Just Saying | Not the Darjeeling Limited: The story of a post-colonial mess
Yonden Lhatoo laments the deterioration of his hometown after the end of British colonial rule, contrasting it with Hong Kong's success story
On holiday in Darjeeling, I've been thinking about how little people in Hong Kong know about this world-famous tourist destination, my original hometown before I settled down in our city.
To begin with, most people these days wrongly identify it with Hollywood director Wes Anderson's whimsical 2007 film, The Darjeeling Limited.
That offbeat comedy was shot on location in the northern Indian state of Rajasthan, and the desert landscapes, camels and turbaned folk depicted on screen have absolutely no connection with the Darjeeling I was born in.
It's the equivalent of filming Chungking Express in Inner Mongolia and everyone assuming that's what Hong Kong is like.
Darjeeling is located within India's geographical borders but was once part of the independent kingdom of Sikkim, with China, Nepal and Bhutan as neighbours.
Like Hong Kong, Darjeeling was ruled by the British during the heyday of the empire, but that's where the similarity ends.