Big Lychee, Various Sectors

In Lingua Sinica, Ryan Ho Kilpatrick looks at Sino United Publishing…

Go book-shopping in Hong Kong and you may be surprised by the range of stores to choose from. Three local chains — JP Books (三聯書店), The Commercial Press (商務印書館), and Chung Hwa Book Co. (中華書局) — run up to a dozen locations each. Not bad for a city where book publishers and sellers are reeling from political controls and where only around 14 percent of residents, less than half the international average, say they like reading “very much.”

But all these are different faces of the same media empire: Sino United Publishing (聯合出版), or SUP. It is an empire that single-handedly controls over 80 percent of the local publishing market and runs over 50 retail stores territory-wide — a virtual monopoly. It is also an empire within an empire, owned and operated by the Liaison Office of the Central People’s Government (LOCPG), which is long rumored to run the Special Administrative Region from the shadows.

Lucy Hornby on China’s first lady. Not to be confused with Joan Baez…

Of course, Peng Liyuan is not just a First Lady. Long before most people in China had heard of Xi, they knew about her. In the 1980s and 1990s, she was one of China’s most popular performers. Western writers tend to describe her as a “folk singer” which gives the entirely misleading impression that she was something like a Chinese Joan Baez. In fact, she was a military soprano, belting out nationalistic hymns to concert halls packed with uniformed officers. For years, she reached a national audience during CCTV’s Lunar New Year gala. This is not a style of music that I myself enjoy, but in China, military singers are undeniably popular. Her album sales made her independently wealthy by the 1990s.

…Despite her obvious achievements, Peng Liyuan’s main propaganda role is as a model of wifely subservience. Back in the 1990s, she gave gushy interviews about Xi being the boss in the relationship, throwing in coy details about her own housekeeping.

Former Guardian correspondent John Gittings’ photos taken in China from 1978-2003. Commentary here. 

For history geeks, an academic paper from the Journal of the History of International Law: The Gentle Civilizer of the Far East – A Re-Examination of the Encounter between ‘China’ and ‘International Law’.

Opening today – I will be seeing it tomorrow: The Solitary Gourmet…

Chart from Joel Chan – the six bars show median monthly household income for 4Q 2019-2024. After a post-Covid recovery from HK$26,500 in 2020 to HK$30,000 in 2023, it has dropped 1.3% to HK$29,600 in 2024. Why? Maybe it reflects migration patterns – higher-earning locals/expats leaving and lower-income Mainlanders coming in. Another factor could be the slump in the property market: if all the tens of thousands of real-estate agents in town see a big enough fall in commissions, it would show up in these stats. In due course, a civil-service pay cut would probably have an even bigger impact.

A survey by Ronny Tong’s Path of Democracy ‘think tank’ shows that 48% of Hongkongers are dissatisfied with the performance of the all-patriots Legislative Council…

Tong … said during a press conference on Wednesday that the high level of dissatisfaction could be attributed to the public perception that some lawmakers lacked “insights” and showed a passive attitude when scrutinising bills.

“People thought that many lawmakers made speeches only to flatter [Beijing] and that they seldom expressed their own insights,” Tong told reporters in Cantonese. “They were also seen as somewhat unfamiliar with or being passive in vetting bills.”

What do the other 52% feel? Maybe they have forgotten LegCo still exists.

NPC and CPPCC members also recently voiced concerns about the quality of lawmakers…

“Some lawmakers, especially newcomers, simply repeat leaders’ speeches or policies without offering innovation or practical suggestions,” one representative was quoted as saying.

Others reportedly expressed concerns about certain lawmakers prioritizing social media visibility over substantive contributions, describing their efforts as “attention-grabbing but shallow.”

The discussions also highlighted the need for fresh talent in the legislature as some suggested reducing the number of lawmakers from the current 90, arguing that the political landscape has shifted, leaving fewer opportunities for new lawmakers to shine.

“If you ask the public, how many can name even three new lawmakers? This shows the system needs re-evaluation,” a CPPCC member reportedly said. 

Did we ever find out why, when LegCo became pretty much all-patriot and pre-approved/appointed, the number of seats rose to 90? Of course, if they cut the number of highly paid members, that would reduce median household income a bit more.

AP on the conviction of Jackie Chen…

A social worker who tried to mediate during the height of the 2019 anti-government protests in Hong Kong was convicted of rioting Tuesday in the latest case that signaled the tough stance the authorities have taken toward political cases.

