Raw, rancid and real in the belly of the beast
For so long the people who run the Sevens have been trying to connect with the larger Hong Kong community. They run mini-rugby tournaments and there are a number of Hong Kong girls roughing it up in leagues around town as well.
But for a true example of kindred spirits, of community and event coming together as one, use your nose. Tourists in this town often comment how they are overwhelmed by the pungent odour that emanates from a combination of meats hanging on hooks half the day in the heat.
Then you wander by a stinky tofu stall and, yow, another blow to the nose. It's a memorable experience that the Sevens seems intent on replicating.
Legend has it that when Bob Hope landed in Hong Kong years ago, he asked one of his welcoming party what that awful smell was. 'It's the s**t,' he was told. 'I know,' said Hope, 'but what have they done to it?' Not sure if Bob ever made it to the Sevens, but if he did, he might ask the same question. There can't be a wet market in Mong Kok that smells worse than Hong Kong Stadium come Sunday afternoon.
After three days of debauchery, the stadium is just flat out ripe. 'That's the way it should be,' said Martin Howard, a Canadian. 'This place is raw and it should smell like it. It would be a pretty boring place if it smelled like a perfume boutique.'
He tells of skating through the aisles in the South Stand because there was so much beer on the floor. 'The place was soaked in beer,' he said. 'It was beautiful.'
Beauty is obviously in the eye, or nose, of the beholder. Despite cracking down on underage party-goers, the South Stand is still the belly of the beast and smells the part. Step into the men's room and prepare to be overwhelmed.
According to survivors of the South Stand, the smell of stale beer and human waste is hardly confined to rest rooms. 'The whole place is disgusting,' says an Irishwoman, who wished to remain nameless. Yeah, but if you wander in, you have to be ready for it. No one said rock and roll was pretty. But now they have spent so much time trying to root out underage kids in the South Stand, maybe next year they can work on the hygiene issue.
Still, it's not only the South Stand, or the men's room, that stink. 'Nothing smells worse than the Poms right now,' says Trevor Moore, a Kiwi who took delight in the thrashing his boys were giving England. Moore and his crew plugged their noses while barking at the Poms in front of them. Rub it in, mate. Why not? We have had to live with the residue of an all-conquering England team at the last four Hong Kong Sevens.
They have been great teams, just ask their fans. It has made them smug and largely insufferable. But now the only thing comparable to the stench of their squad's performance this year, is the rancid stadium itself.
Who says England doesn't contribute to Hong Kong any more?
