The Brunch Club is one of those places where the out-of-work can procrastinate forever. Customers are as much fixtures here as the food-stained sofas. Indeed, there are few places in Hong Kong where one can hang out all day and not get mean stares for lingering over a beverage for hours on end. Plus, they’ve got free Wi-fi, which makes it a natural draw for all the Mac-toting freelancers, drawn in like moths to the flame. Personally, I like it for its free international magazines (that’s browsing only, before you steamroll in and take them all home) and their greasy croquet-madames.

But spending all day in one spot – alone – tends to draw you into other peoples’ business. Like it or not, we are listening.

One day, when I wasn’t minding my own business, I was interrupted by a couple who had no problem with gratuitous PDAs (public displays of affection). In fact, we were sitting so close, I was afraid my foot would get entangled with their game of footsy being played out under the table.

“Baby, I love you so much I want to move here to be with you,” he says, with a thick Canadian accent.

The Chinese girl squeals in delight. They kiss some more. Long, wet, sloppy kisses. Think dogs lapping up water from a puddle, then times that by thirteen .

“Yeah, I’m thinking of setting up an offshore office here so we can spend all our time together. I’m going to give up my Canadian citizenship so I can live here fulltime,” he says, in a line written for straight to DVD romantic comedies. There’s now dead silence from the table next to me, and by now I can’t help myself but look over. Her face is frozen in a half-smile, her eyes outraged. She looks dizzy. The girl picks up her phone and calls a friend.

“I’ve been with this guy six months, I can’t believe he’s dropping his Canadian citizenship to move here,” she says in Cantonese, all the while maintaining a controlled and friendly tone so as not to alert lover boy as to what she is saying. “How the fuck am I going to get to Vancouver? I’m wasting my time, I’m such an idiot.” Dreamy and lovesick he says, “The more I think about it, the more it makes sense tax-wise to open up shop in Hong Kong.”

At this moment – and I’m not joking – she hangs up the phone and, hand pressed on her heart, dramatically fakes a chest pain. “Baby, I might need an operation in the next few weeks, and I don’t think the hospitals are very good here. I have a wall in front of my heart and it hurts, and the doctors here can’t get through it.”

At this point I start laughing; an uncontrollable, choking laugh that’s utterly, unforgivably inappropriate in serious situations such as attending a funeral or seeing someone naked for the first time. I immediately look down and pretend to be reading something amazingly funny in Grazia magazine.

“Do you think doctors would help me in Canada?” she says, weepy-eyed. This girl is going to cry on cue. Lunch and a performance, I think to myself. Awesome.

“I think I understand what you are saying,” he says slowly, finally catching on to her ruse. “Maybe you should stop smoking so much.”

Brunch Club, 70 Peel St, Soho, 2526 8861.