Wah Kee food porn

Sometimes I get a big craving for sweet-and-sour pork and only Wah Kee's will do. The chicken with cashew nuts is my concession to Buffalo Wilbur who doesn't like pork.

K's chippy opens!

K's has opened at the cooked food centre. Buffalo Wilbur was so excited he made me get there on the dot of 12.30pm, when it opened its doors.

 Chips!!

Cod is HK$158 for a large, HK$98 for a medium. Pollock is HK$80. But the portions are generous. And the side dishes are value for money at HK$18 for mushy peas or coleslaw.

As they were doing takeaways only, we had ours by the beach. It felt just like a beach holiday in Britain, complete with rain.

The cooked food centre is certainly going upmarket, especially after the opening of Como Lake, which is getting lots of rave reviews. Buffalo Wilbur was their first customer and he came back gibbering with delight.

Going local in Fu Tung

We were getting a bit tired of Citygate – there is only so much outlet shopping we can do – so we decided to try Fu Tung Shopping Centre on the other side of Tung Chung MTR station.

It has such a different atmosphere from the slick Citygate. For one, most of the offerings were very local.

The wet market portion came as a surprise. It sold everything from cooked food to duvets and toiletries.

Even kimchi.

The shopping centre itself has a disproportionate number of restaurants, clothes shops and mobile phone stores. There's even an entire shop dedicated to frozen food, which you can reheat on the spot.

And a supermarket selling health food and other unusual products such as this leg of cured meat.

Exercise in bureaucracy

We finally did it. We have been inducted into the secret triad of fitness freaks in Mui Wo.

But boy, that was three and a half hours we'd never get back. Watching Harry Potter would have been a much more enjoyable way to spend our Saturday.

Hong Kong loves bureaucracy and nowhere is it more apparent than in that pink concrete monstrosity they call the Mui Wo Municipal Services Building.

You can't just turn up, pay and use the gym. You have to go for a "briefing" on how to use the equipment, with a large dose of nanny-state warnings thrown in.

Because there seems to be only one session a month, everything was fully booked so we had to resort to registering as a walk-in.

It was typical government office procedure – you took a number, filled a form and were made to sit in horribly uncomfortable metal chairs till they called you (after all the obedient registrants).

Then it was like school again. The trainer accepted the forms, checked that they were filled in properly, then did a second roll call to weed out stowaways.

We did all that... only to find out that it was for a Cantonese session. The counter guy conveniently forgot to tell us that.

Determined to get our pass, though, we sat through a video, a two-hour session entirely in Chinese, and (don't think you get away so lightly) a multiple-choice test at the end of it.

All for the privilege of going to the gym. A privilege we still have to pay for: HK$17 an hour or HK$180 a month.

But at least, as a fellow sufferer/trainee pointed out, we're now in the system. That's all that matters with bureaucrats, isn't it?

The frustrated gardener

We love our tiny seaview flat. But my one regret is that we have no outdoor space to grow plants.

My poor basil is reduced to poking its head out of the kitchen window for more growth space and Buffalo Wilbur is always rescuing the pot on the sill that topples at the slightest breeze.

But that doesn't stop me from wanting more plants. So the last time we passed Garden Plus in Pui O on the bus, I told Buffalo Wilbur we have to check it out.

It has stuff I absolutely salivate over... I want these grass sods for my imaginary roof.

And don't the chillies look lovely?

Buffalo Wilbur banned me from buying anything because he doesn't want to rescue yet another pot from the window sill. I need an allotment. Sigh...

Who's Daily Treasure?

So Silvermine Beach Hotel has been sold.

Hong Kong Ferry announced that: "On 12 May 2011, the Vendor has accepted the tender by the Purchaser to purchase the Property at the consideration of HK$280.8 million subject to and upon the terms of the conditions of sale.

"Taking into account the carrying value of the property and certain furniture and fixtures remaining on the Property, a gain in an estimated sum of approximately HK$240 million before tax."

Woweee, that's a lot of profit. So does that mean HKF bought the hotel for a mere HK$40.8 million? Small change, that.

But more interestingly, who is Daily Treasure Limited?

A quick Google search brings up only Daily Treasure Industrial, established in 1990, and specializing in producing decorative jewelry boxes made of real egg shells... I doubt it's the same company.

Friends in the hotel industry said they've heard rumours that the place will be turned into a conference centre. And when you come to think of it, it does make sense as the hotel is close to the airport, fairly self-contained and has a beach for team-building exercises.

I just hope they have a nice restaurant (or even spa, dare I hope?) open to the public.