On July 1, 1997, Hong Kong was passed to Chinese sovereignty by the British.  While it is now officially part of China, it is a special administrative region that functions with a certain level of autonomy, and is significantly different from mainland China.  Because of its history as a colony, it is home to many expatriates from around the world, and these people have shaped its culture.

Hong Kong is only 422 square miles, a little smaller than the city of Los Angeles.  Despite it’s diminutive size, it has nearly 7 million people, and parts of it are among the most densely populated as anywhere in the world.  Hong Kong’s birthrate is among the lowest in the world, less than half of the 2.1 children per woman required to maintain population stability, but it continues to grow because of immigration.  There are consulates from 107 countries on the tiny island.

Cantonese is the most prevalent language in Hong Kong, as opposed to the Mandarin spoken by the vast majority of mainland Chinese.  Because of its decades spent as a British colony, English is also very common.