One Rolex Shop in Times Square sold 200 Rolex in one day back in 2011 to Chinese Big Spenders!
“The Kong Tsan and the Locusts”
Hong Kong, A Dynamic City of no sleep, now is it going to be dead…
Hong Kongers are subtly losing their energy of original Hong Kongers, working style like we were in 80s.
Especially after it was crippled by the bird flu epidemic in 1997 and the SARS crisis in 2003. The Rolex store at Times Square sells 200 watches a day, mostly to mainlanders in 2011.
Where it was once Hong Kong that sent food packages to China in its time of need and supported the Chinese real estate market through investment, the table has turned: It’s China that helps keep Hong Kong afloat these days, the mainlanders flocking to the metropolis to buy its real estate and watches in Auction, often in cash, since credit cards still account for only a fraction of retail purchases in China.
Growing up, we felt superior to the Chinese. In Hong Kong people joke about how the mainland’s nouveau riche mixed Chateau Laffite with 7-ups. In one case a mainlander is said to have toted a bag of cash into a fancy boutique and blurted, “Where’s the most expensive stuff?” Stories like these support the long-held stereotype of the mainlanders as Ah Tsan, or country bumpkins, but as we point out, today the city’s Gucci and Chanel stores have long lines in front, a trail of seemingly endless demand. “There’ll always be the next group of mainland farmers who’ve made it big,”
This shift in economic power has exacerbated Hong Kong’s identity crisis, to the point where it is now the mainlanders who refer to their Hong Kong brethren as Kong Tsan, or Hong Kong bumpkins. Most residents view themselves first as Hong Kongers, not Chinese, underscoring a growing resentment toward mainlanders, who were referred to in a Hong Kong newspaper ad as “locusts” swarming the territory. Nearly half the babies born in Hong Kong’s reputable hospitals in 2011 belonged to mainlanders.
At a Canton Road Dolce & Gabbana store, Hong Kong residents were banned from taking pictures in front of the store’s window display. In response, over a thousand Hong Kongers gathered in the street in front of the store to demand an apology, while venting pent-up frustration that they were being treated as second-class citizens in their own home.
There is a renowned Watch Shop in Tsim Sha Tsui, that one night, one Mainlander came in and started to smoke, one HKer told him not to… and he continued his shopping, the Hong Konger complained o the shop keeper allowing customer to smoke. Well, the shopkeeper signaled the Hong Konger to go away immediately and he would close the door just to serve the Mainlander only as he was intending to buy a Rolex valued HKD$200,000!
Tensions are building, layer upon layer in the floating city. Visitors see Hong Kong as the emerald city on the mountain, but it’s an ailing city. The head is not working right. The limbs don’t work.
Kong Tsan
HK Snob
Watch Fever
Sham Shui Po Snob
Tsim Sha Tsui Kong Tsan
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