Letter from Hong Kong - #20

Hong Kong consist of Hong Kong Island, Kowloon, New Territories and Outlying Islands. Within each area there are distinct districts. Today let's talk about Central, a district within Hong Kong Island. Today it is still thought of as the Financial District of Hong Kong and maybe of Asia, but many financial companies are moving out of the high rents of Central to other districts.

Above picture taken just in from of the Jardine House which was formerly called the Connaught Center.

The Jardine Building is on the left. Jardine House was built in 1972 and as I said above, was called Connaught Center; when built it was the tallest building in Asia with about fifty floors and about 600 ft tall. Today it does not even get a recognition when talking tallest buildings! The small white building in the center is the post office.

The building on the right is the International Financial Center, Tower Two; with eighty-eight floors, after the International Commerce Center in Kowloon it is the second tallest building in Hong Kong. Note all the construction in the bottom right. This is a major harbor project that has been going on at least four years; I remember it was in progress on our last trip here; then it seemed to be just beginning.

I like the tram ride between Central and Causeway Bay: slow so nice to view the the sights.

Central has the longest outdoor escalator or moving sidewalk in the world as seen in the upper center of this photo (not a good shot of it!). The escalator moves downward in the morning to take people from the upper levels of Central to work and then moves upwards beginning around 10:00am.

Central is not just about finance; lots of places to shop and eat!