Sitting on an Air China plane between Beijing and Shanghai. As usual it was delayed by over an hour, and as usual there was no announcement as to why and how long the delay would be. After an hour they suddenly announced a gate change (only in Chinese by the way), but after arriving at the new gate there was indeed a bus waiting to drive us to the aircraft.

Sitting in a coffee shop in the basement of the Kerry Mall in Beijing where I found a free hotspot to check my mail. Nice and warm in here, outside it is freezing cold and it is expected to snow later.

Just now I had a long meeting with a client. I was a bit early, so I walked around a neighbourhood shopping mall before going to the meeting. Just before I planned to walk to the meeting I passed by a perfume store. One of the shop attendants was standing in front of me and wanted to give the air a nice fragrance by spraying some perfume in the air. Nice idea of course, but not if she puts her hand high above her head and sprays the fragrance behind her – right into my face and eyes! She apologized a thousand times, but that did not help me. My eyes were hurting and I smelled like a cheap ladies perfume. And that 5 minutes before the meeting started. I went to the washroom to try to wash off the smell with soap, but that did not really help. Nobody said anything about it during the meeting, but you can imagine that I felt quite awkward!

Off to Beijing today, for a meeting with a China Bay client there about Chinese taxation issues. That’s what I like most about what I am doing: every day is different. And another great thing is that I always tend to meet interesting people with interesting stories: be it clients, friends or reporters. The biggest problem is that there is just not enough time in a day to everything I want to do.

It is always nice to go back to Beijing. Tonight I plan to have a couple of beers with old friends. Flying back to Shanghai on Saturday, where I plan to have Belgian mussels for dinner at the Hilton Hotel (I was informed they flew them in from Europe). In Beijing I used to go to Morel’s quite often, enjoying a Belgian beer with mussels and french fries, but I have not found a place like that in Shanghai.

I spent a couple of hours reading the latest internet report by Guo Liang. The main difference between his report and the half-yearly report from CNNIC, is that Mr. Guo only looks at 5 major cities in China. This gives in my opinion a much better view of relevant internet behaviour than by looking at the nation as a whole. Most internet users are city dwellers, and have the largest incomes. The report was especially interesting for me, as I am currently writing an article for a magazine related to online behaviour in China.

On Tuesday afternoon a representative of a big US website came to talk with us at Toodou about potential cooperation. At 6 PM we were informed that the electricity would be turned off in the office (due to maintenance), so we decided to go for a drink at Bar Rouge instead. Getting there was not that difficult, but getting in turned out to be impossible. The reason: we arrived at 6:15 PM and they did not officially open until 6:30 PM. Our offer to just sit inside without ordering or stand on the terrace was not accepted, even though lights and music were on already. Bar Rouge is getting more and more arrogant, they seem to be having a too easy business. It seems they don’t realize that customers like to be treated nice. This is my second bad experience there, and I won’t be going there anymore soon.

So on we went to Three on the Bund for a drink at New Heights. We sat outside on the terrace overlooking the river (there was outside heating). Next to us the terrace was cordoned off, and I did not pay too much attention to the people there. It seemed like a movie crew having fun after a day of shooting. After a couple of drinks our potential cooperation partner left, and I went on to have dinnerat the same place with Gary, Ninie Wang (see yesterday), and some other INSEAD alumni who turned entrepreneur. Ninie had just moderated a forum in the Grand Hyatt about entrepreneurship in China and had taken these people along.

Charles (one of the INSEAD guys) then told us that he just went to the toilet when a short guy came in. He looked at him and got a shock: it was Tom Cruise! It turns out that the people who were having drinks outside earlier were Tom’s film crew (they are shooting the latest Mission Impossible outside Shanghai). Tom Cruise had dinner in the private room at the corner of the building, which was guarded by two gorilla type guys. Interestingly, the food did not come from New Heights but from another restaurant in the building (likely Jean Georges).

