Hong Kong is a city with a can-do attitude to business, but meeting and incentive planners have ample opportunity to involve groups in educational fun beyond the city’s amazing nightlife. Watch out how groups bond with each other and learn more about Hong Kong with these activities.
1. Harbour tours
After admiring the harbour views from their hotel rooms or ballroom foyers, delegates will be delighted to be given a fresh angle from which to view Hong Kong’s wondrous skyline. Evening or daytime boat trips let groups bond while taking in the nightly Symphony of Lights laser show or cruising to an outlying island for dinner. Types of vessels available cater to most tastes, from luxury yachts to modern versions of the traditional Chinese junk.
M Yachts Asia offer a luxury speedboat for smaller groups To let larger groups enjoy a more spectacular cruise, try The Bounty (pictured above), Hong Kong’s only European tall-mast sailing ship. Hong Kong Catamaran Club has several vessels for hire including a 17.7 metre motorboat for up to 39 passengers.
2. Digital ‘treasure hunting’
For group members who would rather get to know each other on terra firma, teambuilding activities are available based on Hong Kong’s heritage and quirky landmarks, whether in Central, The Peak or Tsim Sha Tsui.
Team Building Asia offers a digital version of the treasure hunt by equipping groups with tablet devices and letting them use geo-positioning apps to track down a series of clues. As teams compete by interacting with historic sites, they learn more about local icons such as the Star Ferry, the island trams, the Bruce Lee statue, heritage buildings on either side of Victoria Harbour and, of course, each other.
3. Finish an outpost tour with seafood
Cantonese cuisine is rightly famed for cherishing the finest of seafood, and Hong Kong restaurants serve this nightly. But for added authenticity try sampling fruits of the sea at a village restaurant to make a fitting finale to a tour of a far-flung outpost. Try the fishing village of Tai O, on Lantau island, where the traditional dwellings are built on stilts.
Age-old crafts that are a way of village can be viewed by groups, factored into teambuilding and even later enjoyed as part of a meal. These include workshops on making shrimp paste and salty egg.
To build an appetite even more there is a chance to have fun by learning kung fu moves at Shaolin Wushu Culture Centre, just outside the village. Also in the Tai O are is arguably the most charming heritage hotel in Hong Kong (pictured above). The former colonial police station dates back to 1902 and now offers nine guest rooms and the Tai O Lookout restaurant.
Tours can be arranged through HKTB using guides from Tai O, or operators such as Tour East.
4. Dragon Boating
One of the more energetic forms of teambuilding is learning to row in unison as a dragon boat crew. Hong Kong even has a public holiday dedicated to the sport with the annual Tuen Ng Festival. There is plenty of opportunity to watch races in June when the season reaches a climax with competitions in Stanley, Sha Tin’s Shing Mun River, Sai Kung and, these days, along Victoria Harbour.
But the best fun is to be had by getting in the boat. Adrianne Lynch, of Events Travel Asia’s Hong Kong office, says dragon-boating is even an itinerary fixture for some corporate groups visiting Hong Kong for the annual Rugby Sevens. The water-based activity is said to blow away the cobwebs after a day of meetings, or a weekend of partying.
5. Discover the New Territories
Hongkongers are not prone to living in the past, but heritage and local folklore nonetheless fascinates visitors. The New Territories, once known as “Hong Kong’s back garden” – or the “land between” – leads up to the border with mainland China and was leased to the British under a 99-year lease that ended in 1997 with the return of the whole city to Chinese sovereignty. The New Territories is home to indigenous clans steeped in tradition and even today are a force to be reckoned with. Learn more about their history and the “Six Days War of 1899” when the British sent a gunboat to Tolo Harbour as villagers took on the might of the Empire.
Laurie Lau, of Momentous Asia is a keen historian as well as a DMC and conference organiser. He also operates other Hong Kong history tours.
