Yau mo gau chor!

The HK International Film Festival started last week. Last Friday we went to the Tamar site and watched "Masked Rider" on "Asia's largest outdoor inflatable screen". My kids love the man-sized mutant sports bike riding bug so I thought this would be a treat for them. It was a nice evening, cool and clear. We were surrounded by what looked like over-excited thirty-something adult men, wearing matching T-shirts, some sporting the special belt that the riders wear for transforming from ordinary joe to super hero. So crazy!

Geeky fandom is perhaps a notch less morally objectionable than the life of Henry Chinaski, the protagonist in Factotum , another film festival number which I saw last night. After the film ended, as the audience started heading towards the exits, I overheard a woman saying

All those people in the film, their lives are so empty!
(Her male companion said nothing in return)

They just drink and smoke all day!
(Nothing)

They drink so much whisky!
....

Their lives are so empty! How can they live like that!
....

The main character can't hold down any jobs!
....

They don't even take showers!
... mmmm... where shall we go for dinner?


***********************************

An amazing piece of overheard conversation, on the 64K bus yesterday:

You know ah fai is getting another promotion...

Yes... some kind of chief supervisor now.

Yes ah, he will get a pay rise too.

Yes, it's good to get a pay rise. More money.

You know ah second uncle, their daughter, she makes around $9000 a month.

Yes, that is not bad, she only graduated from high school.

You know what ar, she had her eye lids done. Double eye-lid operation.*

Double eye-lid operation? I didn't notice anything different wor, we saw them over Chinese New Year right?

Yes, her mother told me ah.

Well it's her money, if she can earn it she can spend it.

Ai.... no ah. She didn't tell them ah. Ah second uncle found the receipt, from the hospital, for her operation, it costs $9,000 ah.

Wah... that's a lot of money. Her whole month's salary.

Ai.... you know what he did ah? That second uncle. One evening he went into her room, with the receipt in hand, and shouted at her. Slapped her on the face a few times ah.

Wah... yau mo gau chor...

Yes ah... really... it's her money loi ga ma, she can spend it whichever way she likes. Um spend dO spend jor lor...

Yes... can't treat the kids like this. She's an adult la ma, can't slap her.

The next day ah, she took all her money out from her bank account, $20,000 or something, and gave it all to her mother.

Ha? Why did she do that?

She wanted them to leave her alone lor, they want her money ma, gave them lor.

Ai.... really.... can't treat kids like this.

She is twenty-five years old ga la ma...

Mi lor....

* popular cosmetic surgery procedure amongst Asian women, where a cut is made on the eye lids to make eyes look bigger and rounder.