Standing in front of Vincent van Gogh's 'Chambre à Arles'

Arrived Amsterdam, not on a business trip. The first impression of the city is, that it is a mix of all the nice sides of Berlin, and Hamburg. By this, I for sure do not mean that is like a German town, but these are the reference points which first came into my mind, arriving from Germany. Amsterdam is nice, lively, people are friendly, and I love the canals, which are here called 'gracht'. Our accommodation is just in a half basement room along Achtergracht, furnished very functional, but nice.

Visited the Rijksmuseum in the morning, and enjoyed the Rembrand and Vermeer paintings, among many other objects. My favorite Vermeer, The Geographer, is not exhibited here, but ironically in the Staedelisches Kunstinstitut in Frankfurt. 

A few weeks ago, I posted some lines on the Chambre a Arles, by Vincent van Gogh, which I like a lot. I look the chance to walk over to the Vincent van Gogh Museum to see the painting. It is very nice. Much brighter than the reproductions I have seen before. The museum rules do not allow to take a photo, but I bought myself a postcard. I like the atmosphere of the room and I will explore this picture a bit more, to understand why I like it so much. This should actually include a trip to Arles in Southern France to see the Yellow House. Elizabeth Briel pointed me at an interesting article on van Gogh's bedroom series: A comparative study of Vincent van Gogh’s Bedroom series by Ella Hendriks, Leo Jansen, Johanna Salvant, Élisabeth Ravaud, Myriam Eveno, Michel Menu, Inge Fiedler, Muriel Geldof, Luc Megens, Maarten van Bommel, C. Richard Johnson Jr and Don. H. Johnson. 

It was quite a museum day, and in the late afternoon we went to Body Worlds. This is really a fascinating exhibition plasticized humans and body parts. I felt the overlaying topic "Happiness" a bit artificial, but the exhibits and the related information was very interesting. I have done a preparation course in the medical school at Cologne University many years ago (back when Universities were still  Universities, allowing all qualified students to study anything). But back then, I was so involved to make good academic use of the allocated body, that a lot of details slipped my attention. Very interesting to visit, in deed.

Visit to Mannheim University

Evening view on the Main Building of Mannheim University in the Palace.

After spending the week in Bonn, I gave a talk on the current reforms of Chinese State Owned Enterprises (SOEs) at Mannheim University Business School on Friday, and taught an introductory lecture on “Doing Business in China” for the Mannheim-ESSEC EMBA students over the weekend. The latter brought me to a small place in the beautiful Pfalz region, called Asselheim. There were nice and interesting classroom discussions, as the students were experienced and many of them well-travelled. Some though were slightly stunned by how different a realistic view on China is from a romantic one. I tried not to touch on the pseudo-cultural propaganda which they might have heard in a Confucius Institute, or the burp on “Guanxi” propagated in second grade management literature. Instead I told them, what my insights are and how things work (or don’t). Hope this provided them a short cut and helps practically.

Now is the Sunday of the Second Advent, and Christmas is approaching together with North-Eastern winds. So, the chances of getting a white Christmas are getting higher.

Week one starts in Bonn (Germany)

The first week of my retirement from big corporate started in Bonn, the former capital city of West Germany, working on a small forecasting project for B+L Marktdaten GmbH. It is nice to have an interesting topic to think about, a quiet and undisturbed place to do so, and smart people to bounce ideas with. I like it much more than paying supplier to do work for me, which I actually would enjoy doing myself. We stayed in the Bonn University Guesthouse which is a quiet and convenient place to be. They also hosted a conference on core technology for electric mobility, and people were happily discussing their inventions for batteries, battery management systems, and also mechatronic solutions which could make electric cars much more easy to maintain than conventional ones. First snowflakes yesterday, were increasing expectations to probably have a white Christmas. Let’s see. The Christmas Market is already up and running here.

Got your papers?

We made a surprise visit to my aunt Ruth Siegmund, who was exhibiting and selling her paper jewelry today in Sayn Palace just below Sayn Castle, which is the residence of the Princes of Sayn-Wittgenstein. Feibai wore the paper earring Ruth gave her before as a present. They are made of a paper covered trunk of a grape. Painted red, looks like coral, but is much lighter. It is cooling down in Germany, after a really warm November. But whether we get a white Christmas, is still in the stars.

Paper Jewelry by Ruth Siegmund.

