A Little Bit of Everything

Old House at Kraanlei Str., Gent, Belgium

2011-01-31T04:45:00.002+11:00

St. Jacob's Church, Gent, Belgium

2011-01-31T04:27:00.001+11:00

Near Friday Market, Gent, Belgium

2011-01-31T04:20:00.001+11:00

Leie River, Gent, Belgium

2011-01-31T04:16:00.000+11:00

St. Nicholas Church, Gent, Belgium

2011-01-31T04:13:00.000+11:00

Belfry, Gent, Belgium

2011-01-31T04:07:00.000+11:00

Old Post Office, Gent, Belgium

2011-01-31T03:53:00.001+11:00

Restaurants near Groete Mark, Leuven, Belgium

2011-01-31T03:33:00.001+11:00

St. Peters Cathedral, Leuven, Belgium

2011-01-31T03:09:00.001+11:00

Central Library of KU Leuven, Belgium

2011-01-31T01:54:00.000+11:00

Oude Markt, Leuven, Belgium

2011-01-31T01:09:00.001+11:00

Groete Markt, Leuven, Belgium

2011-01-31T01:01:00.000+11:00

Campanile di San Marco, Venezia, Italy

2010-01-14T08:40:00.000+11:00

Santa Maria Novella, Firenze, Italy

2010-01-14T08:32:00.001+11:00

The David, Piazza della Signoria, Firenze, Italy

2010-01-14T08:21:00.000+11:00

The Perseus with the Head of Medusa, Firenze, Italy

2010-01-14T08:16:00.002+11:00

Chiesa di San Frediano in Cestello, Firenze, Italy

2010-01-12T09:42:00.000+11:00

Santa Croce, Firenze, Italy

2010-01-12T09:37:00.001+11:00

Chiesa Santa Maria del Carmine, Milano, Italy

2010-01-12T09:25:00.001+11:00

The Church of St. Antonio Padua, Milano, Italy

2010-01-11T08:15:00.000+11:00

Castello Sforzesco, Milano, Italy

2010-01-11T08:09:00.001+11:00

Il Duomo, Milano, Italy

2010-01-11T08:02:00.002+11:00

Buddhist Temple, Bangkok, Thailand

2009-11-22T19:33:00.000+11:00

Petronas Twin Towers at Night, KL, Malaysia

2009-11-15T04:20:00.000+11:00

Petronas Twin Towers, KL, Malaysia

2009-11-15T04:18:00.002+11:00

The Royal Palace, Oslo, Norway

2009-07-04T21:01:00.000+10:00

National Theatre, Oslo, Norway

2009-07-04T20:57:00.001+10:00

Summer night in Oslo, Norway

2009-07-04T20:53:00.000+10:00

City Hall of Oslo, Norway

2009-07-04T20:50:00.000+10:00

Apartments in Oslo, Norway

2009-07-04T20:23:00.001+10:00

Torre Agbar, Barcelona

2009-06-28T05:07:00.000+10:00

Arc de Triomf, Barcelona

2009-06-28T05:03:00.001+10:00

Edificio de Caixa Catalunya, Barcelona

2009-06-28T05:00:00.000+10:00

Parc Gúell, Barcelona

2009-06-28T04:43:00.001+10:00

Sagrada Familia, Barcelona

2009-06-28T04:41:00.000+10:00

Casa Amatller, Barcelona

2009-06-28T04:36:00.001+10:00

Monument of Colon, Barcelona

2009-06-28T04:31:00.000+10:00

Plaça d'Espanya, Barcelona

2009-06-28T04:25:00.001+10:00

Banco de Español, Barcelona

2009-06-28T04:22:00.000+10:00

Our Lady of Fatima, Portugal

2009-02-21T08:17:00.000+11:00

Campo Pequeno, Lisbon, Portugal

2009-02-21T08:12:00.000+11:00

The Batalha Monastery, Portugal

2009-02-21T08:05:00.000+11:00

An Old House in Obidos, Portugal

2009-02-21T07:55:00.001+11:00

The Church of Obidos, Portugal

2009-02-21T07:49:00.001+11:00

San Jeronimo Museum, Lisbon, Portugal

2009-02-21T07:38:00.001+11:00

The Tower of Belem, Lisbon, Portugal

2009-02-21T07:34:00.000+11:00

South Wing of the St. John's Hopsital, Brugge

2008-11-10T04:47:00.001+11:00

The City Hall of Brugge

2008-11-10T04:41:00.000+11:00

The Belfry as seen from Rozenhoedkaai, Brugge

2008-11-10T04:37:00.000+11:00

Rozenhoedkaai, Brugge

2008-11-10T04:30:00.001+11:00

Tower of the Church of Our Lady, Brugge

2008-11-10T04:23:00.004+11:00

Tranforming Ubuntu 8.04.1 on Aspire 5920 to OSX (3)

2008-07-21T02:41:00.002+10:00

Tranforming Ubuntu 8.04.1 on Aspire 5920 to OSX (2)

2008-07-21T02:18:00.002+10:00

Tranforming Ubuntu 8.04.1 on Aspire 5920 to OSX (1)

2008-07-21T02:15:00.003+10:00

Credit to: http://linuxondesktop.blogspot.com/2008/05/transforming-your-ubuntu-804-desktop-to.html

The Opera House, Madrid

2008-06-08T06:54:00.003+10:00

Jardine de Sabatini, Madrid

2008-06-08T06:51:00.002+10:00

The Roundabout in front of Principe Pio, Madrid

2008-06-08T06:48:00.002+10:00

M40 from Montecarmelo

2008-06-06T07:48:00.003+10:00

Ronaldo & Transgender Prostitues

2008-04-30T07:42:00.001+10:00

Mama mia! Yukkk....!

