KikiMin

Notes on re-imagining democracy

2010-07-09T00:43:00.000-07:00

There's this very deeply embedded idea that democracy (the rule of the people) can only be possible with elements such as simple majority (50 + 1), representation (a proxy represents a sub-group) and partisanship (democrats vs republicans).

Simple majority, since you only need half of the voters at most to win, creates a very polarized discussion while leading to the passage of still widely (often close to 50%) unpopular laws. Partisanship leads to too many qui pro quo (I help you pass this law if you help me pass this one) and favors groupthink. Representatives often largely frustrate their voters and tend to create compromises based on geographically defined subgroups instead of abstract ideals. The whole mess leads to contradictory and complex laws with very many unrelated items that very few persons of "the people" can understand (and that "representatives" don't really read or understand anyway).

Looking at the often terribly messy, porky, corporate-influenced systems such as the United States various legislatures, most will give up and say "it's politics"...

However, it's important to get this right as many non-democracies tend to point at these less than ideal systems and say "see! democracy doesn't work as well as our dictatorship / repressive regime / centrally planned system!". Fist fights in parliaments don't help either...

However, there are many forms of democracy out there. For example, Nunavut has a non-partisan consensus government while Switzerland requires a double majority on constitutional matters.

With the advent of modern technology, such as instantaneous multi-point communication and ability to track in real-time billions of pieces of data we can implement many new and possibly better alternatives that could address some of the downsides of most established democracies.

If I were to try to imagine an ideal democracy, I would start by making it direct but with a very high threshold for passing new laws.

Issues could be raised with a simple majority supporting discussion on a neutral presentation of a subject/issue.

There would be no permanent representatives to discuss the issues but instead, on each individual issue raised, freelance "thinkers" (with hopefully some expert credential) that would explain in public forums their initial position and recruit supporters from the voter pool.

The most popular thinkers (selected on the basis of the supporters) on a particular issue would then be remunerated by the state to meet for a fixed duration and come to a possible consensus on a proposal that would finally be submitted to referendum with an high threshold (75%) to demonstrate wide consensus.

Wash and repeat for the numerous issues (and hopefully less of the non-issues) facing legislators.

The process would be highly automated and electronic, open (no hidden lobbies here) and easily accessible.

Of course, the idea is not that I have the perfect proposal yet but the hope is to encourage alternative thinking to come to a solution that is effective at creating the minimal set of reasonable and well thought out laws to make a political entity run well while maximizing voters interest and participation in the legislative process. Think "Wikipedia for bills"!

It would probably be best to fine tune this system on a small scale first, maybe by creating a "virtual government-in-waiting" somewhere to experiment while waiting for most constituencies to catch up on a certain political awareness and ease with modern electronic tools.

Researchable questions:

How would issues to be considered (subjects of discussion) could be submitted?
How well does the Nunavut system work in practice?
How do we ensure that all citizens have access to discussions and voting mechanism?
How do we make the participation system safe and secure?
What kind of social values would be necessary to be make this work?

Notes on America

2010-07-07T21:06:00.000-07:00

As a Canadian and a Quebecker, there's a vested investment in our neighbors (and currently my hosts) to the south prospering. With 77% of exports and and 52% of our imports (in dollar value, CIA World Factbook) going to and from the US and close political relationship we can't afford a sick country to the south - politically, socially or economically.

The US is a society that achieved greatness under pressure and gave an achievable "American dream" to many around the world, constructing a society made up of every ethnic groups allied in the search of happiness in an atmosphere where an equitable chance was afforded to most. A society that set an example (not by force, but by success) to many all around the world. And the USA is still home to greatness: world's best universities, Silicon Valley home of the top technological companies and a list of Nobel laureates that far exceeds, at 320, any other country.

But increasingly (not that the sentiment is new) the greater dream now seems soiled, dirty, unattainable. Surely the economic, cultural and increasingly military empire will last for a while longer but with the economy veering off track it seems that the dream can turn into a nightmare.

Lack of confidence from the population in government entities justified by ineffective governments and transformation from democracy to corporatocracy. An unworkable corporatocracy because of widespread (and again justified) increasing distrust of corporations.

An economy increasingly centered around the military industrial-complex which can only produce hammers in a world where every problem then looks like a nail. The continued slide towards imperialism accompanied by the inevitable widespread violation of the values and human rights.

Lost of real, true "friends" in the world adds to the uncertainty about and worry about the US future global competitiveness (culturally and economically).

In the meantime, reactionary and self-centered citizens are engaged in bitter social debates in all parts of the political compass. This is poorly represented and contained by two parties leading to unbalanced politics without nuance pulled between two extremes and no possible negotiation. This naturally leads to increasing screeching calls to violence towards those of opposing views with only empty nationalism and empty slogans trying to hold the citizenry together.

How do you get the dream back on track so that the nightmare doesn't infect others?

Notes on Modern Nomadic Life

2010-07-06T17:18:00.000-07:00

From the ancient Phoenician trading in the Mediterranean to the warring Mongol empire to modern day immigrants trading skills, there has always been a strong impulse for a subset of humans in each competing society to up and go in search of better opportunities. Large diasporas made up of Chinese, East Europeans, Asians and including a large chunk of the direct descendants of the Phoenicians, Lebaneses.

Formed around city-states, Phoenicians mirror modern electronic nomads moving from metropolis to metropolises: San Francisco, New York, Montreal, Vancouver, Paris, Munich, Shanghai, Buenos Aires... Centers of composite multicultural societies or melting pots , they've far outproduced and out-innovated sedentary locals by exposure to a large variety of cultures in the same lifetime.

Whether genetic impulse or societal pressure or maybe both (after all, migration is part of the human experience), these movements have led to a global culture further extended in modern time by the Internet and air travel.

Strong and welcoming cultures to immigrants have created liberal and open-minded city-societies with an appetite for constant changes. Trading has moved from physical objects to ideas or at least ideas of physical products and the rate of exchanges has accelerated.

Modern nomads have few physical possessions and rely instead on their electronic assets as the center of their identity. Instead of buying souvenirs to collect dust, they keep their possessions light with a focus on consumables and digital copies. Their life is often anchored by sedentary family members and friends in many countries with which they keep contact through intellectual exchanges, common interests and local news that could have global relevancy.

Being well remunerated for their experience, skills and knowledge they move from countries to countries while staying connected. They often live in self-contained family cell of 2 to 4 individuals. They follow opportunities without any of mental and financial burden of mortgages, car loans or pets. Atheists or philosophical with few fixed traditions or with religions that are either very personal (portable) or for which centers of worship exists everywhere, they move around freely. To prosper, they favor tolerance and political neutrality but seek discussions and exchanges of views as a way to experience the world. Their closets are full of clothes and styles varying not only through time but through cultures. They are suspicious and critical of nationalisms and borders, politicians hostile to immigrants (legal or not) although they'll also often develop an exaggerated and paradoxical sense of how good the home country is through many comparisons.

There are downsides of course. Unable to own profitably houses, they rent, moving around constantly and having very little motivation to customize their nest to make it welcoming.

Keeping in touch with friends is difficult and it is hard to create additional interconnections in their global social circle to strengthen it. They often isolate themselves to their small and tightly wound family cell outside work connections.

When not staying long enough, they only skim cultures without any real depth and often forget large chunk of cultural knowledge if they move too quickly. They are generally blind to the majority of the country, living in the very special and exceptional metropolis of each where life often has no relationship with the "countryside" where real power is often held.

Often assaulted by waves of differences and working at assimilating the basic cultural necessities, they often miss on grabbing deeper opportunities.

Various taxation, working visas and regulatory systems make moving around painful.

Some ideas to work around the issues faced by the modern nomad:

standing invitation to family and friends to serve as a forward base for tourism expeditions;
renting fully furnished and equipped apartments (beyond even current standards) to provide an "home sweet home" without having to sacrifice comforts;
participation in sports activities popular worldwide (association football aka soccer);
self-expectation of continuous language and cultural acquisition;
move often and aggressively outside the boundaries of the metropolis;
acquire a good understanding of local history for at least the last 100 years;
share your growing understanding of local culture online;
add alerts or subscriptions to local news sites for the current and past cities you've lived in;
keep notes of the opportunities as you discover them;
open yourself to opportunities to socialize with all social stratas and castes;
stay off the beaten path;
get to know locally popular artists and culture (and hopefully learn to like some!);
keep "bookmarks" on cultural artifacts that you like (movies, songs, books);
stay more than a year in your host country (3 years?).

Interesting researchable questions:

What countries have the largest net inflow and outflow of migrants?
What % of GDP is contributed by migrants (organized by length of stay)?
What attracts migrants? Can being the "world's university" and center of business startups be the main economic driver for a country?
Can migrants replace low birth rate in western societies?
How do countries integrate new migrants well?
What's the top inflow that a country can realistically support without creating inter-cultural tensions?
What country grants the most work visa per capita?
What further parallels can be made with past nomadic groups?
Are nomadic groups cyclical? Are they only possible currently because of the American empire?
What are the consequences of the differences between economic and political refugees and highly skilled / rich migrants?
All other things equals, what are the compensation benefits or knowing 1, 2, 3 languages?

Recommend Books to learn Mandarin

2010-04-29T21:05:00.000-07:00

I've got a pile of books, but only two have been useful so far:

Mandarin Chinese phrasebook & dictionary (pocket book from Berlitz)
Reading & Writing Chinese, Simplified Character edition (William McNaughton, Tuttle Language Library

Recommend websites to learn Mandarin

2010-04-29T20:47:00.000-07:00

Pinyin Practice

Trying to learn Mandarin without knowing Pinyin is like trying to learn English without knowing the alphabet. Start here to get the basics.

MDBG Chinese-English Dictionary

The word dictionary "Look up all chinese words in a text" is particularly powerful and produces beautiful results. It also has facilities to create your own quiz.

MandarinSpot Annotate

This works great to annotate entire article as you can provide a URL.

Chinese Class 101 Youtube Channel

Really great and well made videos... Check out "Lesson #1: Vegetables" and go from there. I thought I would go crazy with the same music track over and over but I didn't so you should be safe!

Why Chinese is So Damn Hard

Good article to read before embarking on the adventure... From it:

I have seen highly literate Chinese people forget how to write certain characters in common words like "tin can", "knee", "screwdriver", "snap" (as in "to snap one's fingers"), "elbow", "ginger", "cushion", "firecracker", and so on.

It really is true; I've tested those words on my Taiwanese born wife and she wasn't able to write down a single one...

One point to think about however before giving up: I think with the advent of various supporting software and portable computing devices such as Android mobile phones with on board translation software it is becoming increasingly feasible to learn Mandarin in a "reasonable" amount of time.

Writing Chinese characters with pinyin, auto-translating text and the ability to look up instantly every word in a text removes some of the barriers of learning Chinese. This means you should "cheat" your way to learning Chinese at every opportunity.

Otherwise, yeah, learning Chinese is definitely one of the crazier adventure someone can embark in!

Recommended PC software to learn Mandarin

2010-04-29T20:37:00.000-07:00

Byki 4 Express

Flashcards on steroids with pictures and audio. It keeps track of "stale items" and makes you review them based on how much trouble you had remembering them in the first place.

What I don't like is that it won't take inputs from the Microsoft IME as-is right now in my copy of Windows 7 but apart from that it's great.

The 13 free flashcards decks will take about 25 hours to master so I would recommend starting with those before buying the full version.

MDBG Chinese Reader

MDBG Chinese Reader is a PC client version of the very useful MDBG website (or is it the other way around?). When it hovers over Chinese characters it shows up you instant definitions and romanization. Another trial software, but very well made and I'm tempted to buy the full license as I'm relying it more and more.

