HK - the land of construction

Originally drafted in July 08, but not tended to until now. Here is a photo of how nonstop Hong Kong construction is. They dig up the concrete of the Tram (electric train which costs 25 cents to ride), WHILE the tram is live. When the Tram approaches, they gather their equipment and move the earth-mover to the side. Upon moving forward, (which is where I took the pic from), they resume digging!

Tips for capitalizing on RMB (CNY, Chinese Yuan, Renminbi, Chinese Dollar) appreciation in Hong Kong

The Hong Kong dollar is declining in value due to its unfortunate pegging to the US dollar, and the US dollar's extreme weakness against most other currencies. The RMB is at all time highs, thanks to its gradual, semi-moderated appreciation against a basket of foreign currencies. The RMB is still kept artificially cheap, which gives China's exports a price advantage. However, it's continued steam-letting by the central bank means a more or less guaranteed return should you buy the currency today. The RMB appreciated about 7% against the US dollar in 2007, and has gone up 4% since Jan 08. Forecasts predict it should do a total of 8-10% for FY08.
Therefore, how do YOU capitalize on this?
Buy RMB, of course. But there are a few options as to how to best do this.

Which Hong Kong bank has the best conversion rate?
Usually the HK banks are pretty much even, but I've learned that some banks (Shanghai Commercial Bank) offer better rates when you have a branch manager convert for you.

Which Hong Kong bank offers the best interest rate*?
Usually, local banks will offer better rates vs the global players, to attract deposits. A pretty blatant example of the variance in RMB interest rates is seen when comparing Wing Hang Bank to HSBC.

• HSBC offers a 0.5% interest rate (click here for all HSBC deposit rates) on RMB deposits of over 5,000. If you are under 5,000, you actually pay HSBC RMB50/month and get zero interest! Shanghai Commercial offers 0.70%, Wing Hang offers a 0.75% interest rate on RMB deposits over 1,000.
• For fixed RMB deposits 1-3 months, HSBC offers just 0.575%, Shanghai Commercial offers 0.80%, while Wing Hang offers 0.83%.

Which Hong Kong bank is the easiest to deal with?
Local banks are more paper-based, vs. web-based HSBC. Expect worse English but fast service, vs. HSBC's millions of customers waiting at the tellers and calling up the hotlines.

Other considerations
If you ever want to transfer RMB from one account to another, across different banks, you will have to withdraw cash to do so. There is currently no electronic transfer of RMB to RMB accounts in HK. Therefore, it's best to make the right decision upfront about which bank to stick with, or else get used to carrying wads of RMB 100 dollar bills from bank to bank, and dealing with the tellers counting and checking them one by one. Depending on the bank, they will check the condition and authenticity of the RMB with varying degrees of anality. The central bank, Bank of China apparently will not accept any bills that are torn or have any dirt/marks on Mao's face.
Shanghai Commerical Bank: Checks each bill on both sides, one with a fluorescent lamp to check for a special square-shaped stamp invisible to the naked eye. Anality rating of 5/5
Wing Hang Bank: Checks each bill on both sides, but does it expeditiously. No luminescent devices are used. Anality rating of 4/5. I had some bills rejected at Shanghai Commercial which were accepted at Wing Hang. Several dirty bills which were rejected, but then accepted after I used a wet paper towel to clean.
HSBC: Pretty loose. The bills they hand out are often soiled and torn, which causes the bills to be rejected by the other banks. Anality rating of 2/5.
Note: If you do get your bills rejected at other banks, you can still deposit them at HSBC or exchange with them for new bills.

How do you do it?
You can convert up to HKD 20,000 per day to RMB. Not sure if this is per account or per person - I tend to think there is no monitoring mechanism to prevent converting 20K per account per day.

*If you really want to get both the appreciation and the interest accumulation, then visit a branch in China to open an account. Then you get a 3+% interest rate instead of this sub-1% BS. You can set up wiring from HK to China accounts. However, getting the money from China to HK is somewhat more problematic - there are caps on getting that money out, unless you withdraw bricks of cash.
"Withdrawals from (local) Chinese banks are often limited, ranging from around RMB2,500 (US$350) to RMB6,000 (US$840) per withdrawal. However, some banks allow customers to make several withdraws in one day." - Chinese Economic Review, April 2008

For HSBC, a foreign bank, "Account holders can only withdraw US$50,000 in cash every year, with a current monthly limit of US$30,000 and an effective daily limit of US$7,900." - Chinese Economic Review, April 2008

Crab pictures

(Below L to R): Crab on Coral, Crab eating a pc of scallop upside down, Crab eating dried shrimp)

(Below L to R): Crab hitching a ride on Crab, Crab eating dead shrimp, Crab wandering

Vivian Chow

Played pool today at Joe's Billiards in Wanchai tonight, and had the pleasure of seeing Vivian Chow there. (See below)

New Movie Theater at Pacific Place

Some pics from the newly renovated AMC theater at Pacfic Place.
Seats are leather, but don't recline. Also, the arm rests don't go back, which is annoying if you come with your significant other. The theater is on the small side, but it's cool that the screen expands horizontally after the preview.

Some unusual movie-snack items below, kind of indicative of the high-class style that Pacfic Place is trying to portray:
Not just hot dogs, but "Italian" sausages. Muffins and some type of dessert as well.

"Select" Olives

Hell in Hong Kong = Ocean Park

I hadn't been to Hong Kong's Ocean Park in 10 years... and I probably won't go back for another 10. I had heard it had been doing well since Disney opened, but this was ridiculous. Maybe it was due to the Chinese New Years weekend (Feb 24, the second one), but I was basically able to see China with a 15 minute bus ride to Aberdeen.

