When you think of Hong Kong culture, visions pop into your head that involve the Buddah, parades with colorful dragons and Tai Chi. One thing you would never think of is horse racing. Chinese love to gamble but casinos are illegal though so the only thing they can legally gamble on is the horse races and a government run lotto. So when Wednesday night or Saturday afternoons come around, the Chinese go crazy with placing bets. Because of their love of horse races (and gambling), the races are a huge part of the Chinese culture. And, of course, Troy forgot his camera so we had to steal this picture from another website.
Wednesday night Troy and I were able to attend the horse races through the AWA. We paid $70 for the both of us and that got us into the horse races, dinner buffet and unlimited beer and wine! The restaurant was also on an outdoor terrace that overlooked the track so our view was amazing! Other then slow poke races with our home town rodeos, we have never really been to horse races. Seeing these magnificent animals and hear them ferociously gallop by was amazing.
We were fortunate enough to be dining with a gentleman that grew up on horseracing. He had so much knowledge that he was easily able to explain us how to bet, how the races are ran, how to make an educated guess of which horse to bet on and he was also able to answer all my plethora of questions that I constantly threw at him. “What is that guy doing? What is that car for? Why do they have polka dots on their uniforms? Why don’t the horses poop when they run?”
He also explained to us that Hong Kong has a horse named Silent Witness that has won 18 races in a row. He said this has never been done so everyone throughout the racing world is watching him. (I’m sure all of you were just dying to know that!)
Troy tried his hand at betting. One race he won about $95HKD which is about $12USD and another race he won $2HKD which is equivalent to about 40cents US. Not even enough to buy us a pack of gum if we wanted.