Rosetta Stone

If you can afford it, I think it's an environment that works very well and is very complete. I love the fact that it's web based! I've had access to a license at work for a while and I'm looking forward to find an affordable license again...

Recommended Android Software to learn Mandarin

2010-04-29T20:25:00.000-07:00

I personally use these everyday as I'm learning Mandarin/Chinese on my Motorola Droid.

Search for these on Android Market:

Google Pinyin

This is an IME, so once installed you need to enable it in Language & keyboard. Long press a text field to select it. Use ctrl-space to switch between Chinese and English, which makes the Android default keyboard unnecessary (except if you need to input a third language...).

Very smooth, easy pinyin input with good suggestions and clear, readable fonts.

Google Translate

Although complex sentences translation is generally poor, the interface is quick and fun to use with a tons of little features (such as copy to clipboard on tap, voice recognition, suggested translations, romanization, pronunciation, etc)

Hanping Ch-En

Great to look up individual words and star them offline (example: if you're travelling to Taiwan or China...). Much more reliable definitions than Google Translate since it is based on the well-known CE-DICT dictionary. Buy the Pro version, worth the (small) price of admission.

MortPlayer

Great to play audio books (such as the Pimsleur audio books). It also helps keeping your audio books apart from your music player.

List of English words I can't pronounce...

2010-03-14T14:08:00.000-07:00

Partly because I've learned English by reading and partly because of my French native tongue, I have enormous problems correctly pronouncing some words - especially those with a th sound

I'll update as I'm reminded of those I can't say correctly:

threaten
three/tree
earth
analytics

O Canada!

2010-03-05T22:05:00.001-08:00

This is Canada. This is Canadian culture. Rick Mercer is Canada. Or at least Anglo-Canada, as I bet very few French-Canadians would know about Rick Mercer.

But they should, as all should you: funny but also deeply opiniated, Rick Mercer is at ease interviewing anyone. Manitoba trappers, roller derby players in Montreal, the prime minister and the fantastically interesting mayor of Mississauga - everyone gets the treatment but usually comes out more human, more Canadian.

A must-see, must-subscribe and must-follow kind of show for the Canadian expats and those who want a funny but informative outlook on Canada. Based on the very low view count, this is an unrecognized show...

in reference to: http://www.youtube.com/user/MercerReport (view on Google Sidewiki)

Intel VTune tools are broken on Windows 7 64-bit

2010-03-01T23:49:00.000-08:00

If you want to profile C++ executables on Windows 7 64-bit with an Intel CPU, don't bother downloading Intel VTune or Intel Thread Checker or Intel Profiler (AFAIK, all the same thing) - they all crash as of these versions:

"Intel(R) VTune(TM) Performance Analyzer 9.1 Build:385" and

"Intel® Thread Profiler 3.1 Build:0.27583"

...with this uninformative error message:

SERA_Set_Platform_environment() Failed

For those like me having the same problems who are still looking for a free profiler that works and can't wait for Intel to fix VTune, check out AMD's CodeAnalyst.

And yes, the time-based profiling for this AMD product works for an Intel CPU (i5 in my case) on Windows 7 64-bit as I've just confirmed... and the download size is a fraction of VTune. You can also see this blog post if you don't believe me!

In CodeAnalyst, you can get functions level percentage by clicking your application process cpu usage bar in the system graph - it will then open a separate tab with function level samples.

Interesting that the trial software from a big company like Intel doesn't work as well as a free (as in beer) software from a company one tenth the size. The fact that Microsoft can't be bothered to provide such a basic development functionality except in their very costly Visual C++ premium edition is unforgivable... Doesn't Microsoft want to show off the fastest apps on their platform?

Note also how much of a pain and expenses are involved in profiling on win32 compared to apt-get'ing gprof and running that on any Linux box!

It's frustrating to have to go through registration screens, Internet Explorer specific sites and a few hundreds megabytes download to discover these facts...

Need privacy? Use Enigmail!

2010-02-23T20:58:00.001-08:00

Do you want to send love letters that only your spouse should be able to read?
Do you want to make sure that emails you received are indeed sent by the person it is supposed to come from (and not some impersonator)?
Do you want to store confidential information at an untrusted location (on a network drive for example) without anyone else having access to that information?
Do you want to exchange sensitive information such as passwords, personally identifying information or proprietary secrets?
Do you want to limit the ability of hostile party to impersonate you electronically?

...then you need PGP (Pretty Good Privacy)!

First, a quick explanation of why PGP encryption is so interesting:

PGP, based on principles of public-key crytography, is a way to hide messages using a private (or secret) "key". The "hidden" (or encrypted) message can only be then returned to its original form using the public key. The reverse is also true: a message transformed by the public key can only be read by the private key.

That has all sorts of really interesting and sophisticated applications but two stand out:

First, you can digitally sign data by encrypting the result of a computation uniquely representing the data with your private key. Since only the public key can open that result, this can be used to prove that the data received matches the data sent.

Second is to create and send a message that can only be read by the person receiving it by using that recipient public key.

An email client to securely exchange email is a great start to add more privacy to your life. Best way to go about sending encrypted email is a combination of the following set of software, all OpenSource, free and cross-platform:

GnuPG: a free software version of PGP
Thunderbird: a well known email client that
Enigmail: a plugin to Thunderbird

There are other tools, such as gpg4win, that will give you additional feature but they all use GnuPG.

BTW, on Windows installing gpg4win also installs GnuPG. The equivalent on Mac is MacPG. On Linux, these tools are generally all part of the distribution (look for Seahorse on Gnome for example).

Also note that Enigmail can be installed from inside Thunderbird by using Tools > Addons.

I'd also like to add that configuring Thunderbird 3 with Gmail is actually very easy; as soon as you enter your email as being @gmail.com, it sets the correct settings. In addition, everything is kept on the gmail IMAP server.

The Enigmail documentation is very good (better than what I wrote above!) and has an example that you can practice with.

Don't forget that when you send an email out you want to encrypt it with your recipient public key so that he can read the message.

When sending an email to someone that has a public key, make sure you've correctly imported the person's key here:

OpenPGP > Key Management > Display All Keys by Default

You can retrieve keys through the key servers:

OpenPGP > Key Management > Key server > Search for keys

However, make sure you exchange and verify the fingerprint for your keys through a secure channel to ensure you've got the correct key!

I would also recommend change the setting to use email addresses to decide intelligently which key to use (just make sure you verify that the key fingerprints you import indeed match the peer they are supposed to represent!)

OpenPGP > Preferences > Key selection > By email addresses

In Thunderbird, don't forget to save your drafts locally, and not on the server, otherwise there is a danger you would store your sensitive message as clear-text in the cloud:

Tools > Account Settings > Copies & Folders > Keep message drafts

I would also suggest disabling automatic decryption as you don't want to accidentally have someone see your encrypted emails over your shoulder:

OpenPGP > Automatically Decrypt/Verify messages

Use the menu option instead:

OpenPGP > Decrypt/Verify

A few things to remember:

be generous with your public key; you can and want to share it with everyone and distribute it through any public servers
be very protective of your private key: although this is itself encrypted with a key phrase, losing or exposing it to untrusted software should be prevented
don't lose it: your public/private key pair should become a way to enforce your identity
one weak point in all this is the software you use to manage and use your keys; be sure you trust the source and where you got it from!

Some settings that might satiate your extra paranoia:

Don't store emails locally where they are vulnerable to getting stolen:

File > Offline > Offline Settings > Message Synchronizing

Don't send emails with subjects:

OpenPGP > Preferences > Sending > Don't warn about subject line

Don't add more information on your setup than you should:

OpenPGP > Preferences > Advanced > Add Enigmail comment in OpenPGP signature

Use the Web of Trust (key signing parties!) by unchecking:

OpenPGP > Preferences > Sending > Always trust people's key

TechRepublic is spammy

2010-02-06T14:32:00.001-08:00

For some reason unrelated to newsletters, I opened an account with TechRepublic.

Two weeks later, this is what my spam-catcher inbox looked like (and note that the whole list does not fit on the screen!):

The number of email that site sent me far exceeded any other email sender (including the prolific local wine store). I'm having an hard time believing that anyone wants so much email from one site! I guess they haven't heard of "information overload".

And of course, when you do try to reach them through their email contact, they pop up a form to protect their own email...

I unsubscribed to all - hopefully they'll respect my wish.

SACK not necessarily a good thing

2010-01-24T17:55:00.000-08:00

Having fun testing large data transfers between Mac OS X, Linux 2.6 and Win7 machines.

I was getting very low transfer rate between the Win7 and Linux boxes (12 Mb/s) versus 92 Mb/s for other combinations.

This setting fixed it:

/sbin/sysctl -w net.ipv4.tcp_sack=0

From: http://datatag.web.cern.ch/datatag/howto/tcp.html

SACKs (Selective Acknowledgments) are an optimisation to TCP which in normal scenarios improves considerably performance. In Gigabit networks with no traffic competition these have the opposite effect.

But now, I have to figure out why I'm getting less than 100mb/s>

Remote ssh connections, No buffer space

2010-01-23T15:32:00.001-08:00

While testing the wonderful UDT, I had the following problems on Mac OS X:

ssh connection being denied (even if Preferences > Share > Remote Login was enabled).

It appears that the UI configuration tool is broken and doesn't allow sshd-key-agent.

Change Preferences > Security radio button to Allow some connection. You should then be prompted for sshd-key-agent.

While starting the client app that creates rather large buffer and UDP packet, I got the following:

$ ./appclient 192.168.0.195 9000

connect: Connection setup failure: unable to create/configure UDP socket: No buffer space available.

This can be solved with:

$ sudo sysctl -w kern.ipc.maxsockbuf=80000000

kern.ipc.maxsockbuf: 8388608 -> 80000000

Start Up Nation

2010-01-01T15:10:00.001-08:00

http://freakonomics.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/12/04/how-did-israel-become-start-up-nation/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+FreakonomicsBlog+%28Freakonomics+Blog%29

Travel tips

2010-01-01T14:32:00.001-08:00

Buy a good carry on, certified by an airline for cabin use. It should have good, large wheels (rollerblade type), a solid handle and many pockets with high quality metal zippers.

Attach a colorful piece of clothing on your luggage to make it easy to identify when you do the luggage claim.

Always bring a pen. For some weird reason, some places such as the US customs in Montreal's PET airport never have any pen.

Always check in online 24 hours before the flight. You may save money (discounts on checked in luggage), time (use of the self checkin terminal) and also a good safety net since the airline knows you'll be online.

Bring snacks; airlines are increasingly skimpy on food.

Make sure to fill out all the necessary forms before you get to customs.

Layer comfortable clothing so you can put and remove items as ambient temperature changes.

Make a checklist and keep updating it as you think of things to bring days before actually packing.

Travel lightly: figure out clothes that can be combined on your trip.

Bring moisturing cream to get around the dry air in the plane cabin,

Don't hesitate to remove your shoes to make yourself confortable.

Essentials: toothbrush, toothpaste, floss! Medication too of course.

Like to swim? Bring your bathing suit - you never know when your hotel will have a pool or a sauna.

Check EVERY pocket for liquids in your backpack and carry on before going through security.

Review visas and passport expiry date weeks before leaving. Renew passport so it is never less than 6 months before leaving.

Have currencies (or even better, credit cards) for both your origin and destination.

Make sure you have sufficient cash in your bank account. Make sure your debit card has a NIP of more digits (ATM in some countries have a limit of 4 digits) and setup automated payments for all accounts.

