Is it worth?

Traveling is always a delicious thing. You have the preparation time, when you savor the thoughts of every little thing you gonna do when you get to your target place. Then, it comes the trip, you enjoy the place as much as you can. At the end comes...nothing less than.... the end. When you start savoring all the things you left behind, all the undone jobs you promised you would do and you did not finish because you were checking all the schedules of your trip.

But only one thing you probably didn't think about: the trip itself. I really mean it. We can list in it waiting time in airports, time spent inside the airplanes and time spend complaining about your broken luggage.

When waiting in the airport, you start to wonder about those people who will flight with you. Come on, look around, some of them are kind of weird, aren't they? Look that family with the mother alone with some kids, yeah those kids who look like angels now, they are actually the ones who will scream the entire trip and not let you sleep all night! And what about that girl dressed with such a short skirt that she can hardly seat, and you wonder how she is gonna spend 11 hours sleeping X seating X spending time in a closed and tight airplane seat? To avoid self pitty you think of your MANTRA: the nice beach where you gonna dive and walk and all the delicious things you gonna eat....

Boarding time!!!! Finaly we got there! Of course the objective of a transatlantic flight will be to carry as much people as they can in the best price (for the airplane company!why? you thought it would be for you?). So boarding time means, for you who didnot buy at least a business ticket, waiting on a long line for some miiiiinutes. To avoid self pitty you think of the nice beach where you gonna dive and walk and all the delicious things you gonna eat....

Inside the airplane you realize that all that money you spent in the ticket is not well employed by the company and they do not give you a confortable seat (unless...). Instead, you will think about all those times you promised yourself you would actually engage in a diet! But you didnt't! Why? IF you travel by TAP (the portuguese airlines) you will have some problems with your seat. It is so tight that if you are a little bit taller than the average, your shoulders will touch the shoulders of your neighbours. Unless, of course, you are lucky and you don't have anybody seating besides you (which is kind of rare). To avoid self pitty you think of the nice beach where you gonna dive and walk and all the delicious things you gonna eat....

After a night spent in the airplane, with the very cold (or hot) air conditioner, with a drunk neighbour who woke you up all the time to go to the toilette to do only God knows what, the other one who snored the entire night in your ears together with drooling, after the fantastic dinner, after the crying-running nose-kids who ran up and down the entire night finally got asleep, after you started to actually follow up all the minutes left to the end of the trip, you wake up (given that you could sleep) and run to the toilette to enjoy those few minutes that it is still not so, let's say, used. To avoid self pitty you think of the nice beach where you gonna dive and walk and all the delicious things you gonna eat....

The airplane landed!!!!! This is the happiest time ever since the beggining of the trip. You run to pick up your bag praying it came with you and you can go to have a shower after this incredible night. You pass a pleasant half to one hour in the passport control queue and to avoid self pitty you think of the nice beach where you gonna dive and walk and all the delicious things you gonna eat.... Now, where is the bag?After a moment of suspense, there it is! A bit scratched and with some handlers missing, but IT is there! Happily you forget all the bad moments and from now on it is just pleasure!

But is it? All of this, is it worth?

Well, I hope you don't ever pass through these 'funny' passages, if you do, just think about the MANTRA: think of the nice beach where you gonna dive and walk and all the delicious things you gonna eat.... See you walking in the crunchy warm white sand in the breezy sea shore with refreshing cold waters.

Copenhagen meeting...

Scientists and politicians of several countries met last week in Copenhagen to talk about the weather changes that have been happening in the last years since the Kyoto signing and to decide what to do next.

It is a fact that our little blue planet has changed since we were kids. I remember a different weather when I was a kid, probably my grandma remembers the same thing. My city, Brasília, the capital of Brasil (that's right, it is not Rio de Janeiro) has a period of June to September without any rain. 40 years ago when my mother moved there, right after the inauguration of the city, there was rain by this time and temperature was not so high around 25-28, today the temperature is around 28-30.

It is also a fact that we have our dose of guilt in the CO2 emissions and still some people believe that global warming isn't caused by men! This sounds unbelievable. Of course, there is the natural course of nature, but since the industrialization time, it increased absurdly.

I hope politicians will get to positive conclusions and we will do our best all around the world to avoid a bad future for the sons of our sons. I live here a video, as I see it is a fashion to use 'poor' Hitler to different reasons, but this one is quite good and about how everybody is concerned with the weather. It is in german, but at the right low corner of the video there is a closed caption for the "English text."



Well, we can do our part, trying to minimize our shower time, and turn off electric machines when not in use (not leaving them in stand by), buy the ones that have clever energy usage, solar energy is an alternative (Germany is quite good in that, told me a German person) and some other things that can be useful...
Think about it, it is worth while!

Event of the year in Geneva

The Escalade, invasion plan

I heard from natives that this celebration is one of the most important ones in the city, it is called Escalade (like in 'climbing').

It starts one weekend before the Dec 12th with a race in the Vieille Ville of Geneva, where serious runners and also disguised runners go to run.