Jackie Chen was part of a group of social workers who often carried a loudspeaker seeking to mediate between police and protesters during the social unrest. She was freed at her first trial in September 2020, but the secretary of justice appealed and a court ordered a retrial by another judge.

(As HKFP – linked below – says: ‘…Chen was acquitted midway through her trial in September 2020, when the judge said her conduct and speech did not amount to taking part in an unlawful assembly, let alone a riot.’)

In the retrial, the prosecution accused Chen, who used a loudspeaker to ask police officers to calm down and not to use their guns to fire non-lethal bullets, of participating in a riot during a protest in August 2019. Chen pleaded not guilty.

Judge May Chung wrote in her verdict that Chen had continuously shouted unfounded accusations against the police and suggested the officers’ actions involved the use of excessive force or were too rapid. Chen had used her social worker role, claiming to be “safeguarding justice,” to back the protesters, the judge said.

Chung ruled that the only reasonable inference was that Chen intended to participate in the riot.

Can anyone possibly think of more than one reasonable inference from these facts? Can anyone think of ones that are perhaps more reasonable?

From the HKFP story…

Deputy District Judge May Chung announced the guilty verdict on Tuesday afternoon, seconds after taking her seat at the bench. She said she had written down her reasons for the verdict and would adjourn the hearing for 20 to 30 minutes to allow the defence and the prosecution to read them.

Chen’s supporters in the public gallery yelled: “We’ll come visit you” and “Hang in there,” as the social worker took off her earrings, rings, bracelet, and necklace and handed them to a relative through a gap in the defendant’s dock.

Chen, 48, looked up to the public gallery and said, “[I’m] OK! Don’t worry. Take care of yourselves!”

Her family members, seated in the first row of the public gallery, were seen comforting each other.

Security Secretary Chris Tang lashes out at a Ming Pao reporter for asking why a recent trip to Thailand was not announced ahead of time. The answer to the question was perfectly reasonable…

The security minister said the operation [to help Hong Kong residents who had been held at a scam farm in Burma] had to be conducted discreetly, and if not, it could jeopardise the rescue effort and endanger the lives of the detained Hongkongers.

He could have left it at that. It was a response that eloquently highlighted the seriousness of the situation and the determination of the government to help residents in distress overseas – and its success in doing so. But instead he…

…accused [the] reporter of attempting to undermine the credibility of the government…

So now that’s the story.

Brian Kern looks back at Hong Kong’s riot trials, which finally seem to have run their course (maybe). Lots of interesting points on the use of the law, individuals’ experiences, the Yuen Long ‘riot’, plus photos and more…

…even though people convicted of riot represent the largest proportion of political prisoners, and riot convictions carry some of the longest prison sentences of any of those that political prisoners have received, this phenomenon of hundreds of imprisonments for riot has gotten relatively little attention.

Why is that? I suspect it’s because lots of observers don’t know quite what to make of it. If you hear that 45 pro-democracy leaders have been convicted of “conspiracy to subvert state power” for taking part in a primary election, that sounds absurd on the face of it, and the “crime” is explicitly political. But “riot”—isn’t rioting bad? isn’t it violent? How can it be justified?

…The vast majority of political prisoners in Hong Kong have been convicted of crimes which on the face of it are not political, like “riot,” but this is done as part of a major political crackdown and to enforce the government’s narrative of the protests, that they were strictly a “law and order” issue, as opposed to what they really were: a political conflict over how Hong Kong was to be governed, between two irreconcilable visions of the kind of place Hong Kong was to be. If you refuse to face this aspect of the crackdown—the weaponization of the justice system to crush political opponents—then you’re missing a very big part of it.

…Interestingly, when the Hong Kong government first started charging large numbers of people with “riot” in 2019 and 2020, it was not very successful: out of its first 25 prosecutions, only six people were convicted. This could not stand. CCP-owned media conducted a propaganda campaign intended to intimidate judges. The Hong Kong government appealed to the Court of Appeal, which agreed with it, ruling on March 25, 2021 that while merely being present at a riot does not in itself render a defendant liable, “actively promoting or encouraging” does. In other words, the court was specifying what “taking part” constituted and was essentially saying that one needn’t take any particular aggressive action to be ruled to have “taken part” in the riot. 

