With a new byline covering the New Year’s Day race meeting at Shatin and writing about “a slow start to the day” before a “festive atmosphere ultimately drew almost 50,000 spectators including nearly 10,000 from the mainland”, it was hardly any surprise for Winfried Engelbrecht-Bresges, the Hong Kong Jockey Club CEO and official cheerleader to describe the day as “terrific”. Written by someone named Mike Chan, we particularly liked reading this little morsel: “Meanwhile, a re

When you’re jaundiced and cynical, believe that you’ve seen and heard it all, and when you’re lost with Mr Bob in Juarez and it’s winter time, too, and negativity won’t pull you through somehow, and seemingly out of nowhere, this amazing talent comes along and puts your house of chaos into some semblance of order and with you able to focus on what truly matters and allow the peripheral clutter to dissolve into hot cocoa, because your personal Jesus is still looking after you.

She’s extremely knowledgeable, not only about cricket, but how her role in the game can help give back to others and which shapes and reshapes the world of cricket. Isa Guha is a game changer and she does this with humility, with no need for showboating and the work of her charity takeherlead.org shows how inclusive and inspiring cricket can be. This has to do with this remarkable person’s integrity and poise, confidence and sense of humour of which she has plenty, something

Tourists or investors? It’s something of a chicken and egg question that seems to keep slipping through the Humpty Dumpty cracks when it comes to talking about the priorities in creating a financially secure and happy Hong Kong. Tourism numbers might look good, but where are most of the tourists from and do they have spending power? https://www.thestandard.com.hk/breaking-news/article/66780/So-many-more-visit-but-spending-remains-weak Let me answer this: Whatever is said or w

When McDonald’s opened its first restaurant in Paterson Street in Hong Kong, my then girlfriend, who became my wife and I were there with a McConga line of people including Commercial Radio disc jockey Mike Souza along with the always attractive Rebecca Ng. Rebecca’s husband and co-owner of the franchise in Hong Kong, Daniel Ng, was busy mingling with guests and cutting various ribbons. Being Creative Director with McDonald’s advertising agency Glenn Graphic, which evolved in

There were plenty of fireworks on the track during the Longines HKIR day at Shatin last Sunday. It’s tiring just thinking about it. There were the wins of Voyage Bubble, Romantic Warrior, the facile win that was almost an exhibition gallop by Ka Ying Rising- what did they beat?- a protester who nearly stopped the running of the Hong Kong Cup before being tackled to the ground, and the kinda odd Jesus Moment by the Club’s CEO who, as usual, described this year’s event, too, as

When everything else fails, there’s always music, and to be specific, the music of the Beatles with detours into their solo work and everything that’s out there today on YouTube about how they created and produced what they did all those years ago and never ages. A few days ago, out popped a lovely new video for George’s song “Give Me Love” that’s gorgeous. Maybe it’s even Georgeous. It’s not one of my favourite songs by “Hari Georgeson”, but watching the effort that the team

The reason why the standards of creativity have dropped is largely because those involved in the creative process that results in the creative product don’t know that standards have dropped. Somewhere along the way, the savvy and maverick thinking of “Mad Man” Don Draper, where many of his ideas and presentation skills were built around the innate ability to know how to read the room, and intuitively know where the pieces fit, most of which have disappeared from what used to

With Longines HKIR Week coming to a close for another year, came an idea pretty much out of left field, where horse racing in Hong Kong and the city itself could become more than the sum of its parts through cameras, lights, action, thundering hooves and storytelling creating a new brand personality for the city. Back in the day, I would have suggested film directors with the status of a Steven Spielberg or China’s Ziang Yimou, below, be given a free hand to produce a ‘feel

Though loathe to use the word “stupid”, I will settle on “miraculously delusional” when writing about Wini, the Hong Kong Jockey Club CEO going out on a limb, and perhaps even clutching at straws, to make mention to the English racing media how the wins of the brilliant Hong Kong gallopers- Ka Ying Rising and Romantic Warrior- gave Hong Kong- and the world- wait for it: Hope. “The ‘poetry in motion’ of Ka Ying Rising and Romantic Warrior’s emphatic victory made it a day of e

