Pinotchio poisoned

In the 46th hour of the poison, I was confused about where I was. Fully clad in Under Armour gear and under every blanket and item that could constitute as a blanket - think coats, plastic bags, towels - I was still, in my bed, shivering. Life's defeats flashed before my eyes. It's hard to not be reminded of defeat when you're curled up in the Ralph Lauren Homeless Collection. The slightest physical movement evoked new pains. It was better not to move. Only, I had to shit and puke. Again.

In the 48th hour of the poison, I heard a train and remembered where I was. My room, above Kyobashi Station in Osaka, was littered with empty plastic bottles with labels of names that ranged from "Healthya" to "Vitamin C 3000 mg." I was hoping they would embody the big bold English slogan of the Pachinko parlors down the road: "The Uplifted Feeling that does Not Cool Down!" Alas, just because there is a smiling squirrel on the label doesn't mean it's an antidote. I had to shit and puke again.

Who had poisoned me?

There was the old yakuza lady who wanted to drink DRC and La Tache and listen to my voice all night long. Her submissive husband behind the bar who served me drinks that she insisted be free. Her card game opponent, a cliche of a former hostess, who amidst my disruption to their gamble, began to shuffle non-stop, smoke, and deal hands to herself. And then there was the confessor - the octopus chef who, after I had eaten the moving tentacle on my plate, informed me with a smile that he had deliberately not removed the poisonous entrails.

If this were a video game, I'd probably just restart at a previous save point and choose a different route altogether, like, for instance, law school...

Reflections on charity during authentic economy class experience

Here I am in seat 65D flying over - I don't have Wikipedia right now - that body of water that separates Hong Kong and Japan. This means that I have 4 full hours to whine on this blog while digesting all those shrimp dumplings and bbq pork pastries I had at the airport. But I'm a bit distracted because I'm staring at an entertainment system that is as good as the one on United Business, and in some cases better. For example, each seat is equipped with an electrical outlet. Like, a real one. It's not even a ploy to get you to buy one of those Targus Duty-Free adaptors. There is also a selection of new English and Chinese movies on a screen just for you. The next time I fly, I will research my in-flight entertainment ahead of time. See, the majority of my DVD collection consists of movies that were purchased for flights that ended up showing them for free. The rest of the collection consists of, pretty much, Casablanca in the various geographical zone formats and an occassional uplifting installment of the Godfather trilogy.

I'm going from one Asian country to another. This means in-flight paperwork. I'm asked in Japanese whether I will be staying overnight in Japan. I respond in English "yes," and get handed a customs declarations card that's entirely in Chinese. Such is the casualty of being an American-born yellow person in Asia. I don't however, compared to being in Europe, get stopped in the street as often to be asked to take a picture for people.

The last thing I'm given is an envelope for Unicef. I think this is a fantastic idea. I get to unload all of the HK coins that I don't want to carry to Japan along with whatever else I feel like giving at the moment. Almost everyone around me is participating. Contrast this with the Save the Children assholes in front of my building in HK. Yes, there is a theory that law of large numbers works. And Russell Street, Causeway Bay is certainly on the short-list for busiest street in the first-world. But on this pedestrian-jammed sidewalk full of brands - Rolex, Longines, McDonald's - and this blog did start as a discussion of brand, I think Save the Children harms their own brand, at least in my view, by engaging in the following discourse:

"Sir, do you have a minute?"
"Sorry, I'm running late for a meeting. Best of luck today."
"It will be very quick."
"I actually give to you already."
"Are you sure? What's the name of the charity you give to?"
"You guys. Save the Children. For years."
Accusatorily, "That's not possible. We've only been in Hong Kong for barely a year,"
"In Canada."
[Look of skepticism.]
"You should work for immigration."

Auto-rebill in charities also annoys the hell out of me. I understand that steady cash-flow helps with planning. I get it. But I'd like to give what I want to give in the moment, and do not want to commit and have to go out of my way to call someone and get leading guilt questions before I can cancel. What is a leading guilt question? Example: Borders at the checkout during Christmas time: "Would you like to donate a book so that a child in poverty can have a chance to read?" The answer, after a what-the-fuck-brain-freeze, is, "yes, I have lots of books at home I would like to donate. No, I'm not going to buy a book from you to do it under these circumstances. Can I have my $10.99 Christmas edition of Decanter, now?"

