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I am not a big fan of J-pop artists. In fact I am not a big follower of any particular group from any particular country. But a friend of mine invited me to see Ayumi Hamasaki’s concert in Shanghai tonight. Ayumi Hamasaki is one of the most popular and famous Japanese pop singers of the past 10 years. She didn’t disappoint and put on a really good show to the delight of the mixed crowd. She is apparently quite popular in China and I would say at least 80% of the audience was local and the rest was mostly Japanese. I haven’t been to a live concert in quite a long time and actually quite enjoyed it. It reminded me of a Las Vegas show at times. Unlike a lot of other young popular Japanese artists, Ayumi can actually sing and she belted out quite a few big numbers. The pictures here a not so good as they were taken with the camera on my mobile phone, but you get the idea of what it was like.

I was in Amsterdam last week on business (again) but decided to stay the weekend to see some friends. I lived in Amstelveen (just outside the city) for 4 years. By the end of those 4 years I was really ready to get out of there. But now, going back and in light of the fact that I am moving to Shanghai soon, Amsterdam seemed like a really nice place to live. I even found myself thinking how nice it would be to live there again. English is spoken by nearly everyone; you can get get around most of the city on foot or by tram; there are a lot of interesting places to eat… Funny how you start to miss certain places only once you realize you may never get the chance to see them again. I imagine I will have some business trips in the future to Amsterdam, but who knows if that will be in one year, two years or 20 years.

Here’s a picture of a typical city street.

I stayed at the Hilton Amsterdam. It was the second time I’ve stayed there. It is about a 10 min. walk from Museum Plain so it’s relatively convenient. That staff are all really nice and, if you have a room on the back of the hotel, you get a really good view over the city.

Just got back from a couple of days in Amsterdam. I like travelling even on short business trips like this one because I can meet and work with different people. On the other, being away from home for more than a couple of nights every week can get tiring and boring really quick. Coming home again now to a cold and dark room is also not so enjoyable. Added to that, tonight on the way home by car from the airport in Paris, the highway (A3) was closed. There are these signs above the highway from place to place with traffic information. The one’s just before getting on the A3 said it was clear sailing into Paris, but the minute I got on it there were signs saying the whole highway was closed 6km. ahead. So then I turned around, which took 15 min. because the next exit was about 1.5km away, and came back in on the A1. All in all this detour due to bad information caused my usual 30 min. drive home to be closer to one hour tonight. What is the point of having these big road information signs if they don’t post correct information on them?!