If you haven't been to one of these things, then they're quite the experience. Thousands and thousands of people of different nationalities (and smell) scurrying about and looking at the next electronic wonder. The place is huge and crisscrossed with booths from one end to the next. Take a look at some of these pics which i downloaded from their website (forgot my camera) just to give you a fair idea of the scale. Of course, the canton fair is even bigger, but that's another story.
With this many people, you'd think it'd be utter chaos. But surprisingly it is quite organized and very well managed. Of course, if you're dumb enough not to register online and just show up there, then you'll be spending a fair chunk of your time standing in line. Registering online gives you a barcode which they scan and out pops your ID and in you go in less than 5 minutes.
Of course, having a fair of this magnitude running concurrrently with a china sourcing fair jacks up hotel prices tremendously. I had to stay in a 3 star hotel away from the main commercial areas and it was still around US$160+ per night which is highway robbery. At least the exchange rate was in our favor for once due to the strong showing of the peso.
Out on the poker front, pretty thin news. Haven't had time to play any MTTs. So had to satisfy my poker craving with the once in a while SNG over at Pokerstars where I'm chasing a small bonus. Results have been fairly good and have managed to eke out a decent positive ROI. This was after a horrendous start. I don't know what it is, but everytime I play somewhere new, it always takes me time to get the groove of things. As I've suggested before, I really believe that each site has its own unique card flop texture and play needs some adjustment from site to site to maximize profit potential. I've had the same experience with Pokerroom, FullTilt, Poker.com and now pokerstars. So I'm fairly convinced.
Of course, it could all be in my mind or it could be just plain variance as I can't really explain the mechanics of it. All I know is I had to tone down the aggressiveness which worked in Full Tilt to start winning consistently in Pokerstars. So take it with a grain of salt.
