Peng, Matthew, Me & Kevin – photo by TechNode

Last weekend I participated in TechNode’s MeshUp Workshop here in Beijing – the goal being to rapidly generate ideas for mobile apps which could make life easier in China.

My team actually won the day, which was a nice surprise and the whole thing was a good experience for a bunch of reasons, which is funny because I almost didn’t attend, and I went in with the expectation that I probably wouldn’t get a lot from it.  How much can you do in 90 mins?

As it turns out, more than I realised!

Brainstorming

Our only guideline was to come up with something that could “make life easier” – it could be in any vertical from helping poor farmers, to students, to expats etc

I find brainstorming to be really difficult and I know I work better when it comes to thinking critically about what is a good idea.   It was obvious that brainstorm wasn’t a strength for anyone in our group as while we were able to generate half a dozen ideas, nothing was ‘out of the box’.  We ideas we came up with were:

• something for language learning
• something to help find an apartment (HT Jen)
• something to find restaurant specials (HT @MikeBoyd)
• something to compare prices in store vs online
• … and a few others

Selection

The good thing about fewer ideas, means that you don’t have to spend so much time trying to work out which one to explore further.

… and without really discussing it, we went with an app to compare prices in store vs online, as this is something we had all experienced and understood the problem clearly.

It’s really annoying when you need to shop for a physical product (like a vacuum cleaner) which you know very little about and really need to go to a store to inspect it before you feel comfortable making a purchase.  The only problem is, once you’re in store and have decided which vacuum, you now have the problem of choosing where to buy it from.

You know you will pay a premium if you buy in store, but sometimes this is ok as you can get the product right away, but how much of a premium are you prepared to pay?

Ideally you want to know all your options, what price is it if you order online and does the saving justify the wait?  Having that information at your fingertips prevents post-purchase dissonance – no one likes to buy something only to discover they got ripped off.

This idea also easily ticks the boxes of:

• who is your customer?
• why would they use this?
• can it be monetized?

UPDATE: After talking about this idea with a friend, he suggested I look at ShopSavvy… which seems extremely similar oh well…

Thinking clearly, getting to the core of the idea

After some open discussion around the idea, we began to drill down on exactly what we were trying to do.  China has an interesting e-commerce landscape, there are a few big players, or online malls similar to Amazon and fewer small specialist retailers.  There isn’t one stand out place to buy from, which is the core difference from Amazon’s Price Check app.  In China there are at least 5 different “Amazons” so our app would need to be an aggregator.

Mapping out the user experience as simply as possible was the next challenge and broke it down like:

1. Capture product data (like taking a photo of the bar code)
2. Display aggregated search results
3. Make selection and show detailed information
4. If happy, make the purchase

It was really interesting to note how hard it was to simplify down to these steps, we kept on getting distracted by possible features such as comparing to other physical stores, or social network integration, and it was clear from some of the other teams’ presentations that they had also struggled with keeping things simple.

In 90 mins you cannot map out and consider every possible function so it’s critical that you stay focussed on the 1 core problem you are trying to solve and ignore anything that doesn’t directly address this.

For instance I kept on thinking about shipping and how that affects the reliability of online pricing – we could use the GPS location of the phone to get the postcode, and then calc shipping but what if the customer lives a long way from where they were using the app…. this level of detail is simply not important in early stage brainstorming!

Practice pitching

One of my favourite parts of these events is seeing other people pitch, and hearing what they have come up with.  Amusingly, 1 group had chosen to do a language learning app, and another had chosen a restaurant deals app. And another guy was independently working on an apartment finding app.  I suppose great minds think alike…

I love the art of the pitch, and my group nominated me to get behind the mic and I tried to stick with the proven method of opening with a simple story and basically walking through a case study of how the app would be used, using a clear real world example.

I pretended that my vacuum cleaner had exploded last week in a puff of smoke and that it was really frustrating going to the local home electrical store and trying to find a new one, especially when I don’t know anything about vacuum cleaners.

I think I did a reasonable job of selling the pain, and explaining how we could solve the problem.

And we were lucky enough to be selected as the team with the best idea!

Networking

The biggest take away from these kind of events though is the opportunity to meet and work with like minded people.  If I ever had to recruit in this space I would be going to these events all the time as there were clearly some smart people in the room.

I’ve got a couple of coffee and lunch dates booked later in the week with people I met to find out more about what they’re up to and I’m sure that they will spiral into going to more events, and meeting more people.

