Hong Kong Trivia Quiz Questions and Answers
What is Hong Kong?
A: Hong Kong, officially the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the
People's Republic of China (HKSAR), is a special administrative region on
the eastern side of the Pearl River estuary in southern China.
Hong Kong has over 7.4 million people of various
nationalities in a 1,104-square-kilometre (426 sq mi) territory making Hong
Kong one of the what?
A: Most densely populated places in the world.
Hong Kong became a colony of the British Empire after
Qing China ceded Hong Kong Island at the end of what?
A: The First Opium War in 1842.
The colony expanded to the Kowloon Peninsula in 1860
after what?
A: The Second Opium War and was further extended when Britain obtained a
99-year lease of the New Territories in 1898.
When was the territory returned to China?
A: In 1997.
As a special administrative region, Hong Kong maintains
separate governing and economic systems from that of mainland China under
what principle?
A: The principle of "one country, two systems".
Originally it was a what?
A: A sparsely populated area of farming and fishing villages.
It is the world's tenth-largest exporter and ninth
largest what?
A: Importer.
As one of the world's leading international financial
centers, Hong Kong has a major capitalist service economy characterized by
what?
A: Low taxation and free trade.
The currency, Hong Kong dollar, is the eighth most
traded currency where?
A: In the world.
Hong Kong city has one of the highest per capita
incomes in the world, but there is severe what?
A: Income inequality.
Hong Kong is a highly developed territory and ranks
where on the UN Human Development Index?
A: fourth.
The lack of space caused demand for denser
constructions, which developed the city to a center for modern architecture
and the world's most what?
A: Vertical city.
The city also has the largest number of what of any
city in the world?
A: Skyscrapers.
Hong Kong’s residents have some of the highest “what”
in the world?
A: life expectancies.
The dense space also led to a highly developed what?
A: Transportation network with public transport rates exceeding 90 percent.
Hong Kong is rated third in the Global Financial Centre
Index, behind what two cities?
A: New York City and London.
Hong Kong also holds first place in an annual ranking
of the world’s most what?
A: “Economically free” countries, topping the chart for 25 years, according
to the Heritage Foundation.
The name Hong Kong was commonly written as the single
word Hongkong until 1926, when the government did what?
A: Officially adopted the two-word name.
The region is first known to have been occupied by
humans during what period?
A: the Neolithic period, about 6,000 years ago.
Early Hong Kong settlers were a semi-coastal people who
migrated from inland and brought knowledge of what?
A: Rice cultivation.
The Qin dynasty incorporated the Hong Kong area into
China for the first time in 214 BCE, after conquering whom?
A: The indigenous Baiyue.
Who was the earliest European visitor?
A: Portuguese explorer Jorge Álvares, who arrived in 1513.
Portuguese merchants established what?
A: A trading post called Tamão in Hong Kong waters, and began regular trade
with southern China.
After the Qing conquest, what was banned under the
Haijin policies?
A: maritime trade.
The Kangxi Emperor lifted the prohibition, allowing
foreigners to enter Chinese ports in what year?
A: 1684.
Qing authorities established the Canton System in 1757
to do what?
A: To regulate trade more strictly, restricting non-Russian ships to the
port of Canton.
Although European demand for Chinese commodities like
tea, silk, and porcelain was high, Chinese interest in European manufactured
goods was what?
A: Insignificant, so that Chinese goods could only be bought with precious
metals.
To reduce the trade imbalance, the British sold large
amounts of what to China?
A: Indian opium.
Faced with a drug crisis, Qing officials did what?
A: Pursued ever-more-aggressive actions to halt the opium trade.
In 1839, the Daoguang Emperor ordered imperial
commissioner Lin Zexu to do what?
A: To eradicate the opium trade.
The commissioner destroyed opium stockpiles and halted
all foreign trade, triggering a British military response and the what?
A: The First Opium War.
The Qing surrendered early in the war and did what?
A: Ceded Hong Kong Island in the Convention of Chuenpi.
The colony was further expanded in 1898, when Britain
obtained what?
A: A 99-year lease of the New Territories.
The University of Hong Kong was established in 1911 as
the territory's first what?
A: Institution of higher education.
When did Kai Tak Airport begin operation?
A: In 1924.
At the start of the Second Sino-Japanese War in
1937,
Governor Geoffry Northcote declared Hong Kong a what?
A: A neutral zone to safeguard its status as a free port.
The colonial government prepared for a possible attack,
evacuating all British women and children in what year?
A: 1940.
The Imperial Japanese Army attacked Hong Kong on 8
December 1941, the same morning as its attack on what?
A: Pearl Harbor.
Hong Kong was occupied by Japan for almost four years
before what?
A: Britain resumed control on 30 August 1945.
Hong Kong became the first of the Four Asian Tiger
economies to do what during the 1950s?
A: industrialize.
By the early 1990s, Hong Kong had established itself as
a what?
A: A global financial center and shipping hub.
The colony faced an uncertain future as what
approached?
A: The end of the New Territories lease.
Governor Murray MacLehose raised the question of Hong
Kong's status with Deng Xiaoping in what year?
A: 1979.
Diplomatic negotiations with China resulted in what?
A: The 1984 Sino-British Joint Declaration, in which the United Kingdom
agreed to transfer the colony in 1997 and China would guarantee Hong Kong's
economic and political systems for 50 years after the transfer.