Macau

Visited in August 2010

During the 8 years of living in Hong Kong, never did I once went to Macau despite it being 1 hour away by ferry. It was in August 2010 when we went back for two months to visit relatives that got us the opportunity to spend two days in the special state that was once a Portuguese colony. Our visit was very much touristy and I had zero say in the itinerary. I remember feeling a little less stressed out (from being around relatives) 24/7 when my mom and sister were left alone in the hotel at night. I should explain that during the two months we stayed in the 800 sq. ft. apartment we lived in for 8 years, except this time instead of a family of four, it was about 6 to 7 people plus occasionally an 8th person confined in wheelchair no less. Let's just say... it did not feel like the home I knew as a child. I was constantly breaking down and thinking about just packing up and flying home. That was the only and last time I threw a tantrum as an adult in front of my mom.

Anyways, back to Macau. Even though the itinerary was not ideally what my immediate family would organize, we did enjoy the much more relaxed environment of the island. I was especially intrigued by the multi-lingual place: Cantonese, Mandarin, English and Portuguese. This place is one of the most diverse places I've been to in Asia, aside from Singapore. Of course as I am writing this journal entry ten years after the fact I visited Macau, the current day Macau would be very different... just as different as my feelings towards this place. Only until in recent years that I was made aware of the fact that my maternal grandmother took refuge and was "adopted" in Macau during Second World War at the age of 4 or 5. If I knew about this ten years ago, I would have made the efforts to trace back the places my grandmother might have took refuge at.

The most memorable moments for me on this trip was walking and experiencing one of the most popular region of Macau — Santo AntóÓio. As a foodie from a family that places culinary experiences first, I was basically like a child in a candy store sampling all the specialty snacks Macau was known for, such as jerkies, sesame chews, almond biscuits, etc. My gluten-free knowledge was not as extensive back then so I'm pretty sure I got sick from all the samples with hidden wheat (soy sauce) and barley (malt sugar). It was all worth it though. One thing I did not get to sample was the Portuguese tart since that is clear-cut not gluten-free.

Another thing that struck me about this city was the architecture. At that point, I had never been to Europe, so I was very much overwhelmed by the colourful European-style architecture and the way it clashed with the cold concrete style similarly to Hong Kong's.

There were much more that we did, but there were the typical, not as important touristy activities that had nothing to enrich our knowledge of Macau's history and culture, a.k.a. tourist traps. However, I will end this with a funny encounter — while visiting The Venetian Macao hotel, another tourist asked me how much I charged for photos. It took me a few seconds to register that she thought I was one of the photographers at the hotel! As student racking up a huge debt at the time, I should have accepted the unexpected gig...

This entry was published on May 15, 2021.