If you buy plane tickets months in advance, buy insurance for unexpected cancellation. Preferrably buy plane tickets in a window of 30 to 14 days before departure.

Packing your pieces of clothing in rolls instead of flat is more efficient and leads to better packing.

Make sure any bottle of liquids that could accidentally open or break are in an hermetic plastic bag.

Stick fragile objects in a box placed in a luggage for extra protection.

Squeamish? Bring a bottle of anti-bacterial hand cleaner.

Comfortable, slip on leather shoes that look both nice and can be used to walk anywhere. Don't skimp on both time and money to find the ideal pair of shoes. Personal prefence is for Ecco, but try them all!

Don't forget to bring a book or a magazine: it will make transit and waiting lines not as painful. Consider getting an ebook (such as a kindle).

Don't forget to charge all your electronic devices and spare batteries. Pack the various chargers and adapters.

Read up on the Wikipedia entry for your destination to make sure you don't miss out on anything.

A smartphone with wifi is increasingly useful as a portable mini computer to make reservations on the road.

A bottle opener can be useful but make sure it ends up in the checked in luggage.

Small first aid kit just in case.

Sunscreen is a must in sunny destination. Get the highest SPF possible.

Clean up your wallet and remove anything you won't need before leaving.

Keep all your passport number, credit cards, emergency phones online (suggest Google Docs).

Keep your addressbook (on your phone?) updated with your friends and family addresses so you can send them postcard.

Funny dreaming dog

2009-12-29T00:11:00.000-08:00

Peugeot BB1

2009-12-07T21:19:00.000-08:00

Comme un Smart, mais pour 4 personnes!

Driving a car with an iPhone

2009-12-06T22:53:00.000-08:00

Tea classes anyone?

2009-11-17T10:50:00.000-08:00

http://www.worldteanews.com/index.php/20091110797/People/A-Dozen-Tea-Sommeliers-Emerge-From-New-Canadian-Program.html

Offered in conjunction with the Tea Association of Canada, the program began as individual events geared toward tea enthusiasts. It evolved into a formalized program consisting of two parts: four courses covering an introduction to tea, tea regions, and preparation and consumption; and four technical and business-focused courses covering menu, sensory development, service training and tea garden management. (For a complete curriculum, see the program's Web site.) In addition to these 140 hours of course work, graduates had to complete a 20-hour internship.

These Apartment Hunters Are the Happy Renters

2009-10-12T21:31:00.001-07:00

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/13/realestate/13HUNT.html?_r=1&pagewanted=all

When the LeCounts moved in this summer, they felt a huge weight lifted. If anything goes wrong, “we don’t have to shell out more money to have it repaired,” Mr. LeCount said. They no longer worry about parking, but drive right to their door. If they have many grocery bags, they wheel them up in a cart provided by the building.

Need a container ship?

2009-09-15T23:27:00.000-07:00

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/home/moslive/article-1212013/Revealed-The-ghost-fleet-recession.html

You may wish to know this because, if ever you had an irrational desire to charter one, now would be the time. This time last year, an Aframax tanker capable of carrying 80,000 tons of cargo would cost £31,000 a day ($50,000). Now it is about £3,400 ($5,500).

Google I/O 2009 - The Myth of the Genius Programmer

2009-09-06T11:25:00.001-07:00

Tellement vrai... À voir par tout les programmeurs (et revoir pour ceux qui comme moi ont un gros égo...)

They Might Be Giants - Podcast for kids

2009-09-06T09:43:00.001-07:00

Dans le genre vidéo éducationnels pour enfants, le band "They Might Be Giants" a les meilleurs vidéos. Dommage que l'équivalent français n'existe pas autant que je puisse savoir.

Pour plus d'exemples:

http://www.youtube.com/theymightbegiants

Google Voice is the shiznit!

2009-08-26T22:21:00.001-07:00

Art?

2009-08-23T09:29:00.001-07:00

Mes pieds

2009-08-22T14:48:00.001-07:00

Nouveau concept de Dr Scholl qui fait des recommendations basees sur la mesure de la pression de la plante des pieds. Malheureusement, le CF120 recommende n'etait pas disponible...

French: The Most Productive People In The World

2009-08-22T13:49:00.000-07:00

http://www.businessinsider.com/are-the-french-the-most-productive-people-in-the-world-2009-8

The real message here is that the French are likely some of the most productive people in the entire world.

France has $36,500 GDP/Capita and works 1,453 hours per year. This equates to a GDP/Capita/Hour of $25.10. Americans, on the other hand, have $44,150 GDP/Capita but work 1,792 hours per year. Thus Americans only achieve $24.60 of GDP/Capita/Hour.

Warren Buffett's Secret Millionaire's Club (MoneyTrack on PBS)

2009-08-15T18:38:00.001-07:00

Trop cool, dommage que ça va probablement prendre un bout de temps avant que ça soit traduit en français...

Ugly

2009-08-11T22:17:00.000-07:00

Widely copied story, author as of yet unknown - extremely touching:

Everyone in the apartment complex I lived in knew who Ugly was. Ugly was the resident tomcat.
Ugly loved three things in this world: fighting, eating garbage, and shall we say, love. The combination of these things combined with a life spent outside had their effect on Ugly.
To start with, he had only one eye, and where the other should have been was a gaping hole. He was also missing his ear on the same side, his left foot has appeared to have been badly broken at one time, and had healed at an unnatural angle, making him look like he was always turning the corner. His tail has long since been lost, leaving only the smallest stub, which he would constantly jerk and twitch. Ugly would have been a dark gray tabby striped-type, except for the sores covering his head, neck, even his shoulders with thick, yellowing scabs.
Every time someone saw Ugly there was the same reaction. "That's one UGLY cat!!"
All the children were warned not to touch him, the adults threw rocks at him, hosed him down, squirted him when he tried to come in their homes, or shut his paws in the door when he would not leave.
Ugly always had the same reaction. If you turned the hose on him, he would stand there, getting soaked until you gave up and quit. If you threw things at him, he would curl his lanky body around feet in forgiveness. Whenever he spied children, he would come running meowing frantically and bump his head against their hands, begging for their love. If you ever picked him up he would immediately begin suckling on your shirt, earrings, whatever he could find.
One day Ugly shared his love with the neighbors huskies. They did not respond kindly, and Ugly was badly mauled. From my apartment I could hear his screams, and I tried to rush to his aid. By the time I got to where he was laying, it was apparent Ugly's sad life was almost at an end.
Ugly lay in a wet circle, his back legs and lower back twisted grossly out of shape, a gaping tear in the white strip of fur that ran down his front. As I picked him up and tried to carry him home I could hear him wheezing and gasping, and could feel him struggling. I must be hurting him terribly I thought.
Then I felt a familiar tugging, sucking sensation on my ear - Ugly, in so much pain, suffering and obviously dying was trying to suckle my ear. I pulled him closer to me, and he bumped the palm of my hand with his head, then he turned his one golden eye towards me, and I could hear the distinct sound of purring. Even in the greatest pain, that ugly battled-scarred cat was asking only for a little affection, perhaps some compassion.
At that moment I thought Ugly was the most beautiful, loving creature I had ever seen. Never once did he try to bite or scratch me, or even try to get away from me, or struggle in any way. Ugly just looked up at me completely trusting in me to relieve his pain.
Ugly died in my arms before I could get inside, but I sat and held him for a long time afterwards, thinking about how one scarred, deformed little stray could so alter my opinion about what it means to have true pureness of spirit, to love so totally and truly. Ugly taught me more about giving and compassion than a thousand books, lectures, or talk show specials ever could, and for that I will always be thankful. He had been scarred on the outside, but I was scarred on the inside, and it was time for me to move on and learn to love truly and deeply. To give my total to those I cared for.
Many people want to be richer, more successful, well liked, beautiful, but for me, I will always try to be Ugly.

The oldest reference I can find for this story is "Ugly" by Karen Stone in 2002 on the Independent Institute of Living but confusingly, although she claims copyright on the page, she also has this after the story:

I wish I knew who wrote this awesomely moving piece, a piece that will probably become a classic fable in due time.

Three Good Reasons To Liquidate Our Empire

2009-08-09T21:08:00.000-07:00

http://www.tomdispatch.com/post/175101/chalmers_johnson_dismantling_the_empire

According to the 2008 official Pentagon inventory of our military bases around the world, our empire consists of 865 facilities in more than 40 countries and overseas U.S. territories. We deploy over 190,000 troops in 46 countries and territories. In just one such country, Japan, at the end of March 2008, we still had 99,295 people connected to U.S. military forces living and working there -- 49,364 members of our armed services, 45,753 dependent family members, and 4,178 civilian employees. Some 13,975 of these were crowded into the small island of Okinawa, the largest concentration of foreign troops anywhere in Japan

Eclipse 6 year old feature request for word wrap

2009-08-05T20:36:00.000-07:00

(Eclipse is an Integrated Development Environment for Java development that I've used and I'm using)

[misc] Text Viewer and Editor needs to support word wrap

...with one valiant attempt from Ahti Kitsik through Google Summer of Code but with no completed results and the following proposal:

Companies who are interested in sponsoring word wrap implementation with some cash -- please contact me directly ahti@codehoop.com for more details. It would be all-or-nothing deal -- sponsorship would be collected only after feature gets into platform codebase.  I'd be happy to come up with a more complete solution if platform team is ready to introduce required API changes and we get enough interest from other companies too. I'm pretty familiar with the codebase and related problems (at least I was ~2 years ago).

MV: the start of Silicon Valley

2009-08-02T18:50:00.001-07:00

Sign on San Antonio road next to the shopping mall.

Site of first silicon device and research manufacturing company in Silicon Valley. The research conducted here led to the development of the Silicon Valley. 1956

The old building now houses a mexican grocery.

SFO airport taxis are a ripoff

2009-08-02T09:00:00.000-07:00

"This is America, you need to give 15% tip" said the Black & White checker taxi driver as we got off the taxi. Sorry buddy, I don't think America is about government enforced monopolies, stifling free competition and ripping off customers. Although maybe unmitigated greed probably is part of the American ethos and certainly this new immigrant learned that lesson fast.

Not only did he want us to pay cash (or face a 10% hike) but he was charging us 150% the metered fare as allowed by the monopoly on taxis at the airport - which came up to 91$ (plus a 6$ tip we gave him)! 91$ is a third as expensive as the 678 miles plane ride we had just taken! Oh yeah, and thanks for pointing out the surcharge once we had left the airport.

Unbelievably expensive for a 25.2 miles (40km) taxi ride home and absolutely unacceptable when compared to decent public transportation (usually less than 10$) available in every metropolis we've been to outside of North America that brings us almost door to door quickly.

In this area, they have trouble maintaining weekend service for the single train line...

Every experience with the taxis waiting in line at the SFO airport has been horrible. They know nothing about the area (you have to provide them step-by-step instructions), their taxi are poorly maintained, they love chatting on the phone and they don't really want to help you get your luggage in and out their crappy car.

You're better to stick with the unsanctioned drivers: at least they are polite, friendly, helpful and their cars don't suck. Or find a driver that you like and call him when you get off the plane...

FareStart restaurant in Seattle

2009-07-30T23:42:00.001-07:00

FareStart restaurant is both a school for the unemployed and a restaurant run by volunteers and students to finance their charitable programs.

Public transportation in Seattle

2009-07-30T23:39:00.001-07:00

Public transportation is unreliable and coverage is spotty. Every morning I took the 26 or 28 to get from 7th (1 block from the hotel) to 34st and Fremont. Whatever time was on the schedule didn't matter it seems as every buses made its way at random times. It seems I never was able to wait less than 15mn for a bus...

