Deja Vu

I know I said I wouldn't write about bars or clubs because I try my best not to go out at night. I'm just too old and impatient for it. However, there are two places that I do visit occasionally, and one of them is Deja Vu, which is owned by some friends of mine.

Yes, so I'm biased, but I really do like Deja Vu over in Soho. Unlike other bars, it's not filled with sports enthusiasts shrieking over sweaty guys playing with a ball or annoying, hick/suburban youngsters overexcited about drinking and going "HEY MAN, I'M SO DRUNK RIGHT NOW," or desperate, pathetic people who need to have sex with strangers because they don't know how to fill the void of their insecurity and low self-esteem. The proprietors are gay, so although it isn't exactly a gay bar, the crowd tends to have more gay men and women, which means that the sophistication level is much higher than at other places.

The music is good and it's never too loud. It's not like those horrid bars with shitty hiphop and Eurotrash guido music that's turned up so loud that the person next to you could let go of a fart that would melt the wallpaper and no one would know.

Plus the cocktails at Deja Vu are just delightful. They have one with lemongrass that is just delicious, and if you don't like any of the cocktails on the menu, ask Kenneth the bartender to whip something up for you. And by the way, Kenneth is GORGEOUS (and straight). I took the Other Dude to Deja Vu a long time ago, and she said that it was wrong for me to hit on Kenneth because Kenneth is too beautiful to be harassed. He's like a painting that must only be appreciated and left unsullied. So, if any of you bitches try anything on Kenneth, I will cut you. If I can't have him, no one can!

Cocktails are about HKD75 each. This is quite reasonable for Hong Kong, considering that most other bars will charge upwards of HKD140 for a cocktail. Yes, Hong Kong is ridiculous with the alcohol prices.

Pardon my shitty photographs, it was 3 AM when I took them, and although I didn't have much to drink, I had overindulged in painkillers and was getting tiny seizures. For much better photographs and directions to Deja Vu, check out their Web site here.

I forget the name of this cocktail. I think it's called Thai Beauty.

The smoking lounge. I was at Deja Vu with a couple of chicks, and one of them wanted to smoke so we sat here under the canopy.

There are fresh flowers all the time.

The main bar area.

Stairs leading up to the private lounge. I used to do tarot reading sessions there. Long story.

Inside the private lounge.

View of the main bar area from the stairs.

The bar. Kenneth had gone home by the time I took the photograph. Ugh, missed my chance. But I did touch his hand so I'm happy.

The entrance foyer, which doubles as a smoking area, as well.

Buttonhole

I used to live across the street from Buttonhole in Soho, and to be honest, I used to give a lasercut-side eye at the staff all the time because they would use the very narrow first floor landing of my building as a place to repair and sort out incoming stock.

Oh well, I'm not such an asshole anymore, I think. Buttonhole is famous for selling designer stuff at quite a low price. The clothing is aimed for an older market, but you'll see quite a lot of nice stuff there, as well. Would you believe that sleeveless white dress with vintage print is a Roberto Cavalli?? That dress is so me, but I decided not to get it because of that reason. I don't want to be stuck in a style rut.

Tsk! Look at this dude walking into my shot. I wanted the Other Dude to go and kick her ass (the OD is an amateur kickboxer who's recently won a fight), but the OD wasn't in the mood.

The OD bought this Alexander McQueen coat. Beautiful, isn't it? She got it for about HKD1800.

I was touched when I told the OD that I liked this Herve Leger dress, and she said to me that I was better than that.

The OD: That's so not you! Herve Leger is for rich Desperate Housewives-type women who are trying too hard to be sexy by looking like strippers.
Me: Well...that kind of sounds like me, minus the rich part.
The OD: You're just skanky, but you're not a wannabe.

Aw, I was seriously touched! But I actually would wear Herve Leger. But I think I would wear it more like a goth stripper after an eight-hour shift, with a crazy bouffant and my bondage cuffs.

Some of the things I've purchased at Buttonhole. I got this straitjacket sweater years and years ago. It was rather expensive, if I recall correctly, it was about HKD300 or so. It used to be blindingly white, but it's gone yellow with age, which I actually like. This outfit is just a casual look, with vintage plaid skirt, bondage collar and my red Michelle Mason clogs. Sorry for the awkward posing. I was perching on the table again.

Oh, I love those shoes so much! I got them at the now-gone Sistyr Moon in Central almost 10 years ago. They are terrible to walk in but so beautiful.

