got it!

Well, the visa is sorted at last. I was hoping for a multi-entry visa, but a dual entry will do me well enough. Reckon there's enough to see in China itself to keep me busy for all the weeknds I'm there anyway! :-) So, got the visa this morning, got a big-ass guide book for Beijing, got my cash (RMB4600 or about €500 worth - exchange rate is 9.4 to the euro, should have got it last week when it was at 9.7!), plane tickets should be arriving any day as well, so we're all good to go!

I also have my arrival sorted as well, there'll be a taxi picking me up from the airport to the apartmnt, then an agent will met me to show me around the apartment and hand over the keys. I'm apparently also getting a local guide assigned to me to "help me adapt to local culture and practise". My own personal guide! Cool! :-)

To be honest, the first time I really got excited about this trip was when I opened the passport and saw the words "Chinese Visa" and my name on the same document! Up until now I've sort of not really believed that the thing is really going to happen, thanks to my company raising my hopes a good few times over the last few years re: travel, pay rises, promotions etc, and all of them falling through. As the boss said yesterday, "this trip is partly in recognition of all the hard work you've done the last few years" - damn straight it is! If they cancel on me at this stage then Tom is getting my resignation letter on his desk within half an hour.

Looks like I'm getting in by the skin of my teeth as well- there was a mail sent around the other day saying "due to budget cuts, all travel and rotations are cancelled for Q4". Seeing as we just announced another quarterly loss last night (only $223m in the red!) that's not going to change any time soon! As one of the lads said here yesterday, "you mightn't have a department to come back to when you get back", but if they decide to move all our work to Prague sooner rather then later, well, my answer is "thanks for the holiday, and I'll have my redundancy check please!"