My wife Louise and I were living in China and we knew we wanted to stay in Asia for the long term, but not in China. We chose Malaysia for the usual reasons – weather, food, people, language, legal, and medical systems. I fell in love with Penang because it combines the charm and history of a cosmopolitan city with the relaxed style of living on a tropical island.

We bought a heritage house and renovated it, with the aim of using it as a holiday home to take occasional breaks from the noise and pollution in Shanghai. But then I noticed a vacant shop house opposite and started thinking….Why not open a wine bar with surprisingly good food, comfortable, welcoming, cosmopolitan…the kind of place that we like to hang out in ourselves, and just across the street from us.

Our house is across the street from That Little Wine Bar, a rare standalone bungalow with a garden, built in 1934. It was in a bad state when we bought it, but now after renovation and modernisation it is a really comfortable home for us. We were lucky to have bought just before the UNESCO listing, before property prices sky-rocketed

The things I love about Penang are: the weather, living across the street from my work (the shortest commute imaginable), running my own restaurant and seeing the smiles on customers’ faces when they are having a nice relaxing evening and enjoying the food. It’s a really nice thing to make people happy like that.

The things that are less good are the bureaucracy such as the tediousness of dealing with government agencies (endless licenses, seven hard copies of each of dozens of documents). Other people seem to complain about traffi c all the time, but honestly, compared to Shanghai, it is nothing here, and on my bicycle or my Harley, I anyway can bypass the biggest jams!

We have a lot of visitors, and I always recommend that they do the tour at Cheong Fatt Tze and visit the Peranakan Museum, to get a flavour for the history and culture of Penang, then wander around the heritage zone and experience life on the streets.

Inevitably I eat mainly at my own restaurant! But when I do get a night off, I enjoy Macalister Mansion for the closest Penang has to the whole fine dining experience, and Il Bacaro for honest classic Venetian food and professional, friendly service.

I just miss my friends and family, rather than anything about Germany itself. I do go home once a year, to a local village beer festival, meet all my friends, and get my fi ll of good German beer. But since I make sausages and bread myself here in Penang, there is really nothing else I miss!