My wife and I just got back from an excellent dinner at Venexia, an Italian restaurant on Panyu Lu (at no. 127, close to Yan’an Lu). I thought I knew most Italian restaurants in Shanghai (or at least in Puxi), but for some reason I had not been to, nor heard of, this one. And it’s a pity I did not hear about the place before, because the food and ambiance are excellent!

We talked to the manager during dinner and found out that it has the same owner as La Gondola. That used to be my favorite restaurant for an after-work pizza & wine on a Friday night when I was still a partner at China Bay, but since I moved my office to Xujiahui I hardly ever go there anymore (the 20-30 min. drive is just too much, and there are too many other good restaurants around). But I still have a weak spot for the pizza’s at La Gondola, and I am happy to know that I have a similar option now.

Venexia’s menu is a bit similar to La Gondola (appetizers, pizza, primi & secondi piatti and Chef’s specials), but the restaurant is a bit more up class. The tables and chairs are bigger, and the ambiance is a bit more of an high-end restaurant, with classical paintings on the wall, and a high ceiling with chandeliers. The service is excellent, with staff that speaks good English and knows the menu well. Prices are very reasonable, my wife and I had a 2-course dinner with 2 glasses of prosecco and water for about RMB 600. Parking is available opposite the restaurant at Prince Garden apartments (the parking fee will be paid by the restaurant).

When I came home from my last trip, I noted that a big candle in our living room had melted because of the high temperatures inside our apartment. I am not sure at what temperature this kind of candles melt, but it must have been very hot in the living room while I was away! Outside it was 40 degrees in Shanghai when I was in India, and because our apartment is on the top floor of a skyscraper (right below the flat roof) it was likely a lot warmer inside. Glad I was not home – and I wonder what the effect will be on my wine collection that is also in the living room….

Yesterday I was checking in online for a flight from Amsterdam to Shanghai, when to my big surprise I was able to change my economy class seat to a seat in business class. At first I thought it was a mistake in the website, but I was able to print out my boarding card. When I arrived at the airport I was still a bit suspicious that it would have been a mistake, but while dropping off my luggage nobody said anything.

When I entered the aircraft it turned out I indeed had a business class seat (seat 1K, the front window seat, and one of my favorite seats). However, it also turned out that I would get economy service instead of the better food and drinks that you normally get in the business class. But that is not a big deal for me. Business class service is something I don’t care about much, the flight to China is always an overnight flight, and the main thing for me is to get a good rest so that I am still able to work upon arrival. So I was once again very happy with KLM: something similar happened to me about 2-3 weeks ago when flying from Shanghai to Amsterdam (although then I did get business class service).

Maybe KLM should start offering business class seats with economy service as an option when you book. China Southern used to have this on their flights from China to Europe, but I am not sure if they still do. As an entrepreneur I still find business class unreasonably priced, but I would be willing to pay a price in the middle between economy and business just for the better seats. The main thing for me is that I can rest during the flight and preferably do some work. In cattle class that is often impossible, although KLM’s economy class is still a lot better than for example NWA’s (the airline that I flew to India last week).

This morning I read in the newspaper that Lufthansa is thinking about installing bunk beds in economy class in the new A380 (3 beds above one another, diagonally placed – see the link above for an artist impression). If they would do that I would immediately switch to them for intercontinental flights, and I am sure many business travelers would do the same. I hope a lot of airlines will follow their example!

Last weekend I was in Holland, and the weather was so good that we decided to go sailing on the lakes in Friesland (pictures see here). I love sailing, but did not do much sailing in the Netherlands over the past 10 years. I was surprised to see how things have changed in the mean time. It seems people’s wealth is really increasing, because a lot more people than before now own a boat. Several new harbors had been built to accommodate the new boats, and it was very busy in the canals that connect the lakes. In the past you were able to easily sail there, but it was now so busy that it was almost dangerous to sail against the wind (you have to cross the canal all the time in order to get to your destination). Furthermore I noticed the trend that many people now own a boat type called ‘Sloep’. This is an open motor boat, normally made of wood and with a luxurious-looking design (among others due to a thick rope all around the top part of the boat). 10 years ago you hardly ever saw a boat like this, now you see the boat type everywhere.

The boat owners normally don’t drive their boats very fast, it’s literally cruising down the canals and lakes while enjoying the scenery. It reminds me of people driving a convertible, for whom the trip is also more important than the destination. I guess it’s an easy choice to buy a sloep. You don’t need much knowledge to drive it, and you can pass below every bridge in the country. Would I buy one if I would live in Holland? Not sure, I prefer sailing myself. But if I would live along one of the canals or lakes in the Netherlands it is certainly something I would consider. But only after first owning both a sailing boat and a convertible!

