Covid-19 Cases Continue to Surge

People waiting in long lines to be tested for Covid-19

There was more shock today to see Hong Kong log another record breaking 1,325 cases today and over 1,500 preliminary positive, which means there could be close to 2,000 cases tomorrow.

Chuang (left) announced 1,500 preliminary cases

If this is not horrifying enough to get people to get vaccinated, I don't know what else to say.

In the last few days there have been some elderly deaths related to Covid-19, practically all were not vaccinated, or had one jab. Unfortunately the Centre for Health Protection does not disclose whether those inoculated had Sinovac or BioNTech; the health authorities will only say both are effective in producing antibodies... 

But there was also a four-year-old boy on Yuen Long who died after having a fever since February 9 and vomited before he passed out and then died. It turns out now from his autopsy that he also had Covid-19.

Lee leads a delegation to Shenzhen tomorrow

Tomorrow Hong Kong and mainland officials will meet in Shenzhen to discuss how to battle Omicron, with the strong possibility of setting up a makeshift hospital. Some people on Twitter are suggesting Hong Kong International Airport's third runway that is being built now be the site, since there aren't anymore flights coming in or out.

Chief Secretary John Lee Ka-chiu is leading the delegation that includes the secretaries for security, health mainland affairs, and transport and housing. 

Hundreds of Cantonese-speaking medical and lab personnel have already come to Hong Kong to help process mass testing.

"The first two batches of colleagues, a few hundred of them, already crossed the border into Hong Kong last week. We gave priority to those who can speak Cantonese, as they will need to interact with Hong Kong people," a Guangdong health official said.

He added these people were mentally prepared to be in Hong Kong for a long stint, as they could not return to the mainland without having completed along quarantine.

How about using third runway for Covid hospital?

It makes being sent to the city sound like a hardship posting...

Learning Cantopop 101

Each day of the year has a Cantopop milestone

 

I met up with a friend today for lunch and then afterwards we went to the fifth floor of Times Square in Causeway Bay where there is an exhibition called Cantopop 101.

Apparently there are three different shows tied to this, dividing Cantopop into different time periods from the 1980s to the 1990s, 1990s to the 2000s, and 2000s to 2010s.

On the exhibition boards made of particle board are clipboards, each with a piece of paper attached to it representing one day, so there are 365 of these sheets of paper, each hung by a clipboard. Each piece of paper meticulously charts what happened in the Hong Kong music scene on that day in different years.

Photos of Cantopop artist Joyce Cheng Yan-yee

It could be a particular singer was born, or a group was first formed, someone's first single was released, a concert was held, or someone died.

It's quite an impressive compilation of Cantopop trivia, but also I'm sure it evokes a lot of memories for people who grew up in these decades and listened to these artists.

There are a few Polaroid shots of artists today and they are signed. They aren't formal portraits, casual and fun.

In the middle of the room are some colourful stools. My friend told me that on specific days artists will come in and perform a "silent concert" where attendees wear headphones to listen. All the concerts have sold out already.

The curator of the show is Colin Mak, a DJ with 90.3FM. The exhibition includes a telephone booth-sized recording studio where attendees can record their feelings about the show and the best ones will be aired on his show.

The aforementioned compilation of the sheets of paper for every day of the year? They have also been made into a book, only 903 copies (the same number as the radio station 90.3), and they were sold out in minutes.

Cantopop memories in shape of tree

This shows how much people love Cantopop, how it has defined who they are, how much they want to preserve it, and worry about its future.

With the Communist Party recently bearing down on Hong Kong when it comes to movies and art, it won't be long before it impacts music, literature, plays, dance and operas.

There is also talk of encouraging more Mandarin to be used in Hong Kong... so what will happen to Cantopop?

A beautiful black and white graphic on the wall shows important musical milestones that start from 1931 and like rings on a tree, grow wider and wider, ending at around 2010. What will happen to this tree after 2021? Will it continue to grow or will it be chopped down soon?

Cantopop 101

Until July 1

Shop 5017-519, 5/F, Times Square, 1 Matheson Street

Causeway Bay

 

Carrie Lam Hosts Talk Show

Bunny Chan talks to Carrie Lam about HK electoral reform

RTHK has quite a few holes in its programming lately thanks to its new director of broadcasting Patrick Li Pak-chuen going through them, and despite not having any broadcasting or journalism experience, has axed nine TV program episodes he has deemed inappropriate.

He also warned RTHK would charge the staff for the axed shows too.