Richard

I am very sad that Richard (Dick) Jones left us on the night before, peacefully at home, far too early. We shared house and garden and the view on the South China Sea for three years on Lamma Island. Richard, a professional camera man, showed me how to use my video camera. Could not have learned it from anybody better. I really liked him with all his crazy, but at times also very normal sides. Now the island will be more quiet, but far less brilliant. The photo below, taken by Andy Maluche, one of his best friends, ... Richard's sleeping bag thrown from his home's rooftop into the jungle. Once again, Richard is gone with the wind. Take care. We miss you.

Vis Naturae

The forest was filled with fog this morning and the dew was dripping from the trees. No wind. No sun to be seen for orientation. If you take two times the wrong turn, you might get seriously lost. But we made it fine, up the mountain to a small hut running a simple restaurant. It is called "Koeppelhuette". Just before arriving there for lunch, we actually came out of the fog into the sunshine with a clear blue sky. It is a nice moment when the sun breaks through the haze and trees. This is Westerwald. It is a region, East of the Rhine and North of the Lahn rivers, with quite some reputation to be rough and cold, and where the smallest sunshine is touching. As I grew up here, it brings of course up all kinds of memories, and a feeling of home. I enjoy very much being back in nature. It has not to be a forest, but when thinking about criteria to judge which place might be nice to live in the future, pollution is a no go.

Picking up Knife throwing

Since this weekend I am back in Germany, I spent my time going for long forest walks and picking up knife throwing again. It is a bit like golf, in terms of it needs a lot of practice and is mainly a thing you do in your mind and not only with your body. I can't say much about golf when it comes to technical terms though, as I only twice tried it at company outings. I was very good at knife throwing some years back. But now I have some handicap, in the sense of my coordination needs recovery. Also comparing knife throwing with golf, people doing knife throwing are much more interesting. Nobody does, knife throwing you might think. Well, "nobody" is more interesting than business people playing golf, believe me. 

Average 78

In the last weeks, during the APEC conference, we were spoiled with blue skies. But today Beijing put on its grey face again, as if it wanted to remind me, that it is really time to go. Something changed though, since APEC is over. The website of the American Embassy air quality monitor is censored now by Government Order. And the published reading for the city average shows AQI 78, which is now called “good”. Somehow I can’t match the view out of the window with the data. I must be just in an exceptionally bad area, if the city average is still 78. Happy for you guys out there in the rest of Beijing. And sorry for dragging down the city average.

Future Antiques

My wardrobe and bed made a long way. Custom made in Hong Kong in Chinese Style, then shipped to Lamma Island, dragged by hand on a cart over the car-free tropical island. Later let down from the balcony on a rope to the garden, shipped first to Hong Kong Island and then trucked up to Beijing over about 2500 kilometers. And even more than that they have been part of my home, where ever they were. It is time to leave them behind in China, as that’s where they belong. I am very happy that they will go to a 200 year old Courtyard Hutong, which is owned and renovated by the grandson of a teacher of Deng Xiaoping, who went to France in the 1920s. As they always had contacts to foreigners, in the Cultural Revolution, they were accused of being spies and him and five other colleagues were murdered by his students. Now, Mr. Zhang, who is the grandson, is bringing the courtyard back to the spirit of his grandfather and host international travelers, who do not travel as “tourists”, but as guests. Once I was asked, why I don’t buy antiques. And my answer was, that I prefer to make things which are so good that they will become antiques. Perhaps, that’s what happened.

"The World's Worst Paradise"

I wanted to post a small photo gallery of some of our Saturday walks in Beijing. But since APEC is over, not just the smog came back, but also the Internet is more crippled than before. There has been a lot of cynical talk about Beijing being able to clean up its mess for the international conference, but not for its own people. But I think this was a very interesting experiment, determining how much industrial production, traffic reduction and economic activity actually has to be shut down or switched to something else to make Beijing healthy again. At least we have a data point now. Getting 50 % of cars of the road, is one of them. Closing more than 2000 factories is another one. Good to get a feeling for the magnitude. This needs more than just a few filters in chimneys and another subway line. It means a whole structural change, not just of Beijing, but also in the wider surroundings. And another datapoint we have, is to see how nice Beijing could be. When I had lunch with a friend last week, he named Beijing “The World’s Worst Paradise”. Compared with other cities, I agree.

