Mind you, they probably didn't have to be trained on the Harbour Circuits and the Sek Kong recce as we did.
Lou,
Too right we did, and I didn't work for Cathay.
Best week's flying in our company was an aeroplane (little B707, later big B707 in my time, earlier years,DC-3, DC-4, then Electra) as a dedicated trainer for a week, with 20/30 pilots to be Hong Kong qualified, and all before the runway was extended and the 13 threshold displaced. Touch and goes on 13 and 31, with plenty of harbour circuits, required for Captains and First Officers.
A wonderful fellow, that I only got to know years after he retired from Cathay was Phil Blown, he never made the transition from the Electra to the 880, as many pilots of the era did not adapt to jets --- was an absolute fund of amazing tales, all of them true. Upset Australian DCA one morning descending into Sydney, dropped down and did a low orbit of his son's school at Bathurst --- woke up the whole town.
Phil was the Captain of the Cathay DC-4 shot down. Phil passed away about a year ago.
Getting in and out in the tail end of a typhoon could get really interesting, one of only two places I ever had to use full aileron and a boot full of rudder on a 707 to keep the wings "sort of level" was going in through the gap for 31 on a "windy" day. Who say you don't use rudder on a jet, except for an engine failure.
Even places like Sanaa or Quetta were never quite like "old Hong Kong".
Tootle pip!!