But have no fear, a programming solution has been found -- Hong Kong's very own Chief Executive Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor has begun hosting a show on what else? Electoral reform.

Li has axed several shows since starting his job

It's riveting viewing.

The first two prerecorded episodes were shown today, as part of "Get to Know the Election Committee Subsectors", where Lam talks to guests from various industries represented in the election committee that ultimately chooses the next chief executive.

Isn't this show a kind of conflict of interest, as Lam chats up people perhaps in a bid for them to vote for her?

In any event, this is the first time a sitting chief executive is hosting a TV program, and even better, a platform for her and her guests to praise Beijing for its foresight in initiating these electoral reforms.

With a plain backdrop with banners on either side of two armchairs and a pot of orchids in between, Lam was the one asking questions of her two guests, Wong Yuk-shan, a local deputy of the National People's Congress and a member of the Basic Law Committee, and then Bunny Chan Chung-bun, chairman of the pro-establishment Kowloon Federation of Associations.

RTHK is broadcasting Lam's 40 episodes

The two episodes touched on various issues related to Beijing's overhaul of Hong Kong's electoral system.

Wong felt honoured to represent Hong Kong in the National People's Congress, noting: "In the whole nation, there are about 3,000 NPC deputies. But for Hong Kong alone with a population of about 7.5 million, we can have 36 NPC deputies. It shows the central government attaches much importance to Hong Kong people's views."

Meanwhile Chan said according to residents he met, they did not think the electoral reforms were a step backward for democracy.

"They understand democracy is only the means, the goal should be for the people to enjoy better livelihoods and good governance," he said.

Strangely the show was only broadcast in Cantonese with no English subtitles. This is outrageous considering the programs are produced by the Hong Kong SAR Government, which claims Chinese and English are the two official languages of the city.

The show is in Cantonese and no English subtitles

Each show was 12 minutes long, and with 40 episodes in total, that means 38 more to go!

On Lam's Facebook page, many posted comments about the show, ranging from support, and saying they wanted her to be re-elected, to others urging her to have direct dialogue with the people.

How many of those comments were planted?

 

 

 

 

More Fears of Positive Clusters

Lots of people hanging out by the waterfront today, with or without masks

Today there is something to be happy about -- Hong Kong recorded four new coronavirus cases, three of which were from abroad.

However, lots of people took advantage of the warmer weather and blue skies to again head out to the beaches and hiking trails...

And it turns out my new next door neighbour doesn't really understand social distancing either.

Many people went to Cheung Chau for Easter Sunday

Early this afternoon I heard the door open and a male voice say, "HEY!" and people came into the flat, and there was practically non stop laughing and joking. It seemed like a mixture of English and Cantonese.

As I had a feeling there would be lots of people out during the day, I purposely planned to go out after dinner for a walk. When I opened the door, I was shocked to see several pairs of shoes outside my neighbour's flat. Nine pairs to be exact.

My neighbour recently moved in, so this was probably a housewarming party, but why now, in the midst of a pandemic?

And while having a house party is not yet banned by the government, it is shocking to see people not making more of an effort to maintain social distancing.

Nine pairs of shoes outside my neighbour's flat...

I took a picture of the shoes and went out for a walk along the harbourfront. I noticed not as many people out tonight as usual, probably because they had already been out during the day, and also it was windier, making it more chilly.

After I came back, I told the man at the reception desk there was a house party next to my flat and showed him the picture of the shoes.

I told him he probably couldn't do anything about it, but I just want him to know. He took down notes.

Then I went into the elevator and when the doors opened to my floor, I was stunned to hear really loud music coming from my neighbour's flat.

But moments later, the music was shut off -- the man downstairs had probably contacted them to be quiet. As I write this blog they are still there, two hours after I complained...

While most Hongkongers are staying home most of the time, there are others who are selfish and still don't think the coronavirus pertains to them...

I just don't want to hear a week from now the Centre for Health Protection talking to reporters in the daily briefing about a cluster of positive cases next door to me!

The Benefits and Pitfalls of Teaching Online

One teacher in his classroom, teaching his students from his laptop

This academic year has been a tough one for students, with the anti-government protests disrupting classes for a few months, and then now the coronavirus. I feel especially for those transitioning from primary to secondary school, and those in university, who are struggling to learn under these stressful circumstances.

So far schools are closed until March 16, but it could be extended further...