Santiago Bernabeu on Match Day (4)

2008-04-30T06:00:00.001+10:00

Santiago Bernabeu on Match Day (3)

2008-04-30T05:55:00.002+10:00

Santiago Bernabeu on Match Day (2)

2008-04-30T05:50:00.003+10:00

Real Madrid's fans waiting for the players's bus.

Santiago Bernabeu on Match-Day (1)

2008-04-27T23:46:00.005+10:00

A friend of mine requested me to buy the "official" shirt of Real Madrid for his beloved 6 year old son. He has been asking me to buy a Real Madrid shirt since 6 months ago, kept asking me about the price, etc.

I tried to discourage him to buy because the shirt, because despite it's officiality, it's Made in China anyway. Also in my opinion it is not worth it to spend some money and give it to Real Madrid CF. Of course the main reason is actually because I don't follow Real Madrid therefore I don't think I should visit their stadium and buy something from their official shop. A fans of Atletico de Madrid should never touch anything Real Madrid.

However, since I don't want to disappoint a friend, eventually I went there this noon after a Sunday mass. Apparently, Real Madrid will play Athletico Club de Bilbao this evening at 9 PM and Real's fans have arrived at the stadium to buy tickets at noon. There was a long queue in front of the ticket office.

Having got off a bus, I walked to the official store of Real Madrid, passing by two lines of Real Madrid's fans on both sides of a small road towards the Santiago Bernabeu's stadium. There was a grey colour coach parked near the stadium, it was the bus of Real Madrid's players. The fans were waiting for the bus, which was going to transport the players to somewhere. I believe they were going to go to their training centre somewhere near Barajas Airport, for a short session before they play this evening.

So, joined the lines and was tried to pick up what was said by the locals, of course I knew nothing because of my lack of Spanish. Then I gave up and walked straight into the official store. I browsed around, checking shirts, jackets, fleeces, scarfs and many other things.

I went to check kid's shirts, then chose one that I thought will fit the body of my friend's son. Afterward I took one hat for my young cousin and joined the queuing line to pay. One shirt for a kid costs 55 Euros and 1 hat costs 20 Euros. So, I've given Real Madrid 75 Euros today. Overall I spent approximately half an hour in the official store, may be a bit more, I could not remember.

When I walked out of the official store, I saw people are still waiting for the bus to pass by and in fact there were more people than there were half an hour before. I stopped there for a couple of minutes and joined the lines once again. Two minutes later, people started to shout and jump, the bus was about to come. Then I saw Real Madrid's players who are sitting on the left side of the bus.

Some faces seem to be well-known. I was able to recognise Robinho and probably Guti, but I had no idea who the others are. They were cold, didn't smile to people who screamed, shouted and called their names. Not a wave, not a smile, just a look without expression.

I took some pictures of the scenes by using my mobile phoe and will upload them later this week here on this blog. Stay with me!

Fernando Torres

2008-03-10T03:40:00.003+11:00

He has scored 25 goals in his first season with Liverpool FC in all competitions. He has 19 next to his name in the English Premier League so far....and he is still scoring them....Every single goal he scored is unique. His goals showed his technique, accuracy, confidence and intelligence. He never score two similar goals......

What to Do When Your Flight is Cancelled

2008-02-25T07:34:00.004+11:00

Watching or listening to news on flight cancellation due to severe weather condition is something many people are used to, but experiencing it and knowing what to do to save your time and do something else that is more useful than waiting and keep waiting are different matters. On Wednesday the 20th of February this week, I was given "privilege" to know how it feels and what it looks like when the authority of London Heathrow airport and British Airways decided to cancel my flight. It was a big mess!

There were about 10 flights canceled on the day, including mine, which was supposed to depart for Madrid at 7.40 in the evening. I expected several hours of delay of course, as I could see the thick fog on Wednesday morning covering the Midland. But to have my flight canceled was a major surprise to me.

At around 5.30 PM the flight departure screen displayed the departure time for my flight as 21.40. Then at around 6.00 PM, it displayed my flight had been canceled. The big mess started immediately. We scrambled to the Customer Service office of BA and requested information about what to do. At the time, we're already within international zone.

The Customer Service lady (a Chinese look-a-like lady with Singaporean/Malaysian accent) told us to walk to the walk back to arrival hall, go through the immigration check point, waited for our luggages, pick them up, go to the ticket office and rebook our flights. It sounds reasonable and easy to do. I would find out later how wrong I had been.

The walking path to the arrival hall itself was not clear, no clear sign, me and my friend were lost basically. Then we found the correct way and spent about 30 minutes queuing in front of the immigration check point. Afterward we spent nearly 2 hours waiting for our luggages, kept looking for our ones and nothing came out. We finally went to the Customer Service in the baggage hall, all they told us was:

"Go rebook your flight and show the receipt of your luggages when you check in to your next flight, tell them to record exactly the same receipt number. The airline staffs will look after your luggages and help you."

If I had known that all we need to do was to rebook our flight and left the luggages to the airline staff, I would have done it quickly and found a hotel to take a rest.

So, we finally re-booked our flight and left our luggages in the airport. Then we found a hotel later and spent the night without changing our clothes. The next morning (Thursday) we checked in to our flight and arrived at Madrid in the afternoon. Having arrived in Madrid, we went to the Customer Service of Iberia (a member of BA OneWorld network) and made a report that our luggages were "lost". They received our report and then promised to send them back to Madrid in 2 days. On Saturday, I got my luggage back.

The lesson to learn is: don't spend your time waiting for luggage when your flight is canceled but you still need to travel using the same airline. Rebook your flight immediately and tell the airline staff to record your luggage number when you check in and make a report that your luggage is lost when you arrive at your destination. Easy.

Crash, Boom, Bang!

2008-02-17T10:01:00.001+11:00

Out of the FA Cup this year!!! Terrible feeling now, oh dear, oh dear!

