Lore of the Land

Spring Time İn Sweden......

2009-04-12T17:10:00.002+02:00

Norrlunds Guld med Korv.....(Swedish dessert)

Lounging it out on the trail to nowhere.....

Sunshine and mossy pants.

Birch and a bridge.....

Chinese hot pot, a raddish, and a hysterical classmate.

Untitled - Undeservedly So

2009-03-19T12:38:00.004+01:00

There is something disgustingly inappropriate about the perverse curiosity of mankind. What rational specie would travel distant lengths to entertain itself with visits to locations of its own demise?

The camps at Auschwitz are hollow and forlorn. They sit in deep silence, aging with a heavy conscious. Their modern burden is to pose in stature as curious onlookers seek an answer to the question of how. The pointed barbs on the wire fence perimeters have started to oxidize and soften, making them more approachable than their prior form. The metal turnbuckles keeping taunt the wired strands are disjointed and unmovable. The wooden guard posts are losing slates and are weathered to a tint which matches the heaven sky on a gloomy day.

The large field camp of Birkenau sits even more silent than its brethren 3km away. The open field still littered with the remains of the crudely constructed cabin shacks which supplied refuge to inhabitants from the storm of the world around them. As if to mark graves of those who parished, the chimneys from the domiciles still stand. Inside the stacks are black and colored with soot that traps the souls of those who were fuel for its creation.

A set of parallel locomotive tracks runs the length of the camp. They start at hells gate and continue to the far fence line where scaling burms are built out of the remains of those piled beneath. The tracks pass a loading dock about halfway through where sorting and culling of the disposable cargo was off loaded. The well worn steel looks sleepy as if even it needs a break from the scrupulous work required by the generation past.

The grass is still green and the trees still grow; what has been will be again, what has been done will be done again; there is nothing new under the sun.

Life Is A Walk In The Park (beach park)

2009-02-28T16:23:00.003+01:00

Back, but not for long.....

2009-01-31T09:26:00.003+01:00

To my regular readers out there I post this post as an apology. I feel bad that I haven't posted in so long....I could come up with a ton of excuses, studies are too exhausting, project work is taking it's toll, etc, but what it really boils down to is that this blog no longer excites me. I have carried on my rambles on this forum for the parts of three years now.....same old gobbly goop with a different package. It has been a good run though, I will admit that. This blog was a learning experience for me....an excuse to write and share stories as I stumbled around my life. Things have changed for me though....big things, things like my direction in life, my attitude towards life, my view on the world, my aspirations for the future, and my next steps (whatever the hell those may be). So, I may dribble a tid bit here and there on this forum, but for the most part this blog is closed.....it's time to let go.

Now, with death comes life. Therefore I am planning to launch a new site in the month or so to come. It will have a different feel to it and a different moat from which I write. It will focus more on entrepreneurship and future trends as well as some huge topic areas that I have been uncovering like a 'participation society' and other behavioral and economic undertones that affect us all. It will be geared towards the future and less focused on telling stories of the past. Sure, I'll make sure to include the occasional over dramatization of a bout with food poisoning, or a minimalist travel tale, but the focus of the work will be different and more about the future and less about reporting the past. There is optimism in this next step.....stay tuned and keep checking back for the launch of the new blog. I promise not to disappoint.

Welcome To Lund - Lesson Four

2009-01-22T22:47:00.002+01:00

Lund University was voted 'least likely university in Europe to be able to print something from a PC 2007 and 2008' by Forbes Magazine college edition (someone should check that reference). For such a technologically developed area such as the Skane region of Sweden you will soon learn that printers are an elusive appliance. The solutions to this mess are few. You can either purchase your own printer for your flat, you can make friends with someone that has a printer who you can bribe for your term papers, or you can find a printer in the city somewhere. The first option, printer purchase, is going to cost you a fortune and therefore I wouldn't recommend it (if you have been following this blog series this week you will soon get the jist of the various themes; Sweden is expensive). The second option, making friends with a printer buddy, is a good option for an every now and again print job. You will however, quickly come to learn that those with printers learn the value of such an asset and become less open about free riders using the device without coughing up some sort of return for their investment. The third option is a good one. Find a printer in the city. Now, most of us students have access to a printer through our program. You will most likely pay for each sheet you print and you may or may not be at the mercy of the IT guy who handles any misfeeds or paper jams. I have seen students backed up for a month in the econ department waiting to print a regression analysis. Therefore, it is in my opinion that the best solution for your printing needs is to visit Lundabocker. What is Lundabocker you say....well, it is a second hand book store that sells consignment books that students want to sell. The store is a great place to stop in to see if there are any books you need (or may simply want to buy), as well as to do any printing and copying you might have. Sergio is the friendly face that runs the place and he's a good guy to know in Lund. The shop just moved at the start of the new year from the AF building to its new address at Kiliansgatan 11. I hear he is thinking of a coffee machine as well....so, print up and Welcome to Lund.