The main time of the celebration is on the night from Dec 11th to Dec 12th. Why? Well, everything started in 1602 with Charles Emmanuel, duke de Savoy (one of the french regions right besides Geneva). He was a duc whose ambition didn't have any limits and he decided to surprisingly invade Geneva with his army and like this save its people from heresy.

Late at night they prepare in Plainpalais to climb the city with portable stairs and arms when a group of Swiss soldiers coming from the Monnaie gate (which can be visited only by this time of the year) interrupt them! Meanwhile they fight, a soldier (Isaac Mercier, who became famous) shoots his arquebus and the alarm is given, the bells in the Temple of St. Pierre start to ring and all citizens wake up and go to fight.



According to Genevois legend, Catherine Cheynel, originally from Lyons and the wife of Pierre Royaume, ("Mère Royaume"), a mother of 14 children (wow), seized a large cauldron of hot soup and poured it on the attackers. The Royaume family lived just above the La Monnaie town gate. The heavy cauldron of boiling soup landed on the head of a Savoyard attacker, killing him. The commotion that this caused also helped to improve the townsfolk to defend the city.



After losing, the Duke of Savoy was obliged to accept a lasting peace, sealed by the Treaty of St. Julian in July 12, 1603, and forget the fact that his trial to end up the influence of Calvin (died 1564) was over. The Escalade was from that time onwards destined to become a symbol of the independence of Geneva, celebrated since every year.

Now you might be asking, why is it so important they celebrate it? Well, think about it. If the French would have won:
1. Geneva would be capital of Savoy region (a very different European map!) and;
2. it would be Catholic instead of being this strong Protestant city it has been since Jean Calvin lived and made this city the Reform head quarters.
3. Another consequence, this one economical, was that some of the more financially-minded Protestants, feeling safe in the haven of Calvin’s city, set up Geneva’s original private banks!

Escalade celebrations include a large marmite (cauldron) made of chocolate filled with marzipan vegetables and candies wrapped in the Geneva colours of red and gold. It's customary for the eldest and youngest in the room to smash the marmite, while reciting, "Ainsi périssent les ennemis de la République! " (Thus perish the enemies of the Republic).




we have to make our own video with our own Marmite!

Other traditions include mulled wine and a large serving of soup, and children in Halloween-like costumes singing Escalade songs for money. And, of course, people disguised in clothes from that time go in procession around the Old Town role playing the important events of that night.

Welcome back...

yeah, WELCOME really for me.

I spent the entire last week in Gödöllő city and what else?Working? After a time like this it is kind of healthy.

I left Geneva on Saturday in the direct flight to Budapest and arrived 20 min before the forecasted, isn't that rare?

Then with the husband parents we went to a restaurant to celebrate the 'name day'. Honestly, I hate this kind of celebration, through all the years I lived there the older people always tried to push this 'event' on me. Not to mention that in the lab the people of my generation reallllly didn't care about it at all. Well, I am sorry but this is how it stayed for me.

Discordances apart, besides the husband parents, other two relatives of his immense family were there, and this accounts for almost everybody (a bit amazing for me, because my close family is composed of about 25-30 people). The restaurant located in the outskirts of Budapest was very cute and with the shape of a boat. The food was good although it is difficult to find a restaurant in Hungary whose food is not hot (on the meaning of veeeery spicy) at all. Well, the meaning is that who needed reading spectacles, didn't have them. I know what this means, since I used glasses for 15 years!

They have a very funny tradition this family. They borrow among themselves the reading glasses, isn't that amazing??? What happened? The waiter overheard they mentioning they can't read the menu so he came and offered what? No, not a menu with bigger letters, instead he offered reading glasses according to their degrees!

Then I passed a homy week working in Gödöllő at the ABC (or MBK). Oh gosh, how I missed being among those funny people and breathing some scientific air. Yeah, Hungarians are funny besides what I listened around here....they are serious when they have to be!

I also enjoyed the price (I didn't know that in Switzerland it was already available) and the time to take the H1N1 vaccine. For those who are curious about the side effects, I didn't have any, just my arm was hurting for a while.

After all experiments were over, I had time to visit the Vörösmarty Xmas market, one of the best around here in Europe and one of the few opened on Sundays! We have kind of a tradition, every year he have to go there or to other Xmas fair. The square is very beautifully decorated, the handcrafts you can buy are amazing and stylish, the food is delicious (and hot) and the mulled wine is fantastic (it is worth to keep the mug that comes with it, we have a collection!). One of the little shops calls foreigner's attention a lot: the kürtőskalács one which is a sweet bread prepared in the wood fire and covered with sugar and walnut/cinnamon/chocolate when it is still hot, it has mouth-watering smells meanwhile it is baked and when it is ready the smells are incredibly tasty!

The night can then be finished with a walk around the boulevard and after at the Andrassy street
with its Xmas decoration. Actually the Xmas illumination of the entire city is extraordinary.

I also came back with the direct flight Budapest-Geneva. one of my sorrows is for how long this flight will be kept because both days I flew the airplane had no more then 20-30 people. Otherwise, if they close it we will have to go to Zurich or by EasyJet.


Now it is back for the same life than before, but with other eyes of course.




The Xmas market view

What now?

