Exclusive | David Wilson reflects on his time as former governor of Hong Kong: ‘It was the most worthwhile job in the world’
Penultimate colonial governor David Wilson remembers meeting Xi Jinping’s ‘extremely interesting’ father, drafting the Sino-British Joint Declaration and his confidence that China will keep its promises
Arthur’s Seat near the centre of Edinburgh is a trek David Wilson is familiar with as the spritely 82-year-old hikes there often when he is in native Scotland. What took him by surprise one day though was when he, in a tracksuit soaked with sweat, got stopped by a group of young Hongkongers.
“Gong duk, is it you?” they called after him in amazement in Cantonese.
“I said to them: ‘How on earth did you recognise me?’” Wilson said in an interview with the Post. “‘Did you know I live in Edinburgh?’ I asked them. They didn’t. Well, they were extremely young when I left Hong Kong.
“I said I was not gong duk anymore,” he said laughing, referring to his previous official title of “Governor of Hong Kong” in Cantonese.
That’s just one – and, in Wilson’s own words – “classic” example of how he has been remembered since leaving in 1992 after five years as the penultimate colonial governor.