Episode 1:

Well, it’s been 4 days since I’ve written anything. We’ve just awakened on the morning of our first day on the cruise ship and I’ve missed writing about my final day in Beijing and our two days of adventures in Hong Kong. It’s horrible not to have internet!

So, where do I begin? I guess, we’ll take you back to our last day in Beijing. When I last left you, we were looking forward to our final day, which was to be jam packed with shopping at the Pearl Market and the the other Markets in town.

Our last night, we were so tired, we had a dinner in the hotel at Soreno, a mediterranen restaurant. It’s rather famous and even Cathay Pacific features meals from this restaurant on its flights. It’s interesting that the place was filled with about 70% occidentals. We fell into bed that final night and, in the morning, Doug woke up and got out our tickets to have the front desk confirm us and print out our boarding passes. As he did this, he noticed we didn’t have a 5:10 flight as we thought, but a 1:30 flight getting in at 5:10. So, all of our shopping plans went down the tube. That left us about 1 hour for shopping in Beijing.

It seems our coming and going from Beijing was run, run, run..with Jane picking us up at the hotel, our running to a bank to get money to pay her...running to the Pearl Market for a measly 1 hour to get our $15 Rolex watches and some $4 pearl necklaces (which match some $100 ones I have bought in the states). It was a good thing that I only had 1 hour. With 8 hours to kill, I might have done some real damage on my pocketbook. Putin was in town causing major traffic jams and Jane was really nervous and hurried us along and back to the hotel to pack up, got us two taxis and came with us to the airport and helped us to the check in line.

As with Cathay Pacific, all went smoothly into Hong Kong and our bags were out lickety split and we hopped into a taxi to the Intercontinental and at the hotel in no time. We had another very smooth transit.

Hong Kong, compared to Beijing, has a very different climate. Beijing’s climate felt like spring - clear, crisp 60’s-70’s. I had been told of Beijing’s pollution. I found the air quite clean and the skies blue. Hong Kong is like Florida with the air muggy and heavy. I was glad I had my hair straightened. It was grey and dank out. The air was heavily polluted.

I was shocked at the difference in the cities immediately. Everyone had always raved about Hong Kong to me. It had been described as this beautiful, modern city. Beijing was a combination of EPCOT and the upper West Side or Upper East side of Manhattan combined with Fifth Avenue only nicer. Most of the buildings were glass architecture and were comprised of stunning design. There were loads of parks and a lot of trees. I never saw any slums. There were only a few older areas in Beijing that I passed, the hutong areas, and those were very quaint and one story dwellings. Driving in, Hong Kong had some massive apartment complexes on the water and beautiful bridges that looked quite nice, but as you drove closer into the city, the grey cement buildings had air conditioners hanging from them and clothes waving in the breeze, they were dirty, absolutely massive in size and not terribly attractive. Hong Kong wasn’t attractive. It was the seedy sister to Beijing. As you drove into Hong Kong, it was riddled with neon lights...Times Square on acid...every store sign is a neon sign and they even hang over the roads. Only the perimeters of the city, by the harbor, have the shiny new buildings that one sees in pictures and are pictured as representing the skyline of Hong Kong. Behind those buildings, by one block, is the real Hong Kong. More on that later.

We arrived at our hotel and Doug gave the taxi driver 300 hong kong dollars for the trip and turned away to get a tip. The driver dropped one of the bills and then told Doug that he only got $200 bills from Doug. Doug said “what?” Well, the hotel staff saw this immediately and rushed up, intervened and soon corrected the problem, but this is a city built on corruption and you really have to watch your back at every turn. This was our introduction to Hong Kong.

The Intercontinental was lovely. We were taken immediately to our room and checked in there, which was a nice touch. I found the room, by Beijing’s standards to be small...maybe 25 sq. feet. It was a very nice room. We had a harbor view room and the view was striking. However, for $600 per night it should be. Nevertheless, service was at the same incredible level as Beijing. We later offered senior staff at the Intercontinental tips for their help with some more complicated matters and the tips were refused. A letter to the Managing Director about their level of superior service is certainly in order as soon as we return.

