My life: Mike Smith

My Hong Kong ties go back generations. My English grandfather moved to Shanghai long before the second world war, and later joined the volunteer regiment in Hong Kong as a captain. My father was a second lieutenant. Both were captured [by the Japanese]. My grandfather died in Sham Shui Po prison camp.

My parents were born expatriates. Mother was an American raised in Manila's colonial heyday; her father ran the port. When my parents moved to a tea plantation in India, they sent me to boarding school in England. I was seven when I arrived at Lancing College, which was also attended at the time by Raymond and Thomas Kwok. I used to commute on a BOAC Comet 4, the first passenger jet, which had to stop seven times between India and Heathrow. Of the first nine Comets built, five crashed.

At 19, I was looking for anything to get out of the UK. I sent in many applications, including to the British Army, Ben Line Steamers and the British South African police. The first reply was from the Hong Kong police force, which in 1973 was like a boy's own wonder world.

I am not sure the police will like my book [ In the Shadow of the Noonday Gun]. A lot of my stories are set around Wan Chai, where I was based for two years in the CID [Criminal Investigation Department]. It was in the old days, when prisoners got beaten up and corruption was rife; pre-ICAC [Independent Commission Against Corruption]. Hong Kong has changed radically, and we're a better place for it. The culture then, inherited from the British Army, was that all police stations had an officers' mess. Senior officers often made junior officers go there after work. Drinking was a big part of the culture. I left the force in 1978, prompted partly by seeing officers retire in their 50s looking like they were nearly dead.

Back then, there was great uncertainty about China. They were firing verbal arrows across the border and the colony was firing them back. In my first few months in the force, I ranked No2 at Ta Kwu Ling [on the border]. Your morning would consist of accompanying an army officer and a team of troops to each border check point. The guy on the other side would stare you out, and then you'd stare him out. Then he'd bang his rifle down on the ground, and you'd bang your rifle down. Then you'd move onto the next crossing and do it again. This was only a few years after the Cultural Revolution and the handover wasn't on the radar. China wanted Hong Kong and Taiwan back. The thinking was that Taiwan would revert first, which we obviously got completely wrong.

The force gave you awesome responsibility. As a kid, I was running a CID team, investigating murders and attacks. The chopper was the weapon of choice and there was an incident every week. I had no fear. Looking back, I should have had, because triads then were ruthless. [But] a lot of the things we saw were shocking and I wasn't immune. At times I wondered, "How do I deal with this?". I started officer training in April 1973. In the six months I was in training, the ICAC was established.