Continue: Love at First Sight : Cultural Shock for Costa Ricans in Hong Kong

Recently, Hong Kong has been ranked as the 43rd most livable city in the world by EIU, surpassing Singapore (46th) and Taipei (60th). However, if you look at the World Happiness Report by United Nations, Hong Kong (70th) falls behind Singapore (22nd) and Taiwan (35th). Although these rankings may not tell us the full picture, we can find Costa Rica ranked as the highest-ranked Latin America country in terms of happiness (14th). And from the conversation with our Costa Rica friends, we get their recipe for happiness - the positive mindset.

​The Rio Olympic brings people's attention to Brazil as we get to know more about this country through the related news every day. However, most people may not know much about a country nearby, Costa Rica. Two Costa Ricans came to Hong Kong as they were impressed by their first-time experience in the city. While Juan and Veronica feel Hong Kong is the center of Asia with amazing people and great mix of city and nature, they find the how locals believe is quite different from their values back home.

Continue: A restless foreign dad in Hong Kong  

​Talking about his personal experience over last 4 years, Mustafa felt foreigners in Hong Kong can have an easy life but it is difficult to integrate into the local community.

​Hong Kong seems to be a safe harbour theres days when comparing to Turkey with a recent coup attempt and Britian where people face the Brexit issue. As a Turkish, Mustafa have been living in UK before moving to Hong Kong with his family 4 years ago. He did not move because he can foresee the bad things that would happen in those two countries. Rather, he moved for a new experience in life for him and his family. However, Mustafa now finds risks for his children's development as they are growing up in Hong Kong. 

​Hong Kong used to be called as a cultural desert but the city has actually transformed into an art hub in Asia during the past few few years. We can date back to 2013 when Art Basel launched its inaugural show in Hong Kong. And in 2016, Art Basel attracted more than 70,000 visitors from various countries in 5 days. The tickets were sold out on the last day afternoon. At the same time, Art Central logged over 32,000 visitors. This trend has helped Romain Jacquet-Lagrèze to establish his photographer career in Hong Kong and many of us to rediscover this city. 

May is coming. If you live in Hong Kong, you may notice a set of events for Le French May in Hong Kong. In fact, Hong Kong is now the hottest spot for French expats. While Americans and Canadians, two of Hong Kong's largest expat populations have dropped more than 10% over past 4 years, the French community in Hong Kong grew at a rate of 5% annually. The French population in Hong Kong is estimated to be at least 25,000 people. Matthieu is a member of the community but he did not come to Hong Kong for an easy life. Instead, Matthieu came here to realize his goal.

​Korean culture has been very popular in Hong Kong. Recently, the drama " Descendants of the Sun" caught the attention of many Hong Kong locals. However, behind the K-pop culture around the world, the situation in Korea does not look good to many young people there. And Mr. Oh is one of the locals who decided to move to Hong Kong because of the dissatisfaction with the society.

Hong Kong and Singapore are often referred as two of the "Four Asian Tigers".  It is common to see comparison between Hong Kong and Singapore as both places are metropolitan and expensive to live in.  While some people feel the life in both places is similar, we often see comments that Hong Kong lagged behind Singapore in both economic growth and living qualities. (Related: Hong Kong ranked 70th in world for quality of living - way behind rival Singapore). So how different Hong Kong is compared to Singapore and in which part Hong Kong is doing better than Singapore? Let us learn from a Singapore local, Adrian, who recently moved to Hong Kong.