The flight attendants come by with cans of Asahi on a tray. And what is this? A meal served on a 4-hour-flight? Service in Economy Class even starts from the back of the aircraft. This is great. I'm going to have beer, and then I'm going to figure out whether this plane has wi-fi, and if it does, I'm going to see if I can cancel my Save the Children account via American Express. I really hope this plane safely lands in Narita.

Pinotchio goes shopping

 "Where's home?"
"My suitcase."
Eyeroll.
 "It's true."

Say it enough times and you start to believe it yourself. Today, I walked into IKEA thinking that I could find a suitcase. I didn't. I did get lost inside. They make the layout so confusing you don't get to leave until you've bought a kitchen. The only other way to get shown the door is by taking pictures for your blog in the children section.

Why do I need a suitcase? I have to check some items into storage (my grandma's apartment) before I leave for Japan. My current suitcase had weighed in at 53.5 lbs in Chicago. Although I have lost a shoe, and taken a write-down on a rugby shirt that the laundry people destroyed (navy blue apparently bleaches into curry-brown) I am going to play it safe as I don't anticipate any baggage weight leniency with my ticket for 65D. Add to that my plans to import some sake, and the goal is to cut weight down to 35 lbs.

For my storage suitcase, I don't need anything fancy. I head to the top floor of Sogo and there is a wide Made in China selection. But the salespeople tilt me considerably. Every two steps and a new salesperson tells me "Tie-ha-la, Tie-ha-la," which literally means, "look, look." Yes, people - I've got my eyes closed and am getting high off sniffing that red 40 Victorinox plastic - thanks for inviting me to look.

My tilt leads me to the Samsonite outlet. I see something suitable in the window. It doesn't have a price tag. I proceed with my usual method of deciding on a cutoff price before checking. This saves a lot of decision-making time and energy. $800-$900 HKD ($100-$120 US) is a clear do, but since I'm on tilt, I will pay up to $1278 HKD. I forget this is a Hong Kong shopping mall and am reminded when I get quoted $3750.

Time to hit the streets. How to find some shady merchandise? It's near where all the hookers are. Where are the hookers? I suspect synergies with the hourly rental hotels. And how does one find those? Smell. Sommelier diploma optional.

I find a stand that looks promising: ladies underwear, gold watches in photograph format, and a sign that has a bunch of Chinese characters on it along with the letters NDS and PSP. This is the Wal-Mart of chop shops, and there are some "Samsonite" suitcases in the back. It's not that I want a Samsonite knock-off, but the sweet old lady says it's only $288 (HKD). A gush of emotion overtakes me and as I'm reminded of my own grandma, I ask the one question that would make her proud: "How about $160?" She shows me how cool the lock is, and suddenly we have a deal at $250. I am such a pussy.

Released into society

Social situations continue to not be my forte. Fitting in is hard sometimes. There are people on this planet, who in order to fit in, need to buy two adjacent airplane seats. And there are others who feel the need to pay for two admission tickets to a wine tasting just to get two servings. I am of the latter. But given the high frequency of gewurzs and near-doux spumante last night, I'm certainly working my way toward burning off those residual United miles at a 2x rate.

For kids who wish to try this at home, fair warning: at the end of the night, there will be no chicken nuggets to satisfy the gnawings of a hungry heart. Apparently, whoever is in charge of Hong Kong McDonald's believes that at 4am, people wish to consume muffins. The only upside to returning home at that hour is that I can get to my front door without encountering any Save the Children assholes.

Other Side of the Rainbow

It's official. United has emailed me with an ultimatum: pay $1,240 or lose your Premier status.  I feel very vulnerable right now. This has never happened before. Not even at Spearmint Rhino's.

The deciding factor was the New Year's Eve flight. I had previously believed that the rules were simple: points and bonuses accumulated through credit card use and other means would never count toward status miles. Sitting in a plane would, always. As it turns out, if your ticket was paid for exclusively with miles, sitting in a plane doesn't count either. 

