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Words: Lee Harlem Robinson & Caroline Manchoulas

Most people know Macy Gray as that girl from ‘I Try’ with the peculiar nasal raspy voice. Hopefully now she’ll be known as the artist who managed to pull off a cover album featuring the most eclectic mix of original material anyone could imagine. ‘Covered’ opens with Eurythmics’ ‘Here Comes The Rain Again’ which in Gray’s drumless version sounds more eerie and ominous than the original. ‘Teenagers’ (My Chemical Romance) is flipped around as Gray sings it from the perspective of a mother of three teenagers. Kanye West’s ‘Love Lockdown’ is performed to the melody of Nina Simone’s ‘Buck’, giving it an upbeat, almost reggae feel. For her version of Colbie Caillat’s ‘Bubbly’ Gray enlists the help of Idris Elba whose deep croon elevates the otherwise forgettable original tune to an adult declaration of love. Gray doesn’t shy away from the big, seemingly untouchable songs either, producing thoroughly enjoyable interpretations of Metallica’s ‘Nothing Else Matters’ and Radiohead’s ‘Creep’. The only track that doesn’t work is Yeah Yeah Yeahs’ ‘Maps’, but apart from that hiccup, ‘Covered’ is definitely an album worth listening to, if only for the comic skits featured in between songs, especially Nicole Scherzinger’s advice to Gray on how to become more popular. Who knew the Pussycat Doll had such a talent for impersonation?

Words: Lee Harlem Robinson & Caroline Manchoulas

Admittedly, my dedication to being strictly indie in 2002 made me frown upon, and consequently ignore, Norah Jones’ debut ‘Come Away With Me’, which tore down the walls between jazz and pop and scooped up many a Grammy in the process. It’s all the more ironic that, since hearing a cover version of ‘Don’t Know Why’ on super-commercial talent show The Voice a few weeks ago, that song has been stubbornly stuck in my head, creeping up on me whenever I feel the need for some music to brighten up my day. (I’ve changed a lot since 2002). For her new album Jones paired up with Danger Mouse — the man with the coolest name in the bizz, who, together with Cee Lo Green, is responsible for ‘Crazy’, one of the best songs ever produced — and that, of course, made my former indie-bits tingle. On ‘Little Broken Hearts’ Jones sings of heartache and loss, something which her soft and dreamy voice, laid over Danger Mouse’s surprisingly mellow and sparse beats, is extremely suited for. Stand-out is the menacing ‘Myriam’ in which Jones boldly threatens the other woman in her man’s life. Perhaps the greatest thing about this record though, is the fact that Jones makes the dark business of breaking up sound almost dreamy and light, making ‘Little Broken Hearts’ the best — and most commercially viable — post-break up album since Adele’s ’21’.

Words: James Soo

So you may think you’re an avid outdoorsy type in Hong Kong, pootling along the Maclehose and walking up the Peak in 20 minutes, but the Himalayas are a whole nutha story. Standing before the Annapurnas, you understand that they are gods. You may trudge through thunderstorms and hail the size of golf-balls, but suddenly it all clears and you see skies that are a blue you’ve never imagined and 7000m tall mountains that would make the most rational atheist prostrate themselves.

GETTING THERE
It couldn’t be easier. Dragonair flies to Kathmandu daily (with a stopover in Dhaka). From Kathmandu you can take buses and flights to the major hiking destinations, although Pokhara remains the most accessible. That’s either a 7 hour bus journey (HKD150) through picturesque valleys or a 30 minute flight (HKD600) over some spectacular mountains. If you do take the bus, don’t take one at night as the drivers have a habit of falling asleep at the wheel, sending the bus off the side of a cliff. If you want to trek to Annapurna Base Camp, set aside at least two weeks because the trek itself takes between 8-12 days and you may need to slow down because of altitude sickness or weather conditions. However, there are plenty of treks that you can do in just a week.