And I got this Manoush dress for HKD419. The price is really good, isn't it? Such a pretty dress!

I'm wearing Costume National beige slingbacks with a silver heel. These shoes are obviously a size too big for me, but they were on sale at On Pedder for only HKD150. For Costume National! I had to get them, and anyway, with gel inserts, they fit okay.

I feel like a Tord Boontje lamp in the dress.

Image taken from here

Actually, when I wear it out, I think I'll take my inspiration from Alan Moore's Swamp Thing (does anyone have a copy of the whole Alan Moore run they can lend me? I only ever read a couple of issues). I'm thinking...braids wrapped around my head, my silver crown of thorns, red eyeliner. Don't you love thematic dressing?

Taken from here

Can I just take this moment to declare how amazing I think Alan Moore is? And he supports libraries and goldsmiths!

Taken from here

Buttonhole is at 68-70 Peel Street in Soho, at least for now until the crazy rents drive them away.

ps. A little bit of Chabi for you:

蓮香樓 Lin Heung Tea House

Another popular destination that I wasn't sure if I should write about but fuck it. I love Lin Heung, it's been around for a hundred years, and hopefully will be around for another hundred.

When my ex-husband and I first started coming here 10 years ago, he referred to Lin Heung as the place where old people go to die. We used to come here really early in the morning because both of us are high-strung about queueing at restaurants. His family is from Hong Kong, but they never had a granny who they could send over to queue for them at dimsum places. (Something you might notice at the more popular dimsum places is the large number of elderly who have been sent ahead like ninjas to grab seating tickets for their families. That's why a lot of places have set up chairs and mahjong tables. Those aren't for you, those are for the old ones.) So that meant that my ex-husband's family usually had to troop off early in order to secure a table, and that got him into the habit of rushing to restaurants really early.

By the way, I know I've referred to my ex-husband quite a few times already and that's because he's still one of the most decent and funniest guys I've ever met. Things didn't work out between us, obviously, but even though we don't stay in touch, I still think of him positively.

Lin Heung is at 162 Wellington Street in Central, right around the wet market.

Their bakery is also famous for its mooncakes, which are made in a really old-fashioned style -- thick skin, very dense lotus paste and heart attack-inducing double egg yolks. They also have the other types of mooncakes with bean paste, etc. but I don't fuck with those.

My friend and I went on a weekday before lunch, so it was relatively uncrowded. The waiter was super nice and seated us with a pair of Taiwanese tourist chicks. This is one of those places where you will definitely have to share tables with strangers.

The cashier where you pay. At dimsum places, you're given a piece of paper that is stamped each time you get a dish. At the cashier, you give the paper to the lady and then she calculates the number of stamps. Incidentally, Lin Heung is pretty cheap. Meals for two are usually about HKD150 if you eat a lot. My friend and I ended up only spending HKD88.

As soon as you're shown your table, the waiter will ask you what kind of tea you want. It's usually a choice between heung pin (茉莉花) or jasmine tea, sau mei (壽眉) or peony tea, and bo lei (普洱) or dirty water used to clean rust from trucks.

Seriously, though, I only ever order heung pin because sau mei makes me too thirsty and bo lei is disgusting. It's pu'er tea, but often a really shitty version of it.

At Lin Heung, they give you a bowl of hot water to wash your utensils and bowls in. You can see our paper with the numbers for stamps underneath the bowl.

Our first dish was radish cake. My friend was kind of shocked at how big it was. Lin Heung's food is quite old-fashioned, so it's usually surprising to people who eat at the more modern dimsum places.

Radish cake close up.

Char siu bao or steamed roasted pork bun. I love Lin Heung's version. Very hearty and the bread tastes wonderful.

Look, it's bo lei tea being prepared!

Cheung fan. I asked the lady for extra sauce. We got the one with shrimp. My brother and I got the beef one before and it wasn't good.

Lin Heung is one of the few places that still use a cart system for dimsum. You can see the mad scramble every time an auntie comes out with a cart of food. It's quite scary wading in. If you want to know what it feels like to be a celebrity mobbed by crazed fans, you should try getting a job at Lin Heung.

I'm not fond of siu mei, and this was merely acceptable, I thought.

That poor cart lady!

This was just lovely! This was siu mei but with quail egg.

The kindly uncle who sat at our table after the Taiwanese chicks left was sooo sweet! He told us: "Kids, I can't finish this all by myself, so why don't you share it with me?"