As of Internet, a few days ago my VPN account expired and won’t expand its service only for a few days more until I leave. The the upgrade of my MacBook’s operating system seems not to be very helpful either. So, I don’t exactly know what cases the problem. Luckily, my website can receive mailed in posts, which do not require me to log on the system itself. That makes it easy to publish, as long as I can send e-mail. But the features are a bit limited. So, I don’t know what you see, until I have a chance to open my website myself again.

All I attach for now, is a photo of the small bridge in my favorite Beijing Park, The Temple of The Earth. More will follow, after we crossed the Great Chinese Internet Wall. I have seen this bridge many times and in different seasons, also with lush grass and bright flowers around. This time it is having the atmosphere of cut flowers after you had them for a week. Don’t want to let them go, but happily looking forward to go to the flower market again and get some new ones. That’s the mood I am in looking at the whole city these days. Time to leave in a few days from now.

Ente gut, alles gut

Beijing made us really a wonderful farewell gift, as we are strolling through it this weekend under APEC conditions. As the impression often is shaped by how the whole experience ends, this looks like a perfect epilogue to our time in Beijing. Today we drove along the Changan Avenue, passing by Tiananmen Square to visit friends on the other side of the city. The sky was blue and the traffic in flow. The traffic management simply took half the cars off the road and put at least one traffic police every few hundred meters. The Tiananmen Square itself is heavily guarded by military and armed police. While we were driving along the landmarks of our memories of Beijing, we nearly felt like a "state guest" ourselves, even we were not in one of the black limousines, but just on the back seat of a shabby Hyundai taxi. Even the air is really clean in some areas you are advised not to open the window, as there are snipers on the roofs, which might misinterpret that move. Well, there is nothing I want less on my last days here than a nervous sniper. You can't have it all. But that's fine for me. As we say here: Ente gut, alles gut.

La chambre à ... ?

Interior design has been always a funny discipline for me. I have stayed in many business hotels and they must have been the result of such craft. But I mostly did not like it there. Well, the Shanghai Peninsula is okay, measured by facts. Everything perfect. At least I have a memory of it at all. But still does not feel like home. In the year to come, I will take a closer look at the accommodations we stay, and keep a photographic and written record on what makes them likable (or not). Benchmark for now, is still Vincent van Gogh's Chambre à Arles. Let's see what else I will find.

Vincent van Gogh, Chambre à Arles

The Hutongs

When you are in the Hutongs, you know you are in Beijing. Generally outside the 2nd Ring Road, I would not even call it Beijing any more. It is something else. The haze in Beijing these days, which is a mix of smoke and fog, makes the small alleys even look more anachronistic, sometimes even spooky. My photo exhibition is still on until October 26th and this is my farewell to this place. Beside some business travel to Shanghai, I will be in Beijing handing over my duties to my successor. In the future, should I come to China, it will be unlikely Beijing. So I will use the last few weeks to manifest a lasting nice impression of this city, which has been my home for the last three years.

First Autumn Leaves in Beijing

It have always been the first autumn colors I recognized: the trees between the canal and the Diplomatic Compound on my way to office. This fall is the last time I will witness this change. The temperatures are dropping sharply and very soon there will be the first freezing nights, followed by a deep winter. The spitting patches on the streets will freeze first, which makes it easier to set the foot in public space. Then the canal will turn into ice and the skaters will make their rounds. The fishermen will make holes into the ice and sit on camping chairs waiting for their catch. This year I will not stay long enough to commute to work by ice skates. A few more weeks and I am gone for good. It has been a long time.

Concrete things

We have been out and about to visit the limestone quarry and cement factory of the Leida Group in Anhui Province. Leida is based in Dongtai (Jiangsu) and integrated vertically by adding mining operations. The high grade limestone goes into PVC manufacturing which is invested by Anhui SASAC and is trucked out from the site. Lower grades go via a 2 km covered conveyer into cement manufacturing. Rest heat is used in two turbines and fed into the grid. From there the cement which is not used locally, is shipped to Jiangsu. The pier is still under construction, but it will be the largest pier of Anhui Province. Also the mining, is the largest quarry in Anhui. 

As I have worked in the mining industry before, I felt quite at home on site. Very nice to see how well managed it is. It has been a long time for me, since I was the little man with the Land Rover Defender, installing and operating monitoring equipment in UK coal quarries. Even my client, British Coal, does not exist any more. 25 years passed. But I always enjoyed doing real things, like moving mountains.