You learn about yourself

Finally, putting your hand up for these sorts of events teaches you a lot about how you work and who you work well with.  It also gives you a chance to play with leadership and public speaking, which you might not get a lot of practice with in your day to day work.

It takes a lot of practice to recognising the situations where you need to assert yourself and make decisions vs when you need to let other people take the lead.  I’m not great at this and know that I need more practise.

It also allows gives you a starting point if you’re looking for a new project or an idea to develop.  While no one in my group was particularly interested in taking the price check app any further, I can see how the idea might feed into a more extended “hackathon” style event, where you might be able to cobble together a functional prototype in a couple of days.

So that’s what I did on Saturday afternoon.

                                      

The case study (all 3500 words of it) has just been published on Entrepreneurs-Journey, a well known internet marketing website.

You can read the full text here:

How I Made My First Internet Dollar – A Passive Income Niche Site Case Study

(as published on Entrepreneurs-Journey on 4 April 2012)

                                      

www.youtube.com/watch?v=6YXwl00ZizQ

If you’re having trouble viewing the video, click here to watch The China Plan on YouTube.

So one week ago, I left Australia and flew 9000 km to Beijing, China which is where I will be living for the foreseeable future. I sold up everything I owned and have little more than a suitcase with some clothes, a backpack and a laptop. The feeling is both incredibly liberating and utterly terrifying.
This post, and the video above is about answering the #1 question that I’ve asked since I announced that I was moving to China, which is…

What on earth am I doing?

For quite a few years now, one of the things that I’ve wanted to experience in my life is to learn a second language, and learn it to a point where it is an asset, not just a novelty.  It’s quite uncommon for people in Australia to be fluent in a language other than English, and I only know a couple of people that are genuinely bi or multi-lingual.

So I decided to pack my bags and immerse myself in China, because I think it will be a valuable life experience.

Why China? Why not Spain or Germany or Indonesia?

I think for better or worse, China is going to be THE country that shapes the next 50 years of human history.  Rather than stick my head in the sand and pretend it isn’t happening, or worse still try and resist it, I’m here to learn everything I can about this country, its language and the culture as I’m sure that there will be great opportunities that will appear in the coming years and I want to be prepared.

One of these opportunities that I’m already investigating is the process of arranging manufacturing in China and how to setup a supply chain that enables single point global fulfilment.

                                      

The article has just been published on Anthill Online, an Australian business website dedicated to start-ups, entrepreneurship, small business and marketing.

You can read the full text here:

What I learn’t trying to launch an affiliate program with three days’ notice by Nick McIntosh

(as published on Anthill Online on 15 November 2011)

                                      

Photo by yum9me

There’s nothing I like more than a challenge when the goal is just “to see what’s possible”. I’ve built heaps of websites, started businesses, volunteered for projects for no other reason to explore an opportunity or learn more about a topic.

But one of the areas that I’ve done very little in is exercise and fitness.

I’m naturally blessed with high metabolism and have never had to watch what I eat. I grew up playing sports and I genuinely enjoy spending time outside doing activities that make me sweat.

Because of this, I’ve never really been interested in going to the gym just for the sake of exercising – it seems a bit silly to be honest. I’ve never had to examine my diet too closely or had any sort of health issue that requires “management”.

But, earlier in the year that suddenly changed…

Back in March I spent 6 weeks following a gym routine called Occam’s Protcol with the aim to put on a few kilos of lean muscle mass, in all the right places.

The program, which combines gym work, diet and a variety of suppliments was outline in Tim Ferris’ book the 4 hour body and the general permise of the routine (like everything in the book) is big results, with as little effort as possible. All backed up with ninja like planning and measurement. This is my kind of experiment.

In the case of putting on muscle mass, Tim was able to pack on 28 pounds (15 kilos) of lean muscle mass in 4 weeks with only 4 hours of total gym time(!).

When I tried this earlier in the year, the results I got were very underwhelming – almost nothing happened.

In 6 weeks I put on 1.6kg of muscle and 700g of fat.

But at the time I only followed the gym plan and did not add in the diet recommendations or suppliments.

Here’s my full post of my first attempt at Occam’s Protocol

So I’ve been wanting to try the experiment again, but this time addressing the diet and suppliments as well as correcting for the issues I discovered the first time I tried.

