Commentary
Twenty-five years ago today, Hong Kong was handed over to China and the last governor of Hong Kong, Chris Patten, sailed out on the Royal Yacht Britannia.
Two months later, as a young fresh graduate, I flew in to begin my first job and career as a journalist and activist.
I had the privilege of living in Hong Kong for the first five years after the handover. I had the opportunity to witness history as an observer of the beginnings of “one country, two systems”—the principle established by former Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping and on which the handover of Hong Kong was based. I also had the privilege of beginning my working life in a city that was the gateway between East and West—the bridge between the democratic world and the world’s largest remaining communist dictatorship….