writer who spent three decades in Japan as well as a brief period in Hong Kong is infamous for the poem behind the last successful prosecution for blasphemy in Britain – The Love that Dares to Speak Its Name.

The force is faces a serious crisis of confidence as public trust plummets. But who is really to blame?