I was also encouraged by finding a couple of other success stories, from people who had been able to replicate the results in the book:

• Josh Crocker +16 lbs
• +18.5 lbs in 7 weeks
• +10 lbs in 2 weeks
• Another two week case study

Round 2

From mid July to mid August I went back onto Occam’s Protocol and this time changed my diet and added in suppliments to match the instructions in the book. Oh and I tracked the whole thing with spreadsheets like the data geek that I am.

First, the results:

Starting Weight (measured on gym scales)
14/7/11 70.9 kg (156 lbs)

Ending Weight (measured on gym scales)
21/8/11 73.6 kg (161.9 lbs)

Gain 2.7 kg (5.9 lbs)

I put on 4.5kg, of which 2.5kg was fat.

Boo

Hardly the kind of gains that are going to leave me looking like the incredible hulk – and the fat gain proportion is certainly way higher than I execpted.

What happened?

So why didn’t I gain 15kg like Tim or at least 7 or 8kg which seemed to be do-able?

Honestly, I don’t know. But I’ll tell you exactly what I did and while I have some theories for what I need to do differently, I’d really appreciate some outside opinions.

The Gym

Just as in my first experiment with Occam’s Protocol, I alternated the A / B routines as outlined in the book with a 3-4 days between each session.

The only difference is that this time I also did the two handed kettle bell swing which I wasn’t able to include before due to a lack of equipment.

I still had to take the video camera a couple of times to ensure that I was performing the exercises correctly and I also had a friend who is very familiar with all the machines to show me the correct positions on each.

Assume the position

Positioning myself on the machines is something that I really struggled with the first time especially on the shoulder and bench press exercises. Should the bar be inline with my nipples or chin, should I push my elbows out or keep them close to my body. These little things can have a big impact on which muscles are being targeted.

Gym results
exercise: starting weight x reps to finishing weight x reps

Pull downs: 50kg x 9 to 65kg x 7 (+30%)
Shoulder press: 30kg x 9 to 45kg x 6 (+50%)
Leg press: 85kg x 18 to 110kg x 11 (+29%)
Bench press: 28.5kg x 8 to 40kg x 9 (+40%)
Kettle bell: 16kg x 25 (2 sets) to 16kg x 33 (2 sets)

So clearly I achieved some decent strength gains, but this wasn’t the goal so I’m trying hard not to get excited by the numbers getting bigger.

Still the biggest challenge in the gym was doing the exercises consistently and gettting the 5/5 cadence right (5 seconds from the top of the movement to the bottom of the movement and back). I really strugged with this with the bench press and the leg press as I seem to hit a weak spot half way through the movement so I naturally wanted to do it more quickly to get some momentum to overcome this.

I tried to correct this by going to the gym with a friend and having them count out the timing, but unfortunately my friend wasn’t able to make every session.

The Diet

I really enjoy food, eating is one of my favourite things but I tend to naturally regulate my diet: If I have a day of gluttony, then the following day or 2 I will skip a meal here or there or just have something light, because I just don’t feel that hungry.

Occam’s feeding is a BIG departure from what I normally eat in almost every way.

To get the kind of weight gain detailed in the book, it recommends you eat a minimum 175 grams of protein every day (for my body weight). However I mentioned this to a trainer in the gym and she said I should probably up that to 250g!

Here’s what that looks like as food:

Breakfast Shake
500ml whole milk (16.5g protein)
1 egg (6.3g protein)
whey powder (30g protein)
almond butter (12g protein)

Breakfast (mid-morning)
Instant noodles (8g protein)
Tuna (33g protein)
1 egg (6.3g protein)

Snack
Protein bar (10g protein)

Lunch
chicken + vegetables + brown rice (33g protein)

Snack
Protein bar (10g)

Dinner
steak + vegetables (35g protein)

Nightcap
500ml whole milk (16.5g protein)
1 egg (6.3g protein)
whey powder (30g protein)

For a total of 252.9g protein

Eating this much EVERY DAY was not fun.

At the start, I thought that I could just battle through an “adoption phase” and then sooner or later this amount of food would become normal. Neil, one of the case studies in the book said that he turned into a ravenous food destroying machine. This didn’t happen to me. By the end of the month I’d scaled back to 100g – 150g protein per day just to keep my sanity.

To make this kind of diet work, I think I’d need to hire a chef or get organised enough to prepare food in bulk – massive bulk. Neither of these are likely to happen.

