AUDIO STORY MP3

The pet emporium owner grinned as the chinchilla ran down my arm to his cage, spun around, lifted one paw, then the other, stroked its long whiskers and posed on his haunches like some cuddly Pokemon toy. My mind filled with Pied Piper thoughts, my husband, Russ, gently pried me away from the little critters and we wandered down the street to the electronics district where excruciatingly cute girls dressed in tiny colorful outfits hawked the very latest in smart mobile phones to testosterone charged guys, eager to out-geek each other with ring tones, displays and design.

This is Mongkok, literally "bustling corner." Mongkok is the gritty, commercial district of Kowloon across from the sophisticated skyscrapers of Hong Kong. Once one of the most densely populated areas on earth with evidence of villages 1000 years ago, Mongkok is a domino assembly of traditional family-run businesses in run-down buildings. Street after street of flower, bird and ladies garments markets, and wall to wall people blend into a screechng Chinese opera of sounds, fragrances, color and commerce.

But what is this? In the midst of the mayhem, looming before us, as if it had just landed from space, rises an aerodynamic, glass and steel complex glinting in the South China sky.

We ascended, opened the front door and walked into our living room where our favorite online jazz station was playing on JBL speakers. On the display of my desk phone was a picture of our cats. I turned on the 42" plasma TV and poured myself a cold beer from the fridge. Ah, home. Except it's not home, it's 6,900 miles away from our California digs smack dab in the middle of the grit of Mongkok. It is a stunning, state-of-the-art hotel, business and shopping facility that combines high tech, comfort and ancient Chinese tradition. The Langham Place Hotel is a harbinger of the high-tech hospitality to come not only to this gnarly Hong Kong burb, but to hotels in general.

The Langham has melded tech with new age, Chinese traditional ambiance, easing the challenge of maintaining connectivity for business travelers. Concealed behind the walls of the hotel are miles of CAT-6 cable, enabling the Cisco IP phone system, ubiquitous wireless everywhere, in the rooms, lobbies and in the business center, even in the elevators. The wireless phone from your hotel room will ring anywhere in and just around the hotel, so you never need to miss a call, even if you don't (quelle horreur!) own a mobile phone. Visitors who want their stay to feel more like home can send their favorite digital photo to the hotel for display on the LCD screen of the room's IP phone, and indicate their taste for online radio stations, and the hotel will make sure their favorite tunes are activated for their arrival.

The residential suite where Russ and I stayed was large enough for us two six foot-plus tall travelers--an elegant, sleek environment where everything is within reach, including handy Ethernet connectors and plugs at desk level (hello… how long did it take for someone to get this one right? no crawling under the table to find a plug). The plasma screens in both living room and bedroom easily enable travelers to view digital photos off their laptop or video right off their cameras. These plasma displays banished bulky tube TVs from the landscape replacing clunky dressers that inevitably supported them with elegant built-ins. And like a yacht, there's surprisingly ample closet space and storage.

A flip of a switch controls a screen to either see or be seen in the tub from the bedroom. A glass wall reveals the sleek bathroom amenities and activities to be seen from the bedroom…or not.

This 665-room 5-star hotel and adjacent 15-story, 300-store glass shopping and 69-story office tower are owned by Langham Hotels, formerly Great Eagle, one of Hong Kong's leading hotel and property companies with holdings worldwide. It took 15 years to build with years of delay as the developers located and paid the owners of long-abandoned, rundown buildings and halted digs to rescue and preserve archaeological finds in the excavation. Today Langham Place is still surrounded by plenty of character with more than enough restaurants within the hotel itself spanning from traditional to cosmopolitan cuisine. Mongkok has never been known as an upmarket area but that is changing.

Next door, the shopping mall beckoned. It was a bit, no, not a bit, it was very over the top with dizzying steep escalators, six-screen cinema and a huge nighttime Digital Sky projection that blanketed the atrium with a music and light show. A bit like cable TV: 300 stores and nothing to buy. We found more interesting items in the street markets.

Even when we relinquished our room on checkout, many of the business facilities were still available to us in the Langham Hotel Club.

  An entirely different technology welcomed us along with at the Chuan Spa. We filled out a substantial questionnaire that helped determine whether we were in need of the powers of the five elements, wood, earth, metal, fire, or water. The subdued, rich wood-paneled hallways lined with tiny votive candles funnelled us to the rooms where traditional Chinese Medicine treatments leveraging the powers of these elements would be applied. Now I 'm not sure if manicures and pedicures qualify as Chinese Medicine, but foot massage, reflexology and getting your nails painted while gazing out onto the concrete honeycomb of Kowloon and water beyond from the 41st floor are good medicine in anyone's book. We passed on the egg-shaped, glossy white hydromassage cocoons with more buttons and setting than a VCR. They say they are guaranteed to banish jet lag. Somehow the Japanese hot tub, sauna and steam baths felt more in keeping with the ambiance associated with natural elements.

There are times that less tech is more.