Well, Switzerland decided with 57% of the votes to not allow more minaret constructions accounting for the first European country to do this. Lots of people thought the construction wouldn't be banished.

What will happen from now on? The party that favors these results, the rightwing Swiss People's Party and the ultra conservative Federal Democratic Union, say that Muslims should interact and integrate into society. What the religious people, 4.5% of the Swiss population, will say about it? On Sunday, after the voting results some went to manifest their rage in the gare Cornavin, in the center of Geneva. A few glasses were broken.

So, they will have to keep praying in the four existing minarets in Switzerland or in the 200 mosques and prayer rooms spread around here. Further requests to build minarets are pending.

Weekend task

This weekend will be a big one in Geneva. They will have a big voting time.

As this is a very democratic country (?) they will vote on constructing (or finishing the construction) of a train that would link part of the city that have quite long traffic jams and we need some buses to get there. Also they will vote if Switzerland should keep exporting 'war weapons'. I think since the two big wars they are big producers!

Also, they will vote, and this will be one of the most important ones, if they should ban construction of more Minarets within the country borders an idea launched by right-wing political Swiss groups. WHy is this topic interesting? two reasons:

1. the Swiss Federation of Jewish Communities and the Platform of Liberal Jews in Switzerland said this law would infringe religious freedom and inhibits the integration of Muslims in Switzerland and also that banning them is no solution serving to create a sense of alienation and discrimination for them here. This opinion is quite historical since local Christian, Jewish and Muslim leaders have also joined forces to reject a ban on minarets. Unfortunately, the Minaret-mosque in Grand-Saconnex close to the Airport was attacked and some windows got broken...

2. In Switzerland, like in other countries around here, voting is not obligatory, in Brazil it is! And here you can vote by post! Can you imagine what some countries could do with this? I can imagine what would happen in Brazil.

Advertisement displayed all over the country!

I think that banning or not their construction won't stop the racism problem. I think people should get better informed and learn more other cultures!

Should we be con-CERN-ed?

THis is a general question. Did you watch or read the book 'Angels and Demons' from Dan Brown? No, this is not an ad. Have you ever heard what is CERN?

in the tunnel (imagine how fit you can get if you work inside it)

Well, maybe in short words: "it is the European Organization for Nuclear Research and one of the world’s largest and most respected centres for scientific research. Its business is fundamental physics, finding out what the Universe is made of and how it works. At CERN, the world’s largest and most complex scientific instruments are used to study the basic constituents of matter — the fundamental particles. By studying what happens when these particles collide, physicists learn about the laws of Nature.

The instruments used at CERN are particle accelerators and detectors. Accelerators boost beams of particles to high energies before they are made to collide with each other or with stationary targets. Detectors observe and record the results of these collisions."

"The Large Hadron Collider (LHC) is a gigantic scientific instrument near Geneva, where it spans the border between Switzerland and France. It is a particle accelerator (I just love this name in Hungarian) used by physicists to study the smallest known particles – the fundamental building blocks of all things. It will revolutionize our understanding, from the minuscule world deep within atoms to the vastness of the Universe."

In other words, this very serious antimatter stuff is built right under our noses. The LHC accelerator is a ring 27 kilometers in circumference. It is installed in a tunnel about 100 m underground. You can see the round outline of it marked on a map of the area.

The circle shows the position on the map of the 27 km tunnel of the LHC!Right under us...Does this mean anything to us in case something goes wrong?

These are temperatures to be registered in this week around here. Does it have something to do with the fact that the LHC was turned on some few time ago? After 7 years living in Europe, I never experienced that warmth in November! Maybe it is just the old friend global warming...

Does a commercial always tell the truth?

Unilever is being sued. Well, all these big companies have been sued. But this time it is a quite interesting reason. A 26 year-old men from New Delhi wants to acquire 26000 pounds with the excuse that what they said in the advertisement is not true.


Probably this didn't happen to him, poor one.

He claims to have been using the products from the brand for years and nothing happens. And?Well, the product affirms that if you use it, girls will fall for you. Since he has tried all the products of this line and nothing happened after about 3 years he feels it is his right to be 'reimbursed', specially after he has been suffering of depression and psychological damages.


He says in his court petition: "The company cheated me because in its advertisements, it says women will be attracted to you if you use Axe.I used it for seven years but no girl came to me."

Lynx - how unilever is known in India - didn't make any comments.

I am very curious with the outcome of this case.

Actually, when I met my husband, he used Axe. If Unilever wants to use us as witnesses, we are in...

2012?

The idea that the world can finish in 2012 as some predicted is quite....how can I say, shocking?

This image of the film 2012, where the Cristo Redentor or the Christ Sculpture in Rio de Janeiro falls apart together with the rest of the city is raising some polemic questions in Brazil a country which the majority of the people is very catholic, this kind of image is almost hurting their feelings.

The Cristo Redentor falling from the top of his mountain meanwhile the Pao de Acucar (Sugar Loaf) in the back and the Guanabara Bay get flooded by a big wave (at least the favela-slums- problems in these mountains would be solved!)

Would that be possible? Would it be like this? Well, let's see in 3 years. Until there we have time to visit this beautiful sightseeing in one of the most beautiful cities of the world.