The Suppliments

Adding in pills and powders was something entirely new to me. But I figured why the hell not. So for the duration of the month I took:

L-Glutamine
Cissus quadrangularis
Alpha Lipoic Acid
Creatine Monohydrate

There’s 2 points I want to note here…

1. The cost

This stuff isn’t cheap! A month’s supply of the above, in the dosages recommended, was $157 USD. Infact, after you add in gym membership and additional food – this whole experiment would have been around $300-$350 AUD. Which could be read as:

I paid $300AUD to get 4.5kg heavier (but 2.5kg was just fat). Hrm. Not sure about that return on investment.

2. The dosage

I was supposed to take 10 grams of L-Glutamine, every 2 hours (80 grams per day) for the first 5 days. But I made the critical mistake of trusting the “2 gram” scoop that was included to be accurate. It wasn’t. Not even close.

I was actually taking 1.5x the dose which I didn’t discover until I almost ran out of L-Glutamine!

Other thoughts

2 days in I got sick & came down with the flu. Rather than doing the sensible thing of suspending this experiment until I had recovered, I decided to plough on and continue with the diet, gym & drugs even though I was running a fever, taking cold & flu medication and feeling horrible.

That was pretty dumb.

I took me about 10 days to fully recover and I think that could have slowed my progress significantly.

The Gym is not fun

A bunch of my friends genuinely enjoy going to the gym and moving heavy things up and down. I thought that there was a chance I’d come to like going to the gym but after doing Occam’s Protocol twice I can safely say that the gym is not for me. At no point was this fun – infact if it wasn’t for doing this as an “experiment” I wouldn’t have made it.

I really enjoy exercise when it comes as the by-product of doing something fun, like rollerblading or rock climbing. But the artificial environment of the gym is just not a place that I want to be.

Tips to make this work

If I was to try this again, I think these are the most crital points for success.  Nail these and you’ve got a shot:

TIP: Buddy up – expecially useful when it comes to timing in the gym, and making sure you’re doing the exercise correctly. As soon as you add another person, I found that my natural competitiveness kicked in so if my friend does 8 reps, I’m sure as hell going to push for 9.

TIP: get someone who know’s what they’re doing to show you which machines to use and how to position yourself.

TIP: get some accurate scales that can measure small quantities – when you’re measuring out a 2 gram dosage, regular scales probably aren’t going to cut it

TIP: plan your meals and prepare prepare prepare – this will take quite a bit of time.

TIP: If you get sick, stop & recover before continuing

TIP: Measure everything and remember to do the measurements more than once.

So… where to next?

Does Occam’s Protocol work? For me? No. Personally I just don’t care enough about building muscle mass to justify trying this a third time.

For me, the process of doing the experiment is what makes this fun, not so much the outcome.

And because that motivation isn’t there, it would take a huge amount of effort for me to manage the diet, drugs and gym to the level of detail needed to get the most out of this program.

The cost also makes it hard to justify doing this again. $350 isn’t a huge amount of money but it is a new pair of rollerblades or 4 months of rock climbing, both of which I love doing.

Tim Ferriss, if you’re reading this (and I hope you have Google alerts set up) I’d love to get your input. I have blood tests, DEXA scans, spreadsheets – the works!

                                      

Photo by mollypop

In December 2010, Tim Ferriss released his new book, the 4 Hour Body. A book that outlines how to get the biggest beneficial impact in all manner of health related topics, with the least effort. It covers weight loss, muscle gain, strength gain, endurance and speed as well as lifestyle topics such as better sex, reversing ‘permanent’ injuries and how to get a great night’s sleep.

It’s no secret that I’m a massive Tim Ferris fan boy, and I couldn’t wait to get my hands on a copy. Infact, it’s the only product that I’ve EVER pre-ordered.

Now, I’m very lucky in that I’ve never had a health issue. I’ve never been fat, I exercise regularly, I sleep reasonably well and while I eat what I want, I tend to naturally follow a healthy-ish diet. My doctor regards me as ‘boring’.

But there is one thing that I’ve always struggled with – putting on muscle. Admittedly I’ve never tried very hard as up until now I thought the only way to ‘bulk up’ was to become one of those dreaded gym junkies and start spending a lot of my time moving heavy objects up and down.

I find gyms to be the most boring places on earth. And I find moving heavy objects up and down, for the sake of building some bulges incredibly stupid. But there’s no denying that I still envy Brad Pitt’s ripped physique in the movie Fight Club.

