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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  • Delicious

    I was amused by this website, which is supposed to let you Make up Your Mind about McDonalds (UK).

    They have a “question and answer” section.  Which sounds like a great idea, until you notice that they appear to employ a team of robots to answer the questions.  For example, almost all the questions about Chicken McNuggets have the following (or a slight variation) as the answer:

    Chicken McNuggets are made from deboned chicken breast meat, which is then minced. A flavoured marinade is then added and mixed in. The minced chicken meat is shaped into McNuggets and coated with the specially seasoned batter, flash fried and frozen.

    …which gets kinda tedious after a while.  Unlike the questions, which include such gems as  “why do you get all the horrid bits if chicken and put them and chicken nuggets?”; “is it true there is paint in your chicken nuggets?”, and “are there eyeballs of chikens in the chiken nuggets”  You will notice that spelling is not a strong point of the average McDonalds customer.

    My question is this – why does the food they serve in McDonalds never look anything like the photographs?

  • Did anyone think this through?

    The Cable TV news service on KCR MTR trains is all about the earthquake in Sichuan.  Would it therefore not be possible (just for a day or two) to drop the idiotic advertising that takes up about 50% of the screen whilst the news is being broadcast? 

    Distressing pictures of earthquake victims do not sit well with advertising for products we really don’t need. 

    Then, of course, in the “breaks”, they show one of the lavish ads for The Palazzo…   

  • The Palazzo and the rugby stadium

    Rugby stadium Today’s SCMP comes with a giant poster of The Palazzo, complete with the ridiculous claim that it benefits from the superb facilities of the Olympic Equestrian Arena.  That’s the temporary arena that the developers portray as a small rugby league stadium (see right), and which will be demolished before anyone moves into The Palazzo.

    Meanwhile, someone has kindly provided a link for the overblown TV ad for The Palazzo (on You Tube of course).

    Personally, I find it amusing rather than annoying.  At least the ad (like the website) looks good, and is well-done, unlike so many of the adverts we have to suffer on Hong Kong TV. 

    According to yesterday’s SCMP, they have managed to sell the first batch of apartments, so presumably they’ll be happy with their efforts in attempting to deceive the public.

    PhotographMeanwhile, one of the largest property agents in this city is wilfully undermining some of the good work done by the developers, by circulating photographs of the actual development, which shows that Ma On Shan may be a  little closer than it appears in the artist’s impression, that the opposite bank of the Shing Mun river is more developed, and that the sewage treatment works are not a large area of green open space. 

    The same leaflet also shows that KCRC House is not being knocked down, but somehow manages to create the impression that Route 9 is a small country lane, and that the housing development next door is some sort of park.

    Palazzo planIt also highlights the fact that this is a very strange site.  On one side we have Route 9, on another side we have the MTR East Rail, and it is built around both Jubilee Garden estate (at one end) and KCRC House (at the other end).  The clubhouse is therefore being built on top of the railway line on a narrow strip of land above the railway and between the highway and the Jubilee Garden estate. 

    Another feature advertised is the “Sha Tin to Central link”.  This is weird, because you would think that a development that is part-owned by the MTR would get this right, but the current plan is that the so-called “Sha Tin to Central link” will become an extension of the Ma On Shan line from Tai Wai to Hung Hom, and that East Rail will be extended from Hung Hom to Central.  Although this is many years away, it ought to be a selling point for The Palazzo – if they could get it right.  But, hey, why bother with something that is true when you have so much that isn’t?    

  • JK Rowling (without beard)

    Helpful caption from the BBC website, for anyone wondering if JK Rowling might have suddenly grown a beard:

     JK Rowling

  • Palazzo fantasia – Everything’s gone green

    Hong Kong property developers don’t just tell little white lies, oh no.

    The Palazzo is a new development in the New Territories.  As is apparently compulsory these days it has a funny foreign name (French and Italian being favourites) and an auspicious Chinese name (御龍山 – which is something to do with an imperial dragon that lives in the mountain).  It’s built on top of the KCR East Rail line opposite Fo Tan station.  On one side it has views of the Fo Tan Industrial Area (and the mountain behind), and the other side there is the Hong Kong Sports Institute and City One Sha Tin (and yes, OK, some mountains behind). 

    Palazzo

    On the right you should see the image the developers want to portray of this rural idyll, with a few landmarks highlighted: the racecourse, Kau To Shan, Tolo Harbour, and the place where horses will jump over some fences in August (which will surely have been demolished long before anyone moves in), and the Shing Mun river.  Very green, isn’t it? 

    Of course, when I say image, what I mean is an artist’s impression…of how the developer wished it looked, rather than the reality.

    Where to start?  Well, I think we can discount the blue sparkling water in the Shing Mun river and the nullah because no-one would believe that, though I suppose we should be grateful that we have been spared the yachts and junks that so often appear in the water in these type of pictures.

    Anyway, my eye was drawn first to the rather large clump of bushes that appear in the foreground.  As luck would have it, they obscure the Fo Tan Industrial Area and the railway line.  If only the artist had moved a few metres to his left or right he could have made his portrayal far more accurate, but unfortunately the imaginary bushes were in the way.  

