Cooking Across 4 Generations

Our second holiday for the year seems to have had a lot of fortuitous occurences. After booking our trip to Hong Kong we emailed some friends to see if they would be there while we would be there. Yes,was the reply along with an invitation to our friends 60th birthday. We talked with a Sydney based friend and were informed about a watch and coin fair also on while we would be there.

So we counted down the days till our departure and left cold and miserable Sydney for the heat and humidity of Hong Kong. Our old bones were yearning for some heat. Uneventful flight but we landed and got whisked away to our hotel in a S500 Mercedes Benz. I tell you, the best way to get from the airport to your hotel (and so much cheaper than here in Sydney). I ended up with a cold for the first few days of the holiday which I lovingly passed on to Rene of course

On our first Monday in Hong Kong we were invited to attend a Greubel Forsey collectors dinner, with the hint of something exciting being announced, but that was for Thursday so a few days of shopping, looking around and a trip to Macau.

On Wednesday we headed off for our first visit to Macau. We caught the jet cat from HK and arrived in Macau an hour later. Customs was hectic and took a while to get through. For our first visit to Macau we decided to stay at The Venetian. Wow massive, quite palatial. Our room was impressive, the bathroom being larger than out bedroom at home. and with two queen size beds it was a hard decision on which to choose. We ended up taking one each just for the hell of it.

After settling in, we decided to head down to the main “canal” where the gondoliers were in full voice. We wandered for a bit and then decided to get out and go across to City of Dreams for a look.

Of course we had to go to the Hard Rock shop (HRC wasn’t open when we were there) to pick up a shot glass. We walked through the gaming floor which was huge and surprisingly not very busy. The House of Dancing Water show was not on the day we were there so missed out. All the usual big name luxury brands had boutiques so we had to have a look, just in case there was something special we hadn’t seen before.

Then back across to the Venetian for a sit down and relax before contemplating dinner.

So many places to choose from for something to eat. We ended up choosing Italian and both had lobster with a bottle of Prosecco. Rene had a Boston lobster which cost around A$60 and I had a delicious lobster and cherry tomato angel hair pasta. After dinner we did some more boutique browsing, and then back to the room for a night cap and a goodnight’s sleep.

Thursday saw us up early for some reason, so we got to have another look around before checking out and heading back to Hong Kong. We were a bit nervous about timing for our trip back to HK as we had to get to the Greubel Forsey dinner. But we need not have worried, thanks to being able to get on a standby line for an earlier ferry and left an hour earlier than originally planned.

Getting back to HK we decided to take a cab to our hotel. In peak hour and it still only cost us A$15. Imagine getting a cab from Central Station in Sydney to the airport in peak hour, similar distance but 10 times the price. Got back to our hotel, freshened up and caught the Star Ferry(best way to get between HK and Kowloon) back to Central on HK Island and headed to the Four Seasons Hotel to meet up with the Swiss Prestige team and Stephen Forsey.

Wonderful food served with great French wines. Foie Gras was on the menu and it was truly delicious. Somehow we forgot to take photos of the food except for dessert. Most unusual of us.

Rene was happy  to catch up with Stephen Forsey again, having met him previously at the Sydney Greubel Forsey event organised by J Farren Price. I unfortunately was working on that occasion.

So what was the special announcement from Greubel Forsey? Well you are just going to have to wait for the official release but and believe me it will be worth the wait.

We were also able to get to the Hong Kong Watch and Coin Fair at the Holiday Inn. Amazing to see so many watches and coins/banknotes for sale under one roof. Not an event to go to if you don’t like crowds. People buying watches had rolls of cash, something you don’t see too often.

Our friend Emil’s 60^th birthday party was held at the members only “The China Club”. Decorated as a  touch of old China from the 30’ and 40’s, the club has a wonderful old school ambience. We remembered to get photos this time. we also caught up with our friend Nicole who ealier this year moved back to Switzerland. Apart from an amazing dinner we also witnessed a chef performing/making noodles and the amazing tea pouring acrobatic demonstration.

No, this is not a man jumping rope, he’s jumping noodles,not sure if it will catch on as a fitness routine LOL. It was interesting to watch how fast the noodles are formed.

We were also astounded by the speed, flexibility and agility of the tea pourer.

And of course no great birthday party could end without having cigars and whisky on the balcony.

The rest of our holiday gave us a chance to relax. We did lots of window shopping, saw some watch models and brands that we haven’t seen here in Australia and did a little bit of shopping(John Lobb shoes for Rene and a Vivienne Tam dress for me).  We were also reminded how cheap food and alcohol seems to be whenever we go to Asian countries. We went to McDonalds and had a meal which here costs us about A$18 but in HK only cost us A$4. A tray of 3 large Nashi was about A$1.50, to buy them here would be about A$6.

We also had to go back to a favourite Ruth’s Chris and our final night was spent dining at Heritage 1881.

It is always good to be away on holiday but it is just as good to get home.

While a lot of the photos in this post were taken by us I would like to thank Swiss Prestige and Emil Klingelfuss for the others.