They also have a surcharge during rush hour... It's small but why? Isn't it better to have more people taking public transportation?

In addition, the bus lines "transform" into other bus lines which can be confusing especially if bus drivers don't call it out.

On the plus side, the downtown area is in a free zone and the clientele is diversified which makes for a nicer experience.

In comparison, San Francisco buses smell like piss with many passengers who haven't showered for weeks. No one that can scrape enough money for a car would be caught dead in a bus in Silicon Valley.

We are very far from Munich and London where "regular" people take the bus...

Portage Bay Cafe

2009-07-26T12:10:00.003-07:00

Yet another restaurant that comes with the cafe designation but works and looks like a restaurant.

The Portage Bay Cafe was referred to us for breakfast by the hotel, located 3 blocks from the hotel and it is enormously busy. Seeing the large set of people at the door we were worried that we would have to wait a long time.

The hostess told us the wait was 15mn but strangely as soon as wrote down our name she decided that we could sit down immediately. It looks like most of the people waiting were large groups.

Service was prompt but we had to wait a while for the food which wasn't unexpected considering. We ordered cinnamon twist french toast and Swedish pancakes and got huge portions (twice what we could eat)... Food is mostly from organic sources and the restaurant has a close relationship with the producers. The price is reasonable (33$ for two) considering the food quality, but the restaurant is very noisy (due to the cement ceiling) and the one stall toilet and one urinal for a restaurant that serves 191 persons is ridiculous.

The contrast in the ethnic composition is noticeable compared to Mountain View with a mostly white clientele with a few Asians sprinkled throughout and what seems to be a large amount of well-paid blue collars. The area around reminds us of the international district of Montreal just before the boom and the empty but very attractive leasing space.

Arrival in Seattle

2009-07-26T12:10:00.001-07:00

The two hours flight with United went without a hitch and thanks to Min Lin membership in the Lufthansa/Star Alliance "Miles and more" silver status we got priority boarding and extra leg space on the flight. The only trouble was the fact that the plane left at 6h15am meaning we woke up around 4am.

Our ride from Tacoma to Seattle was with an Indian Sikh driver that played typical Indian music clip with the hypnotic dance move.

Our hotel, Pan Pacific, looks luxurious but they didn't have a room for us ready so early so we went on a 1h quest to find a breakfast place and ended up at a cafe next to the towering Space Needle.

After we ate we bought a Seattle City Pass and started by visiting the adjacent Science-Fiction Museum and Experience the music with a fun bonus Jim Henson exhibition.

We then proceeded to a Lebanese cafe on Blanchard (looks like most eating place are also cafes!) - the alternative lunch places was an endless series of brunch for weekends. The gyro was good but Min Lin's falafel were a pale and tasteless version of the excellent falafel place in San Jose that Matt made us discover.

Going down to the water on Blanchard, we are overwhelmed by the odor of urine at every corner. Undesired bonus: a used condom on the sidewalk.

Not surprisingly, the city is hostile to people with small bladder as old reliable pee stations such as Starbucks and libraries have locked toilets "for customers only". Is it worth a smelly and disgusting city? Sounds to me like businesses shoot themselves in the foot collectively...

As it is the Seafair parade, some streets are lined up with chairs since early in the morning. The parade is a huge event but we only stopped for a glimpse.

We had dinner at the Wasabi Bistro on 2nd and Bell (an area with many restaurants): king crab soup, garden roll and bay scallop roll. Very good but expensive - 46$. Luckily, Min Lin printed a 25$ gift certificate for the restaurant she got through the airlines miles program of United so the actual total was closer to 20$.

Social network "viruses"

2009-07-24T19:02:00.000-07:00

From a friend:

Beware Netlog !!

I strongly suggest that you NOT click on anyone's Netlog sight should one come across your computer screen!! Through some highly deceptive ploy on their part, it will sign you up to join (even though you have not officially done so), and the result will be that your e-mail address book has been opened up and quite literally tapped into. Everyone in your e-mail address list will receive an "invitation" to look at your sight, thus setting off a chain reaction that taps into YOUR address book!!

Insanely Twisted Shadow Planet - Trailer HQ

2009-07-18T20:23:00.001-07:00

"Michel Gagné was born in Québec, Canada. He studied animation at Sheridan College School of Visual Arts in Ontario, Canada and in 1985, began a highly successful artistic career. "

http://www.gagneint.com

http://michelgagne.blogspot.com/

Its Time for Real / Eat Local, Eat Real

2009-07-16T21:28:00.001-07:00

Home: documentaire disponible jusqu'au 15 juillet

2009-07-13T21:48:00.000-07:00

Home: un documentaire à propos de notre maison à tous.

An inspiring women: Mary Lou Jepsen

2009-07-13T14:17:00.000-07:00

http://www.time.com/time/specials/2007/article/0,28804,1733748_1733754_1736211,00.html?iid=chix-sphere

Jepsen is a veteran of the MIT Media Lab, where she co-created the world's first holographic video system in 1989—back when computer imaging meant straight lines on a cathode screen. In 2005 Jepsen and Media Lab founder Nicholas Negroponte launched the nonprofit, open-source One Laptop Per Child program, which, as the name suggests, was an attempt to get a computer to every child in the world who needs one. The machines would have to work in extreme climate, amid spotty power and Internet connectivity, and be readable in direct sunlight.

[...]

Within two years they succeeded, creating a computer that can run on solar power, with five times the screen resolution of other laptops and a wireless system that creates its own network. The $100 price point has not been met, but $188 has. Jepsen did all that 12 years after receiving a diagnosis of a brain tumor in 1995 that had gone undetected for five years. She beat the disease but must take a dozen pills every day to keep her hormone output stable. Something of a self-taught expert on hormones, she now offers her insights to others who are diagnosed with the same illness. Jepsen is known among her friends as the "light lady" for her work with computer imaging. But the kind of light she's shedding goes far beyond the screen.

Soy Story

2009-07-09T23:42:00.000-07:00

http://www.bonappetit.com/magazine/2009/08/is_soy_healthy

So what's the bottom line? If you're a woman who has been diagnosed with or has a family history of breast cancer, it's probably safest to avoid soy. Men hoping to father children should probably limit the amount of soy they eat, and parents would be advised to follow the Israeli guidelines in serving soy foods to their kids, especially infants and toddlers.

[...]

When it comes to soy and health, there isn't much consensus. But there is one thing that both the anti- and pro-soy camps seem to agree on: Fermented soy is good for you.

How to Find Work You Love and Live the Time of Your Life

2009-07-09T18:33:00.000-07:00

"Do what you Love and the Money will follow!" ==> "Do what you Love and Life will follow!"

"Why do you Love your job?" ==> "No correlation between income level and loving your job"

"Life can follow any income level"

"What is happiness?"

"Define success without a dollar sign"

Further reading: Passion at Work

Another good inspiring talk: Randy Pausch Last Lecture: Achieving Your Childhood Dreams

Delicious lead... Délicieux plomb...

2009-07-05T16:41:00.001-07:00

WARNING: The Red Wine Vinegars and Balsamic Vinegars on these shelves contain lead, a chemical known to the State of California to cause cancer and birth defects or other reproductive harm.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_Proposition_65_(1986)

I still bought a big bottle of balsamic vinegar...

J'ai quand même acheté une grosse bouteille de vinaigre balsamique...

Best of Mountain View 2009

2009-07-04T12:41:00.000-07:00

We've voted for Best of Mountain View 2009:

Restaurants
Best Chinese restaurant: Chef Liu's
Best coffee house: Neto Cafe & Bakery
Best Mediterranean restaurant: Mediterranean Grill
Best sushi/Japanese restaurant: Sushi Tei
Best vegetarian restaurant: Passage to India

Services
Best massage: Massage Envy

Food/Drink
Best noodle place: Ramen House Ryowa
Best pizza: Madonaldo's Pizza
Best place to buy fresh produce: Mountain View Farmers' Market
Best small (non-chain) grocery store: Mi Pueblo

Retail
Best bike shop: Performance Bike
Best new business: 99 Ranch Market

Fun stuff
Best entertainment: Computer History Museum

Theme Category
Best place for a Hero-Villain battle: Castro street
Best rooftop to shine the bat light from: Mountain View City Hall
Best superhero headquarters: Googleplex

Really, 64% for Public Enemies?

2009-07-03T14:00:00.001-07:00

ROTTEN TOMATOES: Movies - New Movie Reviews and Previews!

64%

Public Enemies

I like to rely on Rotten Tomatoes because they gather and summarize the rating of many critics.

On opening night, Public Enemies had 64% so we decided to go see that.

Although the acting was good and the cinematography was great, it wasn't entertaining or emotionally appealing.

I think Rotten Tomatoes still works, as long as you look for something that has >75% (3/4 of critics like it).

Best of Mountain View 2008

2009-06-30T15:00:00.000-07:00

Best business:
http://www.mv-voice.com/news/show_story.php?id=833

Best eating and drinking:
http://www.mv-voice.com/news/show_story.php?id=832

2009 Summer concerts in Mountain View

2009-06-30T12:37:00.000-07:00

Free Thursday evening concerts from 6:30 to 8pm:

http://www.ci.mtnview.ca.us/city_hall/comm_services/recreation_programs_and_services/community_events/summer_concert_series.asp

Mountain View Farmers' Market

2009-06-28T13:34:00.001-07:00

Every Sunday from 9am to 1pm, there is the popular Farmers' market in Mountain View. You can find all kind of organically grown, fresh fruits and vegetables in addition to various homemade products. It's great and Min Lin has her favorite stand to buy really inexpensive Chinese vegetables.

At the entrance there is a huge basket sampling many of the products of the market. The woman at the stand told us: "Go ahead guys, fill it out - you have a great chance to win since there are few people that filled it out!".

So we did.

And we won.

They called us up a few minutes later while we were going to buy additional vegetables from the Chinese grocery on Castro. They told us "You won! Please fetch it in the next 45 minutes... oh, and don't come by bike, there's just too much!" - "...but...but"

... oh boy, trouble...

So now we had to figure out who to call up to share our new bounty. We eventually reached Wenbo; his family had just landed a day ago so were indeed in need of food. Even after just picking up the stuff we wanted and leaving him with a very heavy basket and bag of oranges, we filled out both of my bike saddle bags!

Karen, the person who had encouraged us to participate, was nice enough to help us with additional plastic bags to split the stuff. She also gave us the basket!

We talked for a bit; she works as an assistant-manager for the California Farmer's Market Association and they organize many markets in the region. She also mentioned to look out for the number on stickers of fruits and vegetables; #4 is conventionally grown, #8 is genetically modified and #9 is organic.

What was in the basket:

Shitake mushrooms, salads with edible flowers, baby spinach, zucchinis, Chinese eggplants, baby eggplants, lettuce, tomatoes, corn, broccoli, carrots, celery, various herbs, bok choy, strawberries, cucumbers, plums, peaches, apricots, oranges, potatoes, onions, blueberries from Triple Delight, organic fresh black raspberries from Prevedelli Farms, wildflower honey from Morganic Hilltop, sweet jalapeño marinade from Bolani, dried apricots from Apricot King and much more!!

