On the southern edge of Hong Kong island there lies a beautiful long bay with smooth, golden sands.  The kind of bay that any discerning late 19th-century pirate would like to call home.  A place to relax and unwind, and to divide the booty when the raiding, raping and pillaging are done for the day.

 

And it came to pass that such undesirables took up residence much to the displeasure of Britain's merchant navy and colonial aspirations.  It becomes a little tiresome when spend all your time stripping a country of all its natural assets only to have the afore mentioned assets pilfered by a swashbuckling nar-do-well.

 

It was particularly galling when the parrot wielding buggers nicked the opium that you were trying to smuggle illegally in to mainland China (read about our illustrious opium smuggling here).

 

Eventually tiring of their illegal activity, the British Navy moved in to evict peg-legs, and in 1841, they were finally replused, and the area was ever after known as Repluse Bay.

 

Today it is full of a different kind of pirate - Financial Raider of Stockmarket, scurge of undervalued companies everywhere.  They too like to relax, unwind and count their booty overlooking long sandy beaches.  Consequently housing in this area of Hong Kong can cost upto $2,500 per square foot!!!

 

Overtime developers moved in to make huge sprawling apartment complexes.  One such developer hired a european architect, whom I can only presume studied to much in the Amsterdam coffee shop.  His design incorporated a ruddy great big hole in the middle of the building.  Never mind, times were good and the $1m appartment that could of been there wont be missed.

 

Some time passed and building of the immense project commenced.  Just as the block was approaching completion - KABOOM - in 1997 housing prices collasped and more than halved over the next few years.

 

The developer was distraught - not only was he struggling to flog his flats at cost, he had this huge gapping hole that whould have netted him half a million bucks if his damn architect wasn't so stoned.

 

However, being your typical chinese business man, he hit upon a cunning plan, a very cunning plan indeed.

 

The chinese like there mythical creatures and their feng shui.  In can be seen in everyday life in the orient - look outside any HK bank and you will see lions - they are there to protect the money inside, any bank without them doesn't stay in business very long.

 

The hero of our story heard tales that high in the hills above Repulse Bay there be dragons.  Quickly improvising in a magazine article about his new building, he made up a cock-and-bull story that the hole was there to let the dragon through as it whoshed down the hill to the sea.  If there wasn't a hole then the fiery beast would torch the place on it's way through!!!

 

Boy did this guy know the right buttons to press - in chinese mythology a dragon symbolises equilibrum and balance in the living space, as well as achievement and prosperity. KER-CHING.  Overnight demand for his unsold apartments skyrocketed and prices with them, leaving our entrepped developer's bank needing a few more lions.

 

I wonder if fire risk premiums also went up?