Ireland's Proposal for Switch to Right-Hand Driving

2008-02-11T02:54:00.000+11:00

The Irish are very nice people, they want to switch to right-hand driving because of people who visit them are used to right-hand driving. The Irish do not want the visitors to be involved in accidents because the visitors cannot control their cars well enough to drive in Ireland. This is amazing! This is an example of immigrants and tourists actually change the rule applied in a country. I bet we will not find it anywhere else in Europe!

Diga me

2008-02-10T08:30:00.000+11:00

As foreigner in a new country, I am trying to learn about local culture and way of life, - (I beg your pardon, I am not talking about the "swing" culture of some people in Madrid, definitely not about the clubs where you can have group sex for only 25 Euros as the entry fees) - carefully listening to new sound, capturing new language and trying to understand when to use the terms and in what context they can be used.

One word I often come across is "diga me", which means "talk to me" or "tell me". This word is usually used as an answer to someone who calls us and we want to listen to what the person wants to say. So instead of asking "what's up?" or just "yes" we ask the person to tell us what the his/her intention is.

Diga me is also often used when people answer a phone call, usually with "yes" in front of it. So the complete answer is: "Si, diga me!" or "Yes, tell me!". The locals like to speak at 200 miles/hour, so most of the time we will hear "di" and "me" only, while the "ga" is left out. So, sometime it sounds like "di me"

Now then, because saying "diga me" is a habit of the locals here in my office, most of the time people who answer me (when I call their names), will just say: "Tell me!"......in English, not Spanish. It is a Spanish habit with English translation, as the language of communication between us. At first it sounds odd to me, because I am not used to someone answering me with "Tell me!". But after more and more people say the same thing and once I understand the Spanish translation of "Tell me" and hear the locals keep saying it, I am used to it now.

Live for Nothing, Die for Something

2008-02-04T06:43:00.000+11:00

"Live for nothing, die for something"

John Rambo came out of his retirement to save a group of Christian missionaries and take them out of Myanmar, fighting the troops of the military dictator of the country along the way. It is a scary scenario for the military junta, the ruler of Myanmar and now they are trying to stop distribution of the pirated DVDs of this latest Rambo movie in the country. The military rulers fear of the movie could spur their opponents on to fight them.

While it is unlikely that a movie can influence Myanmar people to fight their military rulers (because ordinary people don't have sophisticated weapons), perhaps this movie can make them dream of the unthinkable, that one day there will be troops sent by some countries to "liberate" them. It remains to be seen if John Rambo indeed becomes an inspiration for the people of Myanmar. Only time can tell and history will record it.

Do Not Queue in Spain...

2008-01-07T09:08:00.000+11:00

Especially when you are waiting for a bus.

This is not a joke. If you try to queue and think the person in front of you IS in the queuing line, then make sure he/she IS QUEUING. Otherwise, the bus driver will just quickly close the bus door, leaving you screaming and swearing, because the person in front of you does not move at all and the bus driver thought all passengers have boarded.

Some locals like to stand very close to the entry door of a bus although they are not going to board in to the bus. I learnt from experiences that being nice and trying to queue behind someone who looks like going to board a bus and waiting for him to move is a disadvantage for myself. Once I realised the person in front of me, who blocked my way to get into the bus, was not going to board the bus, it was too late, the buy driver was annoyed so he just departed, leaving me baffled. More annoyingly the person who blocked my way didn't even say sorry or any word at all.

Sigh...

Differences Between Live Football Coverage in Spain and Indonesia

2008-01-03T06:41:00.000+11:00

Having watched many live coverages of EPL football matches on local television stations in Spain, I can see some differences in the way the Indonesian and Spanish show the game.

The differences are as follow:

1. Indonesia
Pre-game review: Starts 15-30 minutes before the game. At least 1 commentator is present apart from one TV presenter. The so called commentator may be a sport journalist, an ex player or anyone who deemed "knows" about football. It is considered normal if they talk for one minute and then there are some ads for about 5 minutes, then the commentators talk again for another minute, again followed by advertisements for 5 minutes.

In-game comments: Usually in English, in other words the original in-game comments from the broadcaster.

Post-game review: Usually the commentator gives his review of what went wrong, what should have been done, etc. A minute talk normally will be followed by 5 minutes of advertisement, which is just like during the pre-game review. Ends about 10 minutes after the game.

2. Spain
Pre-game review: none but advertisements run for about 10 minutes, until the game starts.

In-game comments: 2 persons, one TV presenter who also reports the game and another commentator who reviews the tactical side of the game.

Post-game: again advertisements run for about 10 minutes.

Happy New Year 2008

2007-12-30T23:41:00.000+11:00

Happy New Year 2008, may the coming year brings you a lot more successes, good health, happiness and a better life.

Feliz Año Nuevo....

And now, it's the right time for Liverpool FC to move closer to the leading pack, let's beat Manchester City!

Atocha Station

2007-12-21T08:59:00.000+11:00

Atocha Station, the main train station of Madrid, connecting high speed train to big cities around Spain, such as Sevilla, Cordoba, Barcelona and Cadiz, and two buildings around it.

Traffic "Jam" in Madrid

2007-12-18T10:27:00.000+11:00

These two photos represent what people here call "traffic jam" or "heavy traffic" that make them reluctant to drive their cars in the city centre. Nowhere like the "heavy traffic" of Jakarta, for sure.

Parque del Buen Retiro

2007-12-14T09:24:00.000+11:00

Two photographs taken from Parque del Buen Retiro in Madrid.

Gran Via, Madrid

2007-12-14T09:18:00.000+11:00

Some photographs of Calle Gran Via in Madrid, taken by using Nokia 6288. A busy street with a numbers of Cinemas, heaps of stores and restaurants.

Liverpool vs Real Madrid, Please!

