A survivor called Hong Kong

Ten years on, what is the difference? The trams still trundle, the ferry still ploughs across the harbour and tourists are still offered fake watches down Nathan Road. All the same then? Has nothing changed since the handover? Not exactly.

Maybe not a tale of two cities, possibly more a tale of two airports.

Pre-handover Kai Tak airport - small and cramped yet thrilling to approach in the pulsating heart of the city, a touch of danger even before travellers set foot in the territory.

Adrenaline rushes as the plane turns 47.5 degrees at Lion Rock for runway line-up, allowing passengers to see Kowloon families watching TV or preparing meals, before battling crosswinds and landing on a runaway jutting into polluted waters.

Chep Lap Kok, the post-handover airport is an engineering feat of astounding proportions. A mountain was levelled and in its place rose an airport in the shape of an aircraft. Landing there is plane sailing, literally, no sharp turns, no buffeting crosswinds, reliable and efficient.

Two airports - two images of Hong Kong. One exhilarating, the other efficient. Clear-cut and too simplistic. Hong Kong didn't look so efficient for most of the last ten years. Turbulence was in the air.

Change of guards

The 1997 handover coincided with the Asian economic crisis which was followed by the bursting of the dot-com bubble and an outbreak of the Sars and bird flu.

Property prices slumped 70 per cent in the six years to mid-2003. Prices have since recovered. A security law brought thousands onto the streets in protest. Beijing was not amused. The security law was dropped but the stand-off rattled nerves about Hong Kong's autonomy enshrined in the Basic Law - the Cantonese call it the "Basic Flaw".

Of course, it was never meant to be handed over, ever. The British won Hong Kong by virtue of their big ships and military might with the treaty of Nanking in 1842. It was given to them in perpetuity.

Trouble was they needed food and water, which were in abundance in Kowloon and New Territories across the harbour, but in short supply, on the barren rock. It was this, the New Territories, that the British pledged in 1898 to give back in 1997, not Hong Kong. They didn't think they would ever have to give it back. The 99-year lease was a convenient agreement.

Even as late as 1984, former British premier Margaret Thatcher wanted to keep it. "Why do we have to give it back," she asked in post-Falklands triumphant mode. Her civil servants told her of the impracticality of keeping it with Kowloon in Chinese hands.

Beijing let it be known that they would march the Peoples' Liberation Army in anyway. China was not Argentina, Deng Xiaoping was not Leopoldo Galtieri. So Thatcher agreed in 1984 to hand it back in 1997.

Every Chinese emperor seeks the "Mandate of Heaven". On that rainy night of June 30, 1997, this mandate was withheld (it rained for two weeks afterwards — a sign the gods were, if not British then, at least, not communist) the 260-island rocky archipelago with the most dramatic skyline in the world saw its policemen change the badges on their caps, the Union Jack go down, Chris Patten the governor, board the Britannia and the Chinese flag flutter in the air-conditioned almost completed exhibition hall with roof tiles missing due to delays in its construction.

In the run-up to the handover there was a sense, not of panic but of unease. Britain was not offering passports. Full stop. No entry. Long before the Polish plumber and Europe Union expansion meant that Latvians had right of entry to the United Kingdom, Hong Kong people were asking why could a German (two World Wars and a World Cup football final) live in Britain, but not a Hong Kong man or woman?

This question was asked not because Hong Kong people wanted to swap Mong Kok for Merseyside or Kowloon for Canterbury but if the Chinese decided to crack down (remember Tiananmen), then is it Britain's duty to provide a safety net? The naïveté was almost touching.

"One country- two systems"

Hong Kong was the most successful colony in the world, with a popular governor — but still to London, a colony. China was the UK's main focus, Hong Kong was getting in the way of the China market. Former British Prime Minister John Major had been the first western leader to visit Post-Tiananmen Beijing. China, to Britain, meant business.

Since 1997, there has been an increasing disregard for heritage. Tile is out, chrome is in. Even Mong Kok's famous night market has being cleared to make way for shopping malls and, their gleaming marble and slabs of concrete.

A Disneyland has been erected. Famous landmarks have been neglected or have disappeared. Others are under threat. The Victoria Harbour may have a bridge spanning its waters.

But Hong Kong is a survivor. Natural disasters, immense human suffering, wars and conquests have made it resilient and proud. It bends rather than breaks and it has bent a lot in the last decade.

Its public finances have returned to a sound footing and concerns about the erosion of civil rights and liberties have markedly eased. At first glance, Hong Kong has regained its old vibrancy, charm and character.

Beneath the facade, however, lies a sea of hidden social, economic and political tensions. But it is now that "one country, two systems" will face its greatest test. There is an anniversary but how to define it? Ten years after its colonial existence is the city securing its new identity or surrendering it?