Summary of last little bit: Went to downtown Shanghai for a day after my 280 project was due. Then headed to Hong Kong on Thursday where I stayed until Monday Morning, when we took the ferry to Macau for a day. Don't worry; don't fret: there will be a post completely dedicated to Hong Kong, but I decided to begin with the bad news. Macau was disappointing, so I'll provide a short recap here (It might become a rant), and the next post will be about Hong Kong. Hopefully, by the time you read this, I will already have posted about Hong Kong so that I do not seem like a low life pessimist. I assure you I am not.
Alright (Sigh) on to Macau. I was excited for Macau: the people were friendly, the signs were in Portugese and Chinese, so I could use my knowledge of Spainsh to figure things out. A lot of the root words are pretty similar. There was even one older woman who spoke Spanish and helped give us directions to get to our hotel, which I though was awesome.
So I decided that red font means that I am ranting and that everything might not make sense but that is okay, okay?
Macau is built on tourism, so you would expect that the friendlies people would work in the tourism industry. No. Everyone else was friendly in Macau: the people on the street, restaurants (the ones not in hotels), and convenience shop cashiers. As soon as we stepped into a hotel, whether it had a casino or not, the people turned dark and cold. People who work in the service industry are supposed to provide services, help the customer, and maybe-just maybe-crack a smile once in a while to show that they are in fact human. Nope, not in Macau. Beginning in our hotel, the front desk failed to properly explain that the extra money they were asking for was a deposit and that we would get the money back. A 10 minute argument ensued.
We proceeded to walk down to St Paul's Cathedral ruins, which was pretty cool, and the area around it was also pretty cool. There is a heritage trail that we followed, and this was the highlight of Macau. I have pictures too:
The trees were pretty cool. They might have been the best part of Macau. We then headed to a traditional Chinese temple, which was also pretty cool.
We then headed to fisherman's wharf which was purely strange. The place was practically deserted except for people in line for what looked like a strip club. The people were middle aged Chinese couples. I still can't explain. Either way, there was a lot of attractions but nobody was there. Everything was plastic. The decorations were like the quality of props on Disaster Transport, plastic that has been spray painted. It was strange and deserted.
And the inside looks nothing like the real Colosseum. We went to the Casinos. The gambling age is 21, and there is no real, logical reason for this. I could rant about whose ID they check, but I would just sound like an angry, short, young looking person. Let's avoid that discussion, and rant about something else. Ready? Go:
Macau is known as the Vegas of the East. It has similar types of casinos, but something is missing. Granted, I have not been to Vegas since I was very very little, but I have heard plenty of stories and firsthand accounts of Las Vegas. I don't think it would be too big of a jump to say that Las Vegas is a fun place to be. There are cool shows, restaurants, stuff to do. Now Macau has a few shows, a few restaurants, but something happened when decided to take Las Vegas and paste it onto Macau once gambling was legalized there. It was like someone took a giant vacuum and sucked all of the fun out of the place.
Additionally, I also did not like Macau because it was exclusive and stuck up, without actually having much substantial quality. For example, when we wanted to go to the top of a hotel to see the view, we got in the elevator and pressed the button for the top floor. There happened to be a fine french restaurant there, and we could not take a look. Now, I was okay with this as a fact, but I was appalled with the way it was done and how we were treated:
The elevator doors opened and we looked to the right. there was a lady standing at a receptionist booth. None of us were dressed up; nobody looked like a shmuck, but we were not fancy. As soon as she saw us she pressed a button which began to shut a pair of automatic wooden doors in front of her and said, in a stern voice "This is a fine dining restaurant." There were no questions, no friendliness that you might expect from service staff, just a stern, cold, GTFO and I will not talk with you pieces of scum anymore!
Here is what I thought of this casino: (not an actual threat, just that I did not like the place)
We went to a cheaper casino (still not friendly service) and those of age played two hands of blackjack. The dealer busted the first hand and they each got 21 the next hand, cashed out, and we left for the hotel. Street signage is awful and there was no reliable transportation system, so an hour walk later, we arrived at the hotel tired and dissatisfied.
Lesson learned: next time I am in the area, enjoy Hong Kong to its fullest and stay away from Ma Cow.
Fake Portuguese food:
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