okay hello everyone and welcome to a very hot and scorching Thursday
afternoon. I'm in Victoria Park in Hong Kong today is August 15 2019 and this
video is very much an interruption to my regular upload schedule so if you're a
regular viewer you'll know that I upload videos once a week I'm currently in the
middle of editing two more videos from Belgrade so they'll be coming up over
the next couple of weeks but the reason I wanted to upload this one now is the
fact that what I'm going to talk about is a very current and relevant issue and
perhaps if I uploaded this in a few weeks it would no longer be relevant to
you okay? right, I found somewhere to sit down, we've got these lovely golden
horses in the background apologies in advance I will be mopping my brow
throughout this video because it's absolutely sweltering right now. now as
you've seen in the thumbnail this video is all about is Hong Kong currently safe
in august 2019 for foreigners / tourists and rather than babble on for 10 minutes
about it and then give you the answer at the end I'm just going to tell you right
now what my current opinion is as of today in real time. right now on the
whole I do feel safe in Hong Kong what I will say about it and I'll go into a bit
more detail about it in a moment is the if you are not actually involved in
something in a country that has these issues you generally won't be affected
you know think of it like when I was in Mexico in Acapulco or when I was in
Colombia in Medellin if I'm not actually involved in you know drug cartels and
drug crime I'm not generally gonna be affected by crime obviously there's
exceptions but that's how I feel currently in Hong Kong I'm gonna talk a
bit about the background of it and also what my experiences are so far has any
advice that I can give about being in Hong Kong at this time of the year while
this is all happening so you might be asking firstly why am I in Hong Kong
okay so if you're new I have been travelling full-time for the last three
years I work online so I basically hop around the world working wherever I can
and I was recently in Europe as I said at the beginning I was in Belgrade
recently and I'm on my way to Indonesia to see a friend
and basically the cheapest way I could find a game to Indonesia with minimal
layovers and all that was coming to Hong Kong I've been to Hong Kong before
about two and a half years ago so I did do some videos here then you can check
down in the description there's the playlist if you wanna have a
look at them and it's always been a place in the world that I've really
admired in a way because obviously it's got the British colonial history and
when I walk around Hong Kong it kind of feels like the Asian London because
you've got the double-decker busses you've got British companies here like
Marks and Spencers I can get food but I would get in London and also I've got
some students on I talk to I teach English online and who are from Hong
Kong and they speak very passionately about British colonialism and they're
passionate about British English and things like that and one of them, Fion,
who might be watching this I talk to regularly about the issues that are
going on right now so that's why I'm in Hong Kong so what is the background of
it if you don't know it feels like it's not covered in the media all over the
world because I've had many subscribers many of you and also on Instagram
messaging me since I've been here you know am i okay
am i safe like worried about me firstly thank you for that because that's really
nice but I wanted to go into a bit of the background just so that you know
obviously I'm not an expert all right it's just from what I've been told and
from what I've seen and things like that you know media isn't always reliable we
know that basically a few months ago an extradition law was introduced by Carrie
Lam the CEO of Hong Kong and that's how it started it started with peaceful
protests as in Hong Kong residents don't want that bill to be passed because it
could involve any criminals being extradited to China where it's a
different legal system things like that so it started with peaceful protests but
it's escalated in recent weeks so it's got to the point where the protesters
are not as peaceful as they were and they want the resignation of Carrie Lam
they want people that have been protesting who are now being classed as
rioters to be exonerated effectively and also the most serious thing I think in
my eyes is about and I'm going to be I don't want to be political but I'm going
to use the word alleged just so I don't get in trouble
alleged police brutality and abuse of power so there has been
many instances of locals and protesters even people that aren't protesters being
beaten with batons, police are using tear gas they are using tear gas in
enclosed spaces and I've also heard about expired tear gas and I've read
about it as well in there wait I don't know that scientific terminology for it
but you know when tear gas expires you know in terms of time it can develop
into a form of cyanide so obviously it's it's extremely serious that allegedly
those things are happening emphasis on that word allegedly in terms of safety
here I have seen things so this is where I talk about my experience so far I've
only been here a few days and primarily I've been working a lot the last couple
of days so I haven't been out that much but at the airport when I first got here
and on Sunday just gone there were protesters in arrivals relatively
peaceful yes there was chanting and screaming and shouting people had
banners safe Hong Kong free Hong Kong stands with Hong Kong hashtag you know
that sort of thing people giving out leaflets I had a few people approach me
Hong Kong locals who were wanted to tell me about what's happening you know I
already knew what a little bit about what was happening so I declined I didn't
