Category Archives: Reviews

Restaurant review: Amber (in which a foodie draws the line)

Some really, really classy restaurants, it says here, have banned patrons from photographing their meals. This anarchist got away with it a couple of weeks ago in the Michelin two-star Amber in the Mandarin Landmark in Central, the only establishment … Continue reading

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I bet Andy Xie can pay his rent with no problem

South China Morning Post columnist Michael Chugani says he thinks Hong Kong’s pro-democrats are more to blame for unaffordable housing than Chief Executive-of-six-months CY Leung. They could, he points out, have used the years they spent fruitlessly demanding universal suffrage … Continue reading

Posted in Blog, Reviews | 26 Comments

‘For people who only watch a little television’

Last week’s ultimately somber stay in the Gateway to the West melds into Hong Kong’s annual Chinese New Year suspension of normal life. Plus it’s freezing. For those who do not share living space with a huge US$45 dollar handout … Continue reading

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Restaurant reviews

Inedible cuts of meat and a surly Afrikaner assistant manager at Japanese eatery Roka in Pacific Place bring out the exquisite best of Target founder and editor Raymonde Sacklyn’s inimitable restaurant reviewing style.   The capital letter, ‘R’, also stands for … Continue reading

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Update from Hemlock

Global markets are crashing, London’s in flames and the Syrian regime is slaughtering its own people – or, as its more understanding friends put it, working for inclusive dialogue. Meanwhile, here in our safe Hong Kong home, we are swaddled … Continue reading

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Book review: The Ghost of Neil Diamond

A quick break from National Regina Week for a review of The Ghost of Neil Diamond by David Milnes, apparently a former teacher at KGV or some such school. The hard-to-forget title proved its worth when I saw this in … Continue reading

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Three Book Reviews

Forget opium, tobacco or San Miguel, or even the Agatha Christie’s Poirot episodes various fiends have uploaded onto YouTube: the greatest addictive curse known to afflict mankind must be Amazon’s Buy with one click facility combined with its massive offering … Continue reading

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Review and gift idea: Sleeping Chinese

Before I forget… It’s that time of the year when The System forces virtually all of us, in however small a way, to partake in an act of collective insanity: the purchasing of things no-one needs for people who don’t … Continue reading

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Three Lamps shine on

Time for my annual inspection of the Three Lamps (or more picturesquely, Three Candles) neighbourhood in Macau. The area is similar to Hong Kong’s Mongkok before parts of it like Temple Street went themed-tourist-zone and others were buried under shiny … Continue reading

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Mao’s Great Famine by Frank Dikotter

It’s not every day you see ‘cannibal-chinese-starved-by-mao-ate-earth-bartered-sex-for-food’ in a URL for an article at a reputable business news website. Frank Dikotter’s Mao’s Great Famine has that sort of effect. Using previously unavailable provincial party archives as well as interviews and … Continue reading

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