What results is an email in January with a link to a drop-down menu that tries to maximize exploitation against your utility curve. If you're short between 7000 and 8000 miles, the make-up is $1240. If you finished the year short 1 mile, it's $299.

I'm not going to pay. But I will grovel. I will nurture that tipping point in a relationship when you start listing facts and past experiences in an effort to overcome the emotional dynamic that has already shifted. Member since 1994! Supported your stock post-9/11!

"It's my fault," I say, "I know I wasn't on board very much this year."
 "A hablar espanol...dos."
"Let me just talk to you."
"Sorry, I didn't get that. Please re-enter your eleven-digit account number."
 "I swear I didn't know I was carrying more than three ounces of liquids."

Used to plan our future together while standing on that moving walkway at O'Hare - the one toward the international concourse that slides under the rainbow lights.

Now, I try to move on. I've been having these online chats with Cathay. The conversations are generic, and sometimes the language barrier gets in the way. But new relationships have to start somewhere. Even if it's 65D.

Pinotchio located and captured

 

I linger too long on a street corner, trying to decide where to buy a bottle of Burgundy for dinner, and am spotted by an uncle who conscripts me into family day. Of course I want to see my grandma. This is true. My little cousins/nephews? They're cute! The problem is that a traditional Chinese family meal is a lot of work. When a person at the table who is older than you has a beverage container that is half-empty, you're supposed to refill it. I do not speak of Riedel Vinum Bordeaux wine glasses here. I'm talking about a Chinese teacup, which goes half-empty after like, a sip. Compound it with the obligation to serve others first when a course arrives - in Cantonese meals this is like every 2.6 minutes - and you're simultaneously sommelier and waiter, as well as ungrateful guest who has not made sufficient progress on his rice bowl despite everyone's thumbs-downing your low-carb diet. The conversation goes something like this:

 
"I'm really fascinated about how much Hong Kong has changed since the last..."
"Eat more!"
"I mean, even right after the takeover..."
"Eat more!"
"The takeover..."
"Why are you not eating?"
"I'm full."
"He doesn't like Chinese food."

The other problem is that I'm morbidly hungover. The night before, guys from the trade took me out to dinner where we did a bottle of cru Burgundy each, followed by a non-stop run of cocktails and beers - a marathon at the pace of a 5k. At some point, we began rating and scoring orange jello shots and tweeting the results to Robert Parker.

A few hours later, I get the following advice:
"You need to lower your standards. Find a woman. Lower your standards."

It is my grandma who says this. My hangover gets worse. I pick up a chopstick and consider driving it through my skull.

Provenance

 The original idea was to get out to Tokyo a few days early - check out the Burgundy trade, find out if that wine bar "Monopole" from comic series "Kami no Shizuku" really exists. But with Sotheby's pulling off a major wine auction next weekend - the last one before Chinese New Year, it seems like I will be staying for a few extra days. The last time Sotheby's came to town, they directly represented Chateau Lafite-Rothschild in what many have called "the height of the bubble." In that auction, Chinese buyers paid over triple the market value for cases of 2009 Lafite because the bottles would be coming directly from the chateau. If this already sounds outrageous, consider the following fun piece of trivia: 2009 Lafite is released in 2012. This means that ALL cases of 2009 Lafite will be coming directly from the chateau.

If you ask the Chinese to define a good wine, the answer will be, "one that comes from Lafite." Asking a French person the same question, you will get, "one that comes from France." An American response usually begins with, "well, like, I'm not really into brands but there's this small producer in [insert city you hope your friends have never heard of here] and it was started by a young couple who still harvest the grapes using organic..."

But winemakers from any country will say that a good wine comes from the fruit of "fighting vines," ones that didn't get water as an entitlement but have had to fight every step of the way to survive. Then, they become wines of the highest quality.

"But of course some don't make it."
"And some do make it," I add, "but don't exactly turn out the way the prescription had intended."
"Oh, you mean phantom wine? Phantom wine can be delicious too, but it just can't make it into the main label. You see, society expects a certain consistency."
"So, what happens to this phantom wine?"
"We may try to blend it. Or if it's too stubborn, it gets shipped off somewhere - another country, another continent. Eventually it finds a home."

