When walking in a group of more than 2, it should be deemed as appropriate jaywalking etiquette to confirm the comfort level of jaywalking amongst your peers. Otherwise, there will be a disconnect in understanding.
When alone, it is certainly much easier to jaywalk whenever you wanted because there is no dialog to maintain. Things get more complicated when in a group setting, one freezes while others dash. Conversations get broken, others are called out as pussies, few get hit by cars, it all gets really messy if no prior understanding is established.
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It's less of an issue in other cities. In a place like Portland or New York (probably Beijing too), there is an underlying assumption of what a pedestrian will do. In the case of New York or Beijing, the assumption is that you will jaywalk and if you don't want to, it's up to you to communicate it with the group you're walking with.
Hong Kong, on the other hand, does not have a set of tacit conventions for people to follow. Some people jaywalk and some don't, some people walk on the right side and some on the left. Even the MTR Stations add to this confusion. One Wan Chai exit encourages people to walk on the right side, whereas the rest ask you to walk on the left side. It's no wonder it's a struggle to anticipate whether or not to cross against the red.
It's the rare case where Hong Kong is too cosmopolitan for its own good.
christopher
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