The film will be on cinemas from Friday 13th (good timing!)

Snow walk!

As I mentioned before Geneva is positioned in quite an outstanding valey(?). One side the Jura mountain chain, on the opposite side the Saleve, 'behind' which we find the Mont-blanc chain, and besides it we find some other mountains. This confers to Geneva an unique weather, at least I think so : )

People we know that come from Nyon or that region to work here often say that the weather here is quite frightening because when they leave home in the early morning to come to work, the sun is shining and warm and when on their way here the see the big foggy cloud that swallows the entire city and nothing can be seen, even the other side of the road.

Yesterday we tested this theory. We left home to go hiking in the Jura mountain, since from our windows it looks like chantily was poured all over its top, like a nice sundae! Here it was foggy, rainny and cool on our way there, 5 km from our home, the sun started to shine strongly, birds started to sing and we got a nice visual on the Jura as Jack Bauer would say. Every example of autumn colours were visible. As we climbed the mountain bits of snow started to appear until everything was totally white like in a Xmas tale we see on TV. Even in Hungary I haven't seen this amount of snow.

Looking for snow to start the snow ball fight (ekkora hogolyo lehetett csinalni!). Look at the pines, cool!

As a Brazilian who was used to experience 17 degrees at night as the coldest temperature of the year I have to admit this is INDEED cold, but nevertheless magical. Everybody surrenders to this capricious beauty of nature.

The entrance of the ski court that was still closed at the Col de la faucille. Families with kids and their sledges (we need to get one for us)

The city of Mijoux in France, between the Jura and another moutain. Just gorgeaous. Imagine it with Xmas decoration??!!
We walked up and down testing gloves and hats that Decathlon provided us one day before, but we realized that we don't have proper shoes and trousers because everybody else was wearing the ski trousers and not getting as wet and damp and heavy as our trousers were.

We realized we have to equip ourselves and keep coming back to this piece of paradise (a cold one actually) that we have so close to us, since Geneva is still warm with its 7 degrees despite the lack of sun (though we heard and a fine snow might be coming next week).

And enjoy the chantily over the Jura top.

Not only of chocolate, Swiss army knife and Matterhorn lives the Swiss tourism

Besides chocolate, Swiss army knives, the Matterhorn, the alps for sking, watches and others, one more reason has been augmenting the tourism in Switzerland: the death tourism.

Euthanasia, does everybody know what this difficult word means?

It is the intentional killing by act or omission of a dependent human being for his or her alleged benefit. Another expression has become as 'famous' as that one is assisted suicide which happens when someone provides an individual with the information, guidance, and ways to take his or her own life with the intention that they will be used for this purpose. When it is a doctor who helps another person to kill themselves it is called "physician assisted suicide."

Why would one choose it, this is really personal, because it provides a way to relieve extreme pain and also a relief when his/her quality of life is low. All these reasons appliable only in one case: when one has a terminal incurable illnes, not the least, it is a case of freedom of choice.

Assisted death is such a controversial topic that it is only accepted as legal in a minimal amount of places like Switzerland, The Netherlands, Belgium, Luxemburg, and the State of Oregon in the USA. From these Switzerland has a particularity, it has been the only place in the world where non residents can go and legally find help to end their life. The Swiss law that allows anyone to help patients die, as long as there are no ulterior motives, dates back to 1942 and is at risk recently after a study showed more and more foreigners are traveling to the Alpine country to take their own lives.

Some weeks ago, Swiss Justice Minister Eveline Widmer-Schlumpf announced she is considering either restricting Switzerland's assisted suicide law in an attempt to cut what she called "death tourism" claiming that somebody can come to Switzerland and already the next day can have an assisted suicide through one of the so-called assisted suicide organizations. Conitnuing she says "We have no interest, as a country, in being attractive for suicide tourism,". Not to mention that "About one-third of the 400 people who came to Switzerland to die here in 2007 were foreigners from either Great Britain or Germany, where helping someone to kill themselves is almost always illegal," explains Bernatto Stadelmann, vice director of the Swiss Justice Ministry in Bern. The new rules would also prevent oganised assisted suicide from becoming a profit-driven business.

Non-government groups in Switzerland offer assisted suicide programs, including organizations like Exit, Ex-international, and Dignitas. From these just the last one welcomes foreigners., helping patients from abroad to obtain a prescription for a lethal dose of pentobarbital, a sleeping potion. Patients must ingest the drug themselves. Those too ill to drink can use a self-induced injection or a tube through the stomach.

This act of buying death in legal terms where the existing law of the land permits to do so has been seen with bad eyes since the gouvernment received information that in the last years not only patients suffering of terminal illnesses passed decided to end their lives like a British couple who were paralysed after an accident.

Probably until next March the government will send a draft law to the parliament.

Source: http://www.eturbonews.com

the sun

the guardian

popcorn session!

Have you seen these adds?


or
or maybe



The film today is District 9. At the beginning I really didn't want to watch it. Krisz is a witness.
Nevertheless we started watching... and it turns out it is not that bad, at least from the truth point of view. What the hec?

Well, if we stop to think that most of those hollywoodian aliens didn't really care about intereacting with humans, didn't have an organized community and were kind of not what we expect as aliens, that is what would happen to them.

