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In Macao, we saw Robert Mitchum and Jane Russell landing in the port city from the Hong Kong ferry. Here we climb aboard the good old steam ferry, Fa Tsan, with the promise of plenty of romance and adventure ahead – although we’ll be needing our sea legs.

When Robert Lomax steps off the Star Ferry onto the soil of Hong Kong for the first time, the thought never enters his head that the island will become his chosen home. It is, after all, hard to think about making a home for yourself when you live in a “borrowed place on borrowed time”.

Hong Kong, 1935. The hard-working Kin Lung knows how to keep a secret. Quietly moored at its home port, the vessel awaits its latest cargo. On the quayside, scurrying travellers dodge baskets balanced on porters’ shoulders, stepping over caged pigs as they weave their way through the hustle and bustle of sedan chairs and rickshaws. You need your sea legs for the film’s opening 15 minutes as we bob up and down before even getting onboard. Afterwards, prepare yourself for seasickness during the 1,000 or so nautical miles that lie ahead across choppy seas, visited by a typhoon, a pirate attack – and tempestuous love affairs!

Welcome to Macao, the fascinating “Monte Carlo of the East”, whose infernal gambling dens are a perfect playground for bad boys. Crooks, fugitives and smugglers hit the jackpot or are left high and dry depending on a throw of the dice. Still waters run deep and you have to be careful: this “calm and open” haven with its gently bobbing sampans has another, hidden side, “secret and veiled”, tucked away inside the casinos, as the opening credits warn us. Macao, in red letters with yellow shadowing on the poster, is all decked out in its finery, every bit as glamorous and elegant as the music-hall vamp who has emerged from its choppy waters.