When you get off the hydrofoil from Hong Kong to Macau, you walk out into a group of hawkers trying to take you to the nearest casino. Once you get past them you arrive at the free shuttle buses provided by the casinos to take you straight to their doors without further delay. I found myself on one of these buses, heading towards a casino whose name I cannot remember. Walking into the lobby I asked the receptionist for a map and she looked at me with slight distrust at the question.
With a gaudy looking map that only has casinos and hotels highlighted on it firmly grasped in my hand, I marched along the streets to where I have wanted to spend my time during my one-day trip. As I begin to walk, I realised that the streets were deserted. I felt like I was walking through a scene in some film where big glittering casinos are filled with wealthy gamblers while the streets lay deserted. Except that the casinos here aren’t so glittery. They are impressive without a doubt, but they lack the shine of the casinos in Vegas, and are filled with a lot of people who don’t have any money.
Macau likes to think that it is the Eastern Vegas when in fact, it is very far from it. A number of years ago a TV documentary was aired in the UK that showed how the great casinos here are built, or at least some of them. Chinese workers working illegally at impossibly low rates, and sleeping together in over-crowded rooms. Women smuggling goods over the Chinese border, to try and make a small profit, these are all part of the day-to-day life of Macau. As soon as you get two roads back from the main streets where all the casinos are, you begin to see evidence of the real island.
Tenement blocks rise up all around, and slowly streets start to become busier until they are bustling with people as in most Chinese cities. There are some beautiful sights to see in Macau such as the facade of a Portugese church, and a beautiful temple, but sadly these are not the reason for the majority of visitors. Will Macau ever match Vegas? I sincerely doubt it.
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