Old China Hands Lunch 3 October

Posted on by Gilbert Van Kerckhove

In the holiday week

For the Old China Hands Lunch 3 October we had massive “cannot make it” as many of our members were away, we still managed to have 20 people. The lunch was in the middle of a “golden week” – National Day and Mid-Automn Festival, also known as the Moon Festival or Mooncake Festival – a harvest festival celebrated in Chinese culture. It is held on the 15th day of the 8th month of the Chinese lunar calendar with a full moon at night.

Labubu wishes

As always all happy enjoying the food and the company in Morel’s Restaurant. I went for the soup that was actually a special lobster soup done by chef Renaat, the preparation took several days of cooking and it was super delicious.

The menu, see the pics:

  • one local draft OR glass of house wine OR soft drink
  • Russian eggs salad OR salade Niçoise OR fresh daily soup (lobster soup or vegetable soup)
  • pork piccata provençale style served with grilled tomato and pan-fried potatoes OR beef tenderloin Stroganoff served with market vegetables and steamed rice OR red snapper Provençale style served with vegetables and mashed potatoes
  • daily desert )pancakes with fruit)

The following lunch is planned for Friday 7 November 2025.

What is your birthday?

We plan to celebrate the birthdays of members present, so we will ask for the date (day – month). Not an obligation but recommended!

Mobility Index Report

How does Beijing rank in terms of getting around easily?
2024 Urban Mobility Readiness Index, a ranking of 70 major cities worldwide on their preparedness for mobility’s next chapter. For its sixth edition, the index introduces a new sub-index focusing on technology adoption alongside customized actionable recommendations for each city.

Very interesting report about urban mobility. Beijing is somewhere in the middle for 2023, see the picture. For 2024 Beijing went up to no. 20! Despite its huge size getting around by public transport (subway, bus – massive network) and share bikes is relatively easy. Not mentioned is that traffic can be dangerous in bike lanes and sidewalks, unsafe with e-bikes terrorizing everybody and general disrespect of traffic regulations. I bike and walk a lot and have no car.
How Beijing Performs Across Urban Mobility Targets: here the link to the updated report with all details.

Old China Hands Lunch 6 September

Posted on by Gilbert Van Kerckhove

End of summer

Our Old China Hands Lunch 6 September 2025 marked the end of summer and holidays. Beijing just had recovered from the turmoil of the military parade of 3 September, Dongchen District had not yet removed the security barriers – Chaoyang had it all cleaned up.
With many of our members busy, the turnout of 25 was reasonable. A few new faces were welcomed.


The menu, see the pictures:

  • sliced smoked salmon stuffed with seafood and garden greens OR poached eggs with wine merchant sauce OR cream of tomato soup
  • fricandeau of beef served with hot cherry and mashed potatoes OR thin-sliced beef tenderloin with black pepper sauce served with vegetables and Belgian frietes OR red snapper Mediterranean style served with daily vegetables and mashed potatoes
  • daily desert

The following lunch is planned for Friday 3 October 2025 (yes, in the holiday week).

Again Gilbert in the news.

It took a long time for my interview to come out, done 23 February 2025 in my office by Chris and his team with a complex equipment setup.

On 10 September it finally came out on YouTube and it’s worth the wait. Chris did a professional job as always.

The interview by Chris Petersen-Clausen is part of the series “Living History”: Stories from the Opening of China is the new series of documentary interviews with Chinese, Americans and others about the experiences they had in the period between the reopening of China under Deng Xiaoping in 1979 and the Shanghai Expo in 2010. These crucial years and the people-to-people exchanges made during this time are a period whose memory we want to preserve with this series. Many of the stories that are being recorded have never before been documented for the public. If you, too have a story from this time that you would like to tell us please do get in touch with Chris at chris@memostothefuture.com – they are continuously filming more interviews.

So here is my story in “Living History”: Gilbert Van Kerckhove – Building the Bird’s Nest Stadium in Beijing.

It all began with an unusual job interview in 1980. Gilbert Van Kerckhove, a young Belgian engineer, was interviewing for a job that nobody else seemed to want. That led him to Beijing, where the engineer and businessman built power stations, the Jin Mao skyscraper, changed a law prohibiting the construction of subways and served as Negotiations Director for the construction of the Bird’s Nest stadium for the 2008 Olympics.

Old China Hands Lunch 1 August 2025

Posted on by Gilbert Van Kerckhove

Good turnout

The turnout for the Old China Hands Lunch 1 August 2025 was unexpectantly better than I calculated: we were 30! Many people on holiday and away from Beijing.
Yes it was hot but so was the chatting. And the food of Morel’s Restaurant was great as always.

See some of the dishes of our menu in the pics.