My cousin who is a primary teacher on Hong Kong Island has had it pretty good -- he just creates assignments online and then his students have to complete them. I asked him if he had to mark their work and he said, well they can check the answers in the answer key... how are students supposed to learn from that?!

This has been a tough academic year for students in HK

I'm glad I'm not a student in his class...

Then I have a friend in her early 50s at the gym who teaches English at one of the universities and she was stressed out learning how to use the software to teach her students online in real time. She has over 30 years' experience teaching in a classroom, but not from a screen from her laptop.

She had to go to the university to teach her classes online because she doesn't have a good enough internet connection at home, and there are IT guys to help her out if she has a technical problem.

However, she found it frustrating that students wouldn't turn on their cameras on their laptops so that she could see all of them or get any reaction from them because they were too shy to ask questions or didn't care to.

It's hard for her to know if they understood what she was teaching them because they hardly gave her any feedback either by voice or in the chat box.

But another post secondary instructor at another local university told me getting feedback online can work if you know everyone in the class and gently tease the students to show themselves online.

Learning and teaching online has had its benefits and pitfalls

"Some of them are embarrassed that their flat looks messy so I tell them they can put up a virtual background behind them. I do that too," she told me, saying she likes to put up pictures of space with an alien poking its head behind her.

"During one of our classes, one of the student's mom popped her head into his room and demanded that he go downstairs right away to pick up some toilet paper! she said in Cantonese much to his embarrassment," she recalled. Everyone in the class laughed.

After teaching them for a bit she breaks them up into groups and as the instructor she can "sit in" on each group without them knowing she is here. She said that they are all talking among themselves excitedly because they haven't seen each other for a while and were craving conversations with their peers.
 However she admits teaching online only works for certain courses, and so she needs to have a backup plan just in case not everyone is on the same page because they were unable to download a software program so that ended that class prematurely.

Teaching online has become an interesting forced experiment to see if the teachers are able to use the technology to teach, and if the students are able to absorb their lessons without having to be in a physical classroom.

Perhaps schools and universities will look into further developing this area of teaching (to gain more income) depending on which courses, as some are more effective online than others. And for teachers, it's been an experience to be in front of the laptop and being "camera ready" as we say in the TV business -- looking professional -- at least from the waist up.

Hongkongers Should Live Better with Pride

 

Douglas Young (left) talks about his lifestyle brand, G.O.D.

Yesterday Douglas Young, the founder of G.O.D. or Goods of Desire, came to our office for an informal chat with some of us.

He is the creative brainchild behind this Hong Kong lifestyle brand to show his love for the city, how it has unique features, and how they can be turned into fun products. By the way G.O.D. is a homophonic translation of the Cantonese, "住好啲" or ju ho di which means "to live better".

Chinese culture inspires Young's design creativity

And the brand has many of these homophonic references that make it more fun for locals than for non-Chinese who don't have a deep understanding of the language.

Anyway, Young explains when he was young he went to school in the UK and ended up studying architecture but didn't practice it. He says architecture is all about maximizing space which seemed kind of boring to him.

By the time he came back to Hong Kong, Young says he had spent the same amount of time in Hong Kong as he did in the UK and felt he was straddling two worlds. When his UK friends visited Hong Kong they would point out things they found interesting that he thought was mundane; he later realized the city could be the inspiration for products that are unique about the place.

One of his more attention-grabbing slogans is "Delay No More", which sort of sounds like the Cantonese swear word 屌你老母 or diu lei loh mo, basically "f*** you". But in English without any context it can mean don't waste time, which is what Hong Kong is about too.

A G.O.D. store in Central with "Delay No More" on it

Not all of his products are related to dirty words -- instead there are fun T-shirts, and Chinese-style jackets and qipaos, environmental shopping bags with porcelain designs, panda-shaped pillows for sleeping on planes, notebooks and file folders with old school mail boxes or tenement buildings,

He feels it's important to promote Hong Kong, and locals should have pride in the city too. Young says maybe because of its colonial history that Hongkongers look down on local things and prefer Western things, but he thinks the city has so much potential if we give it a chance.

Someone in the audience asked him what he thought of local design schools in Hong Kong and Young replied they are fine, but the students are not given an opportunity to work on projects. For example he says at Hong Kong Polytechnic University, there are projects to develop a space in the school or design chairs and so on, and the design students there are not given an opportunity to take on this real world challenge, and instead outside professionals are hired.

