So Hong Kong is this fancy futuristic, global banking hub with bling telecommunications, glittering glass towers reaching into the sky, billion dollar investment bankers swanning about the place blocking out the sun with their Independance Day spaceship-sized egos, & the ability to move just about every currency on earth in the blink of an eye. Yeah? A place where fortunes so huge are made that the expat classifieds have more used Porches for sale than coffee tables (no, really). Right? So I ask you then. Actually, screw that, I'm going to look up & ask the heavens. Why?! Why in the name of all that is less than 1000 years old is the primary form of payment for any significant item still the personal cheque?! WHHHHYYYYYYY?!?!?!
I cannot think of a less dodgy method of exchanging goods than the phrase "yeah, cheque's in the mail..." Which, to be truthful, is probably a totally legitimate & utterly common transactional phraseology on this weird little island. I've been writing cheques lately. *Cheques* I feel like I'm ripping someone off when I'm doing it too, as it's just such an unbelievably arcane method of payment. Honestly, is the home of the Triads that trusting of people?
Let's be serious. Working for a bank can really give you some idea of the havoc that can be wrought with an iffy check. Like, real fun & games. Example: present the cheque, then get a call from the bank querying it, then be all "ooooh yeah, sorry about that, I'll just transfer the money across, silly me!", then don't do it, then get another call & make up another lie, then start ignoring their calls for the whole awesome weekend until finally they realise you're just a great big lying jerk & by the time they roll into your house to repossess it you've totally thrashed that jetski you 'bought', had a kickass time doing it & then they just sigh, shrug their shoulders & decide it's too costly to take your to court so just leave you the hell alone. Well, that & you'll never write another cheque again, but whatever. At least you've still got the memories, right? I mean, cheques. Really? Come on people. You walk into say a fish market, or even better, a brothel - a ha haa - with a cheque & see how far you get before you find a size 11 wellington / boot up your rectum.
Ugh. I might as well go with it. I just...I...ugh. Yeah, f*ck it. Whatevs. Man this place is odd sometimes. It's like East meets West meets the late 70's but somehow in the future. Actually, that just described Kill Bill. But anyway, you get the picture.
Aghast whine over.
NB. Just as an aside disclaimer to ensure I continue to live & breathe as a man with gonads intact: I do not go into brothels under any circumstances, with or without any form of payment known to man.
Fish markets are okay though.
For buying fish of course.
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