mid-march, last i wrote was early november. what a shame! yes, i am quite upset that i was away from the blog for 4 months. so much to share, time is flying by, the pace in HK is incredible - people are always on the move, the energy is exhilarating.
last i wrote, malabika had enjoyed her first month in nepal in october and i finished my 2nd full month of work...
november -
month 3, to be more tough, rewarding, exhausting, and challenging than the previous 2. all about work - no travel plans, the heat of the 1st budget season at chanel. ill spare you the boring details, but let's just say 7 day, 80+ hour weeks - work, work, work. i can't complain, business is booming and spirits are high. we can't seem to catch up with the positive trends causing us to continually revise figures. i also want to get up to speed as quickly as possible and so it requires getting involved in every facet of the business - organization, building relationships with local countries / paris / ny, business planning, strategy, consumer studies, profitability analysis, blah, blah, blah.
the day would start around 930am and would be action packed until 530 with meetings and various projects. 530 to 730 would be catching up on emails and phone calls. and 800 to past midnight would be doing real work. 6 hours of sleep per night. friday night would be usually a reflexology session at 8pm with tom. for those that don't know, reflexology, a massage technique utilizing the pressure points on the bottom of the foot that is connected to everything throughout the body. a 50 minute session on friday night with my favorite reflexologist reading people magazine catching up on the on-goings of lindsay lohan is absolute bliss after the tough week.
not much of a social life in november, the month with the best weather by far in hong kong. hong kong now that's it march i can comment, in my opinion, has the worst weather! humid all year round, not much sun, and polluted. oct-nov are the best months when the weather is 70-80 and the pollution clears so the rare blue sky above. 3 weeks fly by and looking forward to the family visit and my wife returning!
day 1. thurs. after a overnight flight from nepal through dhaka, the family is tired but excited about hong kong. i am at work and will meet up with them in the evening. malabika takes them around for some sightseeing and by the time i get home, they are exhausted! also, the 6 into our place thing was not going to work as we imagined so we got them 2 rooms at the hotel while only the in-laws stayed with us. we went to dinner at a local indian place and the family was ready for bed. not I, it's the 26th evening, i have a day off on the 27th, my first in 3 months. oh, and it's my birthday on the 27th and we are heading to macau. i drag malabika out to a local place to listen to some music and a few drinks and enjoy some alone time.
day 2-4. macau. we get the family geared up for macau on my birthday. the ferry runs every 15 minutes from hong kong and we take a mid-morning ferry to get there by lunchtime. check into the venetian, the biggest casino in the world. the family loves it. we have two large suites and i am finally able to disconnect from work for a couple of days and relax. lots of pictures, lots of fun! lunch at a dim sum place - the first time the family has eaten dim sum and they enjoy it very much. and then on to gambling - most of the ladies like to play slots. the tables are very hard to get on as the limits are super high. we take the family across the bridge to proper macau and to the wynn casino for the evening. enjoy a nice dinner for my bday and then some gambling. again, very hard to actually get on the tables but nevertheless still fun.
next day we take a four hour tour of macau through the hotel which was great. perfect for the family and it was quite well done explaining all of the history of this small portuguese colony and showing the main sites. dinner is at the best buffet in town - the grand buffet at the lisboa hotel. seafood, indian food, thai, chinese, you name it. fantastic dinner and we head back to the venetian to finish the night off with some gambling. next day (sunday) we head back to macau. a quiet evening - we head to one of our fav restaurants in the hood - saba's for some authentic malaysian food. the wknd has come to an end and back to a tough couple of weeks of work for me preparing for the big budget presentation in new york in december.
the next few days, malabika takes the family out sightseeing in hong kong (and of course shopping!) i meet up with them for dinner at home mostly since they were a bit tired of eating out so much. i arranged a boat ride for us on their last night which i couldn't make due to work. felt so bad, it was a cooler day with choppy waters, not the best conditions, and the family didn't have such a great last night. nevertheless, they really enjoyed their time in hong kong and are excited to return in 2010.
november comes to an end, the family leaves, malabika is back home, welcome our first december in asia...