    Then I noticed that the sewage works in the background have also failed to catch the artist’s attention and been replaced with more lovely green stuff (that must be because it’s easier to draw)

    Palazzo (how it is)In the foreground, KCR House (as it probably isn’t called anymore) has also been overlooked by the artist.  The main building has simply disappeared (it should be immediately to the south of The Palazzo) and the smaller building next to it has turned into another piece of open space with bushes and trees.

    That’s three landmarks gone missing.   In case you’re getting confused, I’ve annotated the fantasy picture with a guide to what has been obscured by excessive imaginary green stuff (see right).

    Palazzo and KCR HouseThe picture on the left shows the The Palazzo being built, and you can clearly see that it fits around KCR House, which is the black building at the back right and the low white building next to it (if you’re confused by the orientation, this is looking south whereas the main one is looking north).  Yet you won’t find it in the official artist’s impression.  The photograph also shows what looks like City One Shatin, which unluckily enough doesn’t quite fit into the artist’s impression, being just off to the bottom right.

    Oh, and it seems that Ma On Shan had disappeared off into the far distance.  Not nearly green enough, I fear.

    Palazzo - roomStill, there’s always the view of the racecourse.  That’s gotta be good, right?  From another artist’s impression (see right) which I found on their splendid website, it appears that you can see the whole racecourse from your living room (love the decor, by the way).  Excellent.

    Perspective can be a tricky thing, but if the racecourse is just visible beyond the tops of the apartment blocks (in the main picture), I think that means that it must be at least 700-800 metres from the nearest apartments.  And, if we are going to be picky, there are also the Jockey Club staff quarters blocking the views from the lower floors (which is what this view seems to show).  

    Stadium The other thing that amused me (though I doubt that will influence anyone one way or the other) is that the temporary venue for the Olympics horsey bits is shown as if it were a small football stadium.  It’s not, though, is it?  Imagination is a wonderful thing, and it would be very boring just to show the dull reality of a temporary stadium.  But it isn’t a League Two football ground, guys.

    The website is full of all sorts of other nonsense.  It’s worth a look, and although it is wildly pretentious it does also seem fairly well-designed.

  • The mobile phone that isn’t

    Sometimes you have to admire the ingenuity of Hong Kong companies in overcoming problems – and wonder why the government couldn’t make life simpler.

    Problem #1.  Smartone would like to steal some of PCCW’s fixed-line customers, but they don’t have a fixed line network. 

    Solution – launch a mobile service masquerading as a fixed-line service (HomePhone+).  As far as I can tell, it’s a standard mobile phone (using the GSM network), but adapted so that if you take it outside your home it doesn’t work.  Brilliant. 

    You might ask why they would want to do this.  Good question.  Smartone want PCCW subscribers to be able to transfer their fixed-line numbers to Smartone.  To do this they need to convince the Telecommunications Authority that this is a fixed-line service, and apparently they have managed to pull the wool over their eyes do so.  

    Smartone have been advertising this new service quite extensively and are offering to pay the cancellation fees for PCCW subscribers who are on fixed-term contracts (up to a maximum of 6 months) and give them a free phone.  Yes, that’s the “special” phone that only works on HomePhone+. 

    PCCW are fighting back with adverts that point out the limitations of the new service.  They say that the 2G network is not as reliable as their fixed-line service, and that during a typhoon (or any other time the mobile phone network is overloaded), it might not work.  We’ve been here before, of course, with IP-based phones – then the argument put forward by PCCW was that the phone wouldn’t work if the mains power supply went down (and that if you called 999 they wouldn’t know where you were, unless, you, er, told them).   I don’t think it would put many people off.

    What puzzles me is that HomePhone+ is only slightly cheaper than PCCW’s conventional fixed-line service, and not obviously superior.  Well, yes, it allows you to use an IP phone service without having a broadband connection, but surely the people who might think of using an IP phone service are precisely the people who already have a broadband connection.  Smartone also make great play of the value-added services (caller display, call waiting), but you can have these from PCCW if you pay a little extra.

    In fact, of all the alternatives to PCCW’s fixed-line service, this one looks the least attractive.  If you want to save money, Cable TV can offer a broadband connection and an IP phone service together for less than PCCW’s broadband service alone – though it does mean contending with their legendary customer service.

    Not that I’m complaining.  Anything that forces PCCW to reduce their prices sounds good to me.   Mind you, the government could increase competition and simplify things greatly by allowing fixed-line numbers to be transferred to a mobile service (and vice versa).  I think that would see HomePhone+ radidly withdrawn.  

    Problem #2.  Pay-TV operators are not allowed to re-broadcast terrestrial TV.

    PCCW have come up with a fairly ingenious solution to this bizarre problem.  Their new set-top boxes for Now TV have the digital terrestrial channels on the channels below 100, and the Now TV channels from 100-999.  You don’t need to press any buttons to switch between the two functions, so from a user perspective it is totally seamless.  It  uses one only power socket, and only one HDMI connection to your TV.  Everything is available from one remote control.     

