Farewell, Macau, You Were Fabulous!

Wednesday, July 13, 2011

Today, I have a choice of following the girl around to their various photo and video shoots.  There is even a rumor that Stacy Wang will be bungee jumping for the cameras . . . and to relieve stress, but even that doesn’t entice me away from enjoying some personal time on my last day in Macau.  A gambling mecca of the East, Macau provides a Vegas-style glamour to East Asia housing only one of three Venetian hotel casinos in the world, a Wynn, and dozens of luxury hotel casinos.  Riding up and down the elevators all day, I realize that the Galaxy provides families, couples, and individuals an all inclusive getaway with several pools, a health club, dozens of restaurants to choose from a mall, bakeries, pharmacies, and even a food court for those who want a quick, international bite.

Breakfast at the Terrace Restaurant is an international buffet.  I stuff myself silly on congee, scrambled eggs, hashbrowns, and tiny pastries.  Some of the girls have already finished breakfast before I even get a chance to start.  The morning is scheduled for shooting photos and video around the complex.  I take the opportunity to send postcards on my very last full day of the trip because it has been about the only chance to do so.  Sitting in the elevator lobby on the 23^rd floor of Hotel Okura, my backdrop is the Galaxy Hotel and the big wave pool.  I sun a bit as I write my postcards.  This is the one hotel where free wireless is available anywhere, so I take advantage of it and Skype® in the elevator lobby while I write.  Finished with chatting and writing, I make my way down to the lobby to mail the finished products.  After a little back and forth about how to pay for the stamps, I spot Jasmine (Contestant #14) sitting down in the lobby.  The rest of the entourage can’t be far behind, and it is nearly lunchtime, so I go see what’s up.

Chatting with Kim, Peter, and Michael, they have already done a lot of shooting.  They just have a couple more places before lunch, so I follow them around.  Luckily, I’m useful extra security since they are shooting in wide open spaces with very persistent people trying to photograph them without the girls’  permission.  The fountain in one of the lobbies has a dancing fountain, and the show is starting as we roll up to it.  The girls’ reactions to the light and water show are captured on video.  They pose for pictures in front of a stylized peacock feather backdrop, and the entire entourage move into the casino.  There’s a stage show depicting China just before World War II.  A prosperous time with international influence, the actors and actresses provide a spectacular show of dancing to a constantly changing background.  Here, the girls are asked to react a little more flamboyantly than usual for the cameras to make it a good show.

With only a few minutes for lunch, we are herded into Park Liu Chow, an extremely well known brand name in Chiuzhou cuisine.  Duck and dim sum dishes appear in quick succession.  Discussion of the afternoon events revolve around skywalking and bungee jumping.  Kim challenges Stacy to the bungee jump, and for her, it is less of a challenge and more stress relief.  Logistics of filming the jump are discussed over a lovely orange and jasmine scented dessert soup.  A quick call out to the troops have the girls meeting in the lobby of our hotel at 3pm after rehearsal at 2:30pm for this evening’s events.  As exciting as the afternoon’s events sound, I choose to sty behind and experience the Galaxy.

The complex is huge and confusing for a lot of people.  In my wandering, I happen across several people from the trip who are lost.  Luckily, I inherited my father’s sense of direction, so I am able to at least get everyone back to our specific hotel lobby.  From there, they should be able to find the others.  On the East Promenade where Hotel Okura I located, there are only luxury stores like Van Cleef & Arpel – not my normal price range.  A quick look at the directory, the more affordable shops are on the West Promenade on the other side of the casino which takes up the middle third of the complex.  I admired the Tastes of Asia food court, but I’m still pretty full from lunch.  I do indulge in a crispy caramel ice cream sandwich during my walk.  Macau is known for its Portuguese custard tarts, and I thought I had lost my chance to savor one by not going with the girls this afternoon, but luckily, there are two famous bakeries in mall.  I shop for gifts for the family and stop at Mannings pharmacy to pick up a few of my favorite toiletries from Taiwan.  I feel so selfish for indulging today, but I figured it’s my last free afternoon, so I might as well take advantage.  With half a dozen fresh out of the oven Portuguese custard tarts in my bag, I get back to the hotel to get ready for the evenings festivities.

Tonight, the girls are doing pretty much the same as last night, having a turn on the catwalk in their cocktail dresses and impressing the crowd.  Those of us who are no important to the production are asked to go ahead and get ready and bring our bags down to the lobby so that we can all attend the after party.  I’m going to miss my five star hotel room and being able to actually watch music videos on television.  I pack my little bag and head down to the lobby ahead of everyone.  A lot of hugging and group photos are taken as start filling the bus.  Stay tuned for the final installment including the after party and a most adventurous route to get home.