2007-12-12T08:06:00.001+11:00

All I want for Christmas is....

Liverpool to be paired against Real Madrid in the last 16 of UEFA Champions League.

Yihaaawwwwwwwww.......

Atlas Oil & Gas - Nigeria - Scam

2007-12-08T03:51:00.000+11:00

If you receive this recruitment email in the future, just delete and disregard it, it is obviously a scam. For a start, any company or any recruitment agent, who uses a yahoo webmail address for communication is a crap company. Don't waste your time to deal with them.

Secondly, atlastoil-gas.llc.nu is a valid address but it has nothing in it because it is hosted by 2ip.com, which is a free subdomain website provider. A real company should not have a subdomain hosted in 2ip.com. This is clearly dodgy.

Anyway, here is the email:

Career Opportunity in Atlas Oil and Gas

Atlas Oil & Gas
Office- 102 West Misnister,
Oshodi Apapa Express Way
Lagos, Nigeria.
Phone- +234-1-8967609,+234-1-8507693
Fax- +234-1-7916561

Career Opportunity in Atlas Oil and Gas

Atlas Oil &Gas Company is an emergent dynamic company committed to the provision ofworld-class surveying and geo-spatial data services to oil and gas andlarge-scale construction efforts onshore and offshore in Nigeria and theAfrican west coast.

AtlasOil & Gas Company is recruiting skilled workers for the enlargement of theorganization, for rehabilitations of oil and gas pipe lines in Nigeria andalso for the renovation of the countries refinery.

Atlas Oil &Gas is recruiting candidate from different department from 0 to 30 years ofworking experience.

Atlas Oil &Gas Company has gone through legal recruiting agents on the internet and ourresume was short listed among others by the recruiting management of theCompany, We here by request for your updated Curriculum Vitae (Resume) if youare interested to relocate to Nigeriafor a promising career that includes bellow benefits.

Benefits Package.
1.) Avery attractive monthly salary based on qualification
2.) An open ended contract with high savings potential
3.) Quality single or family housing in Company communities
4.) Free medical care in Nigeria for contractor and family
5.) Accident Insurance
6.) Excellent educational assistance benefits with familystatus contracts
7.) Paid airfares allowing full flexibility with holidaytravel
8.) Personal effects shipment and excess baggage allowances
9.) Access to some of the finest social and recreationalfacilities in Nigeriae.t.c

Atlas Oil & Gasneeds your positive response if you are interested by you sending your UpdatedCurriculum Vitae (Resume) to the recruiting Manager, his name and contact is asfollows.

Name- Engr Gbenga Williams.
E-mail- gbenga@atlastoil-gas.llc.nu or gbengawill@yahoo.com
Phone- +234-8063829418

You can reach on to us on Phone+234-1-8967609, +234-1-8507693 , Fax- +234-1-7916561 and e-mail- info@atlastoil-gas.llc.nu , Further information of the company will begiven to you by Engr Gbenga Williams.

Metro or Bus?

2007-12-07T05:36:00.000+11:00

Moving around Madrid is very easy because transportation network in the city is excellent. This opinion, of course, is from somone who used to live in an overcrowded city in a third world/developing country, namely Jakarta. Jakarta's traffic is a mess and its transportation network is the same. Buses and trains are normally overcrowded during busy hours. The vehicles' condition is mostly bad and getting trapped in a traffic jam and going nowhere for half an hour or even an hour is considered normal in Jakarta. The worst traffic jam in Madrid is still better than the "normal" traffic jam during busy hours in Jakarta. Check this website to read more about this story.

Anyway, this is not a story about how good the traffic jam in Madrid is in comparison to that in Jakarta but about the two most convenient transportation modes in Madrid. The first one is underground train and the second inner city bus.

The people of Madrid are very proud of their underground train network or METRO as they call it here. It has many stations around the city, well-connected between metro lines (routes), well-connected to the bus and surface railway stations and it is one of the oldest underground train networks in Europe. More importantly, all metro stations in Madrid have clear signs, which are easy to follow although we don't speak Spanish and the stations are clean.

However, it doesn't mean there is no negative points about the metro stations in Madrid. The negative points are: first they don't have toilets at all and second some of them have no elevator, which can cause trouble for grandmas and grandpas and not accessible for the disabled people. Nevertheless, travelling by using metro in Madrid is generally quick, easy and convenient but we cannot enjoy the view of the city because all are underground.

If we want to enjoy the view of Madrid, then travelling by bus is the better option. Public bus in Madrid are well-maintained, most of them are new, clean and well-connected between bus route. There are lots of haltes in Madrid and they usually have enough information for us to find our way. There is a transporation map of the city in every halte and there is, of course, time table information for the particular bus routes that pass by the halte.

It is important to note that buses in Madrid are often full of passangers and it is fair to say that travelling by buses during busy hours can be a pain in the arse, well not arse but rather feet, because we probably have to stand in the bus all the way to our destination.

The puublic bus service in Madrid is managed by The Municipal Transport Company of Madrid S.A.. Its abbreviation is EMT or Empresa Municipal de Transportes de Madrid S.A. Its website is at http://www.emtmadrid.es/index.html?lang=eng. The website of EMT is an important source of information for travelling in Madrid by bus because it contains all bus routes in the city. We can find the exact location and halte numbers of the bus we want to travel with in the EMT website.

So, metro or bus, each has its own advantages and disadvantages. Both are useful, modern and well managed.

A Lifestyle Consultant

2007-12-04T09:19:00.000+11:00

A new concept of service is now being provided by a company called Mandhala based in Madrid. This company gives advices to clients who would like to enhance their personal image, enjoy lives and get to know more about lifestyle in the city.