SLEEP
There are plenty of luxury options in both Kathmandu and Pokhara, but the guesthouses are plentiful, cheap and clean. You can easily pay HKD4000 a night for the top end, but for HKD100 you can find a decent room with en suite bathroom. One difference though is that the top end hotels all have generators so there is 24 electricity, whereas the smaller guesthouses may have power-outages for a few hours due to scheduled brown-outs for electricity rationing.

Kathmandu may be the capital but it’s fairly contained and most places are walkable. Guesthouses are concentrated in the tourist ghetto of Thamel. Most are fine, but try to get a room away from the main streets for a quiet night. Pokhara is a bit more spread out with Pokhara itself a good walk from Lakeside, the tourist area there. Lakeside has loads of guesthouses, but due to construction, none has a decent view of the lake! There are options here as well – North Lakeside has a couple of pricier, quieter places as well as the village opposite (accessible mostly by boat). South Lakeside is good 15 minute walk from the main drag but again you get better views and a bit of peace from the hustle and bustle.

EAT
Food is plentiful and amazing in Nepal. From local staple daal bhat (lentil soup with rice – best for those on a budget as you can usually get free refills!) to Indian curries and Tibetan specialities (such as the mouthwatering momos that are best in little roadside shacks), you won’t pay more than HKD50 per head. Bigger restaurants tend to have this global menu that offers pasta, pizzas, burgers, curries, thai food as well as Nepalese food. If you ask, most waiters will advise you to stick to the Nepalese menu. Vegetarians in particular have a great choice, although the country is not so universally meat-free as India.

Both Kathmandu and Pokhara have ridiculous numbers of restaurants and you can’t go too wrong with most of them. Just walk around and you’re sure to find something interesting. A good hangout in Pokhara is Busy Bee’s with views overlooking the lake and a big crowd every night of the week. Bistro Caroline just down the road has a lovely French-inspired garden and a selection of vaguely authentic European food. For something a bit different, head over to Lhasa Tibetan Restaurant where you can chow down to a Tibetan feast and wash it down with Thomba – a traditional hot toddy served in a metal stein with a metal straw on top.

SEE
Much of Kathmandu is a concrete nightmare, but if you wander through the old town you’ll find beautifully preserved little temples, the odd traditional wooden Newari (the indigenous inhabitants of the Kathmandu Valley) house and of course Durbar Square with the old Royal Palace and temples galore. It’s an impressive sight, but Bhaktapur, a short 20 minute drive away, is unmissable. A beautifully preserved Newari town, the entire place feels like you’re walking in a museum. If you have time, try to visit the Museum of Wood-Carving – normally deserted but in one of the most stunningly preserved Newari houses in town.

Pokhara is the adventure destination of Nepal. Most accessible treks start from here and either your guesthouse or any number of outfits in town will accommodate you. I’d suggest going independently from the agents as it will be cheaper and your guide will profit more directly. Also, unless it’s absolutely necessary, don’t camp. Most areas have tea-houses every few hundred metres (some date back centuries serving the old trade routes over the Himalayas) where you can get a clean bed and food for a pittance (HKD10 for most places). But if you’re not up to trekking, you can try your hand at white-water rafting (from a day to a week-long course) and paragliding over Lake Fewa. A number of agencies run 30 min trips but you can also opt to get certified here. One thing that sounds incredible is parahawking – you paraglide with a trained falcon at your hand from which you learn to ride thermals! Pokhara is the only place in the world that offers parahawking.

NIGHTLIFE
There’s a curfew in place in Nepal so you won’t find many places open past midnight (in fact most places shut by 11pm), so partying is not really an option. That said, you can get drunk (and high) extremely easily and cheaply. Local firewater (raksi) costs about HKD10 for a litre and weed grows wild in the mountains! That said, if you’re trekking or white-water rafting, you’ll probably be too exhausted to do much at night!

Conclusion
Nepal is a wonderfully accessible country that is worlds away from the cramped horror of Hong Kong. If you feel like some breathing space and some of the most beautiful scenery you’ll ever see in the world, you have to go to Nepal.

