[Lunatique]

I'll be there for 5 days, renewing my visa and hanging out.

Anyone know any cool places there? Underground music scene? Game studios? Places to buy stuff for really cheap? Great restaurants?

[Bg]

I know nothing about Hong Kong, but have a nice trip anyway!! also if you have some time check out my new 10 minutes old pic:Castle

I'm going to bed now....

[Steven Stahlberg]

Over 3 years since I was there last, so this may be out-of-date. It's not a great place for music and the arts, unless cantopop and karaoke is your fav - though I guess if you look around Lan Kwai Fong you might see some posters for 'events' featuring some DJ or other, sometimes from overseas, never went to any of those though.

If you want to visit the biggest computer graphics facilities I guess Centro and Menfond would still be it. Lots of smaller studios too I guess, probably numbering in the hundreds by now.

Some of the best chinese comix are created there, with some very talented artists, maybe you could get to meet them.

Take the Peak Tram to Victoria Peak. Take the jet ferry to Discovery Bay. Take a whole day just riding around the MTR, popping up to take a look at random stops. Take another day to ride the doubledecker trams around Hong Kong Island - sitting at the front on the upper floor of course. Take a doubledecker bus to Stanley Village. Go to Hollywood Road, and from there, ride the longest escalator in the world all the way up and back down again.

After you been there, write a 'travelogue' about it, I'd be most interested to read your impressions and opinions and adventures there. I miss the place.

[Lunatique]

bg-- Your new piece is cool. I'm on a laptop, so I can't truely appreciate the full range of details. I'll have to look at it again when I get back home to my 19" monitor.

Speaking of monitors, I saw these crazy ass 21" LCD monitors(and even larger ones!) in Hong Kong. OMG, I was drooling. My GF had to drag me away from the display window.

Steven-- I mentioned those places you listed to my GF, and she just kind of shrugged and said, "tourist spots are all the same world over, it's up to you if you really want to see them." I guess she's right. I lived in San Francisco for a long time, and I couldn't even bother to go see many of the famous landmarks...

Last time I was in Hong kong with her, we basically just went shopping and restaurant hopping. It looks like it'll be the same again.

As far as Hong Kong comics go, I personally can't stand them(sorry dude ). It's mostly a bunch of kung fu fighting, Japanese-wannabe, ill-proportionally drawn, badly written stuff. The mishmash of b/w inked pages, colored pages, and fully painted pages just seems pointless and inconsistent to me. The few titles with good art always have really immature and copycat stories, and even then the art style is always a direct copy of well-known Japanese manga creators. I can flip through any Hong Kong comic(good art or bad art), and identify exactly which Japanese artists they copied.

I'll be hitting a really good English language book store tomorrow. I'm dying to read some really good contemporary literature again. I've been struggling through book two of LOTR, and I feel like I've somehow outgrown fantasy novels. It's been like that for the past 4 years or so. Eveytime I try to read a fantasy or sci-fi novel, I just end up losing interest soon, and pick up either classic or contemporary literature instead.

I bought a mountain of DVD's, VCD's, and a few CD's today. I suspect there'll be more DVD/CD shopping tomorow.

I miss the underground music scene, but you said there really isn't one in HK, so I guess that'll have to wait till I get back to the Bay Area. Man, what I would give to see a good live industrial, goth, acid jazz, or progressive house band.

[Steven Stahlberg]

Hehe, tourist places, you could say all of Hong Kong island and Kowloon is one big 'tourist place'. If you want to see the 'real' HK either go to the New Territories - which is much like rural South China so that holds no surprises for you - or enter the Shanghai and Hong Kong Banking Corporation's headquarters, or maybe a fancy hotel. That's typical Hongkers right there, banking and tourism. The making of money, the keeping of it, the investment of it, the use and display of it. That and food, and horse-racing, pretty much sums it up. Yeah, that's one I forgot, the gambling - try to see a horserace, and get in a Mahjong game, that could be fun. I never did either.

