Ingrid and The Human Spider

Ingrid had a brush with fame today as she came nose to nose with Alain Robert, the very flamboyant French daredevil who has been dubbed by many as the 'real-life Spiderman.' Over the past 15 years Robert has scaled over 80 of the globe's tallest skyscrapers using nothing more than climbing shoes and chalk for his hands. No harnesses, no carabiners, no ropes, nothing. Though occasionally he does climb in a full spandex Spiderman costume. His conquests include the Sears Tower in Chicago, the Golden Gate Bridge, Kuala Lumpur's Petronas Towers, Taipei 101, Shanghai's Jin Mao Tower and the Cheung Kong Center here in Hong Kong. His climbs are typically following by a hasty arrest by local authorities and often result in jail time. After a recent climb of a London building he was arrested and slapped with the official sounding crime of 'Wasting Police Time."

We happened randomly upon his book signing in a nearby mall and after hearing him speak briefly about his climbing exploits to a small but inspired crowd, I had a to buy his book and get in line for an autograph. Have I mentioned yet how flamboyant this guy was? He wore a brown leather jacket, Ostrich skin cowboy boots, a rocker mullet and a pair of leather pants so tight the guys from Spinal Tap would have been jealous. He's only about 5'4" tall and might weigh over 120 pounds after a big meal. I asked him whether he had any climbing plans on this trip to HK and he answered with a very cryptic 'maybe'....so I'll be sure to update the blog if he's spotted on any of the city's new skyscrapers.



....thought this last picture was funny because of the look of sheer terror on this person's face....
http://www.alainrobert.com/