NatSec-era Hong Kong is becoming more like the Mainland in governance style and closer to the Mainland economically, just as China’s economy is entering a post-boom slowdown and the US is leading a backlash against Beijing’s over-production/over-exporting policies.

Following Friday’s link to a Reuters story on shippers moving operations out of Hong Kong, a couple more pieces…

HKFP talks to a local industrialist facing rising US tariffs and uncertainty, and an academic…

“Hong Kong is in a tougher spot. The US no longer treats it as separate from mainland China, which strips away any trade advantages it once had,” said Julien Chaisse, an international trade expert at the City University of Hong Kong (CityU).

“That’s not just symbolic because, I would say, it makes Hong Kong an even bigger liability for businesses that rely on access to North America,” Chaisse told HKFP. “Some will rethink their presence [in Hong Kong] or at least hedge their bets elsewhere.”

And more from Reuters…

…Hong Kong has a separate rule of law from China and its own financial policy-making autonomy, but some lawyers, diplomats and business executives say that after China’s imposition of a national security law in 2020, the city was essentially being viewed by the West as fully under the control of Beijing.

This has hurt it economically and cast doubt on whether it is a jurisdiction separate from mainland China with global best practices, they said.

…”Hong Kong is being increasingly lumped in with China … that’s a fact,” said a board member of a leading Hong Kong business family with interests locally and overseas, including retail and property.

“To a degree, this has raised the complexity and cost in our business dealings. We have to live with this.”

According to a person with knowledge of the matter, CK Hutchison had initially tried to fight to keep its two main port businesses in Panama after Trump alleged the Panama Canal was under Chinese control.

But later, Hutchison opted to cash out and mitigate longer term reputational risks.

“People in the Hutch empire are running for cover,” said the person with knowledge of the ports negotiations, who declined to be identified due to the sensitivity of the issue. “This is a nightmare situation and we’ve never dealt with anything like this before.”

…Others, including business executives and lawyers, agreed that Hong Kong is increasingly being viewed as similar to other Chinese cities, even though officials like the territory’s financial secretary, Paul Chan, say the city remains a global hub for the free flow of capital, goods and people.

“The market is based on expectations,” said Vera Yuen, an economics lecturer with the University of Hong Kong business school. “The valuation (of Hong Kong) is based on what they (the world) think, not what you claim.”

Missing an opportunity to stay silent, Security Secretary Chris Tang publicly blasts legal scholar Johannes Chan for an op-ed criticizing the conviction of Lam Cheuk-ting and others attacked by thugs at Yuen Long MTR station on July 21 2019…

Tang wrote: “The author, who is a law professor, has once again published a biased article, deliberately ignoring the fact that some white-clad people have already been brought to justice, misleading readers with a warped perspective that the court has made an unfair judgment regarding either party, shaking the public’s confidence in the court system, and undermining the rule of law in Hong Kong, which must be condemned.”

Tang’s hyperbole might strengthen suspicions that the authorities know deep down that the court was pushing an official version of what happened at Yuen Long that few recognize as accurate. Why else would he care about a respected academic expressing an opinion?

And that’s not all…

Tang also extended his criticism to Ming Pao, saying that the paper’s disclaimer which stated that Chan’s article was not intended to incite hatred toward the government “does not absolve the editor of his responsibility to ensure that the publication is fair, objective, and unbiased.”

“It is hoped that Ming Pao will not continue to be exploited by people with ulterior motives to use this platform to spread confusing remarks, to poison the community, and to create conflicts,” Tang said.

Maybe Tang will have something to say about Hong Kong’s Court of Final Appeal, confirming that prosecutors should allow defendants (members of the Hong Kong Alliance in Support of Patriotic Democratic Movements of China) to see the evidence against them…

During the trial and appeals at lower courts, heavily redacted information was presented as evidence alleging that the Alliance had acted as a foreign agent.

The trio rejected the categorisation and argued that the withholding of such information had denied them a fair trial, as even they could not see the unredacted evidence.

The top court sided with the trio in its judgement, saying that the redactions were “self defeating” and produced “pages often completely covered in black ink.”

The judgment read: “By redacting the only potential evidential basis for establishing such facts, the prosecution disabled itself from proving its case. Moreover, non-disclosure of the redacted facts in any event deprived the appellants of a fair trial so that their convictions involved a miscarriage of justice and would in any event not have been permitted to stand.”