I'm not sure how long I'll be in Hong Kong, but you can find me at the Mandarin Oriental on January 22nd, at the Sotheby's auction of the Wine Collection of Andrew Lloyd Webber.

Will it jump?

In the course of a few months in 2010, the price of the not yet released 2008 Chateau Mouton-Rothschild more than doubled in value on rumors that a Chinese artist would be designing the label.

My trading strategy? Buy Pauillac Chateau Grand Puy-Lacoste and start a rumor that they're going to put a crocodile on the label.

Pinotchio tries to learn to read

Chicago, December 2010 - Only ten minutes left in the time bank - the quota I allocate myself to reduce time wasted on indecisiveness over reasonably indifferent pre-travel shopping decisions. (For international trips this is usually half an hour: saying no to a new suitcase, renewing my policy on eHealthInsurance.com, hacking into my mom's account to steal frequent flyer miles. (This used to be quicker when the password was "Michael.") For domestic trips, it's just however long the line at CVS is. Also half an hour.)

I decide to go to Borders downtown, the one on Michigan Avenue, to buy a Lonely Planet phrasebook for Japanese. Only, Borders was going through "restructuring," which meant that the store was already in an advanced stage of liquidation. As I walk toward the travel section where everything was 40% off, things were not looking good for finding a Japanese Lonely Planet phrasebook.

Yes, that would be Bangladesh and Afghanistan, and below it, Kansas City and Charlotte, straddled by two instances of St. Louis. 

Hong Kong, January 2011 -  thinking back to the missed opportunity to rally a road trip or two, I justify to myself that it's ok, and that the true journey is the one that lies within. I decide to visit a bookstore to uncover the wisdom of the ages. For decades, Hong Kong bookstores shrinkwrapped everything: magazines, best-selling fiction, plush toys. When I last visited in 2009, it seemed like the PageOne chain at least, was loosening up. I'd flipped through enough of Robert Shiller's book of subprime revelation to sell Starbucks at $9/share. Hello Kitty had grown out of her erotic asphyxiation phase. And so I wondered whether there would be a natural progression toward the US/UK bookstore model of bringing in the sofas and coffee kiosks. In 2011, could the people of Hong Kong be trusted to spend money where browsing was free?

At least, not the Christians.

Cos Vegas and Lasablanca

I never drink half-bottles in public. I did buy one to drink at home last night in order to reset into phantom-mode after that Sunday night humanization process known as dinner with my grandma. More accurately, I bought it because I thought it was a good deal. The half-bottle price for the 2000 Lascombes was on par with a level that I had recently gladly paid on the wholesale market. I took out my current corkscrew - yes, current - they all meet horrible fates like impairment from attempted screwdrivering or being kidnapped by TSA - and as I'm about to open the Lascombes, I realized that I had, well, fucked up.

I had confused the price of the 2000 Lascombes with the price of the 2000 Cos d'Estournel. Even though both are second growths from the Bordeaux Classification of 1855 and both are currently on the rise in the market, Lascombes is from the appellation of Margaux while Cos is from St. Estephe. Of course I open it anyway under the assumption that drinking it can only make me smarter.

I latch onto one idea: if I have a sommelier diploma from France and I can make such a mistake - even if it was just a brain fart (them giving me the diploma) - then emerging markets will never, never ever, sufficiently differentiate enough between the Second Growths to drive a substantial divergence in pricing. Perhaps Leoville Las Cases can stay ahead of the pack through its brand distinctiveness in the west, but that doesn't interest me very much. I make a living off where the new money pours in. And I think 2011 will be a year for the current Second Growth laggards.

The Crying of Lot 888

For a moment, the staredown breaks, as our eyes shift toward the visual distraction of a giant yellow Nike swoosh on a red sweatshirt hustling by - his footsteps silent against the carpet of the five-star Mandarin Oriental Hotel in Hong Kong. The auctioneer cries "$130,000" and my staredown foe, looking over his bifocals, takes his auction paddle and swats the air like it's a ping-pong ball. The staredown recommences. The auctioneer looks at me. Attractive women in the room turn to see if this unknown young man who sits alone can triumph against the entourage of rich and powerful mainland Chinese that has so far dominated the auction. My spreadsheet says no.

