In 1980, three dragonboats from Hong Kong made their debut on the River Thames.

BBC: Hong Kong: The birthplace of modern dragons

The sting took place in a dingy residential district of five-story apartment blocks on the outskirts of Dongguan, a city that is part of the Pearl River megalopolis extending from nearby Guangzhou to Hong Kong, 60 miles away.

WSJ: Psst��Wanna Buy a Counterfeit Golf Club? | Golf Journal by John Paul Newport

The flow from the source of the Pearl River, which empties into the South China Sea near Hong Kong and Macau, has been reduced to a trickle from a waterfall.

FORBES: Magazine Article

Shanghai's Pudong district, across the Huangpu river from the old foreign bank buildings on the Bund, shows just how serious China is: a Hong Kong-style skyline of towering buildings, including one housing the largest stockmarket trading-floor in the world, all of it built in just the past decade.

ECONOMIST: Clouds over Hong Kong