Some fun creative items that can be bought at the G.O.D. store

Young continued, saying there wasn't enough patronage of the arts in Hong Kong, not like in Europe and the United States, and that the government should take the lead on this to nurture local talent, to give them opportunities and to show them they can make a living from doing design.

Then he hinted -- well not hinted, he said straight out that he was looking for someone, a creative mind to take over his business. Young said he didn't mind selling G.O.D., but that would mean he would have to continue generating the ideas for the business, so no one would buy it, he said with a laugh.

But he seems to come up with a lot of ideas all the time, and his passion for Hong Kong, and things Chinese are great -- some aren't executed well, but he has the idea, and that's important. The city is lucky to have Young trying to do some creative stuff and make locals proud of their hometown.

Last Supper at Lin Heung

The line outside at 7pm this evening at Lin Heung

Lin Heung Tea House on Wellington Street in Central is considered an institution -- and its history goes back 101 years in Guangdong.

Braised goose webs with mushrooms and cabbage

However it will close in a few days and so my relatives and I made one last pilgrimage here for dinner tonight.

It is typically chaotic in the mornings for dim sum, where not only do you have to fight for a table, or rather a seat where you share the table, but you also have to act like a hunter-gatherer and flock to the trolleys carrying bamboo baskets of steamed dim sum otherwise you'll go hungry.

For dinner it's usually more civilized, but this evening there was a line out the door of people waiting to eat. On Sunday evening we heard the line went all the way down to Stanley Street! Luckily some of my relatives got to Lin Heung early just to grab a table and pre-order some dishes.

Eight treasure duck was very flavourful

However, by the time we were ready to eat, one of the dishes, translated as "gold coin chicken" was already sold out. It's definitely first come, first served here. We could only order what was available so trying to order from the menu was kind of useless.

We managed to snag the eight treasure duck dish that was fantastic -- inside the duck are ingredients like chopped pork, lotus seeds, barley, and salted egg yolk marinated in a thick gravy. Another winner was the steamed minced pork with salted fish garnished with finely chopped ginger strips.

Fantastic deep-fried chicken, a pity only a half portion left

The half portion of deep-fried chicken we were able to get was also excellent with shrimp chips, and scrambled egg with white bait was good too, along with braised goose webs with mushrooms and cabbage.

Other dishes like the stir-fried fish strips were overcooked, while the vegetable dishes like stir-fried pea shoots and vegetables in a broth with vermicelli were lacklustre.

By the time we finished around 8.30pm, we asked about dessert and the waiter said there was only water left, no ingredients like red bean or sweet potato. They really were cleaning out the kitchen larder.

Excellent steamed minced pork with salted fish and ginger

My relatives who had arrived earlier bought some of the restaurant's cookies that are sold on the ground floor so we ate those for dessert. The staff didn't mind that we stayed so long -- the customers were clearing out and even gave us fresh pots of tea.

Everyone else like us were taking pictures of the place, from the menus to the tea pots, the dishes and the dining area. It's not much to look at, but it's a piece of Hong Kong's culinary history.

Apparently from March 1 it will become an iteration of itself with a modified name that will include the words Lin Heung.

But as we all know, that new version could be drastically different.

A station with bowls, plates and tea leaves in the boxes

This past year I've been to a few restaurant closings and it's sad to eat at these places one last time because they are being forced out by the landlords. At the same time there aren't any young people willing to take on such laborious work either. It's our fault for not nurturing the next generation to keep traditional cuisine alive because we don't value it, and instead are always chasing the next new thing.

A Bizarre Dining Experience

My unforgettable dinner tonight at Lei Garden in IFC

This evening, I attended an event at the Four Seasons Hong Kong in IFC mall. There were some small dishes to eat, but nothing substantial.

A friend, M, who arrived late was very hungry and another friend A suggested we have dinner at Lung King Heen, the hotel's fine dining Cantonese restaurant that continues to retain its three Michelin-star rating after 11 years.

However, the staff told us the restaurant was completely packed, so we decided to head to another restaurant in the mall, Lei Garden.

Our kale was supposed to look like this -- but ours was burnt

The restaurant has many branches around town and this one did not receive a Michelin star -- only two of its branches did. Nevertheless we were happy to find at 8.30pm there was a table for us.

We ordered some simple home-style dishes: soup of the day, stir-fried kale with ginger juice, steamed minced pork patty with salted egg, and chicken cooked in a clay pot with garlic and shallots.

The waiter soon came back and told us the daily soup was sold out. He suggested some other soups available, but we decided not to have any.