    However, this is another problem that could easily be solved in an even simpler way.  If the government allowed Cable TV and Now TV to re-broadcast the free-to-air channels (digital and analogue) no new set-top boxes would be required.

  • Do you have an English version?

    clip_image002This advert was in The Standard last week.  I just wonder how difficult it would have been to have got the first sentence proof read by some who was familiar with the English language. 

    I’m sure HSBC could afford it…

  • Ho hum

    Oh, it’s a different type of rally…

    From the BBC website:

    image

    A newspaper has claimed Mosley took part in a “Nazi-style orgy”. He denies his actions had any Nazi connotations.

    He has faced numerous calls to resign since the News of the World’s revelations.

  • What went wrong?

    The Standard is still following up on the collapse of Oasis.  As I mentioned last week, it does appear that the directors of the company had some serious disagreements (Feud not fuel downed Oasis):

    Quarrelling between various investors led to the collapse of Oasis Hong Kong Airlines not high oil prices or a flawed business model as previously thought, sources told The Standard.

    The likely demise of the start-up carrier was triggered by a fallout between the partners in the company, people familiar with the situation said. Chairman Raymond Lee Cho-min wanted to keep Oasis in business, but other investors were unwilling to pour in more money after additional cash injections and wanted to pull out following repeated disagreements, the sources said.

    The revelation left open a brighter glimmer of hope that the citys only long-haul budget airline could be resurrected, and flights could take off again, if the shareholders quarrel is resolved. A source close to one investor said there may be progress on finding a white knight in about a week.

    Budget airline?  I think not.  Anyway, the story goes on to say that the other directors were unhappy with Raymond Lee because he had not made any further investment in the company.  However it does appear that he did take out a loan:

    Unable to raise more funding from existing investors, chairman Lee is believed to have pledged his stake in the company as collateral to take out a US$10 million personal loan from Cheung Kong Group.

    Despite fighting amongst the company’s partners, sources close to the bank creditors of Oasis Airlines said they were comfortable with the company’s financial situation after Raymond Lee’s US$10 million injection and had not triggered the provisional liquidation.

    The irony being that this loan appears to have prevented the rescue of the company that was being discussed early last week (because Lee’s shares were pledged as collateral).  I think we can safely conclude that the other directors would have been happy to sell out to a new investor, whereas Lee felt that the company could survive, and so he took out the loan to try to keep it going.  Maybe he would have been successful if the other directors had agreed – or maybe the other directors were correct that the best strategy was to sell out.  Since they couldn’t agree, the company went into liquidation. 

    The latest rumour is that either Cheung Kong or Victor Li plan to acquire Oasis.  This has some logic to it, given that Li had previously bid for Air Canada, but Cheung Kong have issued a fairly comprehensive denial.  The problem with reviving Oasis is that the new company would need to offer a very comprehensive guarantee to cover tickets that were issued, and that would presumably have a major impact on cash flow.  I suppose the other question is whether anyone has a workable business plan.

    I think everyone agrees that Oasis had a flawed business plan, but not on what was wrong with it.  Here’s one view (Flawed model led to airline’s demise):

    The demise of Oasis stemmed from a flawed business model allocating too many seats for the premium class, according to the Centre for Asia Pacific Aviation.

    Oasis marked out 22 percent of its total seating capacity to 81 business seats in a generous layout, whereas Malaysia’s AirAsia X will only set aside 7 percent or 28 seats in its new planes and Australia’s Jetstar allocates 12.5 percent to business-class seating.

    “The Oasis example reinforces our view that a sustainable low-cost, long-haul airline model must stick to core principles of high aircraft utilization and high seat density to achieve a sustainable cost position,” said AirAsia X chief executive Azran Osman- Rani.

    I don’t agree that it was a mistake to have a large business class cabin.  If Oasis could sell all 81 seats at HK$10,000 (one-way), that is HK$810,000 of revenue.  Selling the remaining 368 economy-class seats at HK$1,800 that would only generate HK$662,000.  Reducing the number of business class seats would not have increased income. 

    It’s well-known that business class is more profitable than economy, and “premium economy” can also be very profitable for those airlines that offer it.  The way that budget airlines make economy pay is to pack in as many seats as possible and maximise the number of flights every day, neither of which are feasible if you are operating from Hong Kong to London and Vancouver.  So Oasis needed to do something else, and a cut-price business class was as good as anything else.   

  • Looking very silly

    By general consent, the English Premier League is the #1 league in the world, as demonstrated by the fact that PCCW paid a small fortune to secure the exclusive rights to show the games in Hong Kong.

    Yet Cable TV apparently know better, and has decided that its viewers are more interested in La Liga, Serie A and the German Bundesliga than the EPL.  The sports news on Cable TV News starts with brief highlights, results and tables from an assortment of continental leagues, before finally and reluctantly giving viewers a quick rundown of happenings in the EPL.

    I believe that they could show the goals from the EPL, but to do so they would need to give a credit to Now TV, and presumably that would be a bit too humiliating for them.  Well, that’s their choice, but they do look extremely silly when they try to pretend that the EPL is suddenly less important than the Bundesliga.