Words: James Soo

Studios are now chasing the grey dollar. Hence ‘The Expendables’. And hence ‘The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel’. Basically proving that while pensioners may have money, they have no taste. Based on the book ‘These Foolish Things’ by Deborah Moggach, this cliche-ridden train-wreck of a film follows a disparate group of British pensioners finding themselves implausibly in a retirement home in Jaipur, India.

Soon, they discover that the magic of the East charms their stony Western hearts, as each of the characters undergoes a massive life-change in the twilight of their lives. Vomit. It’s targeted at the older generation, who the producers assume have the sensibilities of an earlier more racist age. Hence, loads of hilarious jokes about curries giving you a bad belly, funny Indians who shake their heads when they speak and lots of WISDOM from gnomic sadhus who point out the error of their uptight ways.

That the cast is a roster of England’s finest (Dame Judi Dench, Dame Maggie Smith, Bill Nighy, Tom Wilkinson etc etc) is all the more shocking. How could they have thought making this film was a good idea? For a start there are too many stories, so there is no room for more than a superficial sketch of each character. Plot is shat out through Dame Judi’s voiceover exposition-blog (interspersed with Dame Judi looking pensive and uttering more WISDOM). And the hotelier at the centre of it all is Dev Patel (from Slumdog Millionaire) whose embarrassingly parodic Indian accent rarely makes it out of the Welsh borders.

If the film had been made in the 70s when chanting racist slogans was a perfectly acceptable way to spend a Saturday night, then it would probably pass muster. But thinking it funny in 2012 to see a woman refusing to be operated on by a non-white doctor because ‘he can’t wash the colour out of his hands’ is just insane.

Words: James Poon

Metropark hotel in Wanchai has got a new concept with a new logo aiming to be revamped into the direction of a lifestyle hotel rather than being known as a business hotel. With that, they introduced a new restaurant, Le Chef.

Le Chef offers fusion cuisine, simply east meets west and their attempt at it is evident on their ipad menu with signature dishes such as the the Pan Fried French Duck Breast, Apply Puree in Balsamic Reduction server with Foie Gras Terrine and Wood Ear Fungus Salad or the Braised Marinated Pork Belly with Creamy Cabbage in Lemon Grass and Mango Sauce.

We started with the duck breast salad with the wood ear fungus. While the concept sounded interesting, the dish, just like its name, seemed to be just a desperate attempt to make it “fusion” and to call it a salad. If it wasn’t pointed out, I would not have see the “oriental” fungus. While I wish there was more vegetables, the dish turned out quite pleasant. The duck breast was tender and the foie gras terrine was just right.

We moved on with the Pork Belly and this was another attempt of being fusion but this time it worked. While I wished the pork belly would have been a little lighter, the taste is as good as you’ll find in a chinese restaurant while the creamy cabbage in lemon grass and mango sauce unexpectedly gave the dish a good lift.

The most impressive dish of the whole experience would have to be the Lobster Bisque. No fusion here but with the lobster served separately from the bisque, it was not just a gimmick but a fairly smart idea for the sake of the lobster not being overly prepared. The taste was excellent and the chunks of lobsters was the most generous I have had in a bisque.

Time will tell whether Metropark hotel’s attempt at revamping will work but Le Chef might have even a longer way to go in establishing itself as a credible fusion restaurant. Though, its efforts at trying has to be applauded and while the journey is tough, I can see them getting there eventually.

Address: 41-49 Hennessy Road, Wanchai, Hong Kong

Words: James Soo

Studios are now chasing the grey dollar. Hence ‘The Expendables’. And hence ‘The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel’. Basically proving that while pensioners may have money, they have no taste. Based on the book ‘These Foolish Things’ by Deborah Moggach, this cliche-ridden train-wreck of a film follows a disparate group of British pensioners finding themselves implausibly in a retirement home in Jaipur, India.