First, humans wouldn't be sorry, they would isolate and as they show experiment with them, but not so few as they showed. Maybe because it took place in Johannesburg and not close to area 51!

After all, the special effects were good quality, the structure of the aliens was well imagined. I just don't understand what they eat finally, dead animals or one another?
Deserving a great OK is the marketing of the film. First time I saw these pictures I swear I had to think twice. Great idea.

So, interesting movie, in kind of a documentary shape that makes you think what humans would really do to them.

Bravo to area 51? I don't think so...

Swiss knives....again?

Maybe some of you might think I went nuts about this tool.
But this is funny. I found it in the GHI from this week in an advertisement from Artlebedev.
This is a good idea for a Swiss gift in Switzerland or for that person who is a once in a life time or an everyday Swiss chef.

This is what I am talking about. Not a Rambo Swiss Army knife, but a Jimmy Olivier version!
Which seen closer is the following:






Good visual trick, isn't it?

Screen capture of the week!
This is what the weather was supposed to be now.
I was amazed, so warm in the middle to the end of October.
We were in Budapest this weekend and it was colder there than here.
Cool, I wish it continued like this for the entire winter. Not something I will get...Maybe in 2100..

Hungarian, a fashion language?

Nowadays or I have been watching too many films or I pay too much attention to them or some languages have become fashionable.

Fashion is really amazing or maybe the government of these countries pay film directors for their languages to be inside the movies and series?

On a period of 2 weeks we watched some films with Hungarian speech in it! Short but it is there, why not Slovakian, or Croatian or Fin?MAybe Hungarian is just more intriguing.

The first film I basically ever heard about Hungary was the "The whole nine yards" about the a dentist's neighbor and the Hungarian mafia, which was a continuation. It is pretty funny and promising nice laughs till the end.

The second of nowadays was the short lived British series "How not to live your life". In one of the episodes, a girl is waiting tables and Don decides to defend her from a complainer client who shouts with the girl because she does not speak English though she works in an English pub in England. Hilarious adventures when Eddie, the deceased grandmother's carer, admits he can speak Hungarian which he learned meanwhile taking care of an old Hungarian lady.

The third, last week, was the series created to take over Lost after it will be over next year: "Flashforward". At the begining of the episode "Black Swan", meanwhile a man's flashforward in which a bus gets into the water and people draw in it, a guy is very calm and saves the life of a girl who shouts in Hungarian "nem tudok uszni nem tudok uszni!" (I can't swim!).



The last was yesterday night when we watched the awful (I didn't really enjoy) "Drag me to hell". A frightening old lady put a jinx in the bank girl because she didn't want to give her a loan to avoid her house to be taken from her. We think the old lady was Hungarian gipsy, according to her house and according to the saying of the curse: "az ördög bújjon beléd" and some other things we couldn't understand. It was very funny. We just don't understand why the néni's (aged lady) family name was Ganush instead of being Lakatos, now that would have been more real. Also funny was that the grand-daughter of Ganush néni had a Russian accent in English!

Take care next time you deny something to a lovely glass-eyed gipsy-Hungarian lady.

still about the smoke in the air...

This weekend in Fribourg.

Saturday we went to the nice and warm city of Fribourg in the canton of Fribourg! I only knew it was founded in the 14th century and it has a famous university. IT is a beautiful middle age town, built close to a 'whole' and valey. It has a large sized cathedral (St. Nicolas, I am not sure it is catholic, but I have to search for that) and a great market on Saturday mornings besides the mairie and Hotel de ville! It has a wood bridge and you can catch a funicular. Also the bernese alps are visible. But this wasn't our case. I was frozen as usually.

St. Nicolas Cathedral's entrance


St. Nicolas view from the other side

As it was midday we went chasing besides the snow (it was 3 degrees) a restaurant! We were pretty hungry and frozen.

Arriving to the MANOR where we didn't find a MANORA, we could cross through the under passage a COOP city with a COOP restaurant. They really can make great food. As Suisse is a democratic country, the smoke side of the restaurant is the same size than the non-smoking. But I was astonished to see was that both of them had the same amount of families! Little babies, kids playing running up and down. Come on! The smoke is no good for nobody but even kids, their own kids in the game???!!!!a bit too much for me. When I commented this with the others, a family besides us also started talking within themselves about the same. that it is really a pity. At least I would take care of my kid, though he/she has a bigger risk of becoming a smoker than the kid of a family where parents don't smoke.

Well, I didnt come here to talk about this. So enjoy more pics....
Rue des épouses!Cosy little street!(I dont know its meaning though....)

The magical view of Fribourg from the cathedral tower

See you around searching for snow...by the way we found a piece of it in the Jura mountain!

Honestly? I am pro....

L'interdiction de fumer dans les lieux publics entre en vigueur le 31 octobre 2009

It means that the prohibition to smoke in public places will be valid from October 31st of the current year!

I think I mentioned this before here, but lots of people are realllllly against it. They say this law that was approved by 80% of voters on September 27th comes from a dictature and that unemployment will increase since bars and restaurants will close since people can't smoke in it.

