We continue to be amazed at the things people will do to make money in tough times. Yesterday a photo of a totally wet Hong Kong stockbroker in his underwear found its way on to our desk, along with the amazing story behind it. Congratulations to Cecil Cheng of ITG Hong Kong. On Tuesday night he accepted a US$1,000 challenge from a colleague to leap into the icy waters off Lamma Island from the deck of a beach restaurant. 'I have the HK$7,740 in my pocket,' he told us yesterday. 'The water was freezing, but I figured it was the only way to make money in this depressed stock market!' Luckily for Mr Cheng, Lai See refuses to publish highly embarrassing pictures of financial industry types on their nights out. We can say that the water had thoroughly soaked his undergarment, rendering it see-through. And we would never reveal the source of this explosive photo and message signed 'Asad Sultan, ITG Hong Kong'. Green Sunday: Lai See is fascinated by brands, catchy phrases, in fact marketing in its entirety. The mobile phone service industry is proving to be a great source. There was SmarTone's innovative 'Talk Less, Say More' campaign, and now Sunday Communications' 'feels better'. Yesterday Sunday's group managing director Bruce Hicks said he felt a lot better about his company's network coverage, having spent HK$125 million so far this year on improvements including 150 more cell sites. 'The reality is that we had excellent coverage at the beginning of 2002 - but now we're even better,' he said. Lai See is a Sunday customer. We feel better too. Our monthly bill is way below what it was when we subscribed to One2Free and Orange and our handset now works in places it didn't. Another reason we feel better about Sunday: it cares for the environment. Mr Hicks says he never eats shark's fin soup out of respect for sharks and the company does not send hard-copy bills to its customers. This saves lots of paper, and trees, and ensures we waste time every month trying to print our Sunday e-bill which never fits properly on our page and omits the vital (for us) Pay by Phone Service code. Curtailed speech: Do you believe in the free flow of information? Lai See does, so we were slightly shocked by our colleague's experience with the office of the Financial Secretary Antony Leung Kam-chung yesterday. Our correspondent knows he will be on the same flight as Mr Leung returning from a big media event in France. Seeking formal permission for a 15-minute personal interview aboard the plane, he called the Financial Secretary's office. He asked to speak to Mr Leung's press secretary, Raymond Tam Chi-yuen. 'Can you send us a fax,' was the essence of the reply. Our colleague refused to send this fax, asking to speak to the spokesman. Later, he tried calling again. This time, we overheard the conversation. Colleague: May I speak to Raymond Tam please, is he in the office? Mr Leung's office: I have not met him. Colleague: Oh you haven't seen him since the last time I called? Office: Yes I have not met him. Colleague: Thank you, goodbye. Net scam: Reader Craig Emett has alerted us to a scam e-mail he received based on a promotional lottery the recipient has apparently won - yes, just send bank details. The e-mail is similar to Nigerian scam messages but it claims to be sent from a Dutch lottery company. The perpetrators have built their own Web site to give it credibility: www.werken-bij-delotto.net Looks real, does it not? We wonder where they found the group of smiling Dutch organisers. Mr Emett has found a British Web site specialising in this type of fraud at www.stopecg.org/lottery.htm Oh and we forgot to mention: CONGRATULATIONS! You have won . . . Graphic: whee21gbz
