Wednesday, September 21, 2005

Cheapo Chinese?

was reading an article on Hong Kong Disneyland in The Economist when i came across the following...
The park's layout and opening date are ruled by strict feng-shui principles, but Disney may need more than this to persuade the cost-conscious Chinese to spend. Rather than buy official photographs, they tend to snap their own, even posing with shop toys which they then do not buy...
the image that it evoked just really tickled me... =P hey jun, if you ever visit Disneyland during your stay in Hong Kong, it would be really funny if you happen to make similar observations =P

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

hey mints,
yup, its true tt disney are apparently quite troubled by the fact tt chinese/asians have a different perception of spending money to get a good experience.

for eg. it was reported in the HK newspp that some tourists will stand in front of the balloon booths to take photos, but no one will actually buy one; then when they sit the teacup rides, they will just get off half-way during the rides to take photos, which will trigger off the safety alarm and cause the whole ride to stop; also, people take photos of the camera screens specially put in place to take photos for u when sitting rollercoaster rides, instead of paying money for it, etc..

and also, cos we asians love taking photos so much that the tourists also end up sticking to Mickey Mouse and his friends for such a long duration, ie. refusing to let them go until they have taken enough photos with them, that it causes disruption to Mickey's tour schedule around the park. =)

yup, little things like these to illustrate the fact tt its not easy organizing a large-scale biz operation in HK/China.. there are ultimately many cultural differences that needs to be taken into account too.