The top judges also dismissed prosecutors’ argument that it was sufficient for the police chief to “reasonably believe” that the Alliance was a foreign agent in order to issue the data demand, without having to prove it in court.

“It is a necessary element… that HKA [the Alliance] was in fact a foreign agent,” the judges wrote. “The courts below fell into error in holding that it was sufficient merely for the [police commissioner] to assert that he had reasonable grounds to believe that HKA was a foreign agent.”

Reuters sums it up…

Hong Kong’s top court unanimously overturned on Thursday the convictions of three former members of a pro-democracy group that organised an annual candlelight vigil to mark China’s 1989 Tiananmen Square crackdown, citing a miscarriage of justice.

The ruling is a rare victory for Hong Kong’s pro-democracy movement in which scores of activists have been jailed or forced into exile, with many liberal and popular civil society groups shuttered.

I smell a loophole that will need to be addressed.

Reuters on ship owners ‘discreetly’ moving offices and vessel registrations out of Hong Kong…

Behind these low-profile moves, six shipping executives said, lie concerns that their ships could be commandeered by Chinese authorities or hit with U.S. sanctions in a conflict between Beijing and Washington.

Beijing’s emphasis on the role of Hong Kong in serving Chinese security interests and growing U.S. scrutiny of the importance of China’s commercial fleet in a possible military clash, such as over Taiwan, are causing unease across the industry, the people told Reuters.

…Reuters interviews with two dozen people, including shipping executives, insurers and lawyers familiar with Hong Kong, revealed growing concern that commercial maritime operations could be ensnared by forces beyond their control in a U.S.-China military clash.

…”We don’t want to be in a position where China comes knocking, wanting our ships, and the U.S. is targeting us on the other side,” said one executive, who like others was granted anonymity to discuss a sensitive issue.

…Basil Karatzas, U.S.-based consultant with Karatzas Marine Advisors & Co, said Singapore had become the preferred domicile for companies with lesser exposure to Chinese shipping and cargo trade, because it offered many efficiencies, including its legal system, but less risk than Hong Kong.

…One company founded in Hong Kong in 2014, London-listed Taylor Maritime, now has a smaller presence in Hong Kong after making several strategic moves over the past few years.

…The firm “really de-risked Hong Kong”, said a person familiar with the matter, citing investors’ concerns about a Chinese invasion of Taiwan and the Communist Party’s increasing control of Hong Kong.

…Hong Kong-listed Pacific Basin Shipping has traditionally flagged its 110-strong fleet of bulk carriers in Hong Kong but is drafting contingency plans to register them elsewhere as it gauges potential risks, said two people familiar with the matter.

…Three executives and two lawyers told Reuters that sweeping security legislation, first imposed on Hong Kong in July 2020 and strengthened in March 2024, had added to the dangers.

…Some shipowners wouldn’t object to an official request to turn over their vessels, either out of patriotism or the potential to profit from a crisis, one lawyer said.

But “it is better not to be in a position where you might even be asked”, said another veteran lawyer.

“It was not an issue just a few years ago, in what is clearly a redrawn national security map.”

Compare and contrast with Cheung Kong’s sale of its ports for US$19 billion. From the Bloomberg newsletter …

What Li will do with the cash is a burning question. Crypto or Chinese real estate are unlikely to be targets for a group known for its fiscal prudence. Li has spent decades diversifying away from Hong Kong and mainland China by snapping up assets mostly in utilities and infrastructure, especially in the UK and Europe. More of the same is likely. CK Infrastructure is reportedly considering bids for UK waste management firm Viridor and Thames Water. Returning cash to investors in the form of a special dividend could also be on the cards.

Did Donald Trump do Li Ka-shing a huge favour, convincing him to sell assets that for years have profited from growth in international trade just as the US president starts imposing tariffs on anything that moves? (Been sitting on a few Cheung Kong shares for many years – the dividends have long since covered the original purchase – and bought some more six months or so ago because the company is so cheap. Didn’t realize it was that undervalued.)

From the same newsletter, on Hong Kong’s office glut…

…analysts Patrick Wong and Francis Chan predict the office vacancy rate could rise to a record 18% by the end of the year, with average rents falling to the lowest since 2010. Rents slumped about 8% last year, the most since 2020 when Covid emerged. Such a high vacancy rate and tumbling rents may force landlords into fire sales, they write. In a clear sign of the city’s property distress, the average price of Hong Kong prime-office buildings has plunged 45% in just the last six years, according to data by Colliers. Meanwhile supply of new prime offices keeps rising.

