Christmas Gala

Tonight we were invited at the international Christmas Gala at the neighboring political sciences institute. The show featured performances from various countries like China, Moldova, New Zealand, Turkmenistan and Ghana. The music was modern with a mix of pop and hip-hop. For entertainment some tongue twisters were presented, where Chinese students would speak English sentences and foreign students some extremely complicated Chinese ones. The Moldovan students showed some traditional dances from their country. Chinese culture was also reflected in a demonstration of Kung-Fu and a small piece of Chinese opera taken from Journey to the West. The party ended with a large ball during until the early morning, with dances to the rhythm of rock or techno.

Thanksgiving

This year was my first opportunity to celebrate Thanksgiving, a Northern American tradition. With some American expatriates we met on this fourth Thursday in November for a cozy celebration. We had a potluck dinner, with a few different surprises and some fruit pies as dessert. Amongst the traditional American foods for the occasion we had mashed potatoes with gravy. There were also various kinds of meats. We did not stay very long after dinner and the giving of thanks as we had to go back to work on Friday.Thanksgiving has its roots in the early days of the colonies in New England. It evolved to become a national holiday in America. Today, there are some traditions have evolved with this feast, like the pardon of a turkey by the President of the United States. There, the following day is also an important day for shopping, known as “Black Friday”, as many shops have special offer before the start of the Christmas shopping season.

Happy Mid-Autumn

Wishing everybody in the world a happy Mid-Autumn.

Status update for Facebook

Has gone into retreat in a corporate monastery high up in the mountains. May not be able to connect to Facebook in the coming months. If you need to get in touch earlier, please take contact by email.

Slovenia in August

Just came back from a week-end in Slovenia. The Slovenian capital, Ljubljana, is a lovely city. Slovenia is still out of the beaten track for many tourists and the size of the city makes it easy to see most attractions walking. The country managed to get out of Yougoslavia early and was spared the war suffered by other republics, this combines by massive investments from neighbouring Austria enabled its rapid development. A castle dominates the city. On Saturday evening, I enjoyed a delicious Serbian menu at the Gostilnica Rio Momo on Slovenska Cesta. On Sunday, I visited Kopper on the Adriatic coast. The town is close to Italy and has a mix of Italian and Slavic flair. Pizzas were therefore delicious. The trip by train went through mountains and it was delightfull. Pictures of the trip have been added to Facebook and Multiply:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=293523&id=791795443&l=8f78e15173

Great Wall of Facebook: The Social Network's Plan to Dominate the Internet

Great Wall of Facebook: The Social Network's Plan to Dominate the Internet — and Keep Google Out

Posted using ShareThis

Global Ethics Forum

On Thursday July 2nd and Friday 3rd, I had the opportunity to attend the first conference of the Global Ethics Forum in Geneva. Most participants came from Switzerland and France. This forum is a meeting to explore and discuss responsibility whithin the economic environment. The keynote speaches were given by P. Werhane from the International Society for Business Economics and Ethics, J. Quelch from Harvard University and M. Sarabhai from Darpana for Development. Different round tables and smaller workshops helped us expand our horizon and discover various initiatives and share success stories. The Chinese vision 2030 was presented, to make China a leader in green energy whithin 30 years.

The proceedings will be made available soon on the Forums's website:
http://www.globalethicsforum.org/page.php?PAG_ID=35&LAN_CODE=EN

Beach vacation in Bulgaria

Just came back from one week of pure relaxation in Balchik on the shores of the Black see. Below are a few pictures from the area:

Living Values in Acuto

This week-end I had the privilege of attending the EBBF "Living Values" in Acuto near Rome: http://ebbf.org/living_values.html
It was a great opportunity to reflect about values at the workplace, connecting with like-minded individuals striving to increase the standard in the world. The keynote on Sunday was given by the CEO of a German aerospace company, and he explained that the first thing he deed when taking command was to improve the gender balance, having three women and three men as his direct reports. This had a positive outcome on the company and they managed to get a big contract with a large aerospace company.

Books festival in Tübingen

Today I was in Tübingen, a traditionnal university town by the Neckar river. The old town was still well preserved. Parks along the river enabled to take refuge from the heat of an early sommer day. Today there were many fairs dedicated to books, and many people were selling old ones, in addition, writers were invited to talk about their latest releases. You can see a few pictures of the town below:

Grameen Creative Lab

This week-end was sent in Wiesbaden, to attend the "Klassentreffen" (Class Reunion) of the Grameen Creative Lab. The work of Muhammad Yunus, the Grameen Bank and further initivatives and joint ventures to improve the lifes of poor people in Bangladesh were presented. Micro-credits are now even being introduced to the United States of America. In addition to inspiring presentations, we had plenty of opportunities to network with like-minded people, many social entrepreneurs looking at ways to make the world a better place for all people. A World Cafe enabled people to exchange insights. In the evening, the networking continued in the courtyard of a pub in the city centre. On the following morning, we met once again for a common breakfast where new ideas could be generated. New events will be organised by the Grameen Creative Lab all over Germany, to foster social entrepreneurship. Looking forward to meeting you there.

Easter at home

Enjoying time at home with family and friends for the Easter weekend.

Funny Pictures & MySpace 2.0 Layouts

Funny Pics & MySpace Layouts

Funny Stuff & MySpace Layouts

Konstanz

After one year in a tny village on the Northern shore of the lake of Constance I recently moved to the city of Constance. The commuting time is now more than one hour each way, on the other side I can enjoy more cultural activities in the evening. And there is the scenic boat trip on the lake twice a day with beautiful view of the lake.

