It is now 2pm and I am just starting my lunch. By local standards this is actually closer to dinner, as lunch tends to start at noon at the latest. I finished my Cantonese lesson (Neih haih leng neui - you are a beautiful woman) and quickly headed out to pick up tickets for tonight.

First over to City Hall. It's the wrong box office sir, but please try the ESD kiosk in the MTR. An ESD kiosk is a computerised service where you can purchase concert tickets, book events etc. It's very impressive technology and shows how much HK actually has thought about using technology to make things easier. Except when it doesn't work, like today. I enter the MTR (train station), find a queue of gweilos (whites) and know this is the right machine. Quickly the queue melts away - the machine isn't working. It doesn't have enough blanks in it to print tickets for collection. A phone call to the help line tells me to go the Fringe Club. This is at the top of a hill, above Lan Kwai Fong, the bar district.

Make way up said hill, despite 35 degree heat and 95% humidity. Bump into a friend and make dinner arrangements for tonight, before climbing to the top of the hill. Make it to the club. There's another queue, including several familiar faces from the MTR queue. It moves quite quickly and I think my luck is turning. But God is toying with me. The man in front of me wants to buy tickets to 4 events, check the seating, argue about the pricing (like the clerk can do anything about it) before changing his previous bookings. Finally I pay. Now I need to heed back down the hill to work. I double time it down the hill, jay-walking and avoiding cars/trucks/buses/trams with relative ease. My lunch is waiting. It's cold. I'm angry. I blog. I don't feel any better.

I'm telling you, Prince better put on the concert of his lifetime or there will be hell to pay.