Here's a summer garden soup made by Min Lin with fresh vegetables and herbs from the basket:

Recipe of Min Lin's summer garden soup:

Ingredients:

1 big tomato
1 baby green zucchini
1 yellow zucchini
some fresh basil
some fresh coriander
some water, salt, pepper, ginger powder and extra virgin olive oil

Cooking directions:

cut all vegetables, put all in a pot and gently cook until vegetables gets soften
serve with a few drops of lemon juice
good for 3 servings

Ricky + Min Lin Photos

2009-06-27T22:19:00.000-07:00

Photos prises par un professionnel dans un studio à Taipei. Pas mal non?

Pictures taken in a studio in Taiwan by a professional photographer. Not bad right?

The place we took Glamor pictures is at a studio in Ximen Taipei (http://www.flower-waves.com.tw/personal/about.asp - website in Chinese only). Min Lin has negotiated the package and scheduled the photo session 3 weeks in advance. The package we paid was around US$400 with 20 photos and a nice album with our 20 photos of 6x8 size, package includes 3 styles, one on one photographer and stylist. The studio also have a selection of cloths, but it's recommended to bring your own cloths.

It took us around 4 hours for the glamor pictures session and after that it took us 2 hours to choose 20 pictures out of 120 pictures (the photographer and his assistants took at least 1 hour trying to convince us to buy extra pictures, US$25/photo for only digital version and US$40/photo with printed + digital version + nicer album). Overall, it was a nice experience, the only drawback was that final pictures and album was done only a month after.

Debunking Canadian health care myths

2009-06-27T19:20:00.001-07:00

Myth: Taxes in Canada are extremely high, mostly because of national health care.
In actuality, taxes are nearly equal on both sides of the border. Overall, Canada's taxes are slightly higher than those in the U.S. However, Canadians are afforded many benefits for their tax dollars, even beyond health care (e.g., tax credits, family allowance, cheaper higher education), so the end result is a wash. At the end of the day, the average after-tax income of Canadian workers is equal to about 82 percent of their gross pay. In the U.S., that average is 81.9 percent.

Coffee Drinks Illustrated

2009-06-27T19:10:00.001-07:00

http://www.flickr.com/photos/two-eyes/1285147549/sizes/o/

Typing it old skool

2009-06-26T21:57:00.001-07:00

My birthday gift from Matt: a "new" IBM Type M keyboard from the original mold but with a USB interface! Love the taka taka taka of the hard springs inside - reminds me of programming on an IBM PS/2!

Min Lin however is not so happy with the noise... Mouahaha

I'll have to bring it at work to try it out on my colleagues!

HTC Hero - First Look

2009-06-25T13:04:00.001-07:00

Taiwanese (HTC) are really good at making lickable user interfaces for mobile phone ;-)

Mac Book Pro, Mac OS X 10.5.7 crashes and Ubuntu 9.04

2009-06-21T12:38:00.000-07:00

UPDATE: After a little bit of research, I found this:

http://www.pjentrepreneur.com/2009/01/21/update-mac-book-pro-blank-screen-problem/

I've had a Mac Book Pro air laptop since June 2007, one of the 3,1 model.

Model Name: MacBook Pro
Model Identifier: MacBookPro3,1
Processor Name: Intel Core 2 Duo
Processor Speed: 2.2 GHz
Number Of Processors: 1
Total Number Of Cores: 2
L2 Cache: 4 MB
Memory: 2 GB
Bus Speed: 800 MHz
Boot ROM Version: MBP31.0070.B07
SMC Version (system): 1.16f11
Serial Number (system): W8722D1NX91
Sudden Motion Sensor:
State: Enabled

My experience with it has been relatively good and I've been happy with an OS that straddles ease of use with the power of Unix under the hood. I spend hours every day at the computer (probably around 3000 hours on this one since I've bought it) so it is important that it works and although I love figuring out stuff at work I want my computer at home to help me relax.

Since the update to Mac OS X 10.5.7, my computer has been acting up in weird ways. Of course, I'm all out of luck since I did not renew my warranty. I'm not the only one as Min Lin had to change her hard drive for another one when the SMART monitoring started indicating imminent failures. Luckily that was pretty cheap to do in Taiwan.

I've always had display problems of some kind in previous releases. I have a dual-monitor setup (MBP 15 inch display with a Dell 2405FPW 24 inch display) and sometimes one of the display would start flickering for a while, or one of the display would not come back from sleep (with Detect displays resolving that issue) or...

But with the latest update, this went from annoying to disastrous. The OS' WindowServer (equivalent to Xserver) will completely freeze (not even a killall -HUP WindowServer from an ssh shell will recover it) with very abstract artwork being displayed. Using Skype now is a guaranteed crash.

I call this one "windows in the snow"

What is more annoying is that at reboot the boot up process will eventually crash indicating that you need to reboot once again (and again, and again...). The only way to recover from this one seemed to be to boot in single user (Cmd-S at boot) and run a fsck -fy that would ALWAYS find that /var/run/pcscd.pub (incorrect block count for the file pcscd.pub (should be 16 instead of 17). "pcscd is the Unix daemon that handles smartcards for OS X so this appears to be due to some built-in problem in the OS where that particular process file is always open.

I've been researching these issues, but opposite to certainly Linux and sometimes Windows, Mac OS X users are proud of being able to be generally ignorant of anything "technical" and so when confronted with an actual problem they are less than helpful at describing bugs and resolving them instead of just blindly trying things. Apple's help is similarly suited to users that don't know much so you are pretty much stuck figuring the issue yourself. Not only that, but I've read in some places that Apple was aware and may be working at solving these issues but they haven't and will not say anything publically.

From what I gleaned, all this seems to be due to a long present issue with the NVidia GeForce 8600M GT and similar video cards - an actual firmware bug that from release to release gets worked around differently. So under that nice aluminium casing there is actually a lemon! Of course, they probably have/had code to work around the issue which explains the generally satisfying experience but as the OS code evolves so do regressions appear making using Mac OS X on this defective hardware unsustainable in the long term. Which is really sad because when you invest 2K$ in a computer you expect it to last for more than 2 years... Any other company would see itself a subject of a class action suit, but of course fans of Apple are generally more fanatic and can afford to swap a lemon after a while....

So just for kick, I've downloaded Linux Ubuntu Jaunty Jackalope (Jalopy!) 9.04 LiveCD. Surprisingly, this boots and works straight up from the CD-ROM. Surprising since the last time I looked into it you had to jump through all kind of hoops to get it to run on the special EFI architecture that the MacBook have.

Ubuntu has its own problems of course and some of those issues that have been known for a long time (such as the inability to drive the Dell 2405FPW higher than 1280x1024 when it is a 1920x1200 display), the very jumpy touchpad that I had to disable or other subtle user interface bugs (such as an invisible force field that prevents dragging windows from one display to the other). These of course will just get ignored if I report them as they are always working on the next generation instead - most of my bugs related to Linux distros have been closed in the past as deprecated in new releases even when they are very easy to reproduce.

But at least I get hope that it is possible to run this hardware without crashing all the times. It also seems to strangely help with resetting whatever issue is occuring on the Mac OS X side...

Comparaison d'engins de recherche

2009-06-19T16:18:00.000-07:00

"BlindSearch" permet de faire une comparaison entre plusieurs engins de recherche sans etre biaise par nos preconceptions.

Si vous trouvez des mots-cles qui donnent les meilleurs resultats que celui de notre compagnie, n'hesitez pas a me les envoyer avec une explication du pourquoi un est meilleur que l'autre!

Pirates sur la piste cyclable

2009-06-19T08:41:00.001-07:00

Un cycliste avec son perroquet blanc sur son epaule...

Taiwan: A Fruit Lover's Paradise

2009-06-18T00:59:00.000-07:00

If you love tropical fruits, you should definitely visit Taiwan in June-July, it is the best time to taste the most delicious tropical fruits in the world!! You will find lychee, mango, papaya, guava, pineapple, watermelon, sugar cane, carambola, longan, passion fruit, sugar apple, etc... I could eat just fruits all day long ;-)

Other than fruits produced in Taiwan, I also like the exotic taste of durian, imported from Thailand. It's smelly and sweet ;-)

The O'Reilly Procedure

2009-06-17T22:36:00.000-07:00

Roger Ebert: The O'Reilly Procedure

Sometimes O'Reilly is compared with Father Coughlin, a popular far-right radio commentator in the 1930s who fanned the flames against Roosevelt and warned about immigration and "foreigners," by which it was understood he meant primarily Jews. O'Reilly objects to such a comparison, and certainly there is no reason to consider him anti-Semitic.
[...]
What were those "same techniques?" The Indiana team quoted an earlier study:

The seven propaganda devices include: * Name calling -- giving something a bad label to make the audience reject it without examining the evidence;
* Glittering generalities -- the opposite of name calling;
* Card stacking -- the selective use of facts and half-truths;
* Bandwagon -- appeals to the desire, common to most of us, to follow the crowd;
* Plain folks -- an attempt to convince an audience that they, and their ideas, are "of the people";
* Transfer -- carries over the authority, sanction and prestige of something we respect or dispute to something the speaker would want us to accept; and
* Testimonials -- involving a respected (or disrespected) person endorsing or rejecting an idea or person.

Action Discrète - Le buzz du ministre !

2009-06-14T11:43:00.001-07:00

Le futur de la promotion politique sur Internet... La fin est vraiment drôle! Google, PageRank, Lapin Crétin, blogues...

Artisan Wine Depot

2009-06-12T21:24:00.000-07:00

Dégustation de bières avec quelques bières Allemandes et Belges au nouveau Artisan Wine Depot à Mountain View.

Nous avons rencontré un des cofondateurs de Eye-Fi (carte SD avec transmetter WiFi!) Ziv Gellat qui a démontré son produit en prenant des excellentes photos de nous:

Mountain View ranked as 4th "America's Top 25 Towns to Live Well"

2009-06-05T19:51:00.000-07:00

http://www.mv-voice.com/story.php?story_id=5131

Of all the cities and towns in the U.S. with populations under 100,000, Mountain View has been ranked by Forbes magazine as the fourth best to live in and the best in the Bay Area.
A May 4 Forbes story titled "America's Top 25 Towns to Live Well" states that, compared to most cities, Mountain View is more likely to rebound from the economic recession and has the sort of business environment often seen only in large cities.

The top 25 list was created by San Francisco-based ZoomProspector.com, which factored in data such as business environment, cultural attractions, average commute time, entrepreneurs per capita, the number of educated professionals between 25 and 34 years old and median income.

Picnick online photo editing

2009-06-02T05:44:00.000-07:00

I found a pretty cool online photo editing tool called Picnik, it's free and fun!

Before adding effects:

After adding some effects:

You can also create photo collage:

The free version has limited choices of effects and collage templates. It is possible to upgrade to Premium edition by paying an annual fee...

Discover Taiwan - the treasure island

2009-05-30T19:20:00.000-07:00

Here's some links for travel in Taiwan:

Taiwan tourism bureau
Taiwan Map
Taiwan Festivals
Tastes of Taiwan

Transportation
Taiwan Railway Administration - train schedule

Places to visit
Green Island
Taroko National Park
Yushan National Park
Shei-Pa National Park
North Coast & Guanyinshan National Scenic Area
Northeast and Yilan Coast National Scenic Area
Maolin National Scenic Area
Siraya National Scenic Area
Orchid Island (Lanyu)
Penghu County
Liji Lunar World
Yehliu Park
Longdong South Ocean Park
Danshuei Old Street
National Palace Museum
Taipei 101

Accommodation recommendation
Accommodations around Hualien and Taroko
Grand Formosa Taroko (Tien-Xian)
Hotel Bayview (Chishingtarn Coast Scenic Area)
Rainbow hotel (Jiben)
Shiacarl B&B - English version coming soon! (Green Island)
Burgary hotel - Chinese (Taipei)

The crusade for a Christian military

2009-05-30T12:27:00.000-07:00

http://harpers.org/archive/2009/05/0082488

They had commissioned the Special Forces interpreter, an Iraqi from Texas, to paint a legend across their Bradley’s armor, in giant red Arabic script.
“What’s it mean?” asked Humphrey.