In many cities, empty office buildings are converted to housing – such as student dorms. Presumably, Hong Kong policymakers would faint in horror at such a suggestion.

A nematode stuck in permafrost has been resuscitated after 46,000 years of cryptobiosis. Yes – there’s hope for James Tien.

Another of these black-and-white things on YouTube. This seems to be an early 1960s publicity film for the Royal Air Force, in which a civilian gets to ride on a passenger flight full of service families heading to Singapore via Bahrain, Aden, and Gan in the Maldives. Unlike with many productions of this sort, the narrator’s conversations with crew members seem fairly unscripted (though of course on message). Also, a sharp reminder of how Singapore has changed. And then a landing at Kai Tak in an Argosy.

Former Chief Executive CY Leung questions the effectiveness of Hong Kong’s talent-attracting visas…

Chris Sun, the secretary for labour and welfare, published a post titled, “Debunking myths about Hong Kong’s talent admission schemes,” on the bureau’s Facebook page on Monday night, after former chief executive Leung Chun-ying cast doubt on the policy.

On February 23, Leung wrote on Facebook in Chinese that “recently, in different cities and occasions in mainland China, I met [mainland talent] who came to Hong Kong under various talent schemes but they immediately returned to the mainland.”

“They came to Hong Kong just to obtain residency status, solely to conveniently travel to and from Hong Kong; to enrol their children in either schools for Hong Kong residents’ children in mainland China or in Hong Kong schools; or even to enjoy a tax rate for Hongkongers in mainland China,” he continued.

“All these practices go against the original intention of Hong Kong’s talent policies.”

No shortage of anecdotes about Mainlanders – who apply for most of the visas – getting low-level jobs like insurance sales to pass the time here. CY could have added that some of the visa recipients are also concerned with getting their parents into the public health-care system.

In theory, the visas are intended to attract energetic types who will do wonders for the economy. But in practice, their main purpose seems to be to counterbalance the outflow of local and expat middle-class residents over the last five years – to stop the population figures from looking worse. As with efforts to attract more tourists, officials seem driven by boosting numbers rather than anything else. And no-one actually asks how they could make Hong Kong a better place to live and work in.

A court rejects an appeal against a conviction for ‘inciting blank or invalid votes’ in the 2021 legislative election…

[Jacky So] argued the magistrate who handled his case in 2022 had made a mistake by ruling that the provision did not infringe his right to the freedom of expression and to equality.

The ex-student leader was charged in July 2022 for sharing a social media post by self-exiled former lawmaker Ted Hui, calling on voters to cast invalid or blank ballots in the “patriots-only” Legislative Council elections in 2021.

…Government lawyers responded by saying that inciting voters not to vote, as well as to cast invalid or blank votes, [were] all acts “manipulating or damaging the election.” They also said that voting according to one’s preference was one’s personal right, but inciting others to vote “in certain form” should be outlawed.

Yet it is perfectly legal to not vote or to cast blank or invalid ballots. How can someone ‘incite’ a legal act? And urging/‘inciting’ people to turn out to vote (as the government does) or to vote for a particular candidate (as parties do) is OK. Where’s the logic?

Could So also have argued that the government itself ‘incited’ a large number of people not to vote in 2021 by depriving them of pan-dem candidates?

There will be a LegCo election in November. You are free to vote, or not, as you wish. The HKFP report also says…

…The provision regulated behaviour during the election period and thus was not a “total ban of expression at all times,” the judge said.

So people are free to urge a boycott beforehand?

Five new fleets of taxis totalling 3,500 vehicles will be coming onto the streets in the next few months. Apart from their nasty liveries (one fleet is day-glo pink) and silly names (eg Syncab), there’s nothing especially noteworthy about the new cabs. They will accept Octopus and other non-cash payment; the cars are modern and comfortable; the drivers are probably not senile psychopaths with severe spatial awareness deficit. In other words, they’re nothing like the existing taxis.

At least, that’s what we’re supposed to say. I am in a minority of about one in 6 million here, but I don’t have any problems with the current much-maligned taxi services. The drivers are usually vaguely pleasant, or at least not overly surly. They get me to where I’m going, give or take 50 yards or so. Nothing horrible ever happens. 

