Despite his passion for billiards, Yik Kam-yin is reluctant to step inside any of the places where he can play.
A non-smoker, he knows that if he goes into a billiards room, he will face clouds of fumes from smokers puffing away in defiance of a law that banned smoking in indoor entertainment venues three years ago. 'I have been to almost all billiards rooms in Hong Kong,' he said. 'None of them is smoke-free. None.'
There are about 50 billiards and snooker rooms in the city, but only 189 fixed-penalty tickets were handed out in them from January to October this year - a fraction of the 5,845 HK$1,500 tickets issued in all venues in that period. And only 168 complaints of smoking in billiards rooms were lodged in that period.
The Tobacco Control Office acts on complaints rather than sporadic inspections, and Yik said that as most players were smokers, they were unlikely to complain. 'But it prevents non-smokers like me from joining the sport,' he said.
Anti-tobacco campaigners say the problem is that venue operators are not responsible for enforcing the ban; if they knew they would lose their licences if customers were caught smoking, the problem would disappear overnight.
'If you go to the Mong Kok billiards rooms at night, people are smoking all the time. If you go during the day, there are about half,' said Wong Chi-wai, 26, a stage manager. People even smoked during open competitions, even referees, he said.