“Jesus killed Mohammed,” one of the men told him. The soldiers guffawed. JESUS KILLED MOHAMMED was about to cruise into the Iraqi night.

The Bradley, a tracked “tank killer” armed with a cannon and missiles—to most eyes, indistinguishable from a tank itself—rolled out. The Iraqi interpreter took to the roof, bullhorn in hand. The sun was setting. Humphrey heard the keen of the call to prayer, then the crackle of the bullhorn with the interpreter answering—in Arabic, then in English for the troops, insulting the prophet. Humphrey’s men loved it. “They were young guys, you know?” says Humphrey. “They were scared.” A Special Forces officer stood next to the interpreter—“a big, tall, blond, grinning type,” says Humphrey.

“Jesus kill Mohammed!” chanted the interpreter. “Jesus kill Mohammed!”

A head emerged from a window to answer, somebody fired on the roof, and the Special Forces man directed a response from an MK-19 grenade launcher. “Boom,” remembers Humphrey. The head and the window and the wall around it disappeared.

Qu'est-ce qu'un BBS?

2009-05-30T10:36:00.000-07:00

Hier, j'ai été obligé d'expliquer à mes collègues de travail c'était quoi un BBS (Bulletin Board System)!

Ils étaient complètement étonnés d'entendre qu'il y avait dans les années 80 et jusqu'au milieu des années 1990 des (centaines dans la région de Montréal) ordinateurs connectés à une banque de modems (4-32) auxquels les utilisateurs se connectaient de la maison. Ils étaient aussi sceptiques d'entendre que ces BBS offraient des services de forums de discussions, de téléchargement de fichiers, de jeux et de chats avec des limites de temps (1 heure) enfin que plusieurs personnes puissent se connecter à tour de rôle.

Un des deux, un nouveau stagiaire d'origine Chinoise avait entendu parlé du terme BBS en Chine à son université - mais pour lui c'était un serveur un Internet auxquel les étudiants se connectaient pour échanger.

Je pense que je suis trop vieux... Moi et Min Lin on a commencé notre relation sur le babillard électronique du Cégep du Vieux Montréal. J'étais aussi un sysop (system operator) du système et j'en profitait pour donner du temps d'extra à ma blonde ;-).

Taiwan May 2009 2 weeks travel Costs for 2 persons

2009-05-29T23:53:00.000-07:00

After reading posts about our trip in Taiwan and looking at our nice pictures, I think lots of people are curious to know how much did the trip cost?

Here's the breakdown (Taiwanese dollars, conversion at the end):

Note: we stayed 2 nights at my brother's apartment in Taipei.

The total cost excluding round-trip airfare is US$1725.62 (1901.76$CAD), round trip plane ticket San Fran-Taipei is US$865 per person, so the real total is $3455.62 for 2 persons 2 weeks travel in Taiwan. It is possible to reduce the cost if you travel in low season (probably March-April and October-November), airfare can be 30% to 40% cheaper and if you don't mind staying at cheaper accommodations, you can save another 20% to 30%.

Want to have an unforgettable trip? What are you waiting for? Start planning your trip to Taiwan! ;-)

My Tracks Taiwan

2009-05-29T12:00:00.000-07:00

Android My Tracks recorded GPS information for our Taiwan trip:

View Tracks: Taiwan May 2009 in a larger map

Egg standing up on Dragon boat day

2009-05-28T07:58:00.001-07:00

Date: Thu, 28 May 2009 12:25:08 +0800

Lucky year!

Actually, my niece Jessica made an egg standing up by
12:25 and it was still up until 22:00.
Maybe getting lucky by doing this is true, because the
same night my niece won the First Price at Dragon boat
festival organized by our community!

Je suis sur StreetView / I'm on StreetView!

2009-05-26T13:10:00.000-07:00

View Larger Map

Je suis dans la pyramide! J'ai posté ça l'été dernier mais l'image n'était plus valide. J'ai vérifié que je suis encore là...

I'm in the pyramid! I had posted that last summer but the image wasn't valid anymore but I'm still there ;-).

No room for bigots

2009-05-25T17:24:00.000-07:00

http://www.newint.org/features/2009/05/01/no-room-for-bigots/

As for the much-derided Muslims (580,000 in the 2001 census, but now estimated at 750,000) – they are a satisfied lot, according to a poll done for the Trudeau Foundation in Montreal. They register higher levels of pride in Canada than the population at large. They are less likely than Muslims in Britain, France, Germany or Spain to feel that their fellow citizens are hostile to Islam. They did cite discrimination as a problem, but ‘the thing Muslims least like about Canada is the cold weather’, just like all other immigrant groups.

Burgary hotel 寶格利時尚旅館, Ximen, Taipei, Taiwan

2009-05-24T00:24:00.001-07:00

The Burgary hotel 寶格利時尚旅館 is just next the busy Ximen area on the busy Zhonghua road.

Ximen is ideal for shopping, food an ideal to catch a movie with its numerous movie theaters (we saw Star Trek on a large Imax screen).

The rooms are expensive (3680NT$ or around 120$US), the entrance is unimpressive, the free breakfast is the worse we've had. The bed is so-so, better then the plywood hardness in other hotels, although we would have hoped for better and more sheets.

Where the Burgary really shine is in the bathroom with an enormous bubble bath with colored lighting effect and nice shower with a standard showerhead and a rain type overhead showerhead. Next to the bath is a TV screen.

Overall, a good experience and we would come back for a night or two to be in the happening area.

Olympia bakery, Taipei, Taiwan

2009-05-24T00:10:00.001-07:00

Olympia bakery (3 places in Taipei, including one is Ximen) has surprisingly good cream puffs for 30NT$ (1US$) each. They are also very filling so you can't really eat more then one. Another surprise are the dim sum who are tasty and fresh.

Olympia (http://www.olympiafoods.com.tw)

Baiyang trail 白楊步道, Taroko National Park 太魯閣國家公園, Taiwan

2009-05-22T09:06:00.001-07:00

A few minutes walk in the hot sun from the Grand Formosa hotel was the Baiyang trail 白楊步道.

From the start, Min Lin was worried when we had to walk a few hundreds meters in a straight tunnel where the light at the other end was only a dot.

She got more worried when we got to a curved tunnel where we couldn't see the light until we walked to the curve a few meters in.

But she got really worried when we had to walk a few meters in yet another tunnel in total darkness! That last experience was exactly like being blind even with our eyes wide open, the convenient rail our only guide.

Dragging Min Lin through it all was worth it for the sights of the roaring canyon river on one side of a rope bridge (limit 10 persons) and waterfalls on the other. Absolutely gorgeous!

In addition, the trail ends with the water curtain tunnel, where a river flows fed by water leaking abundantly from the ceiling. If you go through, be ready to get wet and watch out for the frogs.

All of this is framed by vegetation covered cliffs, huge boulders at the bottom of the canyon and mountains peaking through the clouds. It is also an easy trail, apart from the scary tunnels. A flashlight is recommend except if you like to have your significant other hold on tight to yourself...

Grand Formosa Taroko Western Restaurant, Taiwan

2009-05-21T01:59:00.001-07:00

The decor is wood and a large slab of rock next to which are placed the various salad dish. Two more islands have most of the meat dishes and a chef speciality area. Tucked in a corner the desserts are layed out.

The staff is very accomodating and prompt, offering us good seats and are quick at picking up the steady stream of dishes.

The desserts are all delicious and include a mango mousse, an angel cake, fruitcake and more. There is also some watermelon and if you want to go French style you can get some of the tasty smoked gouda cheese in addition to a Min Lin's favorite, matcha (green tea) ice cream. The chef was nice enough to bring an extra plate of cheese when we scavenged the last piece.

Wait you'll say, what about the main dishes? Sadly, they are all messed up in their own special way with an uniform abuse of pepper in all dishes. The supposedly French style onion soup is an insult to France and even the spaghetti ranks as the worse I've had.

The buffet food is 590NT$ plus a 10% service charge. We recommend stuffing yourself on the afternoon tea (250NT$) and going for some stinky tofu next door for dinner.

Grand Formosa Taroko 天祥晶華度假酒店, Tien-Xiang 天祥, Taiwan

2009-05-21T01:58:00.001-07:00

Ma-Lu-Su? ("How are you?" in the language of the Atayal, a local aboriginal mountain tribe)

Nested in the mountains and only reachable by an half hour drive in the sinuous and narrow roads through the tall mountains is the Grand Formosa Taroko hotel 天祥晶華度假酒店.

Years ago, the Japaneses during the occupation were the first to turn the region from a dangerous mountain path hanging dangerously on the cliff of the mountains to a tourists destination.

Now, tour buses of mostly Taiwaneses and mainlanders with a few westerners and Japaneses sprinkled throughout negotiate a not much larger road, stopping to admire the beautiful sights of the high, jungle covered mountains and bare cliffs that drop to the rivers.

Some, like us, stop at the amazingly affordable five stars hotel Grand Formosa Taroko with all the modern facilities in the middle of it all. Two restaurants (one western style buffet and one chinese style), indoor and outdoor (roof) swimming pools, spa facilities and a gamut of entertainment choices (ping pong, billiards, video games, bowling). The dinner buffet looks delicious although expensive even by the standards in North America.

You can get a room with a view on the courtyard or overlooking the river and cliff outside. We switched to the second choice so we could run naked in the room with the windows opened.

At night, huge insects (including an enormous wasp that made it in the room) are attracted to the light and land on our window. A bat profits of this by flying again and again next to our window to eat them.

The rooms are decorated tastefully with some inspirations from the mountain tribes while the friendly employees wear uniforms with slight additions that reminds us of traditional aboriginal tribes.

Amazing, if not slightly nauseating, that this mountainous and remote area went from tribes getting necessities from nature to hydroelectric dams to the comforts found in any large city of the world in the span of less than 75 years with the help of a few generations of murdered natives or exploited labor.

All of this so that I can make a call sitting on the toilet by using the convenient phone handset there or watch HBO while lounging on the bed...

Thank you doesn't seem enough.

The only thing left to do then is to complain about how hard the bed is, how the hotel corridors are smelly and how few towels there are.

S-Wa-Yai Da Da! (goodbye in Atayal)

Hike in mysterious valley, Shakadang trail 砂卡礑步道, Taroko National park 太魯閣國家公園, Taiwan

2009-05-18T23:07:00.000-07:00

The staff at the hotel Taroko warmed up to us and we warmed up to them. We were going to leave for the next hotel but they convinced us to try at least one trail, the Shakadang trail 砂卡礑步道.

So after breakfast (fried egg sandwich) we did a 8 km hike through the 1 km tunnel that goes to the "mysterious valley", then following a trail built into one cliff and finally the mostly dried river bed with just enough water for miniature waterfalls and small fishes.

There are a few aboriginal people still living in the valley and they grow a kind of vegetable consumed for its leafs in addition to raising a few chickens.

We then came back to Taroko village and had lunch, mostly gathered from the local 7 Eleven store.

Hotel Taroko 太魯閣旅店, Taroko village 太魯閣, Taiwan

2009-05-18T17:34:00.000-07:00

Taroko village 太魯閣 is the entrance of Taroko National Park 太魯閣國家公園, but we found that it is a scary and deserted place at night: gangs of 12 years old holding sticks roving at night (we only survived those when we said we were Canadians), mean dogs on leashes that jump at you to push you off the sidewalks, a 7 Eleven kept at freezing temperature and a series of abandoned and probably haunted houses that dot its main street.

