exodus (though not all to Hong Kong)

Van HongKong+Macau-April2009

One thing is for sure: when Manila is on the move, you don't want to be in the airport! Today is THE national exodus in the Phils: Saturday, beginning of the Holy Week Holidays ... the airport is packed, huge queues everywhere, but nobody gets angry or impatient, everyone is quietly waiting for his turn, admirable. Even HL, who normally gets very excited in this kind of hectic movement, remained to his senses. Impressive.

Immediately after the shoe-control, we stumbled into the perfume section of the taxfree zone, very ironic hehe! From stinky socks into French Odeurs :-)

Taxfree is not too bad here: 22 us$ for Dunhill International, 50 us$ for Glenfiddich 12 y.o. (1 liter).

And for the rest is Manila international airport quite old, not very efficient, and the Cathay Pacific lounge here is quite crampy, so we're not impressed on our exodus from Manila ... while I write this, HL is roaming around in the tax free area, I noticed his eyes blink when we passed by the bags section hehe! He should limit himself now :)

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and now I'm sitting on my desk in room 834 in Intercontinental Hotel Hong Kong :-)

First of all: HL found a nice leather cover for his new laptop, it's a local design and very special, a mix of leather from snake & fish & other animals! An excellent souvenir and perfect for daily use! All that for just 2.000,00 PHP, it's a bargain (he discussed the price of course, and got 10 % discount hehe).

Cathay Pacific flew us with a newly interior decorated Boeing 747: no more normal chairs, every passenger has his own 'cubicle' (not really spacious, but one really can lay flat and all is within reach), quite special! HL loved it, whereas I found it a bit too claustrophobic hehe!

The arrival in HK was smooth and problemfree: the driver was waiting for us in the airport, we got a swift transfer, in the hotel the check-in was already done and we were immediately escorted to our room - where the hotel guy explained us that for just an amount of 900 HK$ ++ (100 euro) we would get so many benefits (lounge access with free flow of champagne, breakfast, Internet in the room, butler service, ...) that it was really a bargain! HL never can resist bargains, and it sounded attractive to me too, so we went for it. We quickly changed rooms (the bargain included a room with full harbor view, and indeed it's spectacular! at 8 pm there is a sound & light show in the harbor, every day, so I'll try to make a movie of that too!).

Our local contact is Takashi Urata, a young boy who's in the business of hospitality towards older gentlemen. He looks really nice, but I cannot get hold of him, although HL seems to get along with him well. Me, I just don't understand what he wants: friendship? money? something else? and his reactions are mixed with pride and selfesteem, and I simply don't know enough of the honkies to deal with him. Time will tell what our relationship with him will be, but for the moment we'll discover HK on our own :-)

We strolled in the area, the 3 of us, also around the Cultural Center, where streetmusicians were performing one next of the other, clearly the HongKies are used to create their own environment regardless of the environment of the others :-)

So, from the multiple colours and lights and sounds of the harbor of HongKong, I bid you good night!
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