Since we had the friends and family package the rate was brought down to around $335, but that still is rather high. If you compare this to Beijing, where we had a 90 sq. foot room for $250, including breakfast and mini bar, you do get much less for your money in Hong Kong. I’ll digress a bit to discuss our hotels in Beijing. The Hilton was close to everything downtown. It is right near their “Fifth Avenue.” It is a bustling hotel with lovely restaurants and all the rooms are marble and about 50 sq meters with flat screen TVs in both the rooms and bathrooms. There are jacuzzis and walk in closets and living rooms. Service levels were incredible. The Opposite House was a 100 room boutique hotel in another part of town that offered a night life area if you are into that. It also had two nice restaurants. It’s rooms were very large ranging from 70-90 sq meters and offered included mini bar. On weekends the breakfast is included. In Beijing, coffee shops do not open before 9am, so you may want to consider taking a breakfast package if you are an early riser and need to have breakfast. Service levels were equally high here. When we raved about these hotels to our friends who also stayed in Beijing, they stated that their hotels were just as nice as our hotel experiences. It appears that Beijing hotels are just REALLY nice.

Our Hong Kong hotel, by comparison, was more like a NYC room and a lot more money. It was a more standard experience. It is the beginning of a story we were to begin to be told throughout our next two days.

That night, we watched the renowned light show on the pier. All of skyscrapers on both sides of the harbor are lighted up with neon and flash on and off to music for about 1/2 an hour, beginning at 8pm. then, unexpectedly, we met up with our friends, Arlene and Gil, in the lobby and exchanged hellos before heading up to bed.


What we noticed was that Hong Kong appears to now have been designed to separate you from your money. For example, that realization started when I asked “What it would cost to upgrade to the Club floor at the Intercontinental. I was told $120 per day.” This included internet, tea, breakfast, beverages. By comparison, in Singapore, it is an additional $50 per day. I asked “How much for a private tour of Hong Kong per day?” I am used to paying about $300-600 per day for unlimited people (for 6 to 8 hours). In Hong Kong, I was quoted $400 per hour plus car costs plus 10% tip. I usually have my nails done will an acrylic gel nail process and have a pedicure for about $65 in NY. In Hong Kong, it cost me $135.

The next morning, Doug and I decided to opt for one of those double decker big bus tours on our first day in Hong Kong in order to get a flavor for the place. We were staying on the Kowloon side. For those of you that are not familiar with Hong Kong, as I wasn’t, Hong Kong is split in half, separated by a harbor. It takes about 6 minutes by ferry to get from one side to the other and the ferries run continuously. On one side is Hong Kong and the other side is Kowloon. Kowloon seems to house a lot of malls, the furniture district, the home house wears district, the jade market, and some meat and product markets. Hong Kong is the financial district and looks just like NY’s Wall Street. Sprinkled every couple of blocks are upscale malls with exactly the same stores: Prada, Chanel, Gucci, Rolex, etc. It is on this side that Victoria Peak is located as well as some antique markets. I didn’t get the feeling that either side is wealthier than the other. It was written in the local paper that the most expensive apartment in the world recently sold in the Kowloon area (and it was pointed out on the tour) for $50 million US for a 6000 square foot apartment last week. It wasn’t a very nice looking area from my perspective (it wasn’t on the water, etc.). Hong Kong is a terribly noisy city, it is very crowded and the traffic is horrible (as was Beijing’s).

At first, I found it interesting...the lights, the bling in every window...diamonds everywhere...beautiful clothes...but it was overwhelming. There were no deals. The prices were through the roof. I asked our concierge “Who buys these things? How can you have 10 Rolex stores within a 20 block radius? Who can afford all these $13000 and up watches?” He told me that the Chinese are now so wealthy and their taxes are so high, that they come into Hong Kong and buy up all of these goods. That all these stores are not for those in Hong Kong. The markets with all the copies are for the regular folk. The high end store is for the Mainland Chinese. There is now a real dichotomy forming between those in Hong Kong who cannot afford these expensive furnishings and the very wealthy Mainland Chinese who come in to buy them avoid the taxes. He told me that Hong Kong has changed dramatically in the past 4 or so years. He barely recognizes it. It has become a place of haves and have nots.

Hong Kong by the harbor is now a fairyland of capitalism at its very worst. Behind it true Hong Kong. So, those who cannot afford the bling rip those that they think can afford it off. You have all sorts of warning from the hotel about not going into the shops and only buying from the high priced stores because of the bait and switch tactics. It is the wild west and police have no authority against criminal tactics.

The paper is filled with corruption scandals right down to the fact that the lottery has been fixed and there is nothing the government can do about it.

Oh well, it’s time to go to lunch...more later...