want to get involved I also didn't want to film there as well because there
were you know officials airport staff and police around so I didn't want to
get into any trouble with that and that's the first thing and other than
that I've seen little things so outside my hostel around the corner there is a
like a pharmacy and on the wall there is like an advert of for a beauty
product or whatever and it's got a picture of a woman - those guys just
walking off in the distance they're putting like things over eyes of
people I'm assuming because of that thing with the woman that was shot in
the face so things are still happening in Hong Kong - this is to do with the fact
the night I got here on Sunday I was walking through the airport to go to the
MTR and there were announcements due to an issue at a certain station I think it
was in the northwest that MTR station has been closed and what happened was
that's where the police let off tear gas in an enclosed space underground on an
empty our station and they also allegedly shot a woman in the face in
the eye with like a beanbag bullet so they're using beanbag bullet like I'm
not the expert on police weapons, beanbag bullets rubber bullets as well
shields you know all that stuff and that caused uproar quite understandably from
Hong Kong residents the police are doing things like that you know potentially
blinding someone I'm not sure of the status of that woman at this stage so
the next day on the Monday protests escalated at the airport
people were wearing eye patches to highlight the point about the woman that
was shot in the eye and the airport was closed and the airport has been
open-close open-close since then and there's been a lot of people at my
hostel that that come back to the hostel because they provide this cancelled
things like that so I'm meant to be leaving on Saturday okay and generally
these protests seem to happen at the weekend primarily and so I am slightly
worried at the moment in terms of how I can get out of the country I was
watching a video this morning about protesters walking departures and people
you know innocent foreigners tourists wanting to get to their destination
having to climb over people crying arguing fighting with protesters
you know it's it's a complex issue which I can't fully understand because I'm not
a Hong Kong resident I wouldn't claim for a second to even try and understand
or relate to what people are doing it feels like it's quite out of control
it build by it anarchy in Hong Kong in many ways there's people that my hostile
are talking about go into protests and it's just crazy in a way and I think the
thing I'll say about Hong Kong residents the good thing is is that it tends to be
young people I think that are protesting more because obviously they're the next
generation that have gonna potentially be under Chinese law you know it's
the whole thing about 'one country two systems' you know and Hong Kong
residents want to keep their system they don't want to be governed by Chinese law
which is extremely different and so I get why they're doing it but I think
it's in some ways it's going too far you know something needs to be done
right now to stop that and I lesson it or reduce it or change matters and it's
only the government that can do that I think so
that's my experiences that's the background and back to being safe
you know I'm conscious that many of you watching might not be seasoned travelers
or people that have travelled a lot or even been to Asia before or you might be
in a country in the world where Asian matters are really covered in the media
you know I've spent a lot of time in Mexico and one thing I noticed about
Mexico and the u.s. is that it's all geographical you know in the US there's
a lot of media coverage about Mexico, the video I did in Belgrade a lot of
people are commenting saying I didn't know anything about Belgrade I don't
know anything about the Bosnian war so it's all geographical and I think it's
the same with Asia so perhaps
the media in the u.s. I know many of you watching will be from the US I don't
know if the US media is covering what's really happening in Hong Kong so well
you might not be necessarily aware of safety and things like that but I think
the biggest advice is just go about your business as you normally would and just
be wary you know don't get involved in any situations that you don't need to be
you know you're not a Hong Kong resident so you know what is the point in a way
it doesn't affect you I think just be sensitive and understanding of the
locals are going through evil and I couldn't begin to understand what I feel
like being in the position that they're in it's quite scary in a way and I tried
to think how this could escalate further so I hope this is kind of puts your minds at
ease in terms of coming to Hong Kong if you are planning a trip very soon just
keep up to date with news updates from the air for our flights actually flying
things like that and you know speak to locals if you if I may you're staying in
a hospital that's great because you can talk to a lot of locals even if you're
in a hotel you know you can talk to hotel staff you know are there protests
happening today just keep out of the way of it that's the best thing to do you
know I might be investigating anything like that coming up in the next couple
of videos because that's what I do I'm a youtuber so that's an exception so I
will put myself in that position willingly I understand the risk and I'm
not saying that you should okay so I hope this helps up next like I said to
be a couple more videos from Belgrade and then we'll be on to a couple of
videos from Hong Kong before we reach day 1000 let's be happy and positive you
know I'm reaching 1,000 days of travel in three days I'm heading to Indonesia
to see my friend Rafi I cannot wait let's I forget out Hong Kong lovely
thanks for watching and I'll see you next time