Yellow Sea Views

It is amazing that the long coast line of China does not have much to offer when it comes to natural beauty. There is a bit around Hainan, and a few small corners on the way. The rest is pretty unattractive, man-made and mostly covered with trash. I am currently close the Yellow Sea, and as the name already indicates, it is not a blue ocean. The color comes from the load of silt coming from the rivers. But that is not what is disturbing. The coast line is a completely artificial one, with fish farming behind the land reclamation areas - biologically degraded, polluted and overused. China has the policy, to develop first and clean up later. But what has been done here to the coastal ecology is irreversible. I am sure, you don't want to go there without professional purpose, but still you can download the route I took by clicking here (GPX-format).

Beach with Chinese characteristics.

Dongtai (Jiangsu Province) to the Yellow Sea and back.

Fish farming, inland the Yellow Sea (Jiangsu Province, P.R. China)

Opening

Yesterday was the opening of my solo photo exhibition “China’s Empty Quarters” in the Shuangcheng Cafe (46 Fangjia Hutong, Beijing). The photos will be hanging until October 26th. It was a very nice event and I enjoyed the discussions which went far beyond the pictures themselves. Those of you who are in Beijing and interested: the Shuangchen Cafe is a very nice and quiet cultural hub in the Hutongs close to the Lama Temple. It has the mission to build a cultural bridge between Beijing (People’s Republic of China) and Taipei (Republic of China). They have the world’s best Taiwanese pineapple cake, Erdinger Weissbier, and this is not enough there is free Wifi. And yes, my photos, of course.

One Touch Dutch-Chinese Online Movie Festival

Yesterday Feibai was busy in the opening ceremony of the second One Touch Dutch-Chinese Online Movie Festival. It was hosted by the Ambassador of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, His Excellency Mr. Aart Jacobi, at the Beijing Film Academy. Many were involved in preparation and it was a very nice start with the children movie Fidgety Bram in the afternoon, having fun over Dutch cookies and soft drinks, and the documentary Raw Herring by Leonard Retel Helmrich. I really liked Leonard's movie and found it funny that in in the later discussion with him, and among each other, Chinese students found it puzzling not find the opinion the film maker expressed clear enough. I guess the Chinese audience is more used to a stricter guidance what to think. There are not many documentary movies, in the true sense of the meaning, produced in China. And they have to pass strict censorship rules, which request a clear, compliant opinion, and not leave much room for interpretation.

My view on cities

In preparation of the opening talk of my photo exhibition, titled Cities, countrysides and why all heavens are gardens, I have been reviewing my own perspective on cities. It is pretty much like the photo I took of E'erguna (Inner Mongolia) a few days ago: interested to go there, endless grasslands in my back, and flowers brightening the view to town - and happy to get out again. Paul Theroux expressed it nicely like this: "My ideal of travel is just to show up and head for the bush, because most big cities are snake pits" (Theroux, Paul (2011-05-19). The Tao of Travel: Enlightenments from Lives on the Road (p. 8). Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. Kindle Edition). 

E'ergunga (Inner Mongolia), as seen from the hill leading to the wetlands in the plains

Tamagotchi grew into something useful

The original Tamagotchi was an egg shaped digital "pet" which has been first sold in 1996 in Japan. I was taking care of a Tamagotchi for a colleague for a few days back then and obviously, this was rather silly. Since then, all these smartphones and most other gadgets were for me just improved Tamagotchis, and the whole development did not really enter my life, as I don't have the time and patience to take care of them. But I have to say that one machine surprised me recently, which is my iPad mini (the model of 2013 - I guess they change all the time). I have been using it to read my Kindle books and watch the news, but I would have never thought that you can use it also for navigation when you are off the grid. The GPS receiver is fast and sensitive and came nearly close to my good old Garmin GPSMap 62S. I used it with the Maps with Me China offline map. I saw the reviews by some people, that their favorite bakery and the way they walk their dog in the morning is not on there. But hey, you won't care about your bakery, when you travel along the Chinese-Russian Border of Inner Mongolia and find every (every) little trail. I was very impressed. Excellent.

Track North of Shiwei along the Chinese-Russian border as downloaded in 2014 from Maps with Me (www.maps.me).