Then the plate of kale arrived and the three of us were shocked. The stir-fried kale was burnt and the leaves had turned yellow -- whoever cooked this dish did not know how to stir-fry vegetables and chose kale that was not fresh.

My friend A immediately called the server over and complained, saying the kale was burnt and yellow, and how could a well-known restaurant like Lei Garden in IFC serve a dish like this? We are not eating in a dai pai dong or street-side eatery! The server didn't apologize and explained that was the way it was cooked.

We ordered this dish but it was not prepared for us

We were flabbergasted. Stir-fried vegetables are supposed to be burnt?

M tried to take a bite of one while we were complaining and found it very bitter and couldn't finish it.

The fact that the server was unapologetic made us even more annoyed. She suggested we order the pea shoots cooked in chicken broth -- a safer choice.

I should have taken a photo of the kale as evidence, but we were so shocked at the time it didn't occur to us at all.

The chicken cooked in the clay pot rice was fine, and the pea shoots were on the bland side, but at least not burnt.

Then we asked where our steamed minced pork patty was.

The server returned and said it would be another 10 minutes. Excuse me? We ordered this at least half an hour ago! Someone in the kitchen completely forgot our order.

We gave up and paid the bill which came to HK$420 for three including a small bowl of rice.

What a bizarre experience in a well-known restaurant! We're not going back there anytime soon...

A Delicious Alternative to Pork

Does this look like Cantonese steamed minced pork? It's made from plants!

First off -- did anyone in Hong Kong feel the tremors from the 6.1 magnitude earthquake in Penghu county in Taiwan just before 8am this morning?

I was sitting at the table eating breakfast when I felt my building swaying a bit, much like when it did when Super Typhoon Mangkhut came through Hong Kong.

At the time I thought it was strange and a little later when I checked the Hong Kong Observatory for the weather, it had a note that some residents had called in about feeling a tremor.

So it wasn't just me!

The Omnipork right after it is steamed for five minutes

Secondly, this afternoon, I tried some Omnipork, a plant-based meat that is supposed to mimic pork, but is made of shiitake mushrooms, peas, non GMO soy beans and rice. Today is the first day Omnipork is available for retail, priced at HK$43 for a pack that weighs 230grams.

The first demonstration was steamed minced pork, a typical family-style Cantonese dish. The portion looks good for two or three people. When scooped out of the plastic packaging, Omnipork looks like, well ground pork, pink in colour and mushy in texture.

The instructor added some finely julienne ginger and ginger juice, and pre-cooked diced mushrooms. He said the mushrooms had to be cooked beforehand as the Omnipork would be cooked in five minutes through steaming. He also added a bit of soy sauce that wasn't too salty.

Then he placed the plate with the mixture in a steamer and within five minutes we had "pork" that looked darker in colour and had the texture of meat. Because he added mushrooms to it, the taste was more mushroom in flavour.

Omnipork made into dumplings with a splash of sesame oil

Next up was dumplings and the Omnipork was combined with finely minced cauliflower and some of the left over diced mushrooms, seasoned and then portioned in round wrappers. They were then boiled and within minutes we were able to try these dumplings that had a splash of sesame oil and were very delicious.

The versatility of this plant-based meat is pretty amazing -- more so than Impossible Foods and Beyond Meat because there isn't much more you can do to those "meats" except to fry them as burger patties.

But with Omnipork it can be used in a variety of ways, making it easy for home cooks to use it.

It'll be interesting to see if Omnipork catches on especially for the retail market. It could possibly disrupt the pork industry, particularly now with the serious outbreak of African swine fever that is widespread in China!

Chinese Officials Learn Cantonese (Finally)

Chinese officials working in the Liaison Office are learning Cantonese

While I was away, I saw a story from Hong Kong that struck me as amusing, and thinking, "about time!".

Chinese Vice Premier Han Zheng has instructed more than 200 officials who work in Beijing's liaison office in Hong Kong are studying Cantonese to better connect with the city's residents.

Vice Premier Han Zheng wants officials to connect with locals

It only took over 20 years for Chinese officials to finally realize they really needed to learn the local lingo to be accepted in Hong Kong.

Perhaps it's better late than never.

Apparently it was Zheng who pushed for the staff to get language training, while Wang Zhimin, director of the central government's liaison office in the city, has been trying to set an example by "trying very hard to learn, and now his command of Cantonese is pretty good", says a source.

