Horse racing

One of the most popular tourist attractions for westerners in Hong Kong is the Happy Valley Race Course. Located amidst skyscrapers near Causeway Bay (on Hong Kong Island), this small race track packs 32.000 people every Wednesday night. So yesterday, I naturally took my parents there.

The race course opened in 1845, and was built for the British who at the time ruled Hong Kong. The Chinese, however, became more and more fond of horse racing, so the atmosphere is a peculiar mix of gruff elderly Cantonese men, who have statistics and insider information and come for the gambling; and westerners, expats and tourists, who come for the beer, the socializing, and have no clue who or what they are betting on. Happy Valley is one of the oddities of Hong Kong which distinguishes the city from the rest of Asia.

In some ways, it is very Asian: Entry price is 10 HKD, although food and drink is slightly more expensive than the norm. Bets can be placed from 1 HKD to 500.000 HKD (!) revealing Asia's love and mental insanity when it comes to gambling (Macau, the gambling capital of the East, has daily revenues from gambling which are 5 times higher than the Strip in Las Vegas), and you can bet on almost anything. On the other hand, British upper-class still resides, with members' stands, tournaments, and the race track being a spotless lawn.

Betting can be confusing, but it actually intriguing. The 4 main types of bets are winner, placement, quinella and quinella placement. In the first two, you pick a single horse (out of 12), either as the winner or as a placement within the top three. Of course the placement bet gives you considerably lower odds. Quinellas are the same, except you pick two horses - either top two in any order, or two out of top three in any order. You can bet on as many as the top 5 horses (in either a fixed or random order), but those bets are so unlikely that the odds are enormous - some winnings on those bets were several hundred thousand dollars. The odds are updated constantly, and are determined by what everybody else bets on - so if you know something others don't, you can get a considerable return.

A night at Happy Valley lasts 4 hours between 7:00 and 11:00, with the 8 races taking place at 30 minute intervals. After missing the first race, we decided to place one 10 HKD bet on each race, limiting our losses to 70 HKD. I won a quinella on my first race, betting that the two favoured horses would finish 1-2, and a couple of other safe bets, so I ended the day 110 HKD up. That was nothing compared to the total value of bets placed, just shy of 1.000.000.000 HKD! Although some of that was paid out in winnings, operation expenses and rent, I'm pretty sure they make a fine profit. House always wins, as they say.