Soon, they discover that the magic of the East charms their stony Western hearts, as each of the characters undergoes a massive life-change in the twilight of their lives. Vomit. It’s targeted at the older generation, who the producers assume have the sensibilities of an earlier more racist age. Hence, loads of hilarious jokes about curries giving you a bad belly, funny Indians who shake their heads when they speak and lots of WISDOM from gnomic sadhus who point out the error of their uptight ways.

That the cast is a roster of England’s finest (Dame Judi Dench, Dame Maggie Smith, Bill Nighy, Tom Wilkinson etc etc) is all the more shocking. How could they have thought making this film was a good idea? For a start there are too many stories, so there is no room for more than a superficial sketch of each character. Plot is shat out through Dame Judi’s voiceover exposition-blog (interspersed with Dame Judi looking pensive and uttering more WISDOM). And the hotelier at the centre of it all is Dev Patel (from Slumdog Millionaire) whose embarrassingly parodic Indian accent rarely makes it out of the Welsh borders.

If the film had been made in the 70s when chanting racist slogans was a perfectly acceptable way to spend a Saturday night, then it would probably pass muster. But thinking it funny in 2012 to see a woman refusing to be operated on by a non-white doctor because ‘he can’t wash the colour out of his hands’ is just insane.

Words: James Soo

A newlywed couple gets into a car accident and the bride wakes up with no recollection of her husband or even of how they met. I wish someone had struck me over the head outside the cinema so I would have no recollection of having seen this excruciating film. Over the course of 104 long minutes, Channing Tatum’s bovine neck tries a variety of strategies to reawaken Rachel McAdams’ memory of him. You can’t help feeling she’s faking it just to get away from his jaw-numbingly wooden performance.

The Vow is based on a true story, and I won’t deny it’s a sweet story. Initially, you find yourself rooting for this cool, urban couple. He owns a recording studio, she’s a promising young sculptor; they live in a funky warehouse space, her workshop at the end of the alley is hipstertastic. As the film meanders through flashbacks, you understand that McAdams’ character has run away from her privileged upper middle-class suburban country club lifestyle. So while her character tries to understand how she ended up being a boho-chick, Tatum begins to realize that his wife is more than she claimed to be.

But the trouble is the film goes nowhere and takes far too long to get there. There is no chemistry between the leads, making you wonder why they don’t just cut their losses and move on. Partly it’s the amnesia creating distance, of course, but instead of presenting a film where you feel these two should somehow be together no matter what (that was The Vow, by the way), you can’t help wondering if the accident wasn’t destiny intervening to save this awful couple from each other. Best bit: seeing Channing Tatum’s naked ass. Worst bit: the other 103 minutes 59 seconds.

If you’re looking for an escape from the big city and a place to wind down, recharge and escape from it all, then Relais & Chateaux has the answer at the beautiful Satri House boutique hotel in the UNESCO World Heritage town of Luang Prabang, Laos. Satri House offers luxurious rooms adorned with objects d’Art, antiques and sumptuous finishes. Set among secluded gardens you can indulge in lazy days reading by the pools, in the salas or in the library.
DS readers can enjoy an exclusive deal of 4 nights for the price of 3 until 31st October 2012, to enjoy this offer make your reservation by email to reservations@satrihouse.com with “DS MAGAZINE SPECIAL DEAL” in the subject box.

SATRI HOUSE
057 Photisarath Road, Ban That Luang, Luang Prabang, Lao P.D.R
Tel (+856 71) 253 491
www.satrihouse.com

Shanghai Tang have given themselves a bit of a makeover with the opening of their new flagship store on Duddell Street just a hop and a skip from their former home. The Shanghai Tang Mansion has stepped things up a notch – being the largest of their stores offering “multi-sensory experiences in a three-storey retails space of 15,000 square feet.
The store is a modern interpretation of an opulent Chinese Art Deco Mansion, a project taken on by Shanghai-based firm, Design MVW melding modernity and authentic Chinese characters that create distinct style and ambience to the various departments within this luxurious department store.

THE SHANGHAI TANG MANSION:
1 Duddell Street, Central, Hong Kong