The hotel Taroko 太魯閣旅店 staff is unwelcoming this late at night, almost requiring torture to extract tidbits of information while a dog keeps barking menacingly outside.

Our inquiries about using the bicycles are met with veiled threats that we will be run over on the pathless streets of Taroko. We discovered later that this isn't strictly true; there are some bike paths.

We took the most expensive room and ended up with a bed with the firmness of plywood. The shower is so badly designed that the hook to hold the shower head is aligned with and two feets from the sink.

A little sign in the shower warns that we have to let the water run for 5 minutes to get hot water. In actuality, this is more like 15 minutes - I had time enough to brush my teeth and take a full (cold) shower including an hair shampoo before the hot water came on, wasting probably the equivalent of an Olympic size pool. I can assume that the environment won't be an hot issue during the next political elections. Min Lin in the meantime was trying to get the issue resolved with the front desk but only got accusations that we didn't let the water run for long enough...

The restaurant across the street has a good wild (and by wild they mean farm raised) boar dish. However they probably couldn't serve a vegetarian dish if their life depended on it as they gave Min Lin noodles with bits of meat in it.

The next day is a different story. We must admit it is still a good, new, clean hotel well located next to a national park with a view on the nearby river and mountains. And the front desk woman finally cracks a smile while the manager gets up and is actually helpful. Sadly, they still give us misinformation and we end up too early at the visitor center as we were told it opened at 7:30 instead of 8:30.

Départ de Shiacarl 夏卡爾, Green Island, Taiwan

2009-05-17T20:02:00.001-07:00

Shiacarl près des montagnes sur l'ile verte attends,
Au large de la côte est de Taiwan dans le vent ,
Pour les petits bateaux de pêche sur l'eau,
Pour les nages parmis poissons colorés et les coraux,
Pour les marches dans les sentiers de randonnées
Pour les baignades dans les eaux thermales salées,
Mais surtout pour l'hospitalité,
De nos hôtes à Shiacarl toujours gaies,
Le savoir de l'ile du grand frère,
Le sourire de la blonde du grand frère,
Et l'attention du petit frère du grand frère,
Nous sers d'un merveilleux pied a terre,
La bouffe est bonne surtout autour du feu de camp,
Pour manger calmars, maïs et poissons volants.

5th day on Green Island, Taiwan

2009-05-17T17:35:00.003-07:00

That morning we moved back from the other B&B to Shiacarl, taking our two carry-ons and two backpacks on the scooter for the 1mn ride (they are basically next to each other).

After another delicious breakfast, we went to the "cow head", a rock formation on the north east tip of the island that looks like a cow. I can't say I see it but they've conveniently also added a cow skull to the scenery. There are also remnants there of various abandoned fortifications, although I wonder who built it and why.

We drove back through the town (another shaved ice) back to Shiacarl and I went out for more snorkeling where I got a slight sunburn on my back.

We had lunch in town at the Seaweed Meatball restaurant and the owner (Tino) invited us to come back that night for a neat experience.

So we drove again at 6pm that night. The activity was to walk around the littoral and pick up various form of wildlife: crabs and shellfish. We also saw a big "sea rabbit" that emits a red cloud when disturbed in addition to many sea cucumbers and corals. Pretty neat! We could also see a big thunderstorm over the ocean west of the island but luckily we only got a few drops.

4th day on Green Island

2009-05-17T17:35:00.001-07:00

After breakfast at Shiacarl, we went hiking in the ancient across the mountain trail. We saw many lizards taking in the sun in the trail and scurrying into the bushes when we came by, except for two that took an aggressive stance when we were coming down the mountain - probably frustrated at having their sunbathing interrupted all the time. We also saw a deer (a smaller kind then the Sika deer) and a big shiny salamander in addition to many butterflied.

We had to checkout from Shiacarl since they did not have a room for us on Saturday night, so we moved to an hotel in the same village. As most buildings in Taiwan, the exterior looks of older buildings is awful but the actual room was nice, although the mattress was a lot firmer than I'm used to. Still, a very good alternative 20% to 30% less expensive than Shiacarl, although you don't get the same personalized experience and there is no breakfast.

Talking about hospitality, our hosts at Shiacarl invited us to BBQ! The food involved is much different than in north America... We had flying fish (salted and whole), sausage, squid, chicken tail, slices of pork, fish soup (I had an entire small fish floating in my bowl) and corn.

That day, we've also tried out the shaved ice downtown which is ice with red beans, tofu, seaweed, condensed milk and a few other ingredients that are very refreshing.

Google on the road

2009-05-15T20:24:00.001-07:00

[This is in no way official or approved by my employer].

I'm biased but Google online apps and the HTC/T-Mobile/Google G1 running the Android stack (with Linux OS) have been very useful on this trip. Any wireless access point as provided in most hotels (and even in the Green Island B&B!) turns the G1 in a portable computer.

The qwerty keyboard makes blogging and sending out emails practical at a reasonable speed that would not be possible with an onscreen keyboard. Writing these blog posts to share our trip with you is an activity I like to do while waiting for Min Lin to finish up whatever she is doing or waiting for meals.

I found the best way to blog on the road is to use the blogspot email-to-blog functionality. Using drafts on the Android email clients makes it possible to write my thoughts and observations offline to queue them for sending the next time I have net access.

The pictures taken with the built-in camera are low quality which makes them perfect as a preview to the pics taken with my "real" digicam. Email pics attachments to the email to blog are automatically converted. This is an awesome feature which is actually a lot easier than creating a blog post, transferring pics and uploading them.

Since we did not make reservations ahead, Min Lin researched and made reservations on the road and even paid for rooms on secure sites.

Of course, Google search engine has been useful to look things like "jellyfish sting taiwan" to figure out if I was going to die or not.

Some Android apps are awesomely useful too on a trip. I've fallen in love with My Tracks, which uses the built-in GPS (yes, a real GPS!) to record any kind of travel from hiking to train rides. It provides statistics (such as average speed and moving average speed), elevation profile and of course the recorded path on a map. You can also share the tracks, although that doesn't currently work with the OS version I have installed.

There is also the Sky Map application that uses the GPS, compass and accelerometer to show celestial bodies and constellations names. Hold it up at night with a starry sky in the background and you can finally put a name on those shiny things in the sky!

The future is here and it's useful! I think that there is a lot of potential here.

Third day on Green Island

2009-05-15T16:56:00.001-07:00

After going to the hot spring, we slept a little and afterward I went snorkeling. I got in my mind to try picking up some of the plastic trash floating around. When I got to what I thought was a blue piece of plastic, I got a strange burning sensation between my fingers... Jellyfish! My whole right arm was numb. I put some vinegar on it but one of the B&B owner told me that pee was more effective so I tried that in the shower. I was worried it would get worse (some jellyfish are so poisonous that they are deadly) but the pain went away by noon.

We went downtown to get some gas for the scooter and taste the shaved ice. We then went back, had a beer and a while later bit returned to the water for some snorkeling together. Among other things, I saw an impressive lion fish.

After dinner, we went to a special night tour of the island with one of the host. We looked at the stars, a family of Sika deer, brown and green stick insects (the later is a protected specie) and the memorial to the five hundreds political prisoners or so during the Kuomingtang dictatorship.

Our last stop was to get some stinky tofu downtown...

Shiacarl Cafe 夏卡爾, Green Island, Taiwan

2009-05-15T05:02:00.001-07:00

The B&B also doubles as a small cafe for serving guests and outside customers. The eating area is nicely decorated with relaxing music and a soothing ocean breeze.

Our hosts and hostess Selena all take turn cooking and luckily for us they also make the best food on the island, although they quite humble about it.

While the downtown is bland or excessively bizarre, their food strike the right balance between original and good taste. Of particular note is the fruit salad that is common to most of her dishes. They are also accommodating of their mixed carnivorous and vegetarian guests, serving versions of both for any dishes to me and Min Lin. the vegetarian version is also not an inferior version of the meat dish, but delicious in its own way.

I love the fact that we don't have to choose the dishes; we just tell them when we want to eat and the dishes are served, a pleasant surprise everytime.

Jhaorih saltwater hot spring 朝日溫泉, Green Island, Taiwan

2009-05-14T17:42:00.001-07:00

5 minutes drive away from the hotel there is an ocean side hot spring where the saltwater is heated by the underground magma - one of the only three saltwater hot spring in the world where this experience is available.

The resort was called Jhaorih saltwater hot spring (rising sun) 朝日溫泉 during the Japanese occupation, so it is not entirely surprising that rush hour is 5am, just before sunrise. Tradition demands to sit down on the lukewarm water next to the reef where waves crash noisily, although not loud enough to cover the loud discussions of the Taiwanese that made the stop too.

Interestingly, a few hours later the resort is practically empty and me and Min Lin were left almost alone to enjoy the beautiful view and the hot water jets.

Real Snorkeling (2nd day on Green Island), Taiwan

2009-05-14T17:29:00.001-07:00

Yesterday, we went out to the small port that is just across the street from the hotel. I dove in while Min Lin was looking and walking on the littoral.

Just there, below the surface, fishes and coral abound. I saw one of those strange tube like trumpet fish and a small moray hunting in the crevisses that took a cobra like pose when it saw me. There were also huge urchins, their spiky exterior sticking to the walls. The most beautiful was a fiery orange fish, but all the rainbows colors were there on fish of all sizes and stripes.

When I came out of the water, Min Lin reported happily that even the small ponds that she walked along were filled with wildlife such as crabs, fishes jumping from one small reservoir to the other, colorful babies of the bigger ones we see in the water.

Around the island (second day), Green Island, Taiwan

2009-05-14T03:53:00.001-07:00

We had breakfast at the B&B, Shiacarl. It was pretty tasty although I did not like the sausage so I gave the second piece to the dog mascot (tooto) and he seem to rather enjoy it. That dog is an expert at begging food from guests!

The B&B is owned by a very nice and welcoming family that invested a lot of money in achieving their dream of an island job, quitting their jobs to come here. They have 6 rooms (4 for 2p, 2 for 4p) for rent in addition to rooms for more frequent guests. A sign of their philosophy: no TV in rooms! They find the guests being dismayed at that fact very amusing too...

We then went for a scooter ride to go around the entire 20 km loop around the island from 8am to noon with an half hour stop for lunch in the downtown area.

Of course, this includes a few stops along the way to admire the sights. There is a wonderful observation point perched on top of a rock that looks down on two rock formations; one is called the sleeping beauty and the other the dog and they both look like they are described. We also drove down sea level in the location of an old native village and the largest arch on the island. We then went by a Buddhist temple in an underground cave. We also spent some time in the visitor center getting information and sending postcards.

For lunch, I had Sika deer meat (chewy and gamy) while Min Lin ate some fried rice. We drank ibiscus and prune juice, similar to what we had at the dragon restaurant.

Snorkeling around Green Island, Taiwan

2009-05-13T16:35:00.003-07:00

One set of differences in cultures is what they fear and what they don't. Japaneses will gladly eat fugu (pufferfish) that could kill them but fearful of foreigners. Germans will be happy to get comatose drunk but fear slipping back into militarism. Californians (not a nationality but still pretty distinct) will do all kind of extreme sports but fear being in the wrong school districts.