Hong Kong Academy of Management is teaching the officials Cantonese, with most classes taking place after regular office hours.

The source also said most officials were "very enthusiastic and keen to learn", and with a high attendance rate, staff members were passing with good grades.

Apparently Wang Zhimin speaks pretty good Cantonese...

While the officials spoke Cantonese with their own accents, the source said, "at least we can understand what they are saying".

Apparently the liaison office is trying to find opportunities for the officials to practice their Cantonese by organizing volunteer events, like cleaning up Heng Fa Chuen and Silverstrand beach after Typhoon Mangkhut.

It's cute, but a good first step to building bridges with the local community. It should have been done 20 years ago, but now they realize being high and mighty does not work with Hong Kong people. It's about earning respect and this is a good start, even if they don't have a good Cantonese accent!

David Byrne in Hong Kong!

David Byrne opens the show with a brain...

We interrupt our report on Rome and Spain with a report from the second day of Clockenflap, a three-day music and arts festival in Hong Kong.

I was very keen to see Renaissance man David Byrne perform tonight and I was not disappointed!

His entire band is mobile on stage so they can walk around

While I don't know all his songs, I was very impressed by his show -- it was all well thought out, choreographed and sounded amazing.

The stage was completely bare -- and he and almost all of his musicians and back-up singers were in bare feet. They also all wore the same shirt and gray suit, complete with vents and pleats behind each shoulder to allow more movement.

With the bare stage lined with long strings of chain as "curtains", it seemed like Byrne wanted to show that he had nothing to hide -- this is me -- and there are no special effects behind the scenes. And he did point out there were no amplifiers, that it was the musicians themselves who were playing the music.

He and his performers are barefoot on stage

Everyone from the guitarist to the drummers and keyboardist were mobile -- they wore contraptions on their shoulders to carry the instruments around and be able to walk around the stage and even dance.

Meanwhile Byrne himself was completely natural on stage, completely unfazed by what was going on and did his thing. He was non-stop for an hour and a half, singing, playing the guitar, dancing, marching around on stage. At one point he was lying on his side on a chair for a few minutes. Now that's core! And he's 66 years old!

At times he asked in Cantonese, "Ho teng ma?" "How's the concert" or "How does it sound?" We roared in approval.

Midway through he finally performed a Talking Heads song -- Once in a Lifetime -- and then eventually Burning Down the House where the crowd got really excited.



For his last song, Byrne struck a serious social and political note. He sang Janelle Monae's song, Hell You Talmbout, which calls everyone to say people's names. Whose names? Victims of police violence.

There are names like Trayvon Martin, Eric Garner, Freddie Gray, Michael Brown and Sharonda Singleton.

In a recent interview Byrne explains why he wants to perform it:

"Here was a protest song that doesn't hector or preach at us," he said. "It simply asks us to remember and acknowledge these lives that have been lost, lives that were taken from us through injustice, though the song leaves that for the listener to put together. I love a drum line, so that aspect of the song sucked me in immediately as well. The song musically is a celebration and lyrically a eulogy. Beautiful."



It's an energetic song, but also a sombre reminder of the times we live in.

David Byrne, thank you for an amazing concert! We hope you had as much fun performing for us in Hong Kong as we enjoyed every moment with you.

Flashing the Cash in Macau

Beautiful blue skies this afternoon with a view of Galaxy Macau

Usually when I'm in Macau for work, I'm rushing to where I want to get to, and then rushing back to the ferry terminal to get back to Hong Kong as soon as possible.

This time I had an hour to kill before dinner and wandered around Galaxy's shopping mall area. It's very glitzy, much like Elements in West Kowloon, with practically every top luxury brand you can think of having a store there.

Everywhere you look there are luxury brands in the mall

However, unlike Harbour City and IFC mall in Hong Kong, they are not crawling with lots of mainland shoppers. Some stores were completely empty and desperate for anyone to at least walk in, others might have one or two people.

There are two types of mainland consumers these days -- the sophisticated ones who already have the brand name bags and designer clothes who act nonchalant, while the country bumpkins like to flash the cash, but don't have much style.

The latter ones I saw at Burberry, a group of women ranging from 20s to 50s who sat around couches in one room of the store and chatted loudly as they waited for a saleswoman to bring a bag out from the supply room.

One even took her foot that was wearing a dirty nylon sock out of her shoe and rested it on the coffee table. Classy. They spoke in a dialect I couldn't understand but it sounded like they were shouting at each other, but probably having an inane conversation.

