Ordinary Gweilo

It's not big and it's not clever, it's just a Brit in Hong Kong writing (mainly) about Hong Kong

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Month: Dec 2004

  • Paint your way to peace

    It’s sometimes hard to make sense of what is happening in Northern Ireland, but the absurdity of the situation was rather nicely captured by this leader in The Guardian.  In case you haven’t been following the story, the DUP (led by that cuddly religious chap, Rev. Ian Paisley) wants the destruction of IRA weapons to…

  • Let them build whatever they want

    I see that Simon Patkin has graduated from writing letters to the SCMP, and is now a contributor. Still the same old nonsense (subscription required), of course. He is arguing in favour of the preservation of "property rights" in the context of the (now abandoned) redevelopment of Hunghom Peninsula and reconstruction of Central Police Station. …

  • At least it’s not run by a drunk

    This piece from Harry made me laugh: The British Council is better than most language schools. It’s run by the UK Foreign Office: all the other language schools I worked at were run by drunks. They could use this in pamphlets as their "unique selling point." It would be an improvement on “Creating Opportunity for…

  • On second thoughts…

    Well, that was a surprise.  The two property developers involved in Hunghom Peninsula (Sun Hung Kai Properties and New World Development) have announced that they will be bowing to public pressure and upgrading rather than demolishing the apartments: The developers said they had abandoned their original plan because they did not want to foster discord…

  • Asia Blog Awards

    Phil is too busy, so Hong Kong’s most hyperactive blogger has temporarily taken over the Asia Blog Awards.  I wish I could be more enthusiastic about this, but honestly I’m not.  I’m not doing this in the expectation of winning any awards, and if I were then I would go about it in a different…

  • Excuses, excuses

    Sorry for any inconvenience, as they say when they don’t really mean it.  Too busy at work, and sitting in front of a computer in the evening writing more of this rubbish isn’t always the most attractive option. Odd goings on elsewhere.  HkMacs has been unavailable (to me, at least) for several weeks, apart from…

  • Weaselwatch: Credit Cards

    I got a phone call the other day to remind me that I had forgotten to pay one of my credit card bills. That’s funny, I thought, I don’t normally use this card. It turned out that there was an admin charge of HK$60 for their “free” dental coverage. To this they have added HK$100…

  • A small snack

    The Observer had an interesting piece yesterday about Alan Yau, someone from over here who’s doing rather well over there.  He’s from Hong Kong and he runs a London restaurant called Hakkasan, the first Cantonese restaurant to win a Michelin star (though I’m not sure this means anything – the further Michelin gets away from…

  • Watson’s Great Lite Hope

    I happened to be in Festival Walk (Kowloon Tong) recently, and I had only just got over the disappointment of discovering that they are using the same giant Christmas tree for the 3rd or 4th year in a row, when I discovered that the ParknShop Superstore has morphed into something called Taste (as reported in…