What Can Kill You This Week!

One of the nicest things about living in HK is HK Magazine. They're given away free in coffee shops, bars and other places where "Foreign Devils" congregate. Coming out each Friday, they contain all the information you need to know about what's happening in HK in the upcoming week:

Every city should have one.

They're also hilarious. HK Mag has fantastic writers who do the best articles on things of interest to Hong Kongers, and always you can't wait to get your hands on the next issue.

HKers also seem to be divided into two camps: those who hoard each issue for years (and you know who you are. And, yes, I'm also talking about you, ABC!) and those who rip out articles to save and toss the rest. (And I include myself in that group.)

One of my favourite weekly features is:

... which is usually a report on the latest thing coming out of China that can kill you, although they never discriminate so it's not just China:

1) Last week's report was "World of Warcraft" which was about the latest crop of extremely popular and nasty on-line role-playing games.

2) The week before was "Wishing Trees"- the various designated old trees onto which HKers throw streamers containing their wishes - and which are now so laden with HK's hopes and dreams, limbs are dropping off and hitting people. It's funny, yes, only people sometimes die so no one's laughing.

3) The week before it was "Laser Guns" - 

not the cool sci fi kind, but the ones used by cops to judge your car's speed - which, it seems, can give you all sorts of diseases - although the report casts doubt on this because it was brought up in court by a tycoon - clocked doing over 200mph in a 50mph zone in a Ferrari - who wanted to see them banned. Personally, I think you're more likely to die from a tycoon in a Ferrari.

I plan in future to pass on HK Magazine's "what will kill you this week" although I don't have to wait until tomorrow's issue to tell you what it is because this week is a no-brainer: it'll be EV71, the new intestinal virus which is sweeping China and which has already killed 24 children, three of them immediately over the border in Guangdong.

Apparently it all starts off with a rash, and then enormous blisters develop on your hands, feet and inside your mouth, and then they go down into your stomach and blisters up all inside there as well, and then you get really, really, really sick.

And this week is Buddha's Birthday so it's a long weekend and a lot of people are planning to go visit family up there ... and what's the bet a whole rash of kiddies ("rash"!! joke!!) bring it back here with them? And then poor Hong Kong will again get the blame for spreading it out to the rest of the world. But it isn't us, you know! We aren't the ones forever breeding up new and interesting killer diseases. It's always the fault our Northern Brethren but we're the ones who cop it.

But enough complaining! This new disease? Sounds really yucky, doesn't it! I think I'd prefer "Death By Wishing Tree"!

Nope, got it wrong. Seems what can kill you this week is yet another of those violent on-line computer games: