Hong Kong

In Hong Kong for the weekend. Staying at the Island Shangri-La on Hong Kong island. Top floor, "club" room. Awesome hotel, 60 stories. Room is identical to a Kruengtep wing Shangri-La room in Bangkok, minus the balcony. Same intoxicating smell wafting through the lobby floors. I'm hording the L'Occitane soaps, of course.
Went to the Hong Kong philharmonic orchestra on night one. Good. Did Barber's Adagio for Strings first (the Platoon theme if that helps). Second was an original piece by a Hong Kong composer for the bamboo flute. The chick on the flute would give Ron Burgundy a run for his money. Third was Copeland's Third symphony, of which I'm not a big fan. Orchestra was young and talented. Definitely no London Phil or Tokyo Phil, but a great show all the same. Concert hall was on Kowloon side.
The shopping mall integration is pretty advanced here in HK. They are a far cry from Singapore, as all of the malls don't interconnect, and there are still sidewalks here as opposed to the only way to get through the city of Singapore is through the malls. But there are a shitload of malls all the same. Big emphasis on luxury items. Ultra-luxury watches are an obsession here, almost every billboard is for a super lux watch brand; Patek Philippe, Vacheron Constantin, Audemars Piguet... watches that go for hundreds of thousands of dollars and make my watch look like a goddamn Swatch. Exchange rate with USD is terrible, makes everything more expensive than it should be. To the point where when shopping if you ask for the price in USD they will invariably give a 20% US discount on whatever you are shopping for, and that 20% will get your just down to a bit above full retail. Bogus. Except video games, which are about 1/2 price here. Brand new just released PS3 games for $30 US. Awesome.
There is a movie theater in the mall below my hotel that plays movies all night. I have reduced my sleep to 2.5 to 3 hours a night since I've been here and so far seen Red (actually quite good. Willis embraces his old age), The Switch (just awful and super slow paced. Everyone attached to this that usually makes good movies should hide their head in shame), Charlie St. Cloud (horrible. horrible. horrible.), Saw 3D (wow, so bad), Life as We Know It (terrible, too long, I really hate Katherine Heigl), Due Date (really not funny at all, however implausible that seems), and Grown Ups (unbelievably, Adam Sandler films just keep getting worse). So, lots of bad movies and one good one, but god damn its nice to go to the movies in a clean movie theater with a quiet audience.
Went to the two Michelin star classic French fine dining restaurant Petrus last night. Amazing experience, gorgeous restaurant on the top floor overlooking all of Hong Kong. Harp player, classic French motif. My dinner companion was a bottle of 1978 Chateau Petrus. Man it was delicious.
Every other meal I've had Sushi. Great sushi here, all the hard to find stuff I like; aji, uni, toro, ama ebi, you name it. Of course the gotcha is its way too expensive. Like $25 per piece of Sushi (not served in pairs like normal - one piece). Ouch.
Tomorrow heading over to Macao. My fool-proof roulette system will surely break the bank at each and every casino. I don't want to give away all of the details of my system, but, I'll let you know that it was originally developed by a Mr. Wesley Snipes in 1992's "Passenger 57".

I'll post some pics when I upload them.