Winna, Winna Pigeon Dinna!!

  Macau, Macau
Saturday, January 19, 2008

This is my first ever entry into Lisa's travel blog, but certainly won't be the last. I've been tasked with writing about our trip to Macau yesterday, so here we go.

First and foremost, Lisa hasn't yet described our unique Continental Breakfast that awaits us in our hotel's restaurant each morning. Let's just say that there's something for every palate! We've been happy eating our bagels, pastries, bananas, cereal, OJ and coffee, but haven't done a very good job of "leaving our comfort zone" and trying other items, such as pork congee (which appears to us to be pig porridge), or chili glazed deli meat, which looks like thinly sliced processed meat and seems to be a favorite with the German crowd - all one of them staying at the hotel. I also have to mention that the size of the drinking glasses is infuriating me - I'm positive that their coffee cups don't hold more than 3oz. I honestly considered buying a huge 16oz Starbucks Hong Kong mug to (a) try to make a point, which I'm sure would've been futile, but more importantly (b) to get my caffeine fix!

Lisa and I decided to visit Macau on our 3rd day here, as I we couldn't possibly troll for more knock-off gear anymore - I mean, just how many Swiss Navy watches can one have?? We took a cab to the Ferry Terminal and purchased tickets for the Ferry to Macau.

Turbo Jet

Now, before I go any further, I must describe this "ferry," as I'm sure the picture you have in your head is of crappy, slow ferry. However, the official name of our boat was the Boeing TurboJet Ferry 4000 - and I can't be positive, but it just may have the same engine as the 747 plane that we flew to Hong Kong in. This ferry was legit! We pulled away from the dock and within a minute were zooming toward Macau, and it felt like we were riding above the water. 50 minutes and 1 loud, smelly burp in my face from the passenger sitting next to me, later and we were in Mainland China.

Leaving Hong Kong

A little history lesson for all of you - Macau was a Portuguese controlled territory of China until last decade. It is comprised of a peninsula and 2 small islands, connected by bridges. Now why the hell would Lisa and I travel all the way to Macau to see an old Portuguese colony.......(building anticipation).... it's the Vegas of China!!! Lisa and I were shocked when we cleared customs and walked into the frenzy that is Macau's Ferry Terminal. We were bombarded by representatives from the Hotel/Casinos: MGM Grand, Wynn, The Venetian, The Sands, and a bunch of other "local" casino's that we weren't familiar with. Lisa and I hopped the free shuttle bus to MGM looking for a shot at lady luck. 

MGM Grand in Macau 2

Upon pulling up to the MGM, it was clear to Lisa and me that we had far underestimated the size and grandeur (sp) of Macau. It was honestly as if we were walking into a casino in Vegas, complete with Bentley's parked outside, well-outfitted staff greeting us and opening doors, and of course with helicopters landing on the heli-pad on the roof?!?!? Lisa and I snapped a few photos in the unbelievable lobby, complete with a few original works by Salvador Dali, and then we headed into the casino. The casino was a bit different than what we were used to, as many of the games were foreign to us and no one was drinking alcohol, just orange and lemon juice as well as some really sweet milk-tea that at last count Lisa had 17 of. One thing that was familiar to me, though, was that the casino was full of chain-smoking Asians!

Lisa and I sat down at a $100 HK ($12US) BlackJack table  with $1000HK to gamble with. You see, Lisa's not that big of a gambler and gets nervous with anything more... so we set our small limit. I knew we were in for a good day when I hit BlackJack on my first hand! 45 minutes, 2 orange juices and 7 milk-teas later, Lisa and I left the table up $100HK - yup, we doubled our money!! Free trip to Macau!  We cashed out and walked across the street to the Wynn Hotel.

Kun Iam Ecumenical Center

The Wynn was absolutely spectacular and included all of the best, and most expensive, shopping known to man. Prada, Gucci, Louis Vuitton. Of course we stopped in all of them and pretended we were high rollers and were considering purchasing a pair of $500 Prada sunglasses or a $1,500 pair of Gucci shoes. After we got bored with that, Lisa and I asked a Concierge where we could get some good Traditional Macanese food... he directed us to Fat Siu Lau # 2 - a Macanese dining institution for over 100 years. Lisa and I were seated at the window of the very modern dining room, overlooking a huge statue of a praying woman that the waiter told us was a library?

