I REFER to the letters, "Can S'pore ever be an Asian Tiger with grace?" (my paper, Oct 29) and "S'poreans beat most in Asia for graciousness" (my paper, Oct 31).

I am not Asian, but have lived in Asia my entire life. I have adopted both Hong Kong and Singapore as my homes, and I believe that people in both cities show an equal amount of graciousness.

I grew up in Hong Kong and learnt to speak a little Mandarin there in school.

I realised that you need to know only a little Mandarin and Cantonese to survive in Hong Kong, as most people speak fluent English.

People in Hong Kong are fairly polite, compared to other parts of China.

I moved to Singapore a few years ago, and am amazed at how different things are.

Because Singapore is very multi-cultural, there are more languages to learn and use.

Here, you need more than a few words to get help.

While this might be the case, I find that taxi drivers and service staff at information counters speak fluent English.

In Hong Kong and Singapore, you need to inform the wait staff at restaurants not to serve all your food at once but, apart from that, I believe the standard of service in both cities deserve to be acknowledged.

Ms Lillian Armstrong

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