Pretentious? Moi?

Hong Kong property developers love to give their properties pretentious and silly names. Take Grand Central Plaza in Shatin, for instance - it's not Grand (unless Ikea has moved considerably upmarket in the few weeks since my last visit), and not Central. As for the Plaza part, the original Spanish word denotes a public open space like a town square, but in American (ab)usage, adopted in Hong Kong, has come to indicate a shopping mall. Oh well, a half out of three ain't bad.

Then there's Luard on the Park, a serviced apartment block in Wanchai. The "park" referred to is Southorn Playground, but I suppose Luard on the Patch of Scruffy Tarmac Surrounded by a Few Tatty Trees doesn't have quite the same ring to it.

However, for real pretentiousness, you only have to look to the world of showbiz - a headline on the BBC news website a couple of days ago reported Jude Law calls for world ceasefire. I don't want to disparage any attempts to advance the cause of world peace, but would that be Jude Law the respected international statesman? or Jude Law the Hollywood actor who hit the scandal pages for his affair with his children's nanny?