The Peninsula Hotel and its jointly managed addition, the Peninsula Court, occupy the same place in the colony that the Plaza does in New York—smart, eminently respectable and expensive. The Park, the Imperial and the Ambassador are among the best of the large, new hotels in Kowloon. The Gloucester has the greatest status of the Central District hotels, and the Repulse Bay, on the south shore of Hong Kong Island, rates as the island’s most luxurious resort hotel. There are about a dozen other first-rate hotels and approximately 30 additional ones that range from satisfactory to catch-as-catch-can. All those recommended by the Hong Kong Tourist Association are acceptable, but their quality varies with their rates, though not always in proportion. Two outlying hotels worth noting are the Carlton and the Shatin Heights, both in the New Territories but not far from Kowloon. The Luk Kwok in Wanchai, once the locale for Richard Mason’s _The World of Suzie Wong_, prospered so handsomely from the publicity that it is now a quiet, middle-class hotel. Confirmed hotel reservations, arranged well in advance of your arrival, are advisable for all tourists who are not thoroughly familiar with Hong Kong. Certainly it would be unwise to arrive without them and be forced to rely on sheer luck or the noisy touts who besiege incoming passengers at Kai Tak. The touts are kept behind a fence nowadays, but if the unsuspecting visitor lets them steer him to a hotel, their kick-back will be added to the bill. Experienced visitors sometimes check into a modestly priced hotel for the night and spend the next day bargaining for the lowest rates at one of the better places which, when business is slow, regularly knock 30 percent off the stated charges. For newcomers, this is seldom done. Some European and American visitors cannot be persuaded to try Chinese food. Either they think it will make them ill, which it certainly will not, or they believe they’ll look silly fumbling with chopsticks. It must be conceded that inexperienced users of chopsticks usually look rather foolish, but practically every Chinese restaurant will provide a knife and fork if asked for them. No difficulty should arise from a determination to stick to one’s usual diet. Every first-class hotel serves an international cuisine. Prices are tailored to the room rents; high at the Peninsula, cheap at the Y.M.C.A. next door to it. In general, the meals are as good as those at American hotels and they cost considerably less. Steaks are tougher than Choice U. S. beef, and occasionally one resembles a small portion of a welcome mat. Apart from the hotels, there are about a dozen good European restaurants.