Burberry is one of the stores that had some customers

Meanwhile the sales staff wore earpieces and would constantly report on customers' whereabouts -- "the young woman with the black bag is coming up stairs" or "they are still sitting there" in Cantonese.

The gaggle of women got so frustrating for one salesgirl to deal with that she vented her stress by stomping on the store's internal staircase as she walked up the stairs.

Burberry items may be cheaper than Louis Vuitton, but still considered luxury at over HK$10,000 for a handbag.

There's no choice but to try your best to please the rich -- no matter who they are -- because they're the ones paying your salary.

Hong Kong National Party Speaks

Andy Chan argues why Hong Kong should separate from China at the FCC

Hong Kong National Party convenor Andy Chan Ho-tin knew he would be the centre of attention today, giving a talk at the Foreign Correspondents Club and so he got himself into the building in Central hours before it started at 1pm.

In previous interviews he spoke in Cantonese, but this being the FCC the 27-year-old spoke with a slight British accent and his English was pretty good. He was also dressed in a suit to show he should be taken seriously by the much older adults in the room.

I caught the last half of his appearance on Facebook Live and he was composed, answering questions from the audience, mostly made up of journalists. He called China an "empire" and that Hong Kong being independent was the only way it could achieve democracy.

Chan leaves the FCC with police protection

During the Occupy protests in 2014, he explained he was not political at all, only concerned about his career after graduation. However the failure of the Umbrella Movement made him come to the conclusion that it wasn't the Hong Kong government that would grant the city democracy, but the Chinese government.

Hence the need for the city to separate from China and grant itself democracy.

However most people have problems with the part where he said they will use violence if necessary...

Nevertheless, Chan remained unflappable during his FCC talk and the question and answer period after, where the shouts of protesters -- those against him and those for protecting freedom of speech -- were heard inside the room.

"Time and again, our government has shown that whatever 'freedom' and 'democracy' they claim to be upholding are communist mirages," he said. Chan gave examples of the government's bid to stop him from running in the Legislative Council elections in 2016, the ban of the HKNP from registering as a company, and the police proposal to ban his party altogether.

He accused China of reneging on its promise in the Sino-British Joint Declaration that guarantees the "one country, two systems" guiding principle for Hong Kong, declaring the mainland "by its nature as an empire, a threat to all free peoples in the world".

There were protesters against Chan and his platform...

Chan added Hong Kong was suffering "national cleansing" thanks to the one-way permit scheme that allows 150 mainlanders to settle in the city each day.

"Local communities were shattered, because of the rapid influx of an incompatible culture... our very living space is taken from us," he said.

"Even our language, the words that shape our thoughts, are being demonized. Per China's orders, Hong Kong's future generations will now abandon Cantonese and switch entirely to Mandarin."

He is speaking out what many are thinking, which is very daring. Chan seems to be very aware of the consequences and continues to stick his neck out even though he is followed everyday and his family is harassed by people when they are at home.

As expected, the Chinese and Hong Kong governments condemned Chan for his speech and the FCC for giving him the platform to speak, even though the latter stressed the event was an exercise in free speech.

Beijing's Office of the Commissioner of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Hong Kong released a strongly worded statement.

...And there were those supporting freedom of speech

"FCC has already made its stance when it decided whom to invite for a talk. It would be hypocritical or fooling oneself to insist with sophistry that it does not hold a stance after doing something wrong," the statement read.

"We urge the FCC to reflect on itself and right the wrong, and follow the Chinese and SAR laws with its actions... any words and actions which attempt to break Hong Kong away from China would be punished, and no Chinese citizen would agree with anyone or group which backs the Hong Kong separatists."

The Hong Kong government was not as fiery in its tone:

"Providing a public platform for a speaker to openly advocate independence completely disregards Hong Kong's constitutional duty to uphold national sovereignty. It is totally unacceptable and deeply regrettable," it said.

Well... it was China who made such a big deal about it in the first place that led us to where we are today. If it had not called attention to his speaking engagement, then the whole event would have come and gone with hardly anyone noticing.

But Chan's talk turned into a referendum on freedom of speech and he willingly took the spotlight.

Now his party has to submit its defense to the police on September 4 in the hopes of avoiding a ban.

This talk has probably put another black mark against him, but Chan seems undeterred.

Lam Seems to Sideline English

Chief Executive Carrie Lam at her media briefing earlier today

As if we need yet another sign that Hong Kong is becoming more of a Chinese city than an international one is that our own leader, Chief Executive Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor would rather answer questions in Cantonese than English.

