My Take | Think twice before leaving Hong Kong for Britain
- An expat reader offers up-to-date information and advice from a long trip to Britain which exposes the wide gulf between the country as advertised and as it really is
Years ago, a long stay in Britain was one of the most memorable overseas trips I ever had. I once visited the British Museum over four consecutive days and that was the most educational experience of my life, well, aside from going to college. But it bored my then girlfriend to tears and no doubt that contributed to our break-up. She was Irish and considered the museum an imperialist institution, which it most certainly was and is. The Elgin Marbles, anyone?
But I digress.
Well, there is a vast gulf between visiting and living in the country. As a British friend wrote recently, the bureaucracy there in both the private and public sectors, and the general irresponsibility and inefficiency, create a toxic combination that “makes everyday life nearly always stressful and at times a literally Kafkaesque experience”.
06:15
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A long-time expatriate reader in Hong Kong has responded to that earlier column (August 2) and told me his daughter and her fiancé are relocating back to Hong Kong from London to start a family.
Visiting their children and about to become a grandfather, he has been in the UK in the past 1½ months.
“Apart from London we have taken the opportunity to explore both Cornwall and Scotland. For me this is the first time to travel extensively in the UK on trains and in a car,” he wrote.
You think traffic is bad in Hong Kong?
