If there is one thing that defines the pulse of Hong Kong, it is the MTR. Efficient, unrelenting, terrifyingly precise—this underground network has become the beating heart of the city. Trains glide in with hypnotic rhythm, sometimes every two minutes, sometimes faster. The stations swell with human mass, a surging tide of bodies, all pushing towards their next destination with quiet urgency. And then, as suddenly as it began, the wave dissipates—until the next train comes, and the cycle begins anew.
I would rather not be caught in the eye of that storm.
Rush hour in Hong Kong is not merely a matter of inconvenience; it is survival of the fittest. Elbows sharpen. Tempers tighten. There is no such thing as personal space. I’ve learnt to avoid these hours like a seasoned sailor avoids a storm. Instead, I travel during the golden windows—late mornings and after-lunch or lulls—when the chaos gives way to calm. The rhythm of the city softens. You can finally breathe.
It is during these quiet intervals that Hong Kong reveals itself differently. From the carriage window, sunlight flickers through tunnels, city blocks rise like dominoes beyond the blur, and the harbour glints like a dream. The MTR becomes less of a machine and more of a theatre. There are empty seats. The carriage breathes a little. Conversations, once cacophonous, dissolve into background murmurs. A child presses her nose against the window. A middle-aged man scrolls his phone with mechanical detachment. A pair of teenagers, schoolbags slumped at their feet, share earphones and laughter.
Here, amid the hum, I sit with my younger brother, Alex.
We’ve taken this journey countless times, weaving through lines coloured like a rainbow melted underground—Island Line, Tsuen Wan Line, South Island Line, each a vein pumping life through the concrete city. Sometimes we’re heading to Admiralty, for a leisurely lunch or to meet friends. Other times, we detour to Central IFC, to see our father in his office and have lunch together. I still remember those afternoons—his tie slightly loosened, the quiet pride in his smile, the way Alex’s eyes lit up around him. Then we’d drift off again, maybe to Causeway Bay, elbowing through the crush of SOGO, or to Pacific Place and Times Square, chasing sales and little luxuries.
The MTR, for all its clatter and commotion, is an oddly democratic place. Here, suits and uniforms, school ties and shopping bags, all jostle in the same steel tube. You see it in the postures: the weary executive, the delivery man clutching plastic bags, the university student hunched over exam notes, the domestic worker giggling over a video call. Everyone is on the move, but not always in the same direction.
And if you’re new here, it won’t take long to learn—there are no slow walkers in Hong Kong. On the platform, people run—not just when they’re late, but because they must. It is a culture of movement, of speed, of urgency distilled. If you hesitate, the tide will swallow you whole.
Sometimes, it’s exhausting. Sometimes, I miss silence.
But still, there is something strangely reassuring in the constancy of it all. That no matter how frenzied life becomes, the train will come. That beneath the city’s glitter and glass, there is a network holding it all together. And in those quiet, chosen hours, when I’m not driving and the sky is kind, I take the train—not just to reach a place, but to watch the city as it lives and breathes. To see it not as an endless rush, but as a story unfolding, carriage by carriage.
And sometimes, in the reflection on the train window, I catch a glimpse of the boy I used to be—wide-eyed, a little quieter, sitting next to my brother, both of us watching the world as it sped past.
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