Yes, you can order off the menu, as well, at Lin Heung. I should do that next time I'm there. He got fried egg and steamed pork rice.

Oh, I love egg yolk on rice. Whenever I'm feeling poor and need to economize, I survive on fried egg and rice, topped with soy sauce. Bliss.

Anyway, as you can see, we didn't order too many things to eat because the radish cake really slowed us down, and we're not used to eating so early in the morning. However, I'll be back at Lin Heung when a friend comes in from out of town, and I'll do a part 2.

A Quick One While He's Away

玉葉粉麵甜品

Before I begin, I should really explain a little bit about dai pai dongs (大排檔). They're basically outdoor cooked food stalls like the one in Fotan. They have a really interesting history that you can read about on their Wikipedia page here.

I have a particular fondness for dai pai dongs because it has something to do with the reason I moved to Hong Kong in the first place. I came here because of Wong Kar Wai, and I stayed because of Johnnie To. These two film directors, I feel, really capture everything about Hong Kong that I love, including dai pai dongs. (In fact, I'm wondering if I should do a bunch of entries on Wong Kar Wai and Johnnie To movies and their set locations. Would this interest anyone at all?)

The film that really prompted me to decide to live in Hong Kong was Chungking Express. It's not actually my favourite film from Wong Kar Wai, but it was the one where I could imagine living the same life as the characters. In fact, I ended up moving to Soho, close to the escalator and huge dai pai dong where part of the film was shot. Of course, Soho is ruined now because of the bars and restaurants for expats, which is really sad.

Anyway, when I lived in Soho, I used to frequent the 玉葉粉麵甜品 dai pai dong. The meals there are cheap, delicious and filling, and they are usually open quite late, often till 1 in the morning on Friday and Saturday nights. They also have desserts like tapioca in coconut milk and sesame syrup.

Since I had to go to Central to do some errands, I thought I'd stop by 玉葉粉麵甜品 since I hadn't been in a while. I guess I was also feeling a bit sentimental because it was raining, and I didn't bother taking an umbrella and just put on my security guard cap, and it made me think of Tony Leung's character in Chungking Express, Cop 633, eating at a dai pai dong. I love Tony Leung, especially after what he said about Tiananmen. His momma didn't raise no fool.

Taken from here

玉葉粉麵甜品 has been around for more than 80 years. In fact, it originated on Stanley Street (where the dai pai dong scenes for Chungking Express were filmed. However, the two brothers who ran the dai pai dong had a disagreement, and so one of them moved to Elgin Street and opened up 玉葉粉麵甜品.

The selections include fish/pork/beef balls, trotters, brisket and dumplings in noodle soup (HKD18) or dry noodles (HKD22). A plate of vegetables and brisket with dry noodles will set you back HKD45, and the desserts are usually between HKD5 to HKD10 each. For takeaways, add HKD1.

I once tripped so badly here, I ripped my knee open.

I guess if you don't like to use these chopsticks, you can bring your own. I don't really care, though.

Even though the beef brisket is really famous here (it's under the entry "Stewed beef" -- in other restaurants, you'll see it referred to as beef flank), I decided to get a bowl of beef ball noodles. You get six beef balls, three of which are normal and three have lots of pepper. The meatballs are all handmade, you can tell because of the texture, which is quite rough and chewy.

My homage to Cop 633. Er...that's a septum ring, not a silver booger.

See the pepper bits?

During nice days, they set up the chairs on the street itself. Once, when I was having dinner here with my ex-husband, I sat with my back to the bottom of the hill, and for some reason, I ended up tipping over and sliding partway down. It was pretty funny.

So, how to find this place? It's kind of messed up because it's on Elgin Street, except that there are 2 Elgin Streets in Soho. If you're coming from Soho, then walk down Staunton Street away from the escalator, and then on your right, you'll see a bunch of little fruit stalls. That's the Elgin Street where 玉葉粉麵甜品 is on.

Alternatively, if you're walking on Hollywood Road towards Sheung Wan (ie. away from the escalator), keep walking until you see this 7-11 on your left. 玉葉粉麵甜品 is right across from it.

And of course, no mention of Chungking Express should go by without a couple of photographs of possibly the most beautiful man in the world, Takeshi Kaneshiro, who was in the film, as well.

Taken from here

I think the difference between these two pictures is close to 10 years, but he's aging beautifully. I can imagine him as one of those elegant older gentlemen. I just like how he seems so calm and remote, like an unopened book.

Taken from here

I wish guys would grow their hair long and wear hanfu again.