The concerned volunteer handling John Wood’s Hong Kong public relations says that my suggestion of breakfast at the newly refurbished Mandarin Oriental might seem distasteful to the head of a charity.

So on a Saturday morning – at an hour too early to be called brunch – I walk into the cloud of stale beer and cigarette fug that is the main bar of the Foreign Correspondents’ Club in central Hong Kong. A few nights earlier, a proud member described this place as a club for “drunks, cheapskates and losers”. Is this a more appropriate venue to meet a man who likes to think of himself as the Andrew Carnegie of the developing world?