So when I read the section of the 4 hour work week regarding building muscle, and exactly how LITTLE effort seemed to be required, I thought I might as well give it a go. I certainly don’t want to become the next Arnold, but I’d quite like a 6 pack and some upper body muscle definition.

Occam’s Protocol & Minimum Effective Dose

Occam’s Protocol (OP) is the training framework outlined in the book. The premise is simple: Combine the correct exercises, with the correct number of repetitions, with the correct number of sessions per week, while eating the correct foods and taking the correct medications and you will gain muscle fast.

In Tim’s case, he was able to put on 15kg of muscle in 28 days with a total of 4 hours of gym time (!).

But what’s the correct amount?

This is where the concept of Minimum Effective Dose comes in.

The book makes the case that in terms of muscle growth, less is more. You need to do only enough exercise to stimulate muscle growth and then stop. For instance, if 1 set of 5 repartitions is enough to trigger your muscle growth mechanisms, there is no benefit for doing additional sets. In fact, all you do is risk damaging the tissues by over working.

It’s this principle that under-pins the idea of how you can achieve big results with very little gym time.

What I did

First things first, I went and got measured so that I would know my baseline. I used a technique called a DEXA scan which gives you a detailed picture of your body composition. My starting numbers as at 17 February 2011 were:

Total Mass: 68.12kg
Lean Body Mass: 54.79klg
Fat Mass: 10.45kg
Fat %: 15.3

These numbers are neither good nor bad – they just are what they are. I think an achievable goal would be to get to 72-75kg with 10-11% body fat. At these numbers I should definitely be well on the way to looking like Brad Pitt.

Next I mapped out my gym routine, which followed the recommendations from the book.

Over 6 weeks I would do a total of 12 gym sessions of approximately 20mins a session. 12 x 20mins = 6 hrs. Even I can tolerate 1 hr per week in a gym if I’m going to get results.

Specifically, I alternated the following routines:

A routine:
Pull downs
Machine shoulder press
Abs

B routine:
Incline bench press
Leg press
Stationary Bike

OP also recommends adjusting your diet and complementing your gym activity with a number of supplements including Cissus quadrangularis, Alpha-lipoic acid, L-glutamine and Creatine monohydrate. Erm OK?

After mapping the gym stuff I was already feeling a little overwhelmed so I made the decision at the outset that I would focus on getting the gym activity 100% correct, and worry less about diet and drugs.

This is not to say that I ignored these aspects altogether, I did alter my diet for the experiment but I didn’t follow all recommendations as extensively as the book lays out.

Diet wise I tried my best to:

• Increase the amount of protein I consumed and when I consumed it. Each morning I would try to eat at least 2 eggs within 1 hr of waking up OR if this wasn’t convenient I would have a protein shake.
• Minimise junk food and fast food and tried to avoid chips, chocolate or sweet bakery items.
• Reduce the amount of white foods such as white rice, pasta and bread.
• Bulk up my meals with beans and legumes and more vegetables.
• Cut out diary except for 2% milk in my protein shake

In terms of drugs I did nothing except add a 30g scoop of whey protein powder to a banana milk shake.

The results

Click for huge version

And after 6 weeks here’s what I got:

DEXA scan, 31/3/2011
Total Mass: 70.38kg
Lean Body Mass: 56.39kg
Fat Mass: 11.15kg
Fat %: 15.8

So I gained about 1.6 kg of lean muscle mass and also gained about 700g of fat.

Pretty underwhelming hey?

The DEXA scan actually breaks down the body into segments so that you can see the composition of your arms, legs and abdomen.

Interestingly, the most prominent gains appear to be my abs where I’ve lost 50g of fat and added 300g of muscle.

So there was definitely progress but it wasn’t the transformation I was hoping for when I started.

The issues

So what happened? What went wrong and why can’t I bench press an elephant?

There were 3 main problems that I ran into when doing this experiment:

1. The book lacks detail

Having never embarked on anything like this before, I immediately ran into a lot of unfamiliar terms. Words like protein and incline bench press for a start.

It literally took me 2 hours on a Saturday afternoon to re-read the relevant chapters and then with a pad and pencil map out how all the different components were supposed to fit together. What I was going to eat and when. Which exercise routine I was going to do on what day. How much weight was I going to lift and for how long.

So in this regard I now think of the content as an introduction only. If are like me and couldn’t pick out the Smith machine in a gym you’re going to need more info.

2. Gym Setup

I’ve only used a gym maybe 3 or 4 times before and never with instruction. So while it was easy enough to follow the pictures in the book to determine what I was supposed to do, I immediately struggled with how I was actually supposed to do it.

