Chris Peterson is managing editor for China Daily Europe. He is a veteran journalist who had served Reuters and Bloomberg News for the past four decades. He had extensive reporting experience in Vietnam, Singapore, Paris, London and Hong Kong.
I don't think I knew what to expect.
This column was intended to be a light-hearted look at the way international travel has evolved, and my experience of it over the years, but then the dark ugliness of the Brussels attacks erupted and I had to rethink my plans.
His life was gentle, and the elements / So mixed in him, that nature might stand up / And say to all the world, this was a man.
Enter "China Five-Year plan" into Google and you get 29.4 million results thrown up in 0.39 seconds.
It's time to confess. In the 55 years since I first set foot on a plane (a propeller-driven Vickers Vanguard operated by British European Airways), I've traveled and worked all over the world. But I've never been to Beijing - until now.
There were several surreal moments in my hunt for a handshake from Wang Jianlin, the multimillionaire behind Dalian Wanda.
It seems Johnson has picked the wrong side. If the vote goes in favor of the UK remaining in the EU, the mayor of London, whose term ends in May, could well find himself back in the political wilderness.
So finally, after weeks of very public will he, won't he, London Mayor Boris Johnson, a former school friend and political ally of Prime Mini
For years, European Union mandarins in Brussels have touted two things as successful achievements for the body - the single currency, called, unsurprisingly, the euro, and the Schengen Agreement on free movement within certain member states.
The early model was a pig to drive, had suspension that would break every bone in your body if you weren't careful, eschewed such fancy gizmos as heaters and radios, but would go anywhere and take whatever punishment you could throw at it.
It's an adage in the United Kingdom that when policemen start looking younger than you, it's time to check your pension arrangements.
As a global society, we're obsessed by initials, but MES, the latest set, hides a serious dispute between East and West that's threatening to turn the old order upside down.