MACAU
• Dave Rich -after three months in China where the media consists of serendipitous bullhonky
sprinkled with crapulous creativity. I finally found out what was really up with Brittany Spears.

---

Macau is a pastel slice of Portugal, an oasis from the hectic honking of China a millimeter away. The simple act of stepping across the border from Zhuhai, China to Macau breeds relative peace and absolute charm, though Macau has officially been part of China for over two years. The Macanese actually stop for pedestrians while the Chinese accelerate, coming as close as they dare, pedestrians in China bearing the sole responsibility for avoidance of being squashed.

Crossing the road in Macau was a pleasure, traffic screeching to a halt as I ambled casually across the boulevard. In China I’d be playing matador or smithereens. Where China provides a choice between slums and skyscraper shopping centers it’s actually worth crossing the street in Macau, surrounded by sea green and canary yellow pastel in inimitable Portuguese style, white lace accents on buildings from banks to internet cafes. And joy, public internet is free at Macau Telecom stores on every other block, broadband connections convenient to backpackers soliciting money from home, super fast. Backpackers would be better off shunning Macau’s fancy casinos.

Everything in Macau is cheaper than Hong Kong which lies 70 minutes by fast boat to the west, far across a wide bay. You can otherwise get to Hong Kong from Macau only through real China, $20 baksheesh for a visa, three days processing. While Hong Kong is New York on uppers with hectic high rises, Macau is a laid-back duty-free paradise, like buying on the internet with no sales taxes or duty, all at your fingertips, no waiting for UPS to show up, leave a "so sorry we missed you" slip, miss you the next day and ship your order back to bigbusiness.com.

Macau’s traffic is mostly Vespas and Vespa look-alikes, making you think you’re in Rome, Portugal. Compared to China, Macau traffic is piddly. You can escape the scooters to Macau’s islands, Taipa and Coloane. Sixty seven cent buses swoop over two mile-long bridges, radiantly whitewashed spans to Portuguese villages littered with cobblestone streets, pastel buildings and fresh fish restaurants. Still, my favorite seafood remains the squid balls from food stalls in Macau proper, 20 cents each. They’re grilled in front of your drooling tongue, five dozen to each cast iron griddle, rolled to golden perfection, hold the mayo and slather them with dried onions and green wasabe mustard for me.

Another relief from China were the newspapers and TV, media being a subject I never thought would fit in the context of relief. Getting hard news, partly true news, was indubitably exciting after three months in China where the media consists of serendipitous bullhonky sprinkled with crapulous creativity. I finally found out what was really up with Brittany Spears.

I spent a lazy week in Macau doing not much beyond gobbling English language newspapers, TV news and squid balls by the dozen. I did manage to fit in a little duty free shopping and sightseeing, little being the operative word when dealing with a city the diminutive size of Macau, half a million people including the high rise apartment dwellers on the islands.

"Seaman Jeffery Hanks Framingham, Massachusetts This stone is erected in fond memory by his shipmates He fell from aloft Age 17 or thereabouts May 5, 1767."

The symbol of Macau is a huge old church that burned down eons ago, leaving a starship-sized façade looking like a clunky Portuguese Picasso from outer space. It’s apparently obligatory to snap the picture of everyone you know in front of the thing; the crowds are as awesome as the facade. I loved the hilltop fortresses guarded by classy black graffiti-covered cannons poking every which way. Pictures of tourists astride the cannons are equally popular and I have several to prove it. I especially liked the Cemitario Catolica crammed with fancy sarcophagi surrounding a teal church bedecked in white frosting, but the nitty grittiest attraction of them all was the extremely old Protestant cemetery. Few go there and the entrance is difficult to hit upon but the hoards of stone coffins and austere headstones tell their own stories through primitive engravings. The cemetery inters dozens of Americans and others of the sailing ilk, abundant babies and young wives. Few were older than age 30 except a two rich merchants, almost none younger than me. So damn the squid balls, I seized the moment and left Macau while the gettin’ was good.

The symbol of Macau is a huge old church that burned down eons ago, leaving a starship-sized façade looking like a clunky Portuguese Picasso from outer space. It’s apparently obligatory to snap the picture of everyone you know in front of the thing; the crowds are as awesome as the facade. I loved the hilltop fortresses guarded by classy black graffiti-covered cannons poking every which way. Pictures of tourists astride the cannons are equally popular and I have several to prove it. I especially liked the Cemitario Catolica crammed with fancy sarcophagi surrounding a teal church bedecked in white frosting, but the nitty grittiest attraction of them all was the extremely old Protestant cemetery. Few go there and the entrance is difficult to hit upon but the hoards of stone coffins and austere headstones tell their own stories through primitive engravings such as this:
"Seaman Jeffery Hanks
Framingham, Massachusetts
This stone is erected in fond memory by his shipmates
He fell from aloft
Age 17 or thereabouts
May 5, 1767."
The cemetery inters dozens of Americans and others of the sailing ilk, abundant babies and young wives. Few were older than age 30 except a two rich merchants, almost none younger than me. So damn the squid balls, I seized the moment and left Macau while the gettin’ was good.

Dave Rich © 2002
email: dgrendelll@yahoo.com

See also Hacktreks

< Back to Index
< Reply to this Article

© Hackwriters 2002