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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The day after Christmas is known in some parts of the world (chiefly those with a strong British influence) as Boxing Day. A long time ago, servants and tradespeople used to be given a gift (or “Christmas box”) on Boxing Day by their employers or customers. When I was a child (in the UK) it…
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The English Schools Foundation (ESF) has chosen a new chief executive. His name is Mike Haynes and he is the chairman of the Parent-Teacher Association at West Island School (details here) and an ESF executive committee member, but other than that he appears to have no previous experience in the education sector. The story is…
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My post about the effects of the government’s land policy prompted a lively debate over at the Gweilo Diaries [it was a blog run by someone calling himself “Conrad”] Predictably, it has caused outrage from at least one property owner, who assumed that (i) I don’t own property and (ii) that I was advocating that…
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One of the great unresolved mysteries about Hong Kong restaurants is why some of them think their customers want icy blasts of cold air with their food – even in the middle of winter. Today I had lunch in a dim sum restaurant that really excelled itself in this regard – one of my colleagues…
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When I lived in London, I spent a large part of my life never having to use an elevator. In fact when I was a child, one of our small amusements on a Saturday was going on the bus to a large new shopping centre and travelling up and down in the car park lifts.…
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From The Guardian, a story about the latest fare increases on the London Underground. The flat fare for any journey in the central zone is now £2, which at current exchange rates is HK$28. Compare that to the cost of travelling on the MTR in Hong Kong, which is much lower – for example HK$5…
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Simon is whining about having to move to a new office, wait for it, right on the edge of Central. Not Tuen Mun, or Tseung Kwan O, or the Tai Po Science Park, just another location in Central that doesn’t have a view of the harbour!! His complaint is that the large bank that employs…
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There’s an interesting article by Cathy Holcombe in this week’s Spike, discussing the reasons why Hong Kong doesn’t have the loft-type apartments in disused industrial and commercial buildings that are commonly found in New York, London and many other large cities. It’s not lack of supply, nor lack of demand, but a perverse consequence of…
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DVD prices in Hong Kong keep falling, and if you buy in local stores you will pay even less.
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100,000 people marched through Hong Kong yesterday in support of democracy. This was more than the organizers estimate of around 20,000 (which I thought was rather pessimistic) but significantly fewer than marched in July. The police issued a rather mysterious estimate of the number they believed had gathered in Victoria Park before setting off (37,000)…
Ordinary Gweilo 