This is probably old hat to some of you, but I was stopped and searched by police officers in SoHo today, while walking home up the escalators just after midnight.
One officer stopped me and asked me for my ID, which I produced. He asked me where I was going, and I responded "home". He asked me where I lived, and I told him. He asked me if I work here in Hong Kong and I said no, I'm on vacation from Canada. He was extremely polite through the whole thing.
He then asked to search my bag. Since I have no idea what my rights are here (and Google doesn't seem to be overly clear on the topic), I allowed it. He did a very detailed search of my bag. He then asked for my wallet. He went through my wallet in an even more detailed manner which suggested he was looking for drugs (perhaps a dime bag hidden inside or something). But he also even looked at my membership cards and such.
After the bag and wallet search, he gave me a quick patdown, his partner returned my ID, and he thanked me. Through the whole thing he was extremely polite. On a pleasantness scale of -10 to +10, it was at worst a -2. That said, I'm a little anti-authoritarian by nature, so I'd like to know for the future whether they have the right to do everything they did.
I'd also be interested in hearing any of your experiences.
Thanks!