  • Russian eggs salad OR Belgian endive salad with blue cheese sauce OR fresh daily soup
  • pork piccata provençale style served with grilled tomato and pan-fried potatoes OR thin-sliced beef tenderloin with wine merchant sauce served with market vegetables and sauteed potatoes OR pan-fried snapper with mustard sauce served with daily vegetables and mashed potatoes
  • daily desert

Gilbert Internet star in … Fujian

Gilbert was invited to the World Internet Conference in Quanzhou, Fujian. A mega event with 800 participants from China and many countries. The program was very busy, also with an outstanding cultural evening and a welcome dinner where I met the Governor of Fujian Province. I was taken to the Interview Room to face a crowd of journalists. 

I attended as Rotating Chairman of UWEE. See here the link to their official newsletter that also shows a video clip
See here the PDF of the newsletter: 250801 UWEEQuanzhou
Here the link (need VPN in China) for the UWEE clip of the World Internet Conference showing my participation.
Some of the interviews with me published on the Internet, Quanzhou World Internet Conference 24 July 2025, here the YouTube link.

Premiere of New 3 Gorges 3D movie

Posted on by Gilbert Van Kerckhove

 

Premiere event

The Premiere of New 3 Gorges 3D movie was held in the Central Television Media Center on 26 June 2025.
The movie was jointly produced by the former Three Gorges Office of the State Council (now merged with the Ministry of Water Resources), Chongqing Municipal People’s Government, Hubei Provincial People’s Government, China Three Gorges Corporation and China Film Group Corporation, and many international film masters participated in the creation of the film. It took 30 years of tracking and shooting, more than 10 years of creation and polishing, the full support of 11 Chinese academicians; more than 50 experts and leaders participated in the dialogue, and 100 scholars and eyewitnesses contributed. It will be screened in more than 3,000 theaters across the country starting from June 26, and a series of international and domestic screenings will be launched.

During the premiere I was the only foreigner and also the only tourism expert from the expert group that took part in the November 2015 shooting, see the earlier post.
Many speeches from leaders and contributors and the presentation of the movie in 2D.
The detailed report of the event by China Report.:
The world premiere of the large-scale 3D documentary film “The New Three Gorges” with the theme of “Three Gorges Love and Chinese Heart” was held in Beijing, by China Report.
Here the original article in Chinese with translation into English: 250630 Sanxia_eventreport

I was interviewed I think by Chongqing TV.
During the “New Three Gorges Tourism Promotion Conference” delegates from several cities along the Yangtze River presented their region and local products and dishes were displayed.

Watching the 3D movie

On 28 June we went to watch the 3D movie in one of the very few theaters that showed 3D (somewhere in North 3rd Ring Road area), most were 2D. In the afternoon session we had the whole theater for us. We were told the morning session was full.

The double text in the pictures is because of the 3D.

My take on the movie

Of course I am honored and happy to be so much featured in the movie. But I regret none of the other members of our tourism expert team was featured and also none attended the premiere. It seems they were pretty unhappy with the movie, a sentiment I do share in part.
We saw so many amazing tourist sites but they appear little in the movie that spends too much time with insignificant themes. It fails to show the transformation by the rising waters, the impact on logistics and mobility in the whole region. There are other videos that show the submerged villages and structures; nothing about it in the movie.
The movie fails to project and promote the imposing tourist pearls along the Chongqing to Sanxia riverside. It missed a great opportunity.
Let’s hope that other movie segments will be shown later.

 

New 3 Gorges documentaries

Posted on by Gilbert Van Kerckhove

 

Seven chapters

The New 3 Gorges documentaries had 7 episodes, each 30 minutes long, with 7 aspects of “dam”, “water”, “mountain”, “people”, “scenery/The View”, “city” and “dream”. It shows the new achievements, new changes and new developments of the Three Gorges reservoir area and the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze River after the completion of the Three Gorges Project. The film was launched in 2012 and the crew has invested in the shooting, production and polishing of “New Three Gorges for 10 years.
The documentaries were aired on CCTV9, 17 to 23 November 2022. I am featured as a tourism specialist, mostly in Chapter 5 “The View”, from the shooting in November 2015.

See some screenshots from the different chapters.
The movies are 2D, the 3D movie came out years later.
For the 3D shooting, Keith Merlin, the documentary director who won two Oscars, and Christie Niby, the director of “The Truth about Diaoyu Island” and “Mysterious China” , “Avatar” visual effects director Chuck Komisky, “Ocean”, “Migrating Birds” and “Penguin Diaries” director Jacques Behan and many other international film masters participated in the planning, shooting and guidance.

The 3D camera was showed during the Jialing River event on 3 August 2018.

New 3 Gorges documentaries details

Introduction of the 7 episodes, see the YouTube clip.
And on Vimeo.
Watch the full Chapter 5 on YouTube.
In my opinion the documentaries are somehow better than the final 3D movie. More about it in later posts.

Earlier media event

On 15 December 2015 a Media Event was held in the CCTV Media Center (Fuxing Road) to introduce the movie, “Discovering New Three Gorges”.
Check the earlier post.