Welcome To Lund - Lesson Three

2009-01-21T20:01:00.002+01:00

To complement yesterday's piece on food, I thought I would tackle the other staple of academic life...booze. Sweden is not the place to be if you enjoy cheap hooch and lots of it. A lush life can easily cost you twice your monthly rent....the government has to pay for the public systems someway right? Anyways, there are ways to cut costs and still indulge every so often. The best tip...avoid the bars. At almost all the bars in Lund a beer will run you as much as a pizza. Add to that a hefty cover charge for the privilege to buy such novelty and you will wake up with an empty wallet surely every time.

So, what is a lad to do if he needs to itch that thirst. Well, there are two options....the first option is to use your mandatory membership into the university nation society to attend 'pub' nights at the hosting nations as they come about through the week. A beer at the nation (Swedish equivalent to a fraternity) will still run you 25sek ($3 USD) per pint, but it's half or less the price than at a bar. The second option, and my personal favorite, is to simply buy booze from the Systembologet (state run liquor store) and consume it at your leisure wherever you desire. Now, for 10sek ($1.25 USD) you can buy a half liter of cheap Swedish or Danish beer in a can. The brew doesn't win any sort of awards for its tastiness, but it's tolerable and a good option for the price....don't forget to save the can when you're done....each can has a deposit of 0.5sek on it....that adds up to be big bucks if you clean up a corridor party the night after a big bash. One unique feature of Lund is that you can have an open container in the city and it is completely legal. This is a unique feature in Lund and not something that is tolerated elsewhere in the country. The reason for this is that the student union of Lund fought to keep the law this way. So, while it's cold now and a few chilly one's with your favorite blokes in a corridor room might get a bit monotonous, spring will be here soon and then a cold one on one of the many green spaces in the city will be just the ticket. So drink up and Welcome to Lund.

Welcome To Lund - Lesson Two

2009-01-20T09:51:00.002+01:00

By now you have undoubtedly noticed the cost of everything in Sweden. For anyone from the states the sticker shock is extra shocking as our homeland has spoiled us with cheap goods that we import with low tariffs and huge economies of scale. Sorry fellow statesman, there's no super Wal-Mart up here. So, presented in my second lesson is a cost survival guide for food. At least this way you can eat (which is about all you can afford to do up here). Most of the living arrangements in Lund have a kitchen of some sort...either it's a corridor where you share the kitchen with flat mates (like me), or you have a small kitchen in your room that consists of basic microwave, sink, etc. In either case you need to learn how to cook and take advantage of such luxuries.

When you just can't stand your own culinary concoctions anymore and decide to venture out for a meal here are some tips. Sit down meals are very expensive....a big burger at a nice place (Hercules Bar) can easily run 140sek ($20 USD) and a salad most 'nice' places are 60 sek. Thus why I have yet to step foot inside a sit down restaurant for a meal....I say, if you want to eat a proper meal, buy a ticket to the Baltic states and spend a weekend there. You'll come out ahead. So, if nice sit down places are out what is a person to do? Simple, falafel and pizza!!

There are numerous falafel and kebab stands throughout Lund. These are the equivalent to the American fast food dining experience (except there is limited variety and it is way healthier). My favorite falafel is a place I refer to as Kebab Huset Centrum which is located at the corner of Kyrkogaten and Paradisgatan (adjacent to the central library Stadsbiblioteket). These guys run a good place. The oil in the fryer is changed regularly and thus makes the falafel taste true to form. In each wrap there is a load of vegetables jammed in and you can pick between several sauces for toppings (I recommend spicy). A wrap will set you back 25sek ($3.50 USD). If you want to upgrade throw on an order of pommes (fries) and you are set for the rest of the day for under $5 USD. If you get tired of falafel the other option in the city is pizza.

