In Hong Kong, Currently living in one of those ( Slightly larger ones, 90 Sq Feet ). Ask me Anything.

P.S: " almost no developable land remaining" is utter Bull Shit. I wouldn't say we have lots of land, but more then enough to solve the crisis we are in. If the government thinks we are in a crisis anyway. We have a dysfunctional government, and real estate monopoly controlled by a few billionaires. And then there are lots of complicated Chinese Political power frighting going on behind the scene.

One of the main contributors to this state of affairs is geography: Less than 25% of Hong Kong consists of built up area, the rest is hilly and often reserved for parks or nature reserves.

Most people are squeezed into a small area on the island and Kowloon peninsula. This is why population density can range from as high as 56,000/sq km in parts of Kowloon to less than 4,000 in the majority of the territory!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hong_Kong#Geography_and_climat... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Districts_of_Hong_Kong#/media/...

I had a land lord who was from HK. I kept hearing about how HK people had class and British flair and so on and so forth (as opposed to mainlanders).

I thought he was being deluded. It's rather strange that despite all our technological progress, general happiness and contentment has went down (atleast true of the people I know). It's like living to a 125 but spending a great chunk of it alone in a old-age home, or you know like farm-fed pigs.

The picture of the combo toilet-kitchen made me viscerally upset. That must be so unsanitary.

The images reminded me of Jacob Cheung's Cageman (1992) [0]. Additionally, this video [1] is a decent supplementary material to the article.

[0] https://letterboxd.com/film/cageman/

[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Le6nE6yAwFM

I often get the sense that people value land away from the cities not high enough. Sure I understand why people move to metropols, it is a bit like a gold rush. But from some idealistic point, not thinking about money, I feel that the "poor" farmer with a small house and some land is richer than the person living in a 1000-sqf-3-million-dollar-appartment in downtown Hong Kong.

When I saw a couple pictures that showed the interior of one of these buildings with coffin cubicles, I was appalled with the possibilities of fire hazard deadly scenarios. In case of any kind of flame or smoke due to faulty electrical wiring (which causes 95% of all fires), the occupants are as good as dead.

I'm surprised there's no mention of fire safety in the comments. Not by any means an expert on that subject, but these places look like death traps in the event of a fire.

Life in Baishizhou is whole lot better than life of most Hongkongers

According to Index of Economic Freedom, Hong Kong has had the highest degree of economic freedom in the world since the inception of the Index in 1995.[0]

Hong Kong is the 32nd largest export economy in the world and the 12th most complex economy according to the Economic Complexity Index (ECI).[1]

Hong Kong’s unemployment rate was 3.3% as of January 2017 according to Trading Economics.[2]

I think these metrics Trump the photos.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economy_of_Hong_Kong [1] http://atlas.media.mit.edu/en/profile/country/hkg/ [2] http://www.worldstopexports.com/hong-kongs-top-10-exports/

Spent time in HK with a well-off RE developer. Played tennis at LRC, etc. and was able to understand the city better.

Basically everything below mid-level is these conditions. For average in mid-level it's like $15m USD. Condos at the Peak are selling for $120m.

The similar thing to this photographer I witnessed is all the helpers that live on balconies of whom they help. For like $300 a month. They're grateful for having a decent place to live unlike the photos but still no way to live..

To be honest, I'd love to live in such a space. It's more than enough for my needs, and I would save a lot of money on rent. I hate that the government somehow prevent me from doing so.