Macau Beer

Anyway, we were certainly in a traditional Macanese restaurant, with some crazy stuff on the menu, and we were certainly going to order interesting dishes! Lisa opted for the 107 year old whole pigeon served in a closely guarded 107 year old secret sauce and I ordered Macanese Chicken Curry. I also had a Macau Beer, which was actually pretty good! Our lunch arrived and right away I spotted something that I was sure Lisa hadn't seen... I knew she hadn't seen it, because she hadn't started to freak out yet. You see, when you order whole pigeon in China, you get the whole f-ing pigeon, including its head (split in half, just the way you like it), heart, lungs, etc, etc, etc. Lisa was 1/2 way through her first wing before she came face to split-face with her pigeon. She dropped her food and let out a little "eek." Her next sentence, of course, was "Andrew, do something about *that* right now." I played dumb and said "about what." Her response, and of course the response I was looking for was: "about that g-damn pigeon head staring at me.... get rid of it, get rid of it, get rid of it." So I chopped off the pigeon's head for her with my knife, put it on my bread plate and covered it with a napkin. The wait-staff, surely getting a laugh out of our behavior, was kind enough to take the pigeon-head plate away for us. I'd have to say, though, that besides the pigeon head debacle, and Lisa picking around the bird's internal organs, our food was actually quite tasty and we were happy we had ventured to Macau.

We decided to get some exercise after our meal and walked the 2 miles back to the Ferry Terminal. Half-way there, we figured out that we were the only people walking on the street, as it was more of a highway than a street, and we certainly received a bunch of odd glances from passing motorists and even 2 honks - I'm not sure, but I think those honks were for good luck in China and weren't saying "hey whitey, what the hell are you doing walking on the highway," but I could be wrong. We took the 3pm ferry back to Hong Kong, $100 and some serious Macanese experience richer.

Lisa Speaking:
OK, apparently Andrew is pretty good at this blogging stuff.  I have to say upon reading his entry, I am quite impressed with his abilities.  I am going to finish up this entry and officially close the door on Hong Kong.  We had a great time here and are looking forward to Sydney.

So I will take over where Andrew left off.  We arrived back in Hong Kong after our trip to Macau and after some confusion in the ferry terminal as to what line to stand in for a taxi back to our hotel, we hopped in a cab and faced Friday rush hour traffic.  We got back to our hotel in time to freshen up for our one very nice dinner in Hong Kong: Opia at the Jia Hotel.  At this point, I wasn't convinced that Hong Kong had any really good restaurants, but Andrew had read great things about Opia, and the Jia was actually one of the hotels we had considered staying at.  It is super hip and can be equated to a mini Clift or W Hotel.  We sat at the bar and had cocktails created by an international mixologist which contained exotic elements such as dried Gogi Berries.  There were options such as raspberry sorbet daiquiris and Voss Ice Balls over Champagne with Rasberry's.  It was amazing how many flavors were in each of our drinks.  To our delight, we were in the midst of happy hour where it was two for one.  Considering our hotel was around the corner, we figured we might as well take advantage of our free drink. 

We sat down at our super hip table next to the small pool with floating candles and at the urging of our waiter whose wife apparently went to LA ten years ago and never came back, decided to try the price fixe menu which consisted of 5 courses.  We started with a Japanese inspired oyster shooter with mirin tamari and seaweed green tea soba roll.  One word: Spectacular.  Andrew shot his oyster, while I sipped mine.  We were then brought a Kingfish Sashimi with black bean dressing, crispy won ton in cucumber oil and shiso followed by Pan Roasted Sea Perch with Truffle potato cake, wild honey and toasted sesame dressing.  The Kingfish was the freshest fish I have ever had (Sorry Roger at Zushi Puzzle in SF, this was amazing!) and the Sea Perch was both succulent and crispy.  I opted for the char grilled foie gras with toasted onion oil, milk chocolate, caviar and baby basil.  I had never thought foie gras and milk chocolate mouse could go together, but it was maybe one of the most amazing tastes I had ever experienced.  At this point, I went so far as telling Andrew that this restaurant could rival the best in Northern California.  Andrew had the dungeoness crab and squid ink tortellini with spiced butter scotch and followed that with a twice cooked red braised pork hock, while I had the best Miso grilled sea bass with pumpkin puree.  It was the best sea bass I had ever had!!  Even our wine was fantastic.  You may be asking yourself how I remembered all of the details of our dinner after two strong drinks and a bottle of wine.  My secret is, I wrote it all down.  When the waiter asked me what I was writing, I told him that it was for my blog.  I didn't mean for it to sound like I was some professional food blogger, but it must have come out that way as we were paid a visit by the manager who gave me his card and said if I had any questions about the restaurant to feel free to call him.  So for all of you reading this, you are officially reading a very important food bloggers entry!

We woke up on Saturday a little slow and packed up our stuff, had breakfast and checked out.  We walked around Causeway Bay a little and stumbled upon Jun Sushi on Leighton Street, a hipster sushi spot with some of the best Maguro Nigiri I have ever had.  We ventured into some hidden shops and returned to our hotel to collect our things and catch our bus back to the airport.  So here I am now, writing from our hotel during our last couple hours in Hong Kong.  We are off to Sydney tonight on a 7pm flight and will arrive in Sydney at 7am tomorrow morning ready to see what Australia has to offer.