There are several pizza options around and I haven't tried enough of the different places to comment on a 'favorite'. That being said, since it is Sweden, everything is more of less the same so the pizza experience won't differ much from shop to shop. You have two options when you go to a pizza place...take away or dine in. This is tricky business.....if you are solo, take it to go. The reason for this is that the pies are huge. They run around 60sek so you need to stretch it into at least two meals if not three (I've even heard tales of petite women splitting one 4 ways....oh to be thin again) and the only way to do that without insulting the place is to take it to go. The whole 'doggy bag' concept is elusive in Scandinavia. If you are with someone else you can usually maximize your money by dining in as most of the shops have a cabbage salad that they serve along with their pies that you can load up on (unlimited self serve refills) and thus have plenty of food even for two hungry lads. The tricky part about dining in is that the shop owners assume that if there are two people there will be two pies being ordered. They will be astounded when you order one pie and there are two of you....I don't really understand this, but you'll see what I mean when you try to do it. My favorite pie is a ‘kebap pizzor’ with garlic sauce. You will find these everywhere. They are basically a thin crust Italian margarita pizza with kebab shavings loaded on the top and drenched in garlic sauce. A few hot (mild) peppers on top and you are set. Bon appetit and welcome to Lund.

Welcome To Lund - Lesson One

2009-01-19T07:29:00.003+01:00

The Nordic region is cold this time of year. You should have been prepared for that before you moved here. That being said, there is nothing better on a cold day than spending some time with some good blokes over a warm cup of something. Lund offers endless cafes and bakeries to warm up in on these long winter days. One of my favorite places to go is Cafe Ariman. This cafe is located near the rear of the large cathedral in the city center just south of the AF building on Kungsgaten 2. During the day you can occasionally find a chess game (if you don't mind playing on a timer) and at night you will find a large presence of the student body simply hanging out. In the spring time the cafe sets up outdoor seating (and outdoor heaters) along Kungsgaten. A coffee will cost around 24sek ($3 USD) and a beer will cost around 45sek ($5.50 USD), not cheap, but nothing here is....remember the tuition isn't costing you a dime. If you plan to make a night of it at the cafe take a small flask of something in your breast pocket. You can spike your coffee and then offer a spike to your neighbor in exchange for them buying you another cup. You have to be shrewd and constantly look for ways to make your kroner go further.

Welcome To Spring (semester)

2009-01-18T18:54:00.003+01:00

Tomorrow will mark the official kick off to Spring semester 2009 in Sweden. The days are getting longer and brief glimpses of sunshine have started to show through the haze and gray that is the Swedish winter. Before long we will be rolling on the white sand beaches of Lomma and sunbathing until midnight!! Well that, or we'll be able to go outside without a stocking cap, scarf and gloves....I'd take either at this point. So, with the dawn of the new semester and on the heels of the new year I thought it would be fair to kick off a week long series for those new arrivals from across the globe who just arrived in time for school bells on Monday.....simply titled 'Welcome To Lund - We Know It's Cold'....in this series I will try to dish up a daily piece of wisdom that transcends the typical 'orientation' bullshit that will be shoved down the throats of all those budding academics who just stepped off the train. Little lessons that took me months to deduce will be available in short order to the 'newbies'. The best part of the whole deal....no paddling or any other sort of hazing activity (I learned my lesson the first time on that one)....just free advice to make the transition easier. Welcome to Lund!!

Germans vs. Austrians......Kleenex Is The Winner!

2009-01-14T23:07:00.003+01:00

My latest travels were void of a travel partner for the majority of the time. I find that, while sometimes lonesome, solo travel allows you to be more observant about what is happening around you. You notice the small little details of a place that you may not have otherwise picked up on if you were sharing the experience with someone else. At the same time however, you don't have anyone to share your amazing discoveries with when you find them. Oh thank heaven for blogspot....a public place to share details about people's privates...or something like that.....

With that lead in I will share (for the first time ever publicly) what I feel may be an anthropological discovery of mass proportion in which I discovered during my traverse of southern Germany and the country of Austria. While Austria and southern Germany are in fact different in many ways, they share more similarities than they do differences. The language is common (with the exception of regional dialects and accents), the food is Germanic and shares similar root ingredients and the architecture of homes and city buildings share a common influence (to name a few). There is however one distinct difference among the habitants of this land.....the difference; the way in which they clear their nasal cavities.

I was born with a strange defect in which I was unable to blow my nose until the ripe age of 26...it's scientifically referred to as 'sniffalotus' and is only found in 1 in 1 million children born annually. This condition fostered an acute awareness of how people in society blew their nose. It became this fascination where I wondered what it would be like to pass air so freely through my own sinuses. Luckily I grew out of my own debilitating condition, but the acute pinpointing of where fellow man is unleashing a blow has yet to subside.

