Five worlds. One journey.
SdB-Plus has grown over the years into much more than a collection of blog posts. It is a record of experiences, discoveries, challenges and lessons — from building a new life in Vietnam to travelling the world, discovering remarkable food, facing major health challenges and sharing lessons learned through decades of international management and leadership.
I’ve brought these stories together into five main journeys. Choose where you would like to start.
🇻🇳 Living in Vietnam — Our Expat Life
In September 2025, we started a completely new chapter by moving from Europe to Ho Chi Minh City.
What began as a professional opportunity quickly became a much bigger adventure. Month by month, I document what it is really like to build a new life in Vietnam — discovering the city and its culture, restaurants, work, friendships, Rotary, travel around Asia and all the ordinary moments that gradually make a foreign country feel like home.
This isn’t another guide telling you how you should live in Vietnam.
It’s simply our Vietnam story — as we’re living it.
✈️ Luxury Hotels & Travel — Discovering the World
Travel has always been about much more than simply reaching a destination.
From Conrad Bali and The Ritz-Carlton Langkawi to luxury escapes in Vietnam, European road trips, historic hotels and memorable stays in the United States, SdB-Plus has accumulated years of travel experiences.
For us, luxury isn’t simply about five stars. It’s about the room, the location, the food, the service and those small moments that transform a hotel stay into a memory.
These are places where we actually stayed and experiences we actually had.
Sometimes exceptional. Sometimes less so. Always personal.
EXPLORE LUXURY HOTELS & TRAVEL →
🍽️ Fine Dining & Restaurant Experiences — Come to the Table
Food has been part of SdB-Plus from the very beginning.
We’ve been fortunate enough to experience remarkable restaurants across Belgium, France, Portugal, Spain, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom, the United States and now Asia.
From Maison Pic, Clos des Sens, L’Assiette Champenoise and ‘t Zilte to GOFIO, Casa de Chá da Boa Nova and our growing collection of discoveries in Vietnam, these pages tell our gastronomic story.
Some restaurants have Michelin stars. Others don’t.
Because ultimately a star isn’t what makes a meal memorable. Great ingredients, creativity, hospitality, atmosphere — and the pleasure of discovering what a chef wants to express — matter just as much.
Bon appétit!
EXPLORE FINE DINING & RESTAURANTS →
❤️ My Health Journey — Resilience & Recovery
his is the most personal part of SdB-Plus.
It is the story I never expected to write.
Leukemia. A stroke. Rehabilitation. Burnout. Recovery. Resilience.
These articles aren’t medical advice. They are simply the story of what happened, how I experienced it and what I learned along the way.
Behind every diagnosis are fear, frustration and difficult moments — but also progress, humour, determination and sometimes extraordinary reasons to be grateful.
And after everything that happened, the journey somehow led to another completely unexpected chapter: starting a new professional and personal life in Vietnam.
Life doesn’t always follow the plan.
Sometimes the unexpected chapters become some of the most important ones.
💼 Project, Programme Management & Leadership — Lessons from Experience
Projects look wonderfully organised in PowerPoint.
Reality is usually rather different.
After more than 35 years working internationally across Finance, Sales & Marketing, IT, Service Management, Audit, Project Management and Programme Management, I’ve accumulated quite a few lessons about how organisations — and people — actually work.
Here I explore project and programme management, leadership, governance, strategy, coaching, stakeholder management and professional development.
Some ideas come from established methodologies. Others come from discovering — occasionally the hard way — what happens when theory meets reality.
Because projects are rarely difficult because the Gantt chart is wrong.
They’re difficult because organisations and people are complicated.
And that’s precisely what makes management and leadership so interesting.
EXPLORE MANAGEMENT & LEADERSHIP →
The Journey Continues…
These five journeys tell much of the SdB-Plus story — but the story certainly isn’t finished.
Our life in Vietnam continues to evolve. There are more places to visit, more restaurants to discover, more professional lessons to learn and, inevitably, a few surprises along the way.
New articles continue to be published regularly.
Welcome to SdB-Plus — and enjoy exploring!