The dinner was fun, it’s always nice to talk with fellow entrepreneurs and hear their stories. After dinner the BusinessWeek correspondent from Hong Kong came over to have a drink with us, and Gary and I told him our Toodou story. Gary also mentioned an interview he had with CCTVon Monday night and that was done by webcam (they are also innovative). Because the interview was delayed until 00:30 AM he decided to do the interview from his bed, and just to wear a shirt, so nobody would notice that he would be in bed. But what he did not realize until after the interview, was that his bed has an iron frame at the end that was clearly visible for the audience. So everybody knew he was doing the interview while sittng in bed!

Update: I am not the only one who does not like Bar Rouge anymore. Shanghaiist had a post about it today. Check out the comments!

Last night we had a small dinner party at the latest South Beauty restaurant in Shanghai: South Beauty 881. The place is located on Yan’an Xi Lu, between Tongren Lu and Shanxi Lu, on number 881 (hence the name) – right opposite the old exhibition center.

We had dinner with Arnoud Groot, a Dutch journalist for among others Nieuwe Revu, Jetsetters and de Financiele Telegraaf, who will also write about this restaurant. With Marcel Ekkel, a Dutch entrepreneur from Hong Kong who is speaking at a congress in Shanghai tomorrow, and who is also a fan of endurance sports. With Marcus Koppen, a German photographer who accompanied Arnoud during his interviews in Shanghai. With Ninie Wang, a Chinese entrepreneur in Beijing, who runs Pine Tree Life Institute (the first company in China focusing on senior citizens, or as she calls it “people in the happy age”). And of course with Qi (who managed to get off work on time!) and myself. Some great conversations about China, entrepreneurs and long-distance running, accompanied by excellent Chinese food, a couple of beers and Australian Chardonnay.

The complex consists of an old villa that is transformed into a trendy but cosy bar and a newly built restaurant. It has the potential to become a big hit in Shanghai, it is different from other places and prices are reasonable. The place has a beautiful roof terrace where you can relax and overlook the garden and part of Shanghai.

The restaurant itself is very bright, with mainly glass walls looking out over the garden and the old villa. It is quite spacious, but does not feel like a huge restaurant. Interestingly, the building was built around an existing tree! The tree is covered by glass walls and comes out of the roof (I only noticed it while on the roof terrace later on).

The food is excellent, like at all South Beauty restaurants. We had among others the spicy fish (Qi’s favourite), beef cooked at the table in 200 degree oil (by putting hot stones in them), fresh seafood, crispy rice with mushrooms and seafood (I always forget the name), and several vegetables. Everybody loved it! The service was also excellent. Waiters came immediately if there was somehing and they were very friendly.

I think this place has the potential to become one of our favourite restaurants in Shanghai. It is nice to find a place that does everything right: great food, great ambience, great menu, great location and great service (plus reasonably priced: 5 people eating (Ninie came later) including wine for about RMB 1400). Good luck to Steven Gebhardt, the GM, with making it a success! In case he reads this: I noticed that the restaurant is not (yet?) included in South Beauty’s website – that’s a shame of course for such a great place.

The marathon is 3 days ago already and I finally can walk around without too much pain. My muscles are still quite sore, but each day it’s improving. I hope to be able to start doing some sports again by the end of the week. Some pictures of the Shanghai Marathon 2005 (the others can be viewed at my Flickr account):

Before the start at Nanjing Road (in front of the Peace Hotel)

The CCTV camera crew in front of the top runners

Running at about the 8K point (Corner of Zhongshan Lu & Hongqiao Lu)

The most difficult part of the marathon , around 33-34 km. Every muscle is hurting and your body tells you to stop, but you still have another 8-9 km to run.

And the best moment: after the finish!

I did not know it existed, but today for the first time I saw ‘taxi money’. What happened is that the taxi driver from the Dazhong taxi company did not have change for a 100 RMB note. Therefore he handed out taxi vouchers that looked remarkably like real money. They have a value of RMB 10 each, and can be used for Dazhong’s buses, taxi’s and transportion vans. They even have a bar code on there to make sure they are real. Not that this helps much, because the taxi driver did not have a bar code reader in his car. The owners of Dazhong are quite smart: they not only print their own money but earn additionally by putting ads on it (the back is an ad for gas stoves and heaters).