The Germanic snout lends itself well to a good blow. It typically has a wide nostril and tends to protrude noticeably from the face in a manner that makes it virtually impossible not to notice. Despite the similar shapes of both Austrian and German noses the way in which their handlers unload these foghorns seems to differ distinctly based on political bounds. While equally audible and obnoxious there are distinct differences between the two. Process definitions follow:

German blow - this process begins by the 'handler' placing a receptacle (Kleenex or perhaps dishtowel in extreme cases) in a cupping fashion just below the exit chute (nostril). The palm of the hand is turned up and positioned as an overflow. Air is pushed from the diaphragm in a manner that ungulates the upper body like that of a serpentine. It's a steady push and constant flow as the waste is removed. The audible sound mimics the (un)popular television ads for the throat lozenges Ricola in which lederhosen lads pierce the still of the alpine tundra by blasting 'calls' through alphorns. If you happen to be near one of these outpourings as it happens you will feel a slight change in barometric pressure as the surrounding air is displaced by the force of the push.

Austrian blow - this process begins by a 'handler' placing a receptacle across the bridge of the nose and loosely clamping it in place. The pinky finger and ring finger remain free as the other three fingers apply pressure. Again, air is pumped from the diaphragm and the blow begins. The air is released in short spurts that start and stop in rhythmic fashion as though chanting a secret message of Morse code in dots and dashes. The ring finger flutters violently in perfect unison with the pauses in the air release. It's job; dop up the waste as it's exited.

In either case the actor is relieved and fresh at the completion of the exercise....ready to further tackle their day.

Bavaria, A New Indian Family, and Serbian Kebabs

2009-01-11T09:58:00.009+01:00

My latest travels took me to a wonderfully different part of Europe that I feel I had slighted in the past. I started my journey in Munich....the Bavarian capital of Germany, and ended in the Slovenian capital of Ljubljana. I was able to spend just one night in proper accommodation at a hostel in Salzburg Austria, whereas the rest of the time I couch surfed with random people I met through the internet site couchsurfing.com. This was in itself a new experience and admittedly an exciting one. I met some wonderful people along the way and truly got to dig deep into the cultures of the places I was visiting. Avoiding tourist traps and the typical A-list attractions was not only a money saving affair, but a time savings as well.

Munich, the first stop, is an enticing German city and stereotypical in my opinion of what Americans perceive Europe to be. It has castles, beer houses, ladies in lederhosen, heavy meats and potatoes and a host of historically important events that centered around the city through the ages. Since it is home to the annual Oktoberfest, Munich is a haven for travelers daring to try the many beers that originate and popularize this region. Pints are pulled by the liter and serve as a wonderful accompaniment to the Germanic foods that can be found in the city. I was, as always, traveling on a shoe string budget so I never ate much in the way of a proper meal while I was there. You could however notice the warm glows of the other patrons in such establishments who were enjoying such fare...their mugs and blood pressure raised in delight. While I simply fell in love with the grit and diversity of Berlin during this holiday season, it was nice to meet a German city that you could in fact 'take home to mom'.

Salzburg Austria was the next stop on this tour. Salzburg is roughly two hour train ride due east from Munich. During the ride you are escorted by the Alps which you constantly flirt with as you move. It took some ingenuity to manage my way onto the train at a price I felt was fair. Germany has a wonderful rail system, arguably one of the best in Europe. The problem with that system is that it is expensive. There is however one great deal called the Bavarian ticket. This ticket allows up to five people to travel for 24 hours within Bavaria for 28 euro total. Split 5 ways this is a steal. The counter to that is that when you are traveling solo you pay 20 euro for the same ticket. In lays opportunity. My first approach was to convene at the rail station with a cardboard sign that said 'Salzburg - Bavarian Ticket'. My hope was that I would be approached by someone looking to go to Salzburg that morning and we would either split the ticket or find a couple of others to chop the cost further. I stood just outside of the main bahnhaus and waited. I wasn't there for more than about three minutes before the train Gestapo put an end to my pitch. Since I am officially an illegal resident of Europe now and a wanted criminal in Berlin (thanks to Hanife's ill advised intercity rail advice that landed us a 'currently outstanding' fine for illegally riding a metro without a proper ticket) I had to abort my efforts. I was just about to break down and drop the 20 euro on the ticket when suddenly I spotted my 'family'. It was an Indian family three strong. They were headed to the Salzburg platform. Perfect! I offered the man of the house 10 euro for a spot on their ticket. It saved me 10 euro and saved them 10 euro. He agreed and we boarded the train. It was a comedic exchange onboard the train when the guard approached to check our tickets and I pointed to 'dad' as the keeper of my pass. Classic!

Salzburg is a fairy tale city, plain and simple. It has a mountain back drop that oozes beauty and a city center that is simply perfect. Perfection comes with warning though; the city is a tourist trap. The whole place is over priced and nothing (except the architecture) is authentic, but it still emits this amazing feel and charm to it. It is a must do day trip from Munich. You can see the city in a long day and leave with euro in your pocket by dodging the exurbanite cost of a night's accommodation....I stayed in a hostel that night which ran 17 euro....not too bad, but not great either. At one point on the train I thought about pushing my luck with the Indian family and asking them if they had any extra room in their hotel......that would have been interesting.

