Macau Trip

Our tour guide of the Macau Discover Tour said that Macau has a population about 550,000, but they received more than 20 millions tourists last year. One of the major boots on the tourism is the visitors coming from Mainland China, many of whom are looking for good luck -- in casinos, of course.

Neither Evania nor I consider ourselves to be one of those lucky persons who could win on a lottery machine or a gambling table. So we spent most of our time walking around Macau: from Senado Square to Dom Pedro V Theatre, from St. Lawrence's Church to Lou Lim Ieoc Garden, from Dr. Sun Iat Sen Memorial House in Macau to Guia Fortress, Chapel, Lighthouse & Air-Raid Shelters, and from Orient Arch to Kun Iam Ecumenical Centre. Basically, we didn't spend any money on local transportation -- thanks to hotel's free shuttle buses and our legs.

Macau, comparing to Hong Kong, is a smaller and more relaxed city. Perhaps that is also why people we met there also felt more friendly and helpful. We are especially grateful to the following nice people:

• On the first day, a member of hotel's staff helped us check in to the hotel before the regular 3PM check-in time, so that we could join the Macau Discover Tour at 2PM in the afternoon.
• Our tour guide of the Macau Discover Tour gave us a pair of tickets to Macau Tower.
• A room-cleaning staff gave us additional bottles of water and tea/coffee bags.
• The staff at Dr. Sun Iat Sen Memorial House allowed us to have a quick visit of the place after we arrived here several minutes passed the 5PM close time.
• A kind woman whom we asked for direction walked with us to the road leading to Guia Hill.
• A father whom we asked for direction pointed us to the right direction to Guia Fortress. Otherwise, we would be making circles and never get there.
• A guard at Guia Fortress opened the door that he just closed for me to retrieve a forgotten travel book we brought with us.
• Umberto, our gondolier, sang "The Moon Represents My Heart" in Chinese although he does not seem to be a native Chinese speaker.
• A staff at Food Paradise allowed us to take out a free fried-rice dish. He even cooked the dish himself. We tried many others and none of them allowed us to take out free dishes.