Taiwaneses will happily speed at 80 km/h on an old decrepit scooter without an helmet but fear water. This is especially strange for a people living on an island, but Min Lin says learning to swim was never much of a priority when they were children. This explains why Taiwaneses visiting the island have so easily assimilated the fear that swimming alone means you could be dragged by underwater currents all the way to Okinawa...

Instead of educating people, having people sign non-responsibility releases or doing proper management of areas to ensure people swim safely, Taiwan decided instead that you needed a certified instructor to hold your hand. It is just coincidence that it also keeps the local snorkeling businesses going too...

So it is all decked out with a swimsuit, a lifejacket and holding to one of 8 lifesavers strung together in a group of 25 other persons that I lived my first snorkeling experience on Green Island. Not only did I feel ridiculous and insulted, but the sense of adventure and discovery is gone. The experience is as artificial as floating on top of an aquarium.

Yes, of course, the fishes are colorful, varied and bountiful. They've gotten into the habit of eating all the bread that tourism gives them so they gather in the area.

This creates a Disney like experience and a crowd pleaser that will make the experience very enjoyable for first timers.... But I can't seem to get out that the freedom, romance and sense of wonder is missing compared to our experiences on the French Riviera. I'm also wondering how long this will last with hundreds of tourism stepping awkwardly on coral - it seems that the instructors responsibilities don't include educating people to protect the wildlife, although it is forbidden to take anything away (60K NT$).

Just make sure that if you want that freedom you bring some kind of internationally recognized certification...

Transportation on Green Island, Taiwan

2009-05-13T16:35:00.001-07:00

After our ride to the hotel, we decided to go to the downtown area. The island is surrounded by a 20 km road that creates a ring between the mountains and the ocean. From the hotel, the downtown area is 8 km away.

The best way to get around is the scooter: it is energy efficient, well suited to the nice weather and the narrow road and was probably easier to bring to the island by boat too.

The problem is that I don't have my permit and Min Lin's doesn't like to drive... Well, at least we thought it would be a problem because I was handed the keys to a scooter without any questions!

So off I went driving my first real motorized vehicle on the narrow and weaving roads of the island, Min Lin sitting behind me and squeezing me, reminding us from a typical scene from a romantic Chinese movie. The scooter tops out at 80 km/h as I discovered on a few straight stretches.

Luckily, there are very few other visitors to the island right now, because Taiwanese drive as crazy as in Taipei - zig zagging between other scooters and pedestrian at high speed. We seem to be also the only ones wearing an helmet even if the law requires it!

That night, it was also my first time (like everything else on a motor vehicle) driving in the dark. There is no light provided on the road but apart from a few near misses where we almost drove into the water, we made it back safely.

For some weird reason, Min Lin walks away from my rides feeling stressed...

The trip to Green island 綠島, Taiwan

2009-05-12T20:04:00.001-07:00

We got a ride from the hotel to the port of Taitung. There, pushy group guides tried to cut in line until Min Lin got real miffed and started shouting. For some strange reason, Taiwaneses here think I'm Japanese and that it gives them the right to walk all over me until Min Lin gives them crap in the Taiwanese dialect.

The 50 minutes boat trip was uneventful apart from the exocets flying away from the boat, a glimpse at a dolphin (according to Min Lin) and the sight of a few passengers getting sick.

We got a ride from the B&B owner in the back of his two seats Pronto truck. I don't think he made any allowance for trying safer either! Strangely, reckless and fun motor vehicle behavior is not matched with any flexibility in water sports; every tourism must be part of a group.

Arriving at the Shiacarl B&B 夏卡爾民宿, the room we got is quite nice; wooden floors in a 3 stories building with a strict rule not to walk in the room with shoes on; a good Japanese tradition. Our room has a view on the ocean and the jungle near the south-east tip of the island.

Dragon water tea house, Jiben, Taiwan

2009-05-12T19:49:00.001-07:00

After the hot spring cooked eggs, we decided to keep walking towards the Jiben royal hotel. We saw another family of monkeys on the side of the road. They are easy to spot because they get very noisy (like Taiwanese tour groups) and jump from branch to branch when someone walks by.

Our plan was to either find a restaurant or call up the one that was advertising free pick up. However, we then found a sign indicating that the restaurant was 600m away so we decided to walk... uphill.

550m... 500m... was this such a good idea?... 400m... 300m... maybe we should have called them?...200m... the farmer that we had seen coming up earlier with a bag of vegetables is now coming back down with a quizzical face... 100m... we've worked up quite a sweat... 50m... an ugly old shed on the side of the road is not confidence inspiring... "you are almost there".... "just right around the bend"...

The vista opens up on the cloud covered mountains, an orchestra of singing birds, scratching insects, croaking frogs, howling monkeys and foliage dancing in the wind.

The restaurant is a bamboo patio built as an extension to a private home where 5 generations of the same Taiwanese family lived.

As dusk comes, we can see the lights of the nearby city, Taitung. A counter in the restaurant offers wood carved products, rare teas, a variety of body oils. The lady, somewhat surprised to see us without reservations, welcomes us and demoes a mint essential oil to help cold down our overheated bodies. She takes our order for dinner and two drinks (one from a flower and the other prune, both very strong).

The food is zen; simple but tasty, including a mountain vegetable in a light black bean sauce. Eating slowly while admiring the show that nature is putting on is very relaxing.

We soon take our leave, pay our dinner (700$NT total) and use the free ride back to the hotel...

Tonight in Rainbow Hotel 泓泉溫泉渡假村, Jiben, Taiwan

2009-05-12T02:27:00.001-07:00

Another two hours by train and a taxi ride brought us in a remote area in the mountains with many hot springs resorts. We are staying at the Rainbow Hotel 泓泉溫泉渡假村 in Jiben hot spring area. Very basic accommodations since the hotel is pretty old. The facilities are small but have one major advantage compared to spa resorts; the water is naturally heated by geothermal energy and with a large quantity of minerals doesn't need chlorination.

We went for as small walk and saw a monkey. Apart from that the trail is again littered with all kinds of garbage, including an entire bath!

We then went for a walk in the hope of finding something better than the ghastly restaurant at the hotel. We found a place where you can buy and cook eggs in the boiling hot spring water - a Min Lin's favorite.

Second day at Hotel Bayview 七星潭渡假飯店, Hualien 花蓮, Taiwan

2009-05-11T20:27:00.001-07:00

As planned, we woke up before sunrise and after taking a few pics of the sun over the ocean, we went for an hour and 30 minutes (15km) round trip bike ride. This time we went north instead of the south direction we took yesterday.

The bike path is as beautiful and well constructed as the other segment and 1km of the path goes through a botanical park, a fishing village, a cemetery while close to the military base.

The breakfast was also quite good with lots of vegetarian choices for Min Lin including congee and egg foo young. They also serve watermelon; this is a region specialty and it is considered the best in Taiwan. Not only that, but there is currently a watermelon festival going on.

All in all, we got a great deal for 2600$NT (80$USD) and we'll certainly remember room 507! I think it helps that the co-owner also lived in Argentina like Min Lin so they are being extra nice.

As far as now, the weather in mid-may is good too; although very hot at 30 celcius and is not as humid and we don't have much to worry about typhoon. But it is definitely a great idea to put all physical activities early in the morning and late in the evening.

Going to Chixintang 七星潭 (near Hualien 花蓮), Taiwan

2009-05-11T03:48:00.001-07:00

Today, we took the train #2039 limited express from Taipei main station, car 9 seats 14 and 16 at noon. The trip duration was 3h and 8 minutes and the train started exactly on time and made it on time.

Was this an habit inherited from when Japan occupied Taiwan? Are the train on the mainland generally on time? It is depressing to compare this to the sorry state of public transportation and train transportation in North America.

One of the hotel owner took us from Hualien station to the hotel as we were one of the very few visitors that came without a car.

We were immediately impressed by the gorgeous blue and white exterior of the Bay View hotel 七星潭渡假飯店. All employees are very friendly and for once, the room was even better!

Located on the 5th and top floor, it has a superb view of the ocean as the name promised and the room setting is pretty close to the ideal we have for the dream apartment! It has a big bath, a spacious shower, a comfortable bed. The bathroom is surrounded by glass so it is possible to take a bath and admire the ocean view! To top it all NO STUPID CARPETING! Yeah!

The roof has also a lounge area and a jacuzzi that sadly wasn't working. The police will also not permit you to swim in the ocean due to the dangerous waves. I learned that when two of them came and told me to get out after I had some fun breaking the rule and feigning ignorance at the chinese only sign. I still had enough time to enjoy the experience of surprisingly warm water crashing into me a few times.

Since water is out, you have to fallback on the good and free bicycles and the wonderful 10 km coast bike trail. The mountains looking north are quite a sight. You also get a peek at the airforce base (with F16 galore) and the AA flak cannons. I can only imagine that this is possible with the recent detente in relationships with mainland China.

We are also looking forward to the sunrise tomorrow at 5:13 am which should be great since our view is due east.

A can't miss hotel on the east coast of Taiwan although the limited activities and food options probably mean you'll spend only one or two nights. Luckily the area is surrounded with sights and places to go. More in future posts.

Xinbeitou 新北投, Taipei, Taiwan

2009-05-11T00:32:00.001-07:00

Getting to Xinbeitou 新北投 means using the small segment between Beitou 北投 and that station, going through a canyon of residential buildings at 20 km an hour.

Notes about the metro public transportation: it has to be the cleanest in the world. Even the restrooms are clean and new looking years after the inauguration due to the fanatic dedication of the cleaning crews

Once we got to Xinbeitou we were welcomed with a very busy intersection surrounded with the standard set of KFC, Yoshinoya, Starbucks and Mcdonalds and the now widespread construction for the 2010 Taipei international expo.

This is supposed to be an historical site but the seemingly cancerous growth of over development has left an area covered with litter and haphazard construction that is still ongoing.

Our hotel, Jiabinge Hotspring Resort Hotel 北投嘉賓閣花園溫泉旅館, was more the kind of place that you would bring your mistress. Even then, it is of questionable cleanliness; a bunch of hairs in the bath and used tissues under the bed and behind the headboard.

The provided evening snacks and breakfast were however a nice touch, but overall it is not possible to have a nice experience when basics are missing.

The main site of interest, Hell's hot springs (translated to a more innocuous geothermal park ) is closed for renovations and we can only glimpse at what this was once upon a time at a distance.

This left us only the privilege for NT$40 of sharing a public bath with old locals filling the water with their old and dead diseased skins.

Xinbeitou (the "New Beitou") is a place like many others in Taiwan where the charm of the place has been destroyed by over commercialization. The only thing left are the smells of rotten eggs from the hot spring sulfur.

Creer des blog posts d'un telephone Android

2009-05-09T20:56:00.001-07:00

La solution que je connais est d'enregistrer une adresse @blogger.com qui publie quand un message est recu.

Meilleur que le savon ou alcool? L'eau!

2009-05-02T17:01:00.000-07:00

http://www.asm.org/Media/index.asp?bid=42835

They found that washing the fingers with plain water gave the greatest level of norovirus reduction, with an average of about 96% removal. Washing the fingers with an antibacterial liquid soap gave an average of about 88% removal. The alcohol-based sanitizer was not effective at removing the virus from the volunteers’ fingers and only resulted in an average removal of 46%.

Alerte pandémique de grippe phase 5 (de 6)

2009-04-29T14:59:00.000-07:00

http://www.who.int/mediacentre/news/statements/2009/h1n1_20090429/en/index.html

Based on assessment of all available information, and following several expert consultations, I have decided to raise the current level of influenza pandemic alert from phase 4 to phase 5.

http://www.who.int/csr/disease/avian_influenza/phase/en/index.html