When I hear someone rant about their latest nightmarish experience, I lean forward and solemnly say: “There are no bad taxi drivers, only bad taxi passengers.” It does not always go down well.

It might help that I rarely take a taxi more than, say, once a month. And perhaps, subconsciously, the horror stories nudge me towards a bus, tram or train.

A series of lectures from last year’s Hong Kong History Day at Bristol University, covering town halls, Kai Tak, local museums and much more. Including post-WW2 public health posters.

Fitch Ratings commentary on the Hong Kong government’s budget…

The government’s operating balance, which excludes capital account transactions, is still projected to return to surplus in FY26, unchanged from last year’s projection. This partly reflects a new plan to transfer HKD62 billion (around 1.8% of GDP) from six endowment funds that were previously established outside the government’s accounts back on to the government’s books in FY25. We do not believe this will provide a sustainable boost to revenue in the longer term.

Other revenue-enhancing measures, such as raising the air passenger departure tax, were small in scale, while a cut in stamp duty for low-value properties, designed to support property buyers, will reduce revenues modestly. The government opted to leave most major tax-revenue sources, like salaries and profit taxes, largely unchanged. Instead, consolidation will focus on constraining operating expenditure.

There’s so much weirdness out there, and I wonder how historians in the future will explain this. For crypto-scam-Trump nerds only, a long piece from Molly White’s newsletter on how the US President is rewarding his donors from the fake-money ‘industry’ by talking up magic beans (including creation of a ‘strategic reserve’ of digital nothingness). Starring North Korean-backed thieves. Plus lots of other crypto stuff…

…it would be wild for the SEC to crack down on memecoins shortly after the president launched his own in the current political environment where Trump is bringing formerly independent agencies to heel. Yet it is still somewhat remarkable that the agency is washing its hands of one of the most fraud-ridden, manipulated sectors of the cryptocurrency world. 

…Now that the industry has obtained the friendliest possible regulatory environment in the US, they’ve lost their go-to excuse when someone asks why, 16 years in, crypto has yet to fulfill the many lofty promises of reinventing the financial system or “democratizing wealth” or creating a fairer internet or whatever else the entrepreneur in front of you might have latched upon. This should be interesting to watch.

HKFP interviews citizens who wonder why civil servants seem to be relatively unaffected by the government’s attempts to reduce its budget deficit. They also question the point of the cuts to older folks’ transport subsidies – and not without good reason…

The transport subsidy scheme cost the government almost HK$4 billion in the previous fiscal year. Under the new budget, the use of the HK$2 flat public transport fare will be capped at 240 trips per month.

For fares above HK$10, the beneficiaries will need to pay 20 per cent of the original fare.

Labour minister Chris Sun said on Thursday that only around 360 people eligible for the HK$2 transport subsidy took more than 240 trips each month, and only around 25 per cent of the beneficiaries took trips that cost more than HK$10 last year.

Given the costs of updating the Octopus card software to accommodate these changes, plus the rising number of over-60s in the population, are there any actual cost savings at all? If so, how do they compare with, say, a 10-year civil service pay freeze?

From Chinafile, Xi Jinping’s urge to purge. Interesting historical context suggesting parallels with Stalin and Mao…

It is no accident that the communist leader’s concentration of power sits at the center this entire cycle. From the perspective of administrative science, concentration of power is necessary for effective management. In the cases of Stalin, Mao, and Xi, however, power becomes ultra-concentrated. The difference here is not only one of degree, but involves deeper institutional elements. “Institutions” here primarily mean the rules with which power is gained, distributed, and exercised. To put it simply, for effective administration, concentration of power must follow explicit rules, but in conditions of ultra-concentration of power the leader remakes rules at his will. Communist politics by nature tends to yield ultra-concentration, which greatly strengthens the leader’s control but inevitably undermines the governance capability of the regime.

If you’re on Twitter, check out Sean Foley’s photos, mostly of Kowloon backstreets. Reminiscent of of Fan Ho in use of light and shadow,

From YouTube, an old newsreel. It’s 1953, and you can now fly from London to Tokyo by jet in just 36 hours (many of them on the ground at a succession of refueling stops). This is a big deal, since such a flight previously took 86 hours. The bad news: you’re on a Comet. Some nice glimpses of old Manila and Bangkok.