And what about people like me and my friends who don't smoke? We have to stand the smoke in our faces in bus stations, restaurants and bars all the time. No, here they don't ask it and according to what I see on the streets, I believe that 70% of the people living in Geneva smokes!

SO, commerce involved with this will have to build structures that help removing effectively the smoke from the restaurants and public places or maybe a smoking room?

Well, I am sorry, I prefer to be healthy. Why is it sometimes so difficult to achieve!?

a new spicy cheese...

Can you see anything special about this cheese box?

You can't imagine how amazed I was when I saw the ad! I didn't think I could find this here since they are so strict most of the times!

After pepper and other spices or even jam, from now on you can find here hemp cheese! Invented by two Swisses who claim their cheese has a very special taste and a must to be discovered which took 5 years to develop.

The recipe? No, that will be kept in secret. What they remark is that the hemp in the form of essential oil is just used to give an aroma to the cheese, but the psychotropic substance, the one responsible for making you "high", is not present there. Hence, the THC or tetrahydrocannabinol won't be active.

Or anything different here?maybe a particular plant shape?

Produced in the canton of Vaud, besides the canton of Geneve, the product can already be found in some small shops. Also, they already got the rights of selling it to Russia and some other European countries, except the neighbor country France. They say that if the plant is not allowed so won't be its derivatives.

This is the ad:

I just love spiced cheese or almost any type!




Source: http://www.prince-canna.ch/2001.html

1,2,3,4, spoons of sugar sugar sugar

Nowadays publicity shocks! This is a soda advertisement i US from last month. It advises people to not drink it at list not drink everyday soft drinks like n thesoda ans their friends. But pay attention to it, what is being poured instead of soda?

If you remember back on the old days and we went to the supermarket with our parents what size of soda could we buy? I remember that 1 L was the largest you could get. In the US, it used to come in 200 mL bottles. Today, 350 mL cans are considered small and 600 mL bottles are typical. A single super-sized soda can pack as many calories as three to four regular cans of soda.

Many people may stir a teaspoon or two of sugar into their coffee, but few realize that a 600 mL bottle of soda can contain 16 ½ teaspoons of sugar. Drinking beverages loaded with sugars increases the risk of obesity and associated problems, particularly diabetes but also heart disease, stroke, arthritis and cancer.

I won't deny, I really enjoy drinking a almost cold Coke after walking a lot in the warm weather, nothing a cold juice of melon with mint wouldn't satisfy. To help, we can read the nutritional information printed in some of the meals before we buy them. Some people really do it, one might say it became fashion. For example most Brazilians actually spend some time reading it...Amazing no?

creative ideas for gifting?

Everybody has its own idea that why we have pets. Some say to release stress, some say to be loved by somebody at all, some say it is cheaper than have kids, some say to keep healthy as you have to walk and play with the dog, and so on...

Sunday, we were enjoying the last warm sun shine of the year by walking on the Parc Grange on the Eaux-vive part of the lake when I saw something amazing. There was this woman, beautiful, long hair arranged in a pony tail, Nike hat, Adidas trousers, and a NorthFace coat. In her hand she had an interesting long stick she was using to play with her small-"barkative" terrier dog.

Then I realized she is not throwing that stick, buuuuuut she uses the stick to pick up the tennis ball and throw it. Now why a stick? Isnt't it a bit without love? If you don't want to get wet, so don't go into the rain. I thought who has dogs doesn't mind those bits of "disgusting" things all dogs come with.

Browsing on the internet I found on a site what that artifact is: a shooter dog toy. And as mentioned there:
"If your dog likes to chase the ball and you've got tired arms from throwing it.... this is the answer. Place the ball in the holder and pull behind your shoulder and then release forwards. You'll find you don't have to use much force and you'll enjoying throwing the ball as much as your dog will catching it !
.... And, you don't have to bend down to pick up the ball."

I think they forgot to mention the fact that you won't need to get your hands in the saliva-soaked ball....!!!

I thought making exercises was one of the main ideas of having a pet like that...looks like (thanks God) people do have different ideas....

Fight airplanes in the sky genevois.

I know it is just a copy of the newspaper Tribune de Geneve, but I have to admit I was afraid when I saw them flying over my head in the city center.

I was there commuting from one place to the other walking fast when I listened to the sound of some powerful planes and when I look up there they were: 6 mirages....wow

When I was a kid I used to enjoy them, maybe my father's influence?...I recognized the Mirage and immediately thought: "don't say something happened right here in Geneva with all these foreigners and their organizations".

Then I unraveled it all: these old airplanes from the Swiss Army came for the 4th edition of the Geneva Classics and had to land somewhere. The machines were altogether a F/A 18, a Tiger, a Mirage (at least I was right about one of them), a Vampire Trainer and a Vernom. The last airplane was a Hunter "driven" by the astronaut Claude Nicollier.

In the video, the astronaut mentions the pilots and the passengers, I wish I were one of them...jut Cool....

Would you bite it?

It is amazing what people can do nowadays.
From now on maybe we can say almost everything is possible!
A farmer in China's northeastern Hebei province spent six years perfecting the process of growing Buddha-shaped pears.
He grows them inside moulds and sells them for approximately $7 (€4.80).