The company provides information about what to do, where to go and how to enjoy live in Spain and Madrid in particular. It also advices on what clothes to wear and where to shop them, what exhibition and social/club party to attend. Furhtermore , entry tickets to any exhibition or cinemas can also be provided by the company. Basically it can provide anything related to lifestyle to clients who have no time to organize it themselves.

The concept of personal service provided by a lifestyle consultant is a bit different from that provided by a life mentor. A life mentor usually deals with behaviour and problems of his/her client and suggests them on how to deal with the clients' personal problems. A lifestyle consultant, on the other hand, deals with the enjoyable side of life of their clients. A lifestyle consultant does not sell service on how to deal with emotional problem or bad-mood and daily life problem with office colleagues, for example.

Being a lifestyle consultant means it is neccesary to know much about nearly everythings, including at least: tourist places, food, dressing style, the entertainment world, shopping centres, cultural festivals and transportation network. Knowing transporation network is important because it is related to information on how to get to the attraction places efficiently.

It will be interesting to find out if this kind of service is really needed and whether or not it can be a trend for the future model of personal service business. One thing is clear though, being familiar with a new environment is needed by people who are being assigned to a new place, therefore this service is useful for foreigners, like me (it's a pity I don't have enough money to hire a lifestyle consultant).

Christmas Gift

2007-12-03T06:41:00.000+11:00

What kind of gift would you want for Christmas?

A new car? Easy, as long as you have much money or your parents have lots of money or your partner has lots of money.

A new house? This is easy, too, again as long as you have money to buy it.

A new girlfriend/boyfriend? Well, although it is not that easy but still there is a chance you can get it.

Now what about peace in the Middle East?

What about no more "terrorism", any kind of terrorism, in the world?

What should we do to achieve it? It cannot be bought by using our money, neither can it be forced by power. We have no influence to engineer anything. We cannot prevent those with power to keep sending troops, either. Will Santa give us this kind of gift?

Parking a car at the corner between 2 streets

2007-11-27T10:05:00.000+11:00

One thing I find strange here in Madrid is, we are allowed to park a car at the corner between two streets. Usually this is done when we need to stop by, just for a couple minutes and do not intend to park for hours. All we need to do is just turn on the emergency light. That's it.

I have no idea whether this is actually illegal or not, but many people do it and I have never seen police fine drivers who park their cars at the corner of the streets. It is possible that this kind of parking can only be done on small streets, not on main roads in the centre of the city where traffic is heavy.

Nevertheless, this is the first time I see people park their cars at the corners of 2 streets. It certainly does not happen in Indonesia, neither does it in Australia, well, at least based on my experience there.

Bad Wine

2007-11-25T08:39:00.000+11:00

It costs just over €2 a bottle, in fact, a litter. It was €2.35 precisely. The reason I bought it was because I wanted the bottle, which I am going to use as a water bottle in my office. Having a water bottle means I don't need to walk to our pantry every time I need to drink just a little cup of water. It is not that I don't want to walk at all but I can walk to the pantry 20 times a day just for drinking 100 ml of water because the only available cup is in this size.

This wine tastes awful, even for someone who knows nothing about wine, which is me. I can tell if it tastes really awful because it's sour. It leaves bad taste in my mouth after drinking it.

I guess we can tell from its price really. We can expect nothing from a bottle of wine that costs only €2.35/l. The only good thing I can think of this wine is its bottle. A water bottle that costs me €2.35, not bad really.

Fighting for Survival - Self-Taught Spanish 1

2007-11-23T09:19:00.000+11:00

So, how do you order a Subway when you don't speak Spanish at all?

Well, first of all, remember the steps here:
1. Choose from Subway menu (don't forget to remember numbers in Spanish)
2. Decide type of bread you want and its size
3. Order for extra cheese or no
4. Add vegetables
5. Add Sauce
6. Eat in or take away
7. Ask how much the price is

In Spanish, you will have to say:
1. Subway: Pollo Teriyaki (for example), or say Numero Uno, Dos, Tres,... (1,2,3,...)
2. Tipo de pan...(choose from the pictures, there are 4 types: blanco, integral, avena dulce and another one...I can't remember). The size option is either mediano (mid size) or grande (full size)
3. No extra queso (no extra cheese)
4. Con lechuga, tomate y cebolla (with lettuce, tomato and onion), con acetuna y pepino (with olive and cucumber)
5. Salsa mayonnaise (for example if you want mayonnaise or just point any one you want)
6. Para comer aqui (Eat in) or para llevar (take away)
7. Cuanto es? (How much?)

If the person who serves you asks too many questions, just say: sorry mate, I don't understand what you're talking about. Just fucking give me what I said and be quick! I am fucking hungry now, asshole!

Okay, good luck!

CV-DVD Labels & Laser Printer

2007-10-06T16:07:00.000+10:00

They just don't work!

Sometime they do work, but there is only 30% chance they can fit nicely to each other. In other word, out of 10 pages of sticker you print out, there are only 3 pages that you can use. This doesn't mean they are perfect. They are just "use-able".

It is clearly stated on its container that the label is suitable for most desktop inkjet and bubblejet printers. It doesn't mention anything about laser printer. Somehow I was confident that it can be printed on a printer and eager to give it a go, especially after the shopkeeper at OfficeWorks told me "there is no reason why it's not gonna work on a laser printer". I thought "Okay, that's great because I don't have a inkjet and the only printer available in my lab is a black and white laser printer."

Well, the main reason why it is not suitable to be printed on a laser printer is because sometime (not sometime but most of the time) it takes the printer too long to pull the thick label in and therefore when the printer has started printing out the words, the label is still not in. This means the position of the words printed on the label is totally wrong although when I tested the layout on a normal A4 paper it looks good.

Another lesson to learn, by making mistake. I would have been better if I learned it from someone else' mistake though, not mine...

