In many East Asian schools, English language learning is still largely characterized by grammar and vocabulary exercises which aim at preparing students for pubic examinations rather than for genuine communication. The turn of this century has, however, seen a rising trend of using content-based instruction (CBI) approaches, especially in the form of content and language integrated learning (CLIL), as a way to provide authentic communicative contexts for the learning of both content and English as an L2. This kind of CBI seems to be especially sought after in many East Asian societies where English is largely a foreign language (i.e., not used by students and teachers as a daily language for authentic communicative purposes). In this paper the rise of CLIL as an approach to CBI and its attendant challenges and promises will be discussed with examples from Hong Kong.