Tourism Hong Kong style

Travel International Travel
1

Source. Transcript.

[quote]It’s the sort of publicity any city could best do well without. While Hong Kong’s tourism chiefs have been working overtime to attract tourists from mainland China – traditionally the city’s main source of visitors – on the street level, tourism operators seem hell-bent on turning them off ever coming to town.

Mainland China’s official tourism body this week issued a warning to travellers planning a trip to Hong Kong after a video surfaced of a Hong Kong tour guide screaming at a group of Chinese tourists and demanding that they spend more money .

At one stage the tour guide reminds the tourists that she has arranged everything for the trip and “If you don’t pay me back in this life, you’ll still have to pay me back in your next life.”[/quote]

Hardcore.

2

The mentality is truly… interesting. Here’s the tour guide complaining to the tour group that they haven’t spent enough money.

[quote]I was extremely embarrassed to walk out of the jeweler’s. Between two tour groups – how can the difference in spending be so wide? One group spent HK$137,000, but we only did HK$13,000.

You don’t have to follow the tour if you don’t want to buy anything. Just refund the HK$3,000 and you can have things your own way, free-and-easy.[/quote]

[quote]Since you chose to come on this tour, you have to play ball.

We are going to a watch shop now. Is there any issue with that? We are not going there to just window-shop. You have to buy something.

Don’t you come out when the time is not up yet. I gave you two hours just now (at the jeweler’s). There was another group of tourists who didn’t even come out after two hours, and they spent HK$137,000 (S$24,000).

For a group of 24, you spent only HK$13,000. How could you just walk out of the shop when the time wasn’t even up?[/quote]

[quote]I have in my hand here seven receipts from our tour group. One receipt shows over HK$1,000, another two receipts, over HK$2,000. But the rest of you only spent over HK$1,000. I’ll say it out now. There’s not a single receipt over HK$4,000.

Yes, we need to eat and we need a roof over our heads. But please look into your own consciences and search your hearts.

How can there be free lunches in this world? Think about it, your tour costs only 1,000 yuan (S$200), which isn’t even enough for your air ticket from Guangzhou.[/quote]

Look into your own consciences and search your hearts. How can you spend so little? How immoral! :noway:

3

I love that thing where they move a thread, and you receive absolutely no notification as to where it has gone. The time spent searching for it provides an opportunity to be all Zen, and reconnect with the internal Buddha. Good times. :thumbsup:

4

Yeah, the tour companies, and guides directly, get big kickbacks for bringing the herd through this shop rather than that one. Sounds like there’s even competition for commissions there.

I took a tour once, in the States, run by and for Chinese. I had a Chinese friend who set it up. We left Cali on a bus, spend almost all our time on the bus, stopped for about 20 minutes at the grand canyon, stopped at a lousy Chinese buffet, stopped for about 20 minutes at the Hoover Dam, and stopped for four hours at an outlet mall. Then we made it to Vegas in time for some gambeling before bed time. It was just the one night.

The tour “included” a show, but you had to pay extra tips to the guide to go see it, some how. Most people didn’t bother and just gambeled anyway. But everything else the guide could think of, he asked for extra for, too. Changing money in the casino, even, for those silly enough to pay him for it. Then we got back on the bus, stopped for another 4 hours at the outlet mall, stopped again at the same crappy Chinese buffett, and didn’t stop again until we were back home.

It was quite an experience. A lot of the people were grumbeling about the guide, but NONE of them were willing to complain.

5

Wow, that was in the US? I suppose they run the same kind of tours on the Gold Coast in Australia.

6

Yes. I was the only whitey in the bunch, too, of course. They all were baffled at how I managed to make my way onto the bus! That was a long time ago, though. Anyway, it sounds exactly like the kind of thing you’re talking about in HK.

No one else seemed to mind much. They played cheesey Chinese martial arts movies, or soaps, on the bus. Most people just slept all day.

Twenty minutes at the "lesser attractions of the Canyon and Dam was plenty of time to take a couple of “V” photos. Oh, I forgot that we also saw an IMAX movie at the canyon, too, and were asked to spend extra for that. That was the real “tour” of the canyon, and if we didn’t give extra money to the guide, we could just sit in the non-airconditioned bus until it was over. Everyone watched the movie.

And everyone seemed to LOVE the outlet mall.

7

It’s fascinating to see different people’s perspectives on what constitutes travel and tourism. While I was in the British Museum I was exposed to what many Chinese seem to think is the way to preserve a special moment with antiquity, namely obscuring a chunk of the Parthenon by standing right in front of it, pulling a face, flashing a ‘v’, and having your picture taken by mum. There seems to be a very different concept involved, perhaps something like the idea that what’s important is that you prove you were there, rather than actually taking an interest in what else was there, or why ‘there’ was significant in the first place.

8

many tour guides sit at the right hand of satan.

9

I understand the business model; those tour groups arrange tours below cost expecting to recoup on kickbacks. This happens similarly with casino tours (e.g. SF to Reno), but there’s no overt coercion. They probably expect the odds are, overtime, they will still make a profit, even making up for those tourists who don’t even go to gamble. Of course, knowing Chinese culture, it’s so much more blunt and crude, that I’m not in the least surprised. Either they have to change their business model, raise prices, or keep biz as usual and suffer consequences, if any.

But yea, when I was travelling around musuems in Europe, I hated being grouped in with Chinese tour groups that are loud, expect etiquette from others when taking photos but not vice versa (although this is getting better with mainlanders. the HKers just don’t care)

10

When I was looking through Lion Travel offers they had organized tour trips to some outlets in Canada. No sightseeing at all. Just staying at fancy hotel’s and shopping. Oh and the food because it’s the most important thing in the world that even shopping can’t beat.

1 Like
11

Really? Sign me in! :happyrunningaround:

Wait, I need a friggin Canadian visa, dammmmmmmmm :sob:

12

Just one more reason to go full Taiwanese. There’s an ROC passport with your name on it somewhere.

13

I know, dear, I know… :sob:

14

I actually asked them about their Canadian tours because I thought that maybe I should go, never been to Canada before, but then I realized it will be twice as expensive and the lady told me that they only ever orgzanize shopping spree tours and gave me that look “what? you really want to visit Canada for sightseeing?”

15

Weird as when I was in Vancouver everyone told me they went shopping to Seattle.

That said, friggin buses, friggin transportation in general, even local hired tours. Only the one to Victoria was semi good.

I prefer my Taiwanese organized tours: land transportation, meals, tips, all included, no hassle. More expensive? When added hotel and meals and all the hassle, at 5 star level, not really.

16

I dont stay at 5 star hotels in expensive countries. Makes no sense since cheaper ones have great facilities too. And in cheap countries they are not real 5 stars hotels so I avoid expensive hotels altogether.

17

I chose 5 star in India for safety reasons. If not officially 5 star, at least as reputable as possible. True, most can be just frills, but safety is where you pay for.