Hey, Hongkongers! Do you have too much disposable income? Did you buy a car, spend US$765,000 on a parking space, and still end up with more cash than you know what to do with?
We know, it’s hard out there, but don’t despair! Bring those fat stacks on down to the Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Centre in Wan Chai this Sunday to bid on the latest round of personalized license plates to be auctioned off by the Transport Department!
That’s right, Hong Kong’s periodic license plate auction is back again, and if history is any indication, it’s going to be a doozy. Past outings have seen a masked man drop HK$18.1 million (about US$2.3 million) for a plate with the auspicious number 28, and another driver pay HK$9.3 million (about US$1.18 million) for “VV” — ‘V’ as in “Victory”, uh, twice.
Would-be buyers are required to put down a HK$5,000 (about US$640) deposit to take part in the bidding, and are also helpfully reminded in the government’s announcement to bring along a “cheque made payable to ‘The Government of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region.’”
Yeah, definitely don’t want to forget that.
Meanwhile, the names available this time around offer a little something for everyone.
There’s “CAPRESE,” presumably for a big fan of the salad; “DUR1AN,” for a fan of the odiferous fruit; and “DEBUG,” for an exceptionally wealthy coder/exterminator.
Others include the nautically cheerful “AHOY,” the slightly badass “C DRAGON,” the oddly subservient “OKS1R” (displayed on two lines, as in, “OK, sir”), and the inexplicably Texan “LONGHORN.”
To purchase the latter, however, Hong Kong law requires the buyer own a Cadillac El Dorado with an actual set of longhorn horns on the front, a la The Rich Texan from The Simpsons.
