How did Hong Kong become Cambodia 2.0?

I still remember the glory of joining Lehman Brothers as the only sales analyst in the entire fixed income department. I was sitting at the prime area of the trading desks facing the Victoria Harbour in IFC. I would eat Japanese sushi for dinner and fine dine in Soho if not the Elements for the weekends. Parties on boat trips a few times a month with other equally accomplished young elites from all over the world.

What a luxurious life.

I hear stories though.

One of our co-year colleagues is an Asian originally from Xian but raised in Australia. We all hear that she has a loving boyfriend, half caucasian and half asian. Both of them went to uni in Sydney before the couple decided to start a banking career in Hong Kong. The guy was an IBD analyst at Macquarie. The girl was an equity derivatives sales at Lehman. They rented an apartment at 凱旋門. The guy paid for the rent, the girl paid for all the living expanses. It really looked like a surreal life that well surpassed the Hong Kong dream. We became good friends, nevertheless.

But their co-living relationship didn't last as long as they wished.

He was caught cheating on her. With a prostitute. When she was not home. According to what I heard, Hong Kong is indeed a tempting haven with baits ready to lure you into paid sex with just a few mouse clicks away. He probably didn't realize that prostitution was not banned in Hong Kong, unlike Australia. There were tons of underground websites with photos and detailed description about the sex services offered locally in Hong Kong. With just a few clicks online, the prostitutes would come to your apartment within half an hour, like a food delivery guy. No strings attached.

It seems like Hong Kong is truly amazing. So many exciting things going on. Hong Kong is known for its vibrant night life, Lan Kwai Fong, and red light districts, blah blah blah.

But it also reveals something tragic about Hong Kong.

That prostitution is legal in Hong Kong. Prostitution is common in Hong Kong. Prostitution is rampant in Hong Kong.

How did Hong Kong become Cambodia 2.0?

According to the very same friend from Australia, she told me that the Singaporean bankers in Hong Kong were crazily hitting on the Hong Kong analyst girls like my friend and said that they were too busy to have a girlfriend. The Singaporean bankers told their Hong Kong peers that they only wanted blow jobs in the hotels for 10 minutes in a situationship. Not relationship. Just oral sex partnership. And again, no strings attached.

Not only that, Singapore has institutionalised prostitution. Like the sex brothels in Macau, their prostitutes are legal and clean, with health certificates stating that they are STD free.

I grew up in Hong Kong.

I used to think that Hong Kong was a conservative, traditional world city with good loyal guys. Hey, I was one of you too perhaps.

That year at Lehman Brothers just shattered all my fantasies about working in Central and marrying a banker with a middle class life possibly residing in a two bedroom apartment in Happy Valley.

I do not like the fact that I came back to Asia for a banking job but I needed the money to get me to grad school or an MBA. Hong Kong is tax free and I don't have to pay rent if I live with my parents. I only planned to come back to Asia for 2-3 years, but unfortunately I ended up staying here til now.

I still regret coming back to Hong Kong, even after 20 years since I made that decision.

Hong Kong is the region that watches the most Japanese porn, according to pornhub.

Hong Kong guys have a skewed perspective towards women. They objectify women and they are perverts.

Some of them even like to sleep with Thai lady boys.

Talking about Thai lady boys, I wonder if you ever know how Hong Kong became Cambodia 2.0?

It is a very tragic thing that Hong Kong, as an entreport, has nothing to offer expats and tourists except for sex tourism as a last resort to gain international respect and attention.

I went to Thailand and Vietnam on a service trip when I studied at LPCUWC. I stayed at Pattaya and Hanoi for a little more than a week. My service trip guidance teacher, Warwick the Geography teacher from Warwick, allegedly brought back 4 Vietnamese prostitutes to his room at the motel, according to my friend Janet Mui. She is from Maryknoll. And another girl from Maryknoll, Mandy Ho, told me to go clubbing with her at Bangkok.

It really looks like a crazy world out there, where white expats were holding five Thai lady boys on a beach in Pattaya. It looks like Hong Kong, afterall, is not that nasty and obscene. It is all about comparison right?

If the white guys would fuck 6 Thai lady boys in a night, what can Hong Kong do to sustain our position as a competitive world city?

Sex tourism!

Yes, no doubt! It would be sex tourism!

Hong Kong thinks that sex tourism and Lan Kwai Fong nightlife is what keeps the expats coming to this city for business and investments!

And if we market ourselves as the only city in Asia that is AIDS and STD free, this really may sound like a lucrative and effective marketing campaign for Hong Kong!

That's how Hong Kong became Cambodia 2.0. Hong Kong now has the highest concentration of brothels in the world, including the Shanghai street night clubs, mongkok red light districts, 塘西風月, 一樓一, soho, Lan Kwai Fong, nearby Macau, 尖沙嘴大富豪夜總會, 泰國人妖非法入境性工作者 plus other underground sexual service providers online and offline. Hong Kong is bound to be the next up and coming Pompeii.

Thank you Asia, it is truly a group collaboration project that unites all the Southeast Asian countries around us.

Synergy!