After two days of being back from China, I’m having the worst jet lag of my life. All I want to do is sleep, but the trip was worth it.
After visiting Hong Kong, Todd and I took a helicopter to Macau. It was a breathtaking view as we went over the big buildings of Hong Kong and hundreds, maybe thousands, of small islands. I must have walked more than a mile to get to the heliport and my bad leg was throbbing on the ride. Jack Binion stayed in Hong Kong on business, but came over the next day to join us.
After reaching Macau, we went to the Galaxy Hotel and met with our hosts, Tom Hall and Chris Parker. Our accommodations were great and the book signings and interviews went well. George Barahona from DoylesRoom was there and had everything ready. The APT tournament was a little disappointing because of the number of entries. Matt Savage was the tournament director and did his usual terrific job. There were lots of familiar faces including Huck Seed, J.C. Tran, Liz Lieu, John Chan and several more. I guess the flight over affected me also, because I felt really bad and went out early the 1st day. I played pitifully and was embarrassed but just didn’t have the energy and discipline it takes to play tournament poker.
After Jack Binion got there, we visited some of the other casinos. They are much bigger than our Las Vegas ones and there are customers on every table, sometimes standing in line betting on seated player’s hands. We went to the Venetian, Sands, Wynn and several others. It seemed as though Sheldon Adelson owns most of the real estate in Macau and he is making megabucks over there. We went to dinner at the Wynn with my friend from the Philippines, Tim Shirrer and some of his business associates. The food was great as you would expect from a Steve Wynn hotel and casino. Again, I had to walk a long ways because the casinos are so huge, you can’t believe them. Maybe this trip will make me go get this leg fixed.
I was supposed to play in a big cash game but because I felt so bad, Jack and I decided we would leave Todd to play and we would come on home. So we left and took a turbojet back to the Hong Kong airport. Our flight was delayed for an hour before takeoff. That meant we couldn’t make our connection to Vegas from San Francisco. No problem when you are traveling with a billionaire like Jack Binion, you will have a private G4 waiting at another airport. Nice way to travel!
Todd is still in Hong Kong because he was late for his flight. I felt bad about leaving him over there, but he had plenty of friends to hang out with. I’m not sure how he did in the cash game, but I think he won. I’m grateful for him being there because he helped promote DoylesRoom online poker tournaments in the interviews.
Everybody thinks Obama is going to bury McCain in the debates. They should watch the Saddleback forum where each candidate is asked the same question separately. McCain won hands down and answered each question in a positive manner while Obama beat around the bush a couple of times.
David Benyamine – “You’ve got to be the worst caddy in the world.”
Caddy – “No sir, that would be too much of a coincidence.” 
-DB
