Latest from Beijing

After my long weekend in Thailand, the days have been busy with work. Coming home around 7 o'clock in the evening leaves little room for playing tourist except in the weekends and by going out to nearby restaurants in the workday evenings (after working plus transfer for 11 hours, you are too tired to go further away in Beijing, not least because the traffic situation may be terrible and the same with the taxi situation). So staying in the right place, close to restaurants and shopping that you like is essential in Beijing. Going to the other side of town may be a half day exercise ;o)
But in the weekends you can do more exploratory things, e.g. going to Lake Hu Hai, picking fresh tomatoes etc.
Today's photos are from these activities plus other small incidents during the normal work days.
I am truly enjoying the work, but the working hours including transfer is a big change from my previous 2 years of diving holiday ;o)

Mini-holiday Bangkok...

This weekend I go to Thailand again. No diving, but visiting this great city again, Bangkok, and seeing the family of Thanya - my girlfriend through the last two years. And doing quite some shopping. Yes, Bangkok is generally cheaper than Beijing...
Attached some photos and one video...
The boy is the nephew of Thanya.

Our new apartment etc

Yesterday, Sunday 13-May, I finally moved into my new apartment. In the same building, a lower floor (8th floor instead of 30th floor), but much bigger - and even more quiet. Now I have a larger living room, 2 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, a walk-in closet and a larger kitchen. Almost for the same price. And still serviced (=cleaning 3 times a week, with a reception, security guards etc).
Now I think I have found the right apartment for the rest of my stay in Beijing. Great. The moving had to be done with plastic bags - almost one hundred plastic bags I think, since I did not have any moving boxes (and plastic bags in China are often quite small). Yes, I already managed in the last two months to buy quite a lot of extra and nicer looking clothes (instead of the T-shirts and short pants I used all the time in Thailand), I bought some plants, some basic tools,  a scanner/printer etc. My conclusion is that it does not take long time to purchase quite a lot of things so that moving becomes problematic (keep in mind that I moved here with around 30 kilos only - incl quite some part of my dive equipment - which I not really need so much now ;o). Now I probably already have 120 kilo, I guess.
Well, the wardrobe needed some serious change, and so I did. I guess this was the main part ;o).
I would love to attach some photos, but my VPN (that should allow me to escape the great Chinese (fire)wall is giving me trouble (it stopped working some days ago, so I am on a web based VPN). I will do later ;o) (for some weird reason China does not accept blogspot).

Status of my book...

The status of my book is that it has been selling around number 100.000-300.000 best selling electronic book from Amazon over the last 8 weeks (out of 1+ millions of books). A best seller? Hardly ;o)
Yes, these data are from US only, but I assume that sales through Amazon which is one of the few places to buy it counts also as US data ;o)
It is selling as around number 200.000 to 800.000 out of 8+ million of books as paperback
Anyway, I am happy. But of course it is not perfect.
I guess we are talking hundreds or maximum a bit over thousand sold totally, but it is still a new book ;o). I do not have any figures from the publisher (which are accurate), since those data are delayed 3-4 months, but Amazon provides some data for authors also, see attached

A tribute to my brother...

The last two weeks have been very sad. My oldest of two brothers died almost exactly two weeks ago. Yes, I know that this blog is normally very positive and it is about my many great adventures in the world. But life is not always that easy. Death is certainly not easy. I have had two very sad weeks. I went to Denmark last weekend for my brothers funeral, but sitting in China before going was almost worse than being with my family and going to the funeral. Now I am back in China, I have started working but it is still very hard. My brother became only 49 years old. He did not live the most perfect life, but he was a very good brother for me, who always cared about me. So this blog entry is a tribute to Michael. I wish you all the best wherever you are, Michael... I will never forget you.....