We come into this world alone and we slowly close the door and leave this world alone. In the middle is lots of, well, stuff, most of it unnecessary, but one often becomes a hoarder. Amongst all this could be some good stuff- like those who become lifelong friends. You might fall in love, marry, maybe you become a parent and you might reconnect with your own parents as you now understand them what they were going through so much better. When in your bed, you often enjoy being

“Being in Hong Kong, where it’s the favourite pastime of many, why not see how horse racing can help reintroduce Hong Kong to the world- or even reintroduce the world to itself- and be a medium of its own?”. This was someone very close to me talking about today’s Hong Kong, yes, and also the “healing power” of people coming together. I was taking in all she said, but also trying to make light of it by saying that she was sounding like Barbra Streisand singing about “people w

Instead of writing about the 2025 Longines International Jockeys Competition and leaving this for the racing writers, something I wrote way back when about this night and the after party at Adrenaline caught my eye recently. It seemed far more interesting than anything I could write today. These days, my interests are elsewhere, and when I do go racing, it’s not in Hong Kong, not for any other reason than there’s nothing and no one to attract me to the races, let alone most

“ Our money is being used in the wrong ways and we have no say in this matter!” -Hong Kong Belonger Hong Kong is looking for Hope and Happiness, and when not seeing even a glimpse of this it affects people in different ways, none of which is positive. Everyone will have ideas on how to create “awareness” of this problem, but awareness is not a cure. Cures for depression and anxiety and treating mental health aren’t going to happen overnight, especially to the elderly populati

Though with everything that has happened in the past almost two weeks and a sombre mood still hanging over Hong Kong after the fires in the three blocks of apartments in Tai Po, it’s “interesting” to see that the group known as Now United is suddenly back in the picture, and will be prancing around the racecourse in Happy Valley on HKIJC night with, one supposes, their Gangnam Style Giddyup dance moves. Frankly, Hong Kong needs to get back to some semblance of good times and

With many of us still trying to figure out what must be done to get Hong Kong back to some semblance of normality after the devastating fires in Tai Po and produce something approaching hope and happiness, it was oddly interesting timing to read racing writer Sam Agars of the SCMP tackle the subject of trainer David Hayes wanting the HKJC to think “out of the box” about the “oversupply” of Class 4 rated horses. A newspaper story is a newspaper story and this is not to say tha

Some have asked if the photos above are from “A Night At The Museum”, others have asked if they’re from some kitsch horror movie while the smarter of the species have asked if this display of equine oddities is in Shatin. Nah, it’s the Hong Kong Jockey Club Racing Museum in Happy Valley and far better known to longtime Hong Kong Belongers as a good place to catch a cab. Who goes to this place which we remember when attending its grand opening that was officiated by our non am

It was the weekend, I refused to watch the non-stop news about the crippling fires in Hong Kong, finished a song I was writing and stumbled on a video where Michael Parkinson was interviewing the great Shane Warne. It was easy to see that the great British television host and Warnie were friends and nothing was off limits. The more I watched this 2007 interview, I was reminded of how similar Zac Purton is to the great cricketer in his frankness, his pride in being an Austral

Maybe, I am wrong- hard to believe, I know- but even those with whom I once lived are suddenly looking somewhat dull. What I am seeing today an appalling lack of inspirational leaders in almost every industry and with most surrounded by subservient hires to do their bidding. There’s a very noticeable talent drain and strain, which is no doubt why something very important to our lives- the imagination needed to be creative and depend on those with the skills to deliver what’s

Though never tired of Becks and Posh being interviewed by Ali G back in the day, there was some mild interest in watching and listening to her on a podcast in America called @callherdaddy. Of course, she was there to promote her Netflix documentary. Having seen Charlize Theron, who we love to bits, use the word “fuxxing” quite a lot and about the joys of one night stands, we were expecting something kinda similarly offbeat from Victoria Beckham, who we know to have a very wic