Ordinary Gweilo
It's not big and it's not clever, it's just a Brit in Hong Kong writiing (mainly) about Hong Kong
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Category: Life in Hong Kong
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Continuing my occasional series on Hong Kong’s least loved companies, now it’s the turn of PCCW, or more specifically Netvigator. Or, to be precise, the complete nonsense that it is their interactive phone menu system. I wanted to find out more about their 30 mb/s fibre broadband. Their website give a phone number and says…
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A few weeks ago I suggested that there aren’t any zebra crossings on public roads in Hong Kong. Apparently I need to get out more, because there are a few scattered around. In fact, last week the sub-Standard reported an accident on one in Shau Kei Wan: The driver of a light goods vehicle was…
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Unlike my colleague Mr F, I do quite enjoy Chinese New Year. So no complaints from me. In case you’re not up to speed on these things, today is everyone’s birthday, and you have just over a week left to get your Lai See.
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As far as I am aware, there aren’t any zebra crossings on public roads in Hong Kong. There are lots of crossings with lights, and some places where there is a central refuge and you can take your life into your hands, and many, many, pedestrian bridges and tunnels. But the only zebra crossings are…
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Sometimes the price of books in Hong Kong is almost beyond belief: Jamie’s Ministry of Food Page One, Kowloon Tong HK$474 Cover Price £25.00 HK$292 Amazon.co.uk* (shipped to Hong Kong) £17.97 HK$210 Typical UK bookstore price £12.50 HK$146 £1 = HK$11.68 * Amazon price is £9.99, plus a delivery charge of £7.98 (£4.99 per shipment…
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Once again the government seems to have made a mess of something that really shouldn't have be so difficult Two weeks ago, the fare structure for urban taxis was revised, making short journeys more expensive and longer journeys cheaper. However, the fares for New Territories taxis were left unchanged, whereas normally they are kept in…
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Paypal have set up a Hong Kong site. Hurrah – there’s an English version. However, you have to wonder about the common sense of the people who set it up, because this is the screen header: Well-designed multi-lingual sites have a button saying ‘English’. This one doesn’t. However, if you can recognize any Chinese characters…
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A few days ago, Ken Livingstone made the fairly obvious observation that building new roads is only ever a short-term solution, and said that the proposed Wan Chai-Central would be a “complete waste of time” Today, there is a letter in the SCMP on this subject: How inappropriate for a progressive society like Hong Kong…
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The long-established electrical chain Tai Lin recently closed down, apparently a victim of the current financial crisis. I’ve only bought one item there and I had to take it back again and get a refund, so I suppose that doesn’t really count. Their stores always seemed much less crowded than Fortress and Broadway. Ah, yes,…
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More great thinkers in the SCMP’s marvellous Talkback column: As a domestic helper gets a holiday on Sunday, if the Monday is a statutory public holiday the helper gets two days off. However when that happens, who does the cleaning for those two days? It means the house remains in a mess for that period…
Ordinary Gweilo 