Today at a media briefing before her weekly meeting with the Executive Council, Lam thought she was asked the same question twice, once in Cantonese and moments later in English.

She replied she would answer the question in Cantonese and then in English.

Then Lam told Cathy Chu Man-ling, the director of information services, to consider "a better arrangement".

She should answer in English, Mandarin or Cantonese

"In future, we'd better arrange simultaneous interpretation for this media stand-up, because I [keep] on repeating the answers... I have answered exactly the same question in Cantonese, so I'm going to repeat what I said in Cantonese. But in future, the director of information services may consider a better arrangement so that we don't need to waste time," Lam said, before going on to answer the question in English.

The chief executive may have thought the questions were the same, but they are actually different. The first one in Cantonese asked if she would unveil plans for land reclamation during her policy address in October, while the question in English was whether she would take public opinion on the matter into account.

Later Eric Chan Kwok-ki, director of the chief executive's office, explained Lam had no intention of skipping questions in English in future briefings, and had tried to highlight the time-consuming nature of answering questions in several languages.

She was concerned this would prevent the media from having enough time to ask all the questions they had.

"The chief executive is always happy to speak English, and reply to media questions in English when asked in that language," Chan said. "It's only that in Hong Kong, reporters from different backgrounds can speak either Cantonese, Mandarin or English, so she thought that if she needed to repeat answers in all three, time for more questions would be limited."

How long is this question period? Surely it's more than five minutes. And the last we checked English is an official language in the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region.

Sounds like Lam was exasperated or was having a bad day -- giving instructions to her information services director in front of the media was downright awkward.

And Lam wasn't listening clearly to realize the two questions on land reclamation were different.

If a question is asked twice but slightly differently, that's because the reporter didn't think the answer was substantive enough the first time and wanted another more comprehensive reply. Surely Lam knows this from answering questions throughout her civil service career!

For Lam to win the hearts and minds of Hongkongers, she needs to answer the media's questions -- no matter what language they are in. We all have a right to ask them in whatever language we want. The way she handled questions today was hardly a step in the right direction in the politically-charged environment we are in...

Post script: After I wrote this blog post, Lam issued a statement in which she "apologized for any confusion thus caused".

Guess it's better late than never...

Celebrating the Canadian Way

Canadian Consul Jeff Nankivell says Canada is more welcoming than the US

This evening the Canadian Consulate hosted a Canada Day cocktail at the JW Marriott for Canadians to celebrate the 151st birthday of the country.

A Canadian singer performed both O Canada and The March of the Volunteers, the former in English and French, the latter in Mandarin. Hong Kong Chief Secretary Matthew Cheung Kin-chung was impressed by her "impeccable Putonghua".

Cheung Kong's Victor Li (fifth from left) cutting the cake

He was also impressed by Canadian Consul-General Jeff Nankivell's trilingual skills of English, French and Cantonese. He also speaks Mandarin, but tonight wasn't the right audience for it.

Nankivell gave an energetic speech off the bat, saying how Canada was a safe place to visit, how it was a welcoming country and was eager to do business with others in an indirect jab at the United States.

He continued about how it was a good place for education, and how it welcomes investment and listed the many trade agreements it has with other countries. He joked about how Canada hoped the Trans-Pacific Partnership or TPP would stay in place, as American President Donald Trump has threatened to abandon it.

At the end he said how Canadian food and drink were delicious -- mei sik, mei yum, ho mei. Do jie! 美吃， 美喝， 好妹。谢谢！

Inviting guests to try out their hockey skills

Cheung repeated Nankivell's mantra and added how his Cantonese was ho jeng. 好正！

Actually Cheung's spoken English is excellent. He observed of the many other national day ceremonies he had attended, never had he witnessed one that was so lively, as Nankivell even put a funny hat at one point, eliciting laughs from the audience in the ballroom.

Later on a large cake was rolled out, and the sponsors of the evening were invited to come on stage to assist. The biggest one was Cheung Kong Group, which meant Victor Li Tzar-kuoi was invited on stage, along with representatives from The Royal Bank of Canada, Bank of Montreal, Sun Wah Group and Delia School of Canada.

The other major announcement was that in September, there will be an exhibition game between the Boston Bruins and the Calgary Flames in Shenzhen in an effort to promote ice hockey in China. About time the NHL tried to shoot and score in the Middle Kingdom...