To Hefei from Nanjing, Thanks for Everything! Love, Miss NY Chinese XOXO

Monday, July 4, 2011

Waking up at 7AM this morning was such a luxury.  The girls had a few appearances to make around Nanjing before we headed the three hours to Hefei.  After breakfast at the hotel, we made our way to Softech, one of the pageant’s major supporters.  We took a few quick pictures and were then treated to an elaborate breakfast on the 47^th floor of the Intercontinental Hotel.  I overheard the chefs chatting while I was in line for breakfast.  One chef commented that the girls ate so little.  His colleague pointed out that they were in a beauty pageant which is akin to being a model and asked him if he had heard of any models who ate large amounts of food.  The light bulb went off in the chef’s head.  Little did he know is that most of the girls had actually just had breakfast at the hotel.  The food was amazing . . . a lot of dim sum inspired breakfast items.  I also learned in line that all of the chefs were from Guangzhou and Hong Kong, so dim sum seems to be a natural product of their backgrounds. Speeches of gratitude and the presentation of gifts representative of Nanjing and New York are exchanged.  Everywhere along the way, the red and gold banners welcoming the pageant contestants had been well-organized and hung before our arrival, so we always had a prepared photo opportunity no matter where we popped into along the road.

Next stop was the Nanjing Hospital where television crews were at the ready for this affair.  It was graduation day for a lot of the interns, which meant we had just that many more onlookers.  The flurry of media caught me by surprise because it had just been the four of us on the trip and maybe one or two additional reporters or cameramen.   The banner advertisement welcoming them was signed by each of the girls. Some of the questions the Chinese media asked were expected such as “do you like China” or “what do you think you will take away from this experience”.  Other questions were quite a bit more intrusive, but the girls bared the burden of these questions like true women.  The  mistress of ceremonies from the hospital did make a good point that being a beautiful woman and being intelligent in China is an extremely hard combination to maintain, so the school is proud of its female students and the contestants for staying true to developing both mind and body.  For all of the questions the contestants answered for the media, one theme was apparent, natural beauty comes from intelligence and those are the most important things in life.  A gift is presented to New York contingent, and we head off in the direction of Hefei.

We stop at a rest area and hurry as quickly as possible.  The expectation of the quality and state of a government maintained rest area differs greatly between the US and China.  In the States, we expect toilets that are maintained on an hourly basis with toilet paper, sometimes toilet seat covers, hand soap, sinks with working faucets, and some way to dry our clean hands, or perhaps a combination thereof.  In China, the most anyone expects is a door on your stall and a trashcan for the toilet paper that you can’t flush.  Today, that was all we got more or less.  We did get a side of flies with the facilities.  So, remember, when you travel outside of the US, keep a pack of tissues and some paper or liquid hand soap on you for those long roadtrips.

We checked into the hotel with a grand reception banner and lantern style balloons.  The hotel is called the Lakeside Hotel Hefei,  and its claim to fame is that Chinese President Hu Jintao stays at this very building in the hotel whenever he is in the Anhui Province.  We all got ready for the big reception dinner thrown by the Anhui Radio and Television studio in the main building of this expansive complex.  The welcome was more than I was expecting.  It was fully outfitted with mixed media elements on a very large LED screen.  Dish after dish came out in quick succession and were whisked away just as quickly.  Every few moments, there was a photo opportunity, but eventually, this writer gave up trying to capture all of the great moments on “film”.  There was just such a crush of people at any given time around the contestants that the large amounts of flash affected my shots, so I decided to just continue capturing the moments with the written word.

Our MCs for the evening were Pan Pan and our very own Stacy Wang, 2007 winner of the Miss NY Chinese title.  Each of the contestants introduced themselves and spoke a little about their interests and what this trip to China has meant to them.  Some of the contestants speak Cantonese, so Stacy did a wonderful job of interpreting for our only Mandarin speaking guests.  This is the first ever trip to China that the Miss NY Chinese Pageant has taken, and all of the guests were excited to have China’s prodigal daughters returned.  There are VIPs from Anhui Radio and Television, the Anhui Plastic Surgery Hospital, and even a government official or two at the head table with the co-founders of the pageant, William Yip and Eric Yuen.  The dinner follows tradition with the VIPs toasting with every table to welcome us to Hefei, and the banquet ends with announcements and the schedule for the next day.

Tomorrow, we have a tour and press event at the plastic surgery hospital as well as a visit to the TV studio where the girls will be every afternoon while we are in Hefei.  I have to say, it’s really nice to be able to stay in one place for a few days.