Feliz Naw-Ruz

Feliz Año Nuevo Persa a todos. Que este año nuevo le traiga suerte, salud y felicidad.

Yatzy

En ny norsk film har kommet ut: Yazti

Om en ungdom som ble sendt ut av Oslo til landet.



Om dere lurer å hvorfor jeg gjør reklame for filmen. Det finnes nemlig frie billeter å vinne, selvom det er uklar om billetene blir sent til Tyskland.

Rheinfalls

Went to the falls of the Rhine in Neuhausen today. It was a nice walk from Schaffhausen. The waterfalls are the largest in plain waterfalls in Europe. The views were great, especially from above like from Schloss Laufen. In the late winter, it was not overcrowded yet, as only few tourists were there. The weather was overcast but still dry, pictures could have been greater with a blue sky.

Below are a few pictures from the area:

Birds' Test

And my results are: "Hummingbird"
Hummingbird

YAY!!! You're a Hummingbird! Their super interesting and everyone thinks so too. You love flowers (well hummingbirds do) and you go on your own pace and don't need to follow others! C:

På ski i Østerrike

I går har jeg vært på ski igjen. Det var faktisk første gang på tre år. Turen gikk til Schoppernau i Østerrike, two timers kjøretur fra Überlingen. Temperaturen var optimal, circa 7 minusgrader ved begynnelsen av turen. Totalt gikk jeg i fem timer, i en dal men fine utsikter over alpene. Selv om jeg ikke hadde gått på ski i mange år, hadde jeg ikke glemt alt, og beina kunne finne igjen en passende måte å bevege meg. Likevel ble det tungt til slutten og kommer til å føler det i beina i noen dager fremover.

Feliz Año Nuevo (Chino) 新年快乐

Feliz Año Nuevo. Que el año del Buey le traiga suerte, salud, riqueza y alegria.

Fenêtre sur le Monde - La Chine Splendide

Mes derniers jours de mon second periple Chinois m'ont amené à Shenzhen, une ville de plus de dix millions d'habitants à la frontière avec Hong-Kong. Il y a trente ans, cet endroit ne contenait que quelques petits villages de pêcheurs et maintenant c'est l'une des plus grandes métropoles du monde grâce à son statut de zone économique spéciale. A côté des grands magasins, la ville offre également de beaux parcs. Dans au moins deux d'entre eux il est possible de passer une journée entière. La Fenêtre sur le Monde présente les sites les plus connus de tous les continents, bien que la part de l'Europe me semble exagérée par rapport aux autres regions. Parmi les attractions, on peut noter un Taj Mahal miniature, une copie de la Tour Effeil. Il y a également une piste de ski avec de la neige artificielle et une patinoire. A intervalles réguliers, des groupes de danses présentent des danses traditionnelles de diverses parties du monde.
Le second parc présente la Chine, avec ses monuments fabuleux et sa diversité ethnographique. Des reproductions en miniatures des principaux sites Chinois sont placés dans une configuration correspondant à leur place sur une carte du pays. Des villages des groupes minoritaires comme les Yi ou les Miao ont été construits et les traditions de ces groupes sont présentées au public. Il y a même des démonstrations de danses folkloriques, parfois le public étant invité à participer. Et le soir un spectacle théatral contant l'histoire de la Chine. L'entrée de chaque parc est de 120 RMB, c'est un peu cher comparé au coût de la vie local, mais cela vaut la peine en raison de la beaute des parcs et de leur valeur éducative. Ce soir je prends l'avion pour Shanghai et si la durée de la correspondance avant la vol pour Munich le permet, je visiterais la ville en utilisant le Transrapid Maglev, le train le plus rapide au monde, reliant l'aéroport au quartier d'affaire.

Vous trouverez les images sur Facebook:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=207060&l=162f6&id=791795443
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=207125&l=f972a&id=791795443

Wochenende in Zhaoqing

Am Wochenende hatte endlich zwei Tage frei und konnte deswegen weiter weg von der Stadt und andere Gebiete der Provinz Guangdong besuchen. Die Entscheidung ging für Zhaoqing, eine Millionenstadt am Westfluss in der Richtung von Nanning. In der Nähe der Stadt befindet sich einen schönen Park um den Sternsee. Am Sonntag war es Zeit für eine kleine Wanderung in den Bergen, im DingHu Shan Gebiet. Der Ort ist seit Jahrhundete heilig für die Buddhisten, und ein Kloster konnte besucht werden. Es war schön einer der wenigen europäische Touristen zu sein.
Bilder von der Tour sind im Facebook zu sehen:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=207058&l=7745c&id=791795443

Guangzhou

Today, I had the chance to visit the large city of Guangzhou, also known as Flower City, which is China's second or third largest. As the saying goes, there people eat everything that has four legs except chairs, everything that swims except submarines and everything that flies except planes. Indeed, in a sidestreet close to the main mosque, there were many food shops selling things unusual to Europeans, like alligators, snakes or scorpions for cooking. The place where I had lunch did not have a menu translated into English, so I used the picture menu instead and ended up choosing something that reminded me of a fish dish I ate in a Chinese restaurant in Sharjah a few years ago, but to my surprise it was meat. And my friends back in Zhuhai could not tell me what it was as the name of the food was composed of a flower and the name of the street. Later I visited Samyan Island, which is home to many embassies and shows architectural features between European and Chinese. There were even Tibetan prayer flags on a church.
The area close to the bus station is full of shops for clothes, and is worth visiting, hunting for bargains.

Feliz Año Nuevo 2009

Feliz año nuevo para ustedes. Que este año nueve le traiga fortuna y alegria.