The victor and his son exchange high-fives with an intensity that is heard across the room, and arguably around the globe. Fine wine auctions have become a sporting event, where instead of boxing gloves, there are IBAN numbers, BIC codes, and checkbooks. But perhaps true competition - as a senior instructor in my martial arts days once told me - must be done without gloves. And so I wonder whether this breed of newly uber-wealthy mainland Chinese will pay for their wine with packets of cash. After all, what could be inside those Louis Vuitton man-purses?

But at the end of the day, their method of payment is of little consequence to me. I hadn't majored in econ to analyze M1 money supply. I'm a wine trader. What I care about is what they buy, so that I can apply that knowledge in conjunction with many other pieces of data, toward making informed decisions. Every time I get outbid, I learn a little more: which brands they prefer, which vintages, which bottle sizes. Could quirky decisions such as declining to take identical lots at the winning price only to pay more for them in outright bidding reveal a small window into their behavioral buying patterns?

I walked out of the auction empty-handed, but got the last bit of information I needed to pile on some bets when the UK markets reopen on Monday.  I'm reminded of the classic quote from "White Men Can't Jump" that ends with, "and sometimes when you lose, you really win." Just this one time, let it be true.

Awake

An indication that I was never meant for this life is my body's total inability to deal with jet lag.  And it's not because of the wine.  I could be eating my vegetables, jockeying the elliptical, wiping my ass with organic sandpaper from Whole Foods and it wouldn't matter. I'd still be up at 4 in the morning staring at that annoying blue color the sky first turns when the birds wake up.  The list of people who deal with jet lag better than me include Stephen Hawking, my grandma, and the fat guy from LOST.

Contrary to what might be implied on this blog (and what my family believes), I actually do a fair amount of work and need to be smart during business hours. After three visits to Starbucks - in an absurd ritual of taking an escalator to a glass elevator to the sixth floor of a shopping mall and back down the same way - I was still drinking pure black coffee at the rate of $3.47 USD for a grande, which I imagine places HK as the most expensive Starbucks in the world.* In London, by contrast, I paid $1.70 USD for a cup, when using a gift card. (Loyal readers will have already correctly guessed that I didn't receive said gift card as an actual gift but rather bought it myself to capitalize on the arbitrage.)

The new Starbucks logo. Do I really need a bigger siren to remind me it's an addiction...

* Technically, the principality of Disney Village, France pips it at $3.51 USD. But with the Euro breaking below 1.3 today, it's getting awfully close.

Peeping thru the blinds

The Times Square shopping mall features an exterior-facing glass elevator that can get from the ground floor to the top in something like 10 seconds. This means that factoring in for stops and off-peak hours, approximately 10,000 assholes can stare into my bedroom window every day.

This afternoon, I decide to cross the street and take the elevator. Not to participate in group voyeurism – I’m saving that for my trip to Japan – but to go and find out what it was that Chinese people were drinking.  At Watson’s Wine Cellars, as in many places in Hong Kong, a Chinese person (who speaks with a non-trivial accent) goes out of his way to greet me in English. This is not good for Operation Get Cantonese Good Enough to Tell Grandma I’m Not Signing Up for eHarmony.hk.

It takes me two seconds to decide that I’m not going to buy anything, as I scan through the prices of various Bordeaux. (The math is convenient: The Great Britain Pound is worth about 12x the Hong Kong Dollar, and there are 12 bottles of wine in a case. So by looking at the Hong Kong price per bottle, I can immediately benchmark it to the GBP case price that I trade in.)

Deciding against a sheepish “Just browsing,” I ask for red Meursault – a wine that I couldn’t find in a year of living in France – and get left alone. The clerk seems content to get back to smiling on the phone. And I am content to discover that on the rack of Mouton-Rothschild, an empty space accompanies the price label for the 1996. (I have a secret evil plan for trading the 1996 that I’ll reveal once I either bank it or it blows up in my face.)

