China's first astronaut will be given celebrity status in Hong Kong, sharing a stage with pop stars Nicholas Tse and Joey Yung in a visit organizers say will be short on formalities but long on popular appeal.

Yang Liwei has been hailed a national hero since piloting China's first manned spaceflight and he heads to Hong Kong on Friday for appearances that seem intended to bolster a sense of patriotism in the former British colony.

Yang has been all over Chinese television, in government-approved interviews, but he's made no known public appearances in the mainland. In Hong Kong there will be at least the appearance of openness.

Yang will be seen pressing the flesh in meetings with local students and he'll be giving a lecture, but it's unclear whether he'll take unprompted questions from Hong Kong's freewheeling journalists.

Some Hong Kongers have called the space flight as a waste of money 40 years after the Soviet Union and the United States did the same thing, though others have seen it as a proud moment for China.

Hong Kong leader Tung Chee-hwa will host an official banquet for Yang, but the remainder of his schedule has a decidedly populist twist.

Although Yang will be treated as a star, he won't get the security trappings of visiting dignitaries, with no bodyguards planned, according to a report in The Standard newspaper.

Police declined comment on the report.

Yang's Shenzhou 5 space capsule, which orbited the Earth 14 times, will be on display at the Hong Kong Science Museum along with his space suit and samples of his space meals.

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