The pictures below are indicative of the horror we faced as long lines and huge and unruly crowds. The China aspect was due to 95% of the visitors being from the mainland, and bringing their local customs along. I was pushed countless times, had my butt hit, my head brushed, had my shoulder grabbed from behind (by a Singaporean).

There are a few potential strategies for waiting in line the mainland way.
1. One is just to keep cutting people, even though you're in a 2-3 person-wide line, within enclosed ropes. Just shove your way through, it's OK. You don't know any better.
2. Another common method is to keep intense pressure on the person in front of you. This means you want to keep bodily contact with that person at all times. When the line shifts forward, you close the gap with the person in front by bumping into their back, and maintaining physical contact. Gender does not matter - you don't care, because you are on a goddam mission and failure is unacceptable. Keep doing this until the person can't take being violated anymore, and lets you take their position.

No matter which method you choose, be sure to "act" oblivious when somebody yells at you or talks down to you. It's OK, your skin is thick. Further, it doens't matter how old or young you are - be confident that you too can annoy the hell out of someone into advancing your line position.

The best part of Ocean Park was the Aviary, where there weren't many people (probably afraid of the Bird Flu). Here are some pictures from there and a CNY pic.

HK Fish and Geckos

There are two places in Hong Kong that fish hobbyists congregate.

• Kowloon side: Mongkok's Goldfish Street (金魚街)
  There are a few blocks worth of fish stores (saltwater and freshwater), where you'll find fish cheaper than you ever imagined (vs. US). The stores are usually packed with hobbyists.
• Hong Kong side: Tai Koo place's Hong Kong Aquarium Plaza
  This is an enclosed building, where you can shop in a quieter and cleaner environment than Mongkok. The prices are pretty much the same, perhaps a tad higher for equipment. The pictures you see below are from this plaza, not Mongkok.

So how cheap is cheap? Just look at the floating styrofoam price of HK$ 15 (US$ 1.92) for the Pearlscale or Auriga Butterfly. You'd pay about 25-35 in a fish store (online it's cheaper by a bit). You see full grown dog-face puffer fish for ~$3-4. As you can also see, they pack the fish in tight, and allow you to catch your fish yourself (so you can choose the one you want). Unfortunately equipment is oftentimes more than the US, for the same brands. However, if you feel like gambling, you can go with the China products.

Here you see how they see those sad Goldfish. Just like clothing on a rack, but they're fish in bags. They also sell 'em this way outdoors in Mongkok. On the bottom right you see the cheap freshwater guppies.

Because the fish are so cheap, I rushed my tank setup which probably resulted in several premature deaths. This is a Heniochus butterfly fish which was doing well in my tank for 2 weeks but then caught ick (I guess it was in its body, since there were no fish in the tank before) and died a nasty death. White dots lead to not eating for 2 days, and then he lost balance and died. His body at the TOD was splotched with red marks, which I'm not sure what disease that is.

I came back to my apt at 2AM one evening and went into the bathroom. I was startled by the sight of a swiftly moving gecko (or whatever it is) on my shower wall. It's apparently normal for this to happen in HK. Anyways, I caught it in a box and kept it overnight. I planned to release it into the park, but due to time constraints I ended up "releasing" him into the elevator. I know it sounds cruel, but I didn't spot a cadaver later that day, so he should be fine.

HK is Smokin'

If you like to smoke, or smoke itself, come to Hong Kong. You still have until 2007 to smoke freely almost anywhere. It looks like a good third of all males here smoke cigarettes regularly. However, the way in which cigarettes are smoked here seems different from other places. It is a sad, desperate type of inhalation, in which they know each puff could be their last, but keep smoking because they almost want it to end. That does sound quite morbid, but that's the feeling I get. It's the type of smoking that is coupled by the squinting of the eyes as the smoke is drawn in, that tasty, necessary addiction being satisfied. Add in some local curse words about having lost the latest bet on the horse race and you pretty much have the complete picture. Alright, that might be a niche segment... but not as niche as you might think.

There is so much smoke that sometimes you can't simply hold your breath or walk around the mini-cloud. You are just...in it.

Japan is bad too, and lots more women smoke there vs HK, but the way in which smoking is carried out does not seem as desperate. It just seems more habitual, and not necessarily every cigarette is smoked to the butt.

Hong Kong, Shanghai

Recently I got to Hong Kong's immigration and I experienced another 30+ minute wait. But this time, it was for other reasons. To me, it was obvious why the immigration officials were taking so long. Most of the people in line before me were from the Philippines, probably off of the same flight. The officials kept questioning them about how long they were staying, how many times they'd been to HK, etc. They've never asked me that. Anyways, it's just my opinion that this was something fishy, and perhaps indicative of the culture here.

The pollution reports you've seen on TV about HK are true - in some parts of the city. All I can say is that when I was in Wanchai the other day waiting for someone, I couldn't stand on the street for 3 minutes before feeling so disgusted, sick of the dirty air from the traffic, that I had to seek refuge at an HSBC bank.

That said, Shanghai's pollution the other day was thick haze all day, through at least 12:00AM midnight. I kept asking the cab drivers what that was, and they all said, "Fog". Yeah... Fog doesn't have a scent. It smelled like burning leaves, which I have smelled, but it was the type that I envision SouthEast Asia's burning deforestation smells like. Every breath you take stains your lung just a little more black.