Everybody can freely use my Flickr pictures under the Creative Commons license, and because of that they end up on many websites. Sometimes even on commercial ones, which is actually not allowed according to the Creative Commons license that I use (Attribution, non-commercial, no derivatives). I don’t mind that very much, but people should at least have the decency to check if it’s OK.

Recently for example Nokia used one of my pictures on its website to promote the E65 phone: http://europe.nokia.com/A4368290. They did not check with me if I would agree to this, and except for the credit I did not receive a penny. This is fine with me, I am not blogging nor taking pictures to make a living – that’s also why I do not put ads on this blog for example. But it’s a bit weird that someone else finds out and asks me about it. I did not even get a link (trackback), which is the least they could have done.

And amazingly they even dare to put Copyright Nokia 2007 next to it. So now they suddenly own the copyright to this picture? That’s turning the world upside down Nokia!

I just noted that I have over 50,000 views of my Flickr pictures already. To be exact, 50,503 visitors have looked at my photos at the moment I write this. The count seems to be picking up, even though most people in China cannot look at my pictures anymore (Flickr has been blocked since a few months).

Some more statistics: I started my Flickr photo stream (http://www.flickr.com/photos/chijs) in July 2005, so about two years ago. Since then I posted 4701 pictures, or over 6 pictures per day. According to my blog I hit the 10,000 pictures views milestone early March 2006.

Last night we had once again a very good dinner, this time at the quite famous Khyber restaurant, that serves North Indian food. After dinner we decided to walk back, because the weather was very pleasant (27 degrees and dry). It was an “interesting” walk!

It started with the beggars outside the restaurant that tried to follow us. They did not understand why we did not take a cab, because everybody who dines at Khyber seems to do that. We crossed the road, where lots of people were just making their beds in the open air (making a bed = putting some cartons on the ground to sleep on). We walked around them into a dark street that leads to the Oval Maidan grassland.

I had planned to walk through that park in the direction of our hotel, but the gates were locked. So we continued along the dark road covered by trees that made it even darker. Suddenly four guys crossed the road in our direction. It looked like they were not there to just say hello to us, and we sped up a bit walked on the road itself where there was some light. Then they noticed that Bennie was quite tall (1.96 m) and they decided to leave us alone. A bit scary. This never happened to me in Shanghai, although in Jakarta I had a similar experience once during daytime.

We continued past the university and the High Court, and suddenly noted some well-dressed young women standing in the shade of the trees. At first we were wondering what they were doing, but when we saw some other men walking by very slowing while looking at the women, it became clear to us that we had come across some street prostitutes. Maybe the guys who seemed to try to rob us had assumed that we were heading for these women, so that we must have cash on us. The girls were wearing traditional dresses, and were very different from what you would see in a Dutch red light area. We decided not to linger here, but move away as soon as possible.

Walking on the street at night in Shanghai has never caused me any trouble, but in Mumbai things seem to be a bit more dangerous. Maybe this was just a coincidence, I am not sure, but I will just take a taxi from now on. I like an after dinner walk, the only quiet time in this city, but I don’t want to end up in trouble.

This afternoon I had a few hours left to explore Mumbai a bit on foot. I made a walk from the hotel on the west side of the peninsula through the old English town to the waterfront at Colaba on the east side. It was way too hot to walk, because finally the sun came out, but it was a fantastic walk anyway. This is literally London in the tropics, but a bit greener. Some of the building are absolutely stunning, especially Bombay University and the High Court. I walked for about 2 hours, and only saw European architecture. I probably could have know this, had I prepared a bit for this trip in advance (I did prepare, but only the business part, not the tourist part), but I was very surprised.

Mumbai (or Bombay, the original name that many people still use) is a great city to spend a few days, there is so much to see and do. And a lot looks so familiar if you know England a bit. My impression of India gets better and better. But the CEO of the company that we talked to this morning warned us: Mumbai is not representative of the whole of India, and the part of Mumbai that we are staying in is not representative of the whole of Mumbai. So we start with the best of the best so to speak. No power cuts, good internet, relatively clean and not too poor (relatively speaking to what I was expecting). Wednesday and Thursday we will travel a bit farther out of town, let’s see if we still like it then.

For some of the pictures that I took of the street scenes and the European architecture, see my pictures at http://www.flickr.com/photos/chijs (or if you read this later, click on the photo set Mumbai/Bombay on the right side of the screen).