What About Me

2007-10-06T12:14:00.000+10:00

"What About Me" is a song that told a story about how "small people" are neglected by the society. The "small people", who live in the ground level of the social system can be those who are still young, have nothing or low-paid jobs. The song was sung by Moving Pictures, a rock band from Sydney in 1980s.

Check this YouTube Video out to listen to the lyrics and have a thought about our surrounding where we can see those "neglected people":

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GClKDN9o88U

Cutting Refugee Intake and the Bashing of A Sudanese Boy

2007-10-03T23:28:00.000+10:00

Mr. Kevin Andrews, the Federal Immigration Minister of Australia, is back in the news headlines. He announced the decision of Australian government in cutting the intake of African refugees, particularly from Sudan, and cited the difficulty of those people in integrating into the Australian society as his reason.

The announcement was made on the back of news of one Sudanese boy who died recently as a bashing victim by three teenagers in Noble Park, Victoria. It was originally thought that the boy was involved in a fighting with a kind of "gang", perhaps of African background, however later on Police found out that the basher are not of African origin.

The timing of Mr. Andrews' announcement is quite strange because to tell people that the African refugees intake from Sudan will be cut due to their difficulty in adapting to the Australian lifestyle while one Sudanese boy actually died as a bashing victim by three other boys and girl, without any information on who was at fault, frankly does not make sense at all. It was pretty much a prejudice that the boy died because of his own fault, perhaps he bullied his basher or tried to robe one of the basher, or because he didn't want to do what most ordinary Australian do.

Understandably, Mr. Andrews has to cope with heavy criticisms from several people, no less than the Premier of Victoria, Mr. John Brumby and the Police Chief of Victoria, Ms. Christine Nixon.

Ms. Nixon told that the numbers of crime committed by the Sudanese only make up 1% of the total numbers of crime they deal with in Victoria and are not represented more than the proportion of their population.

What already clear is the government of Australia had decided to limit the intake of African refugees of Sudanese origin, due to reasons we don't know, and the recent bashing case of a Sudanese boy has been taken for a ride by the office of the Federal Minister of Immigration to announce its decision. It must have been more difficult for the minister to announce the decision had there been no case involving member of the Sudanese community recently.

Repairing My Own Laptop

2007-09-30T16:13:00.000+10:00

Being confident alone is not enough to help you repair your own laptop, although the task you want to do is as simple as changing a CMOS battery. It takes more than confidence, knowledge of the location of the battery in the laptop and having the right tools to perform the task. A right way to start is to know what you want to do and how you want to get into the point of doing the task, in other words, what to disassembly first, second, third and so on.

Unlike a PC, disassembling a laptop is not a matter of loosing all screws and pulling all cases then you can see everything in the box. A laptop is different from the larger personal computer because firstly a keyboard in a laptop is located on top of the machine, secondly opening the bottom cover of the laptop doesn't mean we can see the laptop machine and thirdly, in order to open the bottom cover itself you need to find the unseen screws, which somehow may be located "under" the keyboard.

My first adventure in disassembling my old, secondhand and cheap Compaq Presario 700EA nearly successfully break down the unlucky machine and at one stage I thought if I could not assembly it again, then I would have had to get it binned permanently. I tried to loose all screws that I could see at the bottom cover of the laptop and thought it should be enough. I started to pull the cover but failed to open it and forced it until it nearly cracked.

I thought I needed to disassembly the screen first so that I can open the bottom cover, so I pull out all screws on the screen and disassembly everything. I still could not take the bottom cover off. Then I realises there must be some screws that still hold the bottom cover. These screws might be located under the keyboard, so I tried to pull my keyboard but I don't know how to do it. I decided to take its button off one by one. When I realised the screws were not there (which means I did another mistake), I spent more than one hour to assembly everything back to as before my work started.

Having finished assembling the laptop, I browsed the internet afterward and found the following website, which provides instruction on how to disassembly a COMPAQ laptop:

http://repair4laptop.org/disassembly_compaq.html

Apparently, I should not have opened up the bottom cover of my laptop to change a CMOS battery. I just need to take off the LED panel, the keyboard, the optical drive and the plate where the keyboard sits.

In total I just need to loosen about 8 screws, 3 in the bottom of the laptop and 5 under the keyboard. I don't need to touch the screen whatsoever, let alone totally disassembling the screen as I did before I learned from the website. The keyboard itself can be folded as a whole once the LED panel has been taken off. So I don't need to take the buttons off one by as one as I tried to do before.

I was lucky to be able to assembly my computer back without having any major problem when I disassembled it. I broke the button of the conventional modem of my laptop when I pulled it apart, but everything else is fine. Finding the website above has helped me fixed my laptop more efficiently and now the CMOS battery of my old laptop has been replaced with a new one. No more adjusting time and date every time when my Ubuntu start up. The lesson to learn is, make sure you know what you want to do and how you want to do it. Don't forget to learn from others.

Wasting Wealth a la Mr. Abramovich

2007-09-23T22:13:00.000+10:00

Jose Mourinho, arguably the most successful coach of Chelsea FC, resigned from the club last week after a draw against Rosenborg of Norway in the group stage of the 2007/2008 UEFA Champions League. The story of his resignation shocked the football world, because the club and Mr. Mourinho himself have tried very hard to play down any problem between the owner of the club, Roman Abramovich, with the manager until recently. However, only a day after Peter Kenyon, the chief executive of Chelsea FC reiterated that Jose Mourinho is the future of the club, up came the sacking news.

It was published that the club parted company with Mr. Mourinho by "mutual consent", in the sense that Mourinho was not sacked and in the same time he didn't resign either. By using the "mutual consent" term, it means Mr. Mourinho will be entitled to approximately 20 millions pounds pay-off, as a compensation from the club to ask him go.

Mr. Abramovich has just thrown away 20 million pounds as if that amount of money was only peanuts to him. It is ridiculous to think about some people cannot even find a single dollar a day to make a living, while in the another part of this world someone has just wasted 20 million pounds happily.

