WHEN Lu Ping, China's chief of Hong Kong affairs, arrives tonight, it will be into a territory that members of his immediate family know intimately. Both his wife and son have worked for various Hong Kong companies for years, and have easy access to the territory's top businessmen and community leaders.
Their combined knowledge of the territory may give some the impression that they are a conduit of information for Mr Lu, who has not visited the territory for the past two years because of the row over Chris Patten's political reforms. However, a close look at the relationship suggests this is unlikely to be the case.
Mr Lu's wife, Xi Liang, has worked in Hong Kong since 1985, while his son, Kenneth Lu Gong, has been employed by a string of Hong Kong companies. As China's most senior official on Hong Kong affairs, Mr Lu makes it his business to know what is going on here - yet his absence from Hong Kong has made this difficult.
Neither his wife nor son will be at Hung Hom station to greet him when his train arrives from Guangzhou. Some suggest the Lu family has grown apart. Others say their absence is purely a coincidence.
According to colleagues, Ms Xi, deputy general manager of China International Trade and Investment Corporation (Hong Kong), is currently on the mainland on business, believed to be using her engineering background to oversee the construction of new power plants.
Ms Xi, 65, works from a plush office in The Landmark, and is not expected back in Hong Kong until the middle of the month, according to her secretary. A frequent traveller to the mainland, she was also away during her husband's last Hong Kong visit, in early 1992. Like many other mainland couples of their generation, they work apart and rarely see each other, leaving little scope for Hong Kong businessmen to win favours from Mr Lu by pampering his wife.