Facelift consultation

I had a colleague who used to say: "Give me your honest opinion" when what he really meant was: "Tell me how wonderful I am."

Government consultations in Hong Kong always feel like that. The organisers don't really want to hear your honest opinion; they want you to tell them how good their plans are.

At today's public consultation on Mui Wo's facelift, they spread out all these print-outs in glorious colour and basically wanted to know (a) or (b). It was like a multiple-choice exam in school – which one of our amazing ideas do you think is more amazing? They didn't want an essay on what Mui Wo people really thought.

People were asking: "Why are you 'beautifying' the bit of Mui Wo that has already had a facelife rather than do real facelifts on the ugly bits – ie everything to the left of the ferry pier like the lorry park and... oh yes, the town itself."

The answer: "Oh this is Phase I." A Phase I that seems to have gone on for five years while everywhere else falls into disrepair.

After half an hour, I left. I had more effective ways to spend my Saturday afternoon... such as hang out the clothes and update this blog.

Buffalo Wilbur, bless his cotton socks, is soldiering on and hoping to make a difference.

Cute Mui Wo video

This is a school project but it is so charming and gets the point across in such a cute way.

Love the bunny. I vote Joy for Mui Wo mascot.

Mui Wo beautification project

Ooooo, looks like the beautification project that has been so long in the works it was beginning to resemble a mirage is on the way. Hope beautification doesn't equal concretisation, as it does in many parts of Hong Kong.

Here's the government announcement:

Tai O heritage hotel to open

November 09, 2011

A heritage boutique hotel converted from the Old Tai O Police Station will open by year's end, Secretary for Commerce & Economic Development Gregory So says.

Preserving the colonial architectural features and highlighting the history of Tai O, including the Old Tai O Police Station, the hotel will be an ideal attraction to local and overseas visitors, he told legislators today.

Besides the Tai O hotel, three new themed areas of Hong Kong Disneyland are due to be completed by 2013, with the first one, Toy Story Land, to open later this month.

The Civil Engineering & Development Department is conducting improvement works in Tai O in phases, and is embarking on the detailed design for a project to beautify Mui Wo. A new hotel with convention facilities in Discovery Bay will start operation in mid-2012.

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There is a 2006 document detailing what the Islands District Planning Office is proposing - the relocation of the lorry park and setting up seafood restaurants instead of the cooked food centre among them.

Wonder how much of it is real and how much is just a castle-in-the-air thing.