SCMP gives visitors some lip
THE South China Morning Post will be exposing visitors to the territory's 22 leading hotels to a striking new television commercial on the Hong Kong Channel from this week.
Featuring a tight shot of a pair of full red lips, it is reminiscent of the opening credits of the cult musical The Rocky Horror Show.
It also seems to have an element of Bill Yim's Hong Kong Speak programme, which also airs on the in-house hotel channel.
But Alan Jarvie, who is the creative director of the Saatchi & Saatchi-made ad Lips, said of the striking image: ''I think you could say it is a happy coincidence.'' The lips in the 20-second advert, offering helpful Cantonese phrases, belong to Kitty Mui Kwok-lan, the receptionist at Saatchi's Hong Kong office.
The 20-second ad begins by suggesting some helpful words for business visitors.
''Faster,'' says the voice-over, then the lips provide the phonetic translation - fi di.
The phrase for the bill is given as mi dan and expensive as ho gwai.
Then the translation of the phrase ''Hong Kong's leading English-language newspaper'' is given as South China Morning Post.
The word for really is given as ai ya, and the final phrase - Can I have a copy please? is rendered simply as - SCMP m'goi.
The advert will be screened 24 times a day, in all 22 hotels on the system and will be seen by an estimated 1.9 million people during the first year.