“So, which Bordeaux sell well?” I finally ask the clerk, after mentally deliberating on the proper Cantonese grammatical sequence of the sentence.

“Lynch-Bages,” he says confidently, along with two others.

I wonder if there’s some kind of secret society and a global conspiracy to push Lynch-Bages. Prices have gone up, and everyone, from wholesalers to merchants to wine bars have been trying to get me to invest/trade/drink it. Everyone also seems to have cases upon cases of supply.

I turn back to the glass case, just past the Mouton and above the Latour. There’s a single bottle of Lafite in the entire store, and it’s 2001, one of the least desired vintages.

“That’s it?” I ask.

“Yes, we can’t quite ever hang on to them.”

That’s quite a thing to say about a wine that’s US $1500 a bottle and already quadrupled in cost, almost linearly from two years ago.

The Cup of Everlasting Returns

I had come to Hong Kong to see whether the Legend of the Carruades was true. In Irish folklore, there are wish-granting leprechauns with pots of gold at the end of the rainbow. Across the sea, in the bars of Bond Street, London, British merchants spoke of beings from a faraway land who could turn mediocre wines into 150% annual return investment vehicles. I wasn't sure I believed in leprechauns, but I had little doubt that Chinese people actually existed. The question was whether their brand-driven consumption demand really sustained the market prices, or whether something else was actually going on.

As time zones go by...

A dream was going against my favor this morning and I found myself awake at 5am. I went online, told Google that I wanted results in English for the zillionth time, and discovered that the McDonald's downstairs was not only open 24 hours, but that McDonald's in Hong Kong DELIVERS. I'm genuinely curious but decide that for the morning, seeing as it was early enough for McDonald's to be unpopulated,  I would take a self-indulgent dine-in meal. (In Causeway Bay where I live, it's near impossible to take a fast food meal without sharing a cramped booth with some random old people who pick their teeth while watching you eat.) Footnote: I'm not being overly dramatic. In the Hong Kong cheap eats world, everyone shares tables, nobody talks to each other, and people love to pick their teeth. (Sometimes behind the green surgical masks. The city never quite got over SARS.) 

In my best Cantonese, I explain that in the US, you get the Monopoly game pieces with hash browns, and not just after 11:00am.  I receive a packet of butter.

I sit down by the window. It's still dark outside, and beaten down middle-aged men and women  - a Chinese version of the kind described by Kerouac at the end of that book - push trolleys of fresh newspapers into the main streets and bags of garbage into those narrow inefficiencies in the real estate market known as alleys. Inside McDonald's, the theme song from Casablanca, "As Time Goes By" begins to play. But this is neither a gin joint nor a bar, just another McDonald's on the other side of the world. It does, however, make a fantastic fried chicken with eggs. 

No subject

I polish off this bottle and hit refresh on my Blackberry.  Her extra last name on Facebook is still there. I ask for a refund.

The day upticks in general

 

Had some complimentary unagi nigiri and Veuve Cliquot at the SFO lounge near Gate 96. Then a few plastic pre-flight cups of the 1998 Henriot champagne, which as usual, got me yelled at for having to pee at somewhere between 0 and 10,000 feet. When lunch came, the whites were a Chablis Premier Cru and some kind of Carneros chard that tasted like viognier. The reds were a Chateauneuf du Pape and a merlot of little consequence. All of these bottles were squeezed between the thighs of 60-year old flight attendants during the uncorking process. (I was in seat 2K, next to the wine bar.)

At this time, I will divulge that my First Class flights from ORD-SFO and SFO-HKG cost a grand total of 72,500 miles and $5.00 for taxes.  To put this into perspective, a successful application for a United Mileage Plus credit card gets you 30,000 bonus miles. Today I bought $101 of multi-vitamins I normally buy from GNC. I shopped at drugstore.com instead. They were cheaper, free shipping, and no sales tax. I also got 2,200 UA miles. (1000 for sign-up bonus + 10 miles per dollar promotion for purchases over $100 + 2 miles per dollar spent as a qualified purchase on my UA visa.)