For example, on the machine should press, should the bar be infront of my head or behind it? How low should I go? After the first gym session I realised that I had no idea if I was doing the exercises correctly, or even safely. I subsequently spent about 2 hours on youtube and a variety of personal fitness websites understanding what the correct technique was.

Which was great except it’s hard to know what you’re actually doing when you don’t have someone to spot you.

To rectify this I grabbed my video camera and started recording each exercise as I performed it. This was a pain and it took until the 3rd week for me to be confident that I was executing the motions as required.

3. The diet and drugs

I got totally overwhelmed on this front. While the Slow Carb Diet isn’t very complicated – just don’t eat carbs and eat more protein. When you are trying to gain weight you need to add in carbs and again the book doesn’t really do a good job of giving you the finer points on this. I believe this is called the information overload or the paradox of choice (or maybe a combination) – there’s just too much info saying do this but don’t do that so that the end result is deciding that it’s all too hard.

Same thing with the drugs. Too complicated. Take X before your meals and Y after the gym but then have a day off before taking Z.

Really all of these things stem from number 1. Not having the right information or being unable to execute on it.

What I’d do differently next time

I’m going to definitely try this again, now that I have a better understanding of how OP works.

The number 1 thing I would do differently is find a buddy so that I have someone with me in the gym to make sure I’m doing the right thing.

I’d also take the time map out my meals and supplements for 4 weeks and then make sure that I rigorously stick to it as it’s clear that without these aspects working in sync with the gym time, the results just aren’t going to materialise.

Stay tuned for round 2…

UPDATE: Round 2 has taken place. Does Occam’s protocol work?

                                      

www.youtube.com/watch?v=vOyxMn52DCk

Click here to watch the video on youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vOyxMn52DCk

This one is for all my friends and family. You know who you are.

Here are the cliff notes:

Lead up stress & terror completely unnecessary.  Haven’t had any issues being understood or getting the essentials.

Landed on my feet and have made a few friends from where I’m staying

A full strength 600ml beer costs 60 cents (AUD)

Jumped on a bike a went for a ride. A big surprise is how laid back this city is -- everyone takes their time and while it’s certainly busy -- it’s not manic (like Hong Kong for instance)

Beijing is a VERY clean city (way cleaner than Brisbane), there is no trash anywhere.  But unfortunately, it still looks dirty because of all the dust that blows in from the north.  It reminds me of what Brisbane looked like a month after the floods -- like it needs a good hose down.

There seems to be a battle between old and new. I’ve seen a lot of big brand new buildings standing next to old crappy buildings (not the historic style).  Development seems to be a bit hap-hazard.

                                      

Photo by Mortimer62

So in a couple of days I’m going to be leaving on my first “mini-retirement” to Beijing, China. I’m going for a month.

To say I’m excited would be an understatement, but it doesn’t show the full picture. My emotions have been oscillating between pure excitement and sheer terror in the lead up to this trip.

Excitement for the obvious reasons. Terror because I’m going solo, to a country where I don’t speak the language and will have to solve new problems that I haven’t experienced before. On an intellectual level I know I’ll be fine -- I’m a smart guy who’s capable of working stuff out but as I haven’t lived the experience or anything like it before, there’s a bit of trepidation.

For those not familiar with a “mini-retirement” (it’s inspired by Tim Ferriss) let me explain:

A mini-retirement is a break from your day to day life, often to explore a new country, hobby or idea usually for a period of 1-3 months. It is in contrast to a traditional retirement in that you take many ‘mini-retirements’ throughout your life rather than deferring your adventure until you are 65.

So for the next month I will be living Beijing, China and exploring all that it has to offer.  I’m taking my laptop and mobile phone and have arranged to be servicing my clients in Australia as normal, even though I’ll be 7000km away.  For all intensive purposes they won’t know that I’ve gone (but I have told them).

So to whet your appetite for what I hope will be many videos of this little adventure, here is an outline of what I’m taking with me.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=iRJe86ehUrM

Click here to watch the video on Youtube:
Youtube: Mini-Retirement to Beijing, China: What I’m packing

I’ll do another post about some of the details, incase you want to copy them at a future date. Some of the more interesting things on my packing list are:

• A nifty laptop lock cable
• Zip-ties
• A “get out of jail” card
• Zip lock bags
• A tiny super absorbent towel