Batgung

General Hong Kong information

geoexpat.com has links to all kinds of stuff about HK. Should be the first stop for anyone looking for general practical information about living in Hong Kong.

And if you've got small children, also check out geoexpat's sister site, geobaby.com.

HKExpats is a ‘comprehensive’ site that’s driven primarily by members-only discussion forums and ‘wikis’ for Hong Kong information. Proceeds from the site go to charity. Admirable in theory, and some parts of the site, e.g. the ‘wiki’ on local vegetables, are quite useful.

Asiaxpat.com is a big commercial site with an active question-and-answer style forum. The quality of information varies greatly.

The Hong Kong Weather Underground is Hong Kong's premier weather site, featuring up-to-the-minute weather info, and an active, interesting discussion board. Weather Guru Clarence has a revamped, better-than-ever version of the site up.

openrice.com provides a searchable entre into the vast world of Hong Kong restaurants. It's comprehensive and features lots of reviews. We've linked the English restaurant search page, but there's a Chinese version available, too.

The World of Lily Wong includes a selected archive of Larry Feign's brilliant Lily Wong comic strip, which ran in Hong Kong from 1986-2001. Essential Hong Kong insights aplenty.

The Hong Kong Standard ain't much, but at least you can read its news stories, unlike Hong Kong's other English-language newspaper, which for reasons of its sheer distastefulness will not be named here.

Hong Kong Blogs and commentary

The Hong Kong cybersphere is blessed with some very high-quality personal websites and blogs. Here are some of the best.

Some batgung favorites:

Big Lychee A protege of the Artist Formerly (or maybe still) Known as Hemlock takes up the reins. Links to at least parts of the erstwhile Hemlock site are available.

Ordinary Gweilo lives in the New Territories and aims at providing an 'out of midlevels' view of Hong Kong, a goal to be commended. Sensible commentary on current issues found here.

Gweipo is an entertaining writer with a long history of overseas-living experiences. Lots of posts on schools and education, fitting in in a new culture, and other matters of first concern for expats.

Ulaca is an excellent blogger: he writes well, and he pursues a worthy project, i.e. applying the wisdom of G K Chesteron and C S Lewis to life in Hong Kong.

Happy in Hong Kong's Greg and Sonia are Hong Kong newbies, and they're documenting their transition into life here with considerable technological brio: text, photos, podcasts, video and various Web 2.0 approaches are all utilized, with some helpful explanatory links, too.

Other sites we recommend:

The Big White Guy A very good-looking weblog that’s a nice introduction for Hong Kong neophytes.

Chase Me Ladies, I'm in the Cavalry is something a bit different, and still has Hong Kong ties, although its author no longer lives here. Hemlock describes it as 'mou lei tau' for westerners, and that's about right. Also see Harry's Killer Fact page.

Daai Tou Lam Diary is maintained by an American expat living on Peng Chau island. He provides prolific, earnest commentary on Hong Kong and world politics.

Diaspoir.net is run by another of our regular contributors, Dave -- aka odaiwai. Lots of computer stuff, and also funny descriptions of HK daily life.

Fumier is a Brit in Hong Kong who's not happy with Hong Kong driving skils . . . .

Hongkietown both fulfills and upends some stereotypes. He’s a man about town -- especially certain parts of Wanchai -- but he's also articulate and even reflective about 'living the expat life'.

Our frequent contributor Ron has his own blog at SeeLai.com, and he's put up some amazing posts. If you want the skinny on doing, uh, the business in China, this is place to go. Warning: this site features lots of soft-core pics of Asian women.

Sun Gai Gweilo provides a nice mix of photos and observations on life in the New Territories. Also lots of internal combustion . . . .

Hong Kong hiking sites

Roz's Hiking Pages Fun, photo-rich Hong Kong hiking site from Roz. The site covers all of Hong Kong's major trails, and many other hikes, too. Roz even invites you to come along for walks!

Hong Kong Outdoors is a good-looking, useful introduction to the eponymous subject. There's solid practical information on Hong Kong as well.

Hong Kong Trampers also offer weekly organized walks open to anyone.

Language sites

The Cantonese Sheik is a remarkable site with an active discussion board aimed at people learning the Wah. You can find posts with unlikely but inspiring opening sentences such as 'I live near Belfast, in Northern Ireland, and would like to learn Cantonese.' Waah!