From: Reuters in Der Spiegel

A bit of statistics...

I found some statistics here in the Tagesanzeiger newspapers about curious statistics regarding the city of Zurich. Just for the fun of sharing, I paste here a part of it:

- the average zuricher eats 33 grams of chocolate per day – 12,3 kilos a year.
- the most common names are «Peter » and « Maria ». According to statistics, Peter and Maria cannot stand more than 10,5 years of marriage, after what they head to the attourney’s cabinet for a divorce (the swiss average is 14,5 years).
- the average zuricher lives in a 3-room flat, uses 285 liters of water and produces 267 kilos of trash a year. Most of them do not possess a car, and when they do, it is most likely to be either gray (26%) or black (20%).
- and last but not least: the Mayor’s Department reveals that Zurich snorts 39,000 rails of cocaine per day. For those who wonder, the habit can be revealed simply by analyzing the water from the city’s sewage system.

As the person who translated (Marina from glocals) this bit, I also wonder what would these statistics be for Geneva. Probably more chocolate eating and more cocaine, or not, because this city is a bit smaller than Zurich?...that is the question.

Source: http://www.tagesanzeiger.ch/zuerich/stadt/Jeder-Zuercher-isst-123-Kilogramm-Schokolade-pro-Jahr/story/30684657

little trip to Italy in the weekend...

Life in Italy, read fast:

wake up but not so early, healthy and delicious breakfast, capuccino, go to work with scooter (the little motorcycle), horn, overtake a car on the right side, be horned, ciao bela!, horn to the girl on the street, stop to talk to the person on the scooter besides you and don't mind the kilometric car queue forming behind, get a slap on the face in front of everybody, speak loud, drink another capuccino in the bar with a 70-80 year-old who smokes without stop and discusses about the Milan football match, scooter, go home to have lunch with tree plates (small salty sticks with bread, bruscheta or salad or macaroni, rice and steak, tiramisu), a espresso per favore (just foreigners drink capuccino after lunch time), siesta, all shops closed including restaurants, nap, scooter, beep beep, all shops open, speak gesticulating a lot, ma que cosa!, another espresso, end of work time, small jam to get home or happy hour, sit on the bar with friends, speak loud, talk about the boss, lots of people walking and talking about the "bastardo and poor Mike Bongiorno" on the streets of their towns while eating an ice cream, kids running and explaining about their days, go home, dinner with a chianti or a grapa, maybe a espresso?, sleep to restart all again tomorrow with the bless of God.

This is how fast, happy and full of life is the life in Italy, it is amazing, just who has been there understands it...

bruscheta?
need explanation?

And this one?Already hungry?

capuccino or...

Espresso? small but so strong....

Geneva x Havana x cigar x cigarette x no smoker

While the smoke is malign for us and that Geneva will vote on September 27th on the banning of smoking in public places, an association is organizing the 1st World Cigar Night, right before the eve of the election. Daniel Ceszkowski, president of Geneva Cigars, however, claims: "We do not celebrate the end of the world, but early recognition. Recognition of Geneva as the capital of the cigar. Because it is not known - fairly or not - is that besides banks, watchmakers, the ICRC or the UN, Geneva is also the world capital of the cigar, after Havana. It is indeed the most important place of international trading in this sector. "

This association wants commercial recognition, but not only. For Charly Schwarz, secretary of the Geneva Association of Cigars "they also wish to establish Geneva as a city of epicurean pleasure.They also wish to send a strong signal to the authorities who do not know how to improve the image of Geneva, I don't really understand how....

Smoke for pleasure, "The cigar is also linked to the sustainable development of the personality," dares Daniel Ceszkowski. "Smoking is the stress and the cult of performance, all of which belong to a modern old-fashioned. The cigar, it is an element involved in sustainable development. Because it takes time. You do not smoke a cigar at the foot of your office building during the break between 10 am and 10:05. Instead, you expect to have time for you and time for others. "

For the president of Geneva Cigars in effect, "the cigar provokes discussion and enriching friendship by what he creates. Taste, shapes, brands, personal preferences and changing current smoking permit, when sharing, to better understand each other, become more intimate, without being aggressive. "

The association claims that "unlike cigarettes, cigars do not constitute a public health problem because it remains the realm of complete pleasure, without the manic side-compulsive who knocks on cigarette smoking." They also say that it creates social ties in a society desperate to find. In addition, we are here in the land in the craft and not in the industry. Another value that is dear to us because it is endangered. "

What about luxury?
I always associate cigar with luxury, in the interview the secretary of the association says that "The cigar is a pleasure eminently democratic, contrary to what one might think at first." He explains : "Look. It is the only luxury item that you can buy the part with your money daily. Try to do the same with a Ferrari, a Vuitton bag, a yacht or an apartment overlooking the water jet. It is also the only luxury product that is produced entirely in the Third World. "

Even after resuming this interview I still don't like any kind of smoke, all of them are harmful for our beautiful lungs.

