Let me tell you about the very rich. They are different from you and me.

It appears that Hong Kong's courts have finally yielded to the need to generate additional income and are now staging their first theatrical product: the absurdist case of Koo Siu Ying. She lived with tycoon Lim Por-yen for 46 years and had two kids with him. The relationship broke down in 2002. Now she claims she was his "third wife" and HK$574 million he gave her was not a loan but rather a gift. He is counter-claiming it was a loan and he is now owed more than HK$1 billion. Either way that's a lot of shekels. But the case has been sidetracked by an important issue: can she call herself a wife or even a concubine?

"She's obviously not a wife in the Western sense,'' Justice Stuart-Moore said Tuesday. "She's probably not a wife in the Chinese sense. She may be a concubine in the Chinese sense. We need proper evidence on this and what the obligations are to a concubine.

"My understanding of a concubine is someone who joins a household and understands they will be looked after for the rest of their lives. "The question of whether a husband should look after a concubine is one which needs to be determined.''

Two experts on Chinese custom law should be flown to Hong Kong from London...first-class and put up at the Mandarin Oriental Hotel because this would not be a great hardship in comparison with the amount of money involved in the case.

Apparently it's not just the rich that are different to you and I. Senior judges are too.