Category: Life in Hong Kong
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I went into to a stationery shop to buy a toner cartridge for my printer. A thimble-full of ink for only HK$100 – thanks very much, people who design printers. What amused me was that the shop had used plastic ties in an attempt to prevent customers from stealing these hugely over-priced items. Which was…
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Another one of those surveys that seem to work wonders in getting free publicity. It was in Friday’s Independent London’s public transport is world’s best (no, really) and Sunday’s SCMP London ranked above HK in transport poll as well. A survey that voted London as having the best public transport system in the world has been greeted with…
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It’s that time of year again. Every Chinese restaurant has piles of Moon Cakes everywhere you look. Worse still, fridges across Hong Kong seem to be full of the wretched things, with hardly any space available for actual food or drink. I’ve never quite seen the attraction of these lard and sugar-filled delights. And who’d…
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I notice that the KCR is advertising their "direct" service from Tsim Sha Tsui East to Lok Ma Chau. The irony here is that when the "Southern Link" is completed in a couple of years, it will be necessary to change at Hung Hom so it won’t be direct at all. Mind you, maybe by…
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I used to think that Hong Kong supermarkets were easy enough to categorise. CitySuper and Great have lots of stuff I want, but can’t afford Park’n’Shop certainly isn’t Tesco or Sainsburys, but it is (just about) OK Wellcome generally isn’t. CRC? Who goes there? And, of course, the basics are available everywhere. Or so I…
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Did I miss this story in the SCMP? I found it in New Scientist: Tsunami risk for Hong Kong and Macao Hong Kong and Macao are enormous, sprawling economic centres perched on the coast. And both stand a 10 per cent chance of being hit by a serious tsunami in the next century, warn geophysicists.…
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Last week I mentioned that the drive-in cinema in Kowloon appeared to have closed down. Today comes confirmation of this in the SCMP (Drive-in cinema shuts after just 8 months – subscription required): The curtain has fallen on Hong Kong’s first and only drive-in cinema just eight months after it opened. Movie fans might have voted…
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The BBC reports (China dishes up menu translations) that the Beijing Tourism Bureau is trying to improve the English translations of restaurant menus in preparation for next year’s Olympics. Translations such as “virgin chicken” for a young chicken dish and “burnt lion’s head” for pork meatballs are confusing for foreigners, it says. [..] The names of many Chinese dishes have…
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I love it when companies try to get away with whopping great lies. A drive-in cinema opened in West Kowloon at the end of last year, and it has had an advert in the SCMP for several months. For the last few weeks the advert has solemnly announced that the cinema is closed for a private…
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This comment about a recent post reminded of an article some time ago in The Economist (subscription required as this is so old): MEET your airline’s latest employee: you. You may not have noticed, but you are also now working for your phone company and your bank. Why? Because of the growth of the self-service…
Ordinary Gweilo 