The pay-off for Mourinho is the latest example of Abramovich's "generosity" in spending million after million to buy overpriced football players and inflate the salary of players in his club. Overall he has spent over 200 million pounds to date. There are no economic nor business calculations that can be applied to explain the football club management a la Mr. Abramovich. It is just extraordinary and out of this world.

The Paranoid Thinking of a Postgrad Student

2007-09-22T21:43:00.000+10:00

There is a phase when a postgraduate student is very scared of one thing related to their project, namely losing all works they have been doing for the last couple of years, due to a problem in their computer system. The problem can be caused by a hard disk failure, or perhaps a software f*ck up and a more extreme one, somehow fire burn down the building where they have been working days and nights, due to electricity short circuit from one computer in the building. I know it sounds funny and this clearly is an extreme paranoid thinking of the student, but to be honest, it does come up in my mind.

I thought it was funny when I read the "Tales from the Road" comics of Jorge Cham (Jorge = Whor Hé), in which he revealed that one of his fans in Kansas University (if I remember correctly) always has her project back up around her neck, i.e. she wears her USB disk - containing the back up of her project - as a necklace. This sounds like taking the caution to the very extreme - I for one will not do it, however it is understandable if students do not want to lose any bit of their works especially when they are approaching the end of their project.

I myself have burnt more DVDs in the last couple of weeks than I ever burn in a year during the second year of my candidature. I usually back up my project every 3 months in the first year. I used to trust the computer system very much. I always think they are reliable and they don't often have any problem anyway.

One day, there was a leak from the plumbing system of the university, the computer where I had project was affected, it was flooded by water and needed to be shutdown, but afterward it cannot be restarted. I could not work on my project for a month. I was still lucky to be able to get the data and my project out of the computer, no data loss at all. It is unimaginable if something worse had happened. I don't want to take any gamble since then, better safe then sorry, I do my back up every month.

In the last couple of weeks, I have this strange thought of all sorts of possibilities that can make my project folder under threat. Starting from a failure in my PC, my lab mate mistakenly bin my stuffs to the university building on fire. It then makes me think that I need a way to save my data/analysis results. So I burn 3-4 DVDs in a week, while having a back up of my project folder in a USB and also another back up in an external hard disk. So, I have 3 back ups and one original folder. As if this is still not enough, I am always extra cautious when I want to cross a road, making sure I can pass safely to the other side of the road and just in case if a driver didn't see.................oh dear, terrible!

Crime Unfolded - The Story of Qian Xun Xue

2007-09-22T16:09:00.000+10:00

Be aware of whom you sit next to in your next flight to oversea. He/she may have committed a crime somewhere and is running away to hide him/herself.

A man, who is suspected of murdering his wife, is believed to be in Los Angeles at the moment, hiding low while Interpol are chasing him. He is of Chinese origin and have been living in Auckland, New Zealand for the last 10 years. He was married to a 27 years old Chinese girl and they have one daughter for the marriage.

The story started when he abandoned his 3 years old daughter in Southern Cross station in Melbourne and the security CCTV camera saw a little girl wandering around by herself without company of anyone on Saturday morning (September 15). The little girl has been seen led by a man of Asian appearance but then the man disappeared, leaving the girl in the station. The girl was then approached by the station's security officers within 15 minutes and because she didn't speak anything, she was called "Pumpkin".

On Monday 8 AM, September 17, Police believed that the little girl and the man might be from overseas and they also believed the man was "her relative". By Monday mid-day, the Police learned that the little girl was from New Zealand and they found out she had arrived to Melbourne on Thursday afternoon or evening from New Zealand. The scenarios were formed based on several calls from public to CrimeStoppers' call line.

Tuesday, September 18, the names of the little girl, her mother and her father were finally discovered. She is Qian Xun Xue, 3 years old, lives in Auckland and the search for her mother started. The New Zealand Police were contacted and their search of Qian's mother was not successful. It was feared that "something" had happened to her mother.

Wednesday 4 PM, September 19, a body of a woman was found in the boot of a Honda parked outside Qian's house. It was feared that the body actually belongs to Qian's mother. A forensic test finally revealed she was Qian's mother. Interpol then have a case to chase a man, while the New Zealand Police have to cope some criticisms because they were thought to be a bit late in conducting a search of the car, which had been parked there when the Police and journalists visited the house two days before.

An international man hunt was then issued by the New Zealand Police, the LA Police are now working on the hunt and it will be interesting to see how this case ends in the future.

A Day in the Life of a Post-Grad Student

2007-08-23T23:35:00.000+10:00

A day in the life of a post-grad student:

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08.30 AM: Morning alarm (turn off alarm, laying on the bed for 10 more minutes before taking shower, this is the plan)
09.30 AM: Wake-up and realize it is already 30 minutes late (this is the actual)
10.00 AM: Breakfast, check world news
11.00 AM: Arrive at the univ., turn on computer, check emails part 1
12.00 PM: Morning coffee, socializing and building network until...
01.30 PM: Lunch
02.30 PM: Afternoon nap
04.00 PM: Check emails part 2, browsing football forums
05.00 PM: Doing research
06.00 PM: Happy hour
07.30 PM: Dinner
08.30 PM: Check emails part 3
09.30 PM: Making phone calls back home
10.30 PM: Writing for blogs, browsing, check emails part 4, until...
12.30 AM: Call it a day and take a rest, preparing for another hard day at school
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Aussie Guy Looking for Asian Girlfriend

2007-08-06T23:58:00.000+10:00

It is possibly a joke, but then it claims that the request is "genuine".

A bloke, perhaps a Monash University ex-student, has tried to advertise himself by displaying a piece of paper with handwriting on the announcement board in one faculty.