There's also the colonial history part of HK, but I don't know how interested you are in all that.

As for the shopping, it's good but not that great, but I understand if your GF prefers shopping to anything else, what woman doesn't? j/k (well half kidding anyway)
And yes, I suppose the shopping there is definitely better than in China.

Discovery Bay is where I lived, and IMHO well worth a trip, even if it's not typical HK in any way. In fact I think it's rather unique in the world.

About chinese comics, yeah they're not on the top of my list of artistic achievements, but there was one or two guys who's work I admired back then, don't know if they're still there.

[Tiger Eaten]

All I can say is that if you walk into a dark club and a nice pretty lady sits down beside you and starts to talk to you. Whatever you do, WHATEVER YOU DO: Do NOT buy this woman a drink of any kind. You will end up paying close to a hundred dollars for a glass of soda.

Um, this um, happened to a friend of a friend of mine......not me....no.....I would never........

[Lunatique]

Steven- Man o man. This trip is turning out to be a hit and run kind of thing. Get official business taken care of, then go shopping all day. Not that I'm complaining, since Hong Kong isn't really a cultural oasis anyway. I'm not one of those people in love with Hong Kong films or over-romanticize the whole Chinese culture stuff anyway. In fact, I think most of Hong Kong's films are disgustingly bad, with VERY few exceptions. I feel the same way about Chinese culture in general, so.... I'm a traitor to my own race. Bwahahaha!

Tiger Eaten--- Oh DUDE, you were a chump! You got duped by a sly "gold-diggin' professional" girl! Bwahahahaha!!! Err....I meant, your FRIEND.

I'm not a naive foreigner, so don't worry. I'm too quick for these greedy little girls that either want your wallet or a greencard. Beside, my GF makes most of them look like scary dogs anyway.

[Steven Stahlberg]

I entered one of those places of ill-repute, this was about 10 years ago, I didn't pay whiskey-prices for a girl's tea, since me and my friend were just watching the floor show. It was rather disappointing in one way, not as wild as the shows in Pat Pong in Bangkok, no nudity, the girls even have opaque pantyhose on... but some of them were every bit as young and beautiful as anything you might find anywhere else.
How do they do it? They use Filipino girls - they come over on contract and work for 6 months, then go back home with more money than most doctors and lawyers over there... so it's a very popular way to make money for pretty young Filipino girls - I met one that was 18 and had a boyfriend back home, she was going back soon, probably rich then by her standards... (Actually already the filipino maids in HK are making more than Filipino doctors and lawyers, I heard... sad but true...)

[Tiger Eaten]

So, my "friend" stated to naively argue with this young woman, explaining logicly that he'd never been advised of the prices and quite frankly found $85 dollars a little steep for a glass of soda. All very sophisticated, resonable, friendly debate. Yep.

They must have hand signals over there because suddenly my "friend" found himself surrounded by the bartenders and other men that suddenly appeared who stood by as the girl grinned widely and said "it would be better if you payed now.....and go." I seem to remember something my friend said about an iron gate being closed over the stairs leading out by the mamma-san that ran the place and kept closed until the transaction was complete.

Lovely place HK! I miss it so!

[ April 22, 2002: Message edited by: Tiger Eaten ]

[Lunatique]

I'm back!

Man, this trip has been nothing but shopping, shopping, shopping, shopping......

I'm pretty happy since I bought a stack of great books. Lots of Pulitzer winning novels that I've always wanted to read. A stack of new Korean films made me damn happy too. These guys are over-shadowing the rest of Asia in filmmaking.

I was totally freaked out when I saw a music video on Channel V of a band that I used to be friends with back in the mid-90's. They are a heavy metal band called Assassin, and it looks like they got back together after calling it quits 5 years ago. They are faster, meaner, more dynamic than they were back then. I'm so FUCKING HAPPY for those guys. I ought to call those fuckers up to say congrats.