April 29, 2013
Hong Kong

A New Home, A New Beginning

Loyal readers who've been eagerly (or dreading) awaiting the return of the wandering Ned are hereby rewarded with the first of what hopefully will be many new posts from perhaps the most exotic major city in the world, Hong Kong, where East meets West.  My patient and supportive law firm, Dechert, has persuaded me to relocate to Hong Kong to help lead and develop our Asia practice while spending the occasional hour on client work, mostly involving government and corporate investigations.

The decision was not an easy one.  My sons are in the NY area and my quite aged, increasingly dependent parents, live outside of D.C.  But with sufficient support and heavy use of Skype, the distance may not be so great, although the time zone difference (12 hours) is definitely a problem.  The chance to refocus my career and get out of my comfort (actually, in the end, my discomfort zone) while having a bit of what everyone calls "an adventure" proved to be a powerful lure.  That and, of course, the dough.

While I expect to do a lot of traveling about Asia, I would expect most of the entries to be my impressions and experiences here in Hong Kong (hereinafter, as we fancy lawyers say, "HK".)

For the uninitiated, or truly undereducated, Hong Kong is a series of volcanic islands dotting the southern coast of China near the Pearl River, a series of waterways leading up from HK to the major southern city of Canton (now Guangdong).  A small fishing village until the mid-19th Century, HK became a major port during the opium boom encouraged by the British East Indies Company.  HK became a British colony from that time until 1997, when the "handover" to the Chinese government took place.  HK is now actually, HKSAR, or Hong Kong Separate Administered Region.  It is part of China under a unique treaty that, until 2047, promises that there will be "one country, two systems" in place.

Hong Kong is pretty nervous about the arrangement but, by and large, they enjoy vastly greater economic and political freedom than their mainland counterparts.

I hope to continue to blog, here or in another space.  If you want to be along for the ride, file a comment with your e-mail address and I'll send you the new location.  And if you are thinking about breaking out of the prison we put ourselves in, day after day, I can only say - "go for it!"