The ad is attached below:

Presumably he is desperately seeking for an Asian girlfriend, but then it could be that someone is trying to make a fool of the bloke. Although the advertisement is real, I just cannot believe someone would actually do this, seeking a girlfriend by displaying an ad like this.

I don't believe if a girl would actually be interested to contact the person at all. Nevertheless, it is quite funny :)

Farewell, Dr. Mohamed Haneef...

2007-07-29T22:44:00.000+10:00

Farewell, Dr. Mohamed Haneef, from the land of 'fair go', namely Australia, the land where everyone has equivalent rights, the land of dream, the land where the future is bright, Adios! See you around when we see you...(meaning: we most likely will not see you again, ever).

The first 10 words in the paragraph above were taken from The Sunday Age, published in Melbourne today (29th of July, 2007). It was the headline of the newspaper, covering the most recent debacle of Australian politics, where cousin of cousin of cousin of British terror suspects was mistakenly accused of helping his cousin of cousin of cousin to plan the bomb attack to Glasgow Airport.

Dr. Haneef, who has working visa as a health worker in Queensland, came to Australia on the basis of his needed skill, but because of his SIM card found in the apartment of the terror suspects, he was prosecuted in Australia.

The initial accusation was his SIM card found in a burnt car, the car that exploded in Glasgow, was used as an "evidence" of his involvement in the attack. But later it was found that the SIM card was actually seen in the apartment of his "cousins". His visa was canceled and not re-instated although it is now admitted by the Australian government that there's no basis to prosecute him (well not yet, this is what the government said).

"This is a political game.", said Jason Koutsoukis of The Age.

Indeed! It is a nasty game. And a disgraceful one, too!

Lycos Gives 3 GB for FREE

2007-07-26T00:05:00.000+10:00

Lycos - http://www.lycos.com give away 3GB of mailbox size for each of its free email address. On top of that, they allow you to attach anything as big as 20 MB. However, if your account is not active for 30 days, they will delete everything you have in the account, all of them except your username, and you cannot receive an email either!

Some major webmail providers fight each other nowdays. Yahoo7! (Yahoo!'s Australian portal) gives UNLIMITED mailbox size, while LIVE (Hotmail) give away 2 GB.

This trend obviously was started by GMail with its 1GB mailbox and then increasingly bigger until now becomes 2.8GB.

From my personal point of view, I still prefer to use GMail, because it is definitely faster and it collects every emails with the same subject under one heading only. Very useful because it is easier to follow discussions within the same subject. Kudos to Google!

(Apparently) Free SMS

2007-07-25T23:36:00.000+10:00

I was sent an email by a friend, telling about FREE SMS service by a website called SMSCity. Coincidently, I was looking for free SMS providers so that I can save some bucks by sending text messages over the internet, instead of using my mobil all the time. It costs me AU$0.35 to send an international text message, and I can send 20-30 messages a day, which will cost me hell lot of money. In Indonesia, it costs only Rp 350/text message, which is like AU$0.05 or five cents. Yes five cents only!

Back to SMSCity...I registered straigthaway and got my 20 credits for FREE. Then I started playing around the Send SMS page. The price of 1 international SMS costs 8 credits, which means I can send less than 3 SMSes with the my first 20 credits. The FREE SMS section itself can only be active during "Happy Hour" and for me in Australia, my happy hour is 6 PM - 7 PM everyday.

During the "Happy Hour", only 1 sms can be sent everyday and the funny thing is, if I wanted to send the 2nd one, I have to do it at 8 AM in the next morning. It is funny in my opinion because it is nearly impossible for someone to send the SMS exactly at 8 hour 00 minute 00 second. Beside that 8 AM is a time when someone is preparing to go to his/her office/school/university. Or perhaps they are not awake yet. I haven't really tried how it works, because I am not awake around this hour.

SMSCity provides a reasonable service for people who expect some freebies, obviously there are no free lunch these days, so a service like this one is good enough for me. And they allow me to buy cheap package for sending SMS as well, certainly cheaper than my mobile provider's price.

Scientific Commons

2007-07-16T18:46:00.000+10:00

A search-able website listing many millions of Master and Ph.D theses from around the world has been established by a university in Switzerland. This website is called Scientific Commons and its address is:

http://www.scientificcommons.org

Scientific Commons is a project owned by the University of St. Gallen with repositories located in universities in 50 countries (871 repositories as of today). It uses Open Access Protocol for Metadata Harvesting to retrieve the theses. The ScientificCommons website basically indexes the theses and the authors only and it provides a link directly to related repository for anyone who wants to download the files.

The project is aimed to provide freely accessible scientific knowledge to the world through internet connection, which is a noble idea that has to be supported by all of us.

Guide to Pre-Paid Plans in Australia

2007-07-11T18:26:00.000+10:00

Google helped me found this guide about available pre-paid plans in Australia. This is very useful and worth reading for those who want to live and get a pre-paid plan for their mobile in Australia. Here is the link:

http://www.bill-busters.com.au/prepaid.html

"I'm Paris Hilton! Get me out of this prison!"

2007-05-09T23:37:00.000+10:00

Some Paris Hilton's "fans" or rather "followers" are trying to save their lovely celebrity from living in a prison for 45-days. Paris Hilton herself, as reported by The Age, supported and urged her fans to sign an online petition, which was started by her friend Josua.

It seems that being a celebrity means someone could break the law and then tried to escape punishment. Perhaps Paris Hilton thought she is too pretty to become a prisoner?

The Last Message of Suicide Girls

2007-04-24T18:38:00.000+10:00

This article tells a story about how MySpace website of two girls (who later committed suicide by hanging themselves together in the same tree near Melbourne) received a last message as follow:

"RIP Jodie & Steph"

The message was posted one day before the girls went missing. Scary stuffs...:(