This month there will be a voting for a law against smoking on public places. People against the law says that it is a type of dictature, and that this is the type of law that separates the people into two. Also, they claim that it is very bad for the sick people in the hospital because they won't be allowed anymore to smoke in their room, forcing them to leave the hospital in wheelchairs or with their infusions in order to smoke. Why can't the build a smoking room like the ones in some of the train stations or airports? If it is already difficult to convince people that smoking is harmful for everybody but I also don't want to keep being a passive smoker everywhere in this city.

So, my dear reader, if you are a smoker, sorry, but this is my opinion.

How money can be useful...

Lots of people know that Switzerland is a country where lots of very rich people live. They spend their money in the best ways like 100 000CHF watches, VERY expensive cars, flats, dressing items.

But this video shows something I haven't seen yet.
The Alinghi 5 yacht is transported from its home port of Geneva, Switzerland to Geno (I know it as Genova), Italy for sea trials in preparation for the 2009 America's Cup race. The helicopter, Russian Mi-26, flew a distance of 300 kilometers (186 miles), where the 90 foot, two tonne catamaran was carried, crossing the Alps in the process. Of course, this is about sports, and when it is about it, no money can be spared since there is a lot of marketing involved not to mention that it is healthy!

I so much wish I could had been wrapped or attached somehow to the boat just to enjoy the view!

Pumpkin soup!

Maybe I start to think about this because it is near lunch time. But picture this: a velvet pumpkin soup warm and salty (some people just can think about pumpkin as a sweet food, not Brazilians), add to the top of it some freshly broken pepper and some pieces of roquefort cheese which will melt and add a fantastic taste to the soup

This is what I would think about all the time when visiting this exhibition in Ludwigsburg, South Germany, the world's biggest pumpkin exhibition. In its eighth year, the show features 500,000 pumpkins, spanning 450 different varieties. The fruits are modelled into famous fairytale scenes.

Meanwhile, a pumpkin restaurant lures visitors to indulge in culinary delights ranging from pumpkin and pecan pie to pumpkin wine and pumpkin soup. For sure the last place mentioned is where you would find me.

Finally in Switzerland!

But what a pity that so far from Geneva.

From November 11th the controversial exhibition showing the amazing job of Gunther von Hagens will be exposed in Zürich (if it doens't find any impairment until there!). Called " the world of bodies and the cycles of life", these exhibits, first showed in Tokyo in 1995, always raise all types of moral and ethical questions.

It is a fact that his lookout is already impressing. His lack of tanning and the constant presence of his black hat induces us to think about something cadaverous. When he was still a young boy and living in the rough times of East Germany, he received the diagnostic of a rare blood disease which didn't allow him to play like other kids and made him spend lots of time inside hospitals. In his teenager years he passed his free time dissecting cow hearts in his relative farm.

Dr. von Hagens and his art, I really admire him!

After he grew up, Dr. Von Hagens has been doubly condemned for exploiting the dead and for sourcing cadavers and body parts from Russia and China, with members of Falun Gong alleging he uses the remains of executed political prisoners. Dr. Von Hagens, who was jailed by the former East German regime for political dissent, appears to have at best a cavalier attitude to the ethics of body-part procurement.

Still, the controversy has been great for business. His travelling exhibition of "plastinated" cadavers and organs has attracted almost 10 million paying customers in Japan, Germany, Austria, England and Hungary.

He invented this technique on the late 70s, he uses real human bodies that have been preserved
so they do not decay. First preserved according to standard mortuary science, the specimen is then dissected to show whatever it is that someone wants to display. Once dissected, the specimen is immersed in acetone, which eliminates all body water. It is then placed in a large bath of silicone, or polymer, and sealed in a vacuum chamber. Under vacuum, acetone leaves the body in the form of gas and the polymer replaces it, entering each cell and body tissue.
A catalyst is then applied to the specimen, hardening it and completing the process.
This method of preservation creates a specimen that will not rot.

This offers thousands of unique teaching possibilities for educators at all levels, including medical professionals, archeologists and other scientists.

Using lasers and a meat carver, he has gone on to perfectly cross-section his plastinated people. One of the 'dolls' presented in the exhibition is an entire cross-sectioned human body, from head to toe. It is just beautiful to see how we are inside. One part of the exhibition has a note before its door warning people it might be rude for some and this is also the reason why many times the exhibition was canceled: human fetuses in different stages of development are presented form the first days of life till close to birth and a baby yet in the mother's womb.

In Paris, the exhibition was interdicted with the critics that "the organs these bodies contain should have been used to save a life" or that is body commercialization without permission. Generally they use bodies from prisoners condemned to death in China. If you pay attention to the eyes of the pieces when visiting, you can see their Asiatic origin.

A big piece, a horse and its rider.

Do you smoke? In dark you can see the color of your lungs. A normal one has very light color and is very healthy.

Personally, I really enjoyed the exhibition in Budapest and I think it makes you think about ourselves, the person close to you, about our life and what is gonna be after it is over. Also I heard it makes people think that when someone makes an animal suffer it is the same as making a person suffer because we are not so much different after all.

It is really worth seeing it, if you have the nerves and the money of course (I think it will cost about 25-40 francs)!

source: http://www.bodiestheexhibition.com/
www.bodyworlds.com