After Salzburg it was time to catch another train that would take me the whole distance across Austria, through the Alps, and punch out on the other side in the sleepy little city of Villach. At this point I was traveling with a half gnawed loaf of bread, a tillahook block of mozzarella cheese, and a few pepperoni sticks that I picked up two days before when I made my exit from Munich. This was not a trip of culinary discovery but rather an exercise in minimalism. My train ticket allowed me to hop on and hop off the train as much as I liked during the day. There were trains every two hours so I planned to make one stop along the way and see the Alps a bit more intimately than from behind cabin glass. I selected Bad Gastein as the place I would stop. It was deep into the Austrian Alps and I thought would give me a taste of what this range had to offer. Living in Colorado I have certainly seen my share of ski areas and the surrounding towns that adjoin them. This place was different though. It was nothing like the sprawling mega plexes of American ski areas. Bad Gastein is a quaint little village with just a single line train that towed skiers in and out throughout the day. I hiked around the city for about an hour and a half...walking the many small alleys and cobblestoned paths. I eventually made my way to a nearby hill top where I had a great view of the slopes across the valley as well as the exit to the female sauna where an occasional 'snow angel' would get made in hopes of cooling off. I returned to an outdoor seating area where weary skiers were taking a break with hot beverages and light snacks to wait for my train. An hour later I was in Villach.

Villach is a truly sleepy little town on the southern border of Austria. I arrived in the city on a holiday so literally nothing was open. I wandered around the city center for a few hours and waited to meet up with my couchsurfing host for the night....once she arrived we had a light dinner at her place and then I crashed, taking an opportunity to stay out of the cold for an extended period of slumber. Two days later it was time to head further south to Slovenia. I again hopped on a train.

Now here was an interesting place. Slovenia occupies a geographic position that truly makes it a melting pot. You have the Balkans to the south, Italy on one border, the Germanic influences of Austria and Germany to the north, as well as lingering 'spice' from the eastern block that sits not so far away. I had no idea what to expect when I got to this place, but I was certain that my host and good friend Primoz would show me a good time. My first encounter with Slovenia was a pizza shop called Azur (spelling?)....here I had a pie that was to die for. I don't know if it was the fact I had only had cheese and half spoiled pepperoni for the half of week leading up to the meal or what, but this pie was amazing. I gobbled it down at break fork speed nearly impaling a waiter along the way. The next indulgence was a cup of coffee on the city's main river walk. A perfect cup. Much different from Scandinavian and other European coffees I have had during my time here. We explored what we could of the city the first day and I took a few pictures along the way. The second day we took a short drive to a nearby city that was situated about an hour away from the capital. Here Primoz had a meeting with some colleagues of his so I was escorted by his girlfriend to a cafe nearby where we were to wait. Here I had a massive slice of chocolate cake with a cherry on top. Delicious! When Primoz finally returned we headed back to the capital for the afternoon. In the evening (after not eating anything substantial since noon the day before) we set off to experience Serbian cuisine at a local spot Primoz was familiar with. He took the liberty of ordering and I'm glad he did. Out came this tray of meats! Sausages, beef steaks, chicken breasts, chicken skewers, and did I mention sausages. Along side sat warm pita bread and a host of salads and toppings to garnish the carne. We gorged to a point of discomfort and rolled out of the place with pants unbuttoned. The final day we took a scenic drive as we headed back to Austria to the airport there. Slovenia has an amazing range of mountains that when covered in snow was simply beautiful. I think this is a country that those traveling to Europe should seriously consider throwing on the itinerary. Great food, surprisingly friendly people, amazing coffee, and a few mountains to stimulate the cornea make this a truly undiscovered hot spot for westerners looking for something a bit different in Europe.

That Was Interesting.....

2008-12-31T06:50:00.005+01:00

That's it I guess. 2008 is over....2009 looms ahead. I promised myself last year about this time that I was going to make 2008 my best year yet. I didn't really know what that meant, how I was going to do it, how I was going to measure it and if I would even recognize it if in fact I pulled it off. Well, I think I did it. I think I had the best year of my life this last year. It was a strange series of events that changed my job, changed my address, and changed my haircut. I got to make two trips across the Atlantic...once to visit and once to stay. I got to return to academia to meet a host of new people in this world who hail from all over the world. I got to meet long lost relatives who help to understand who I am and who 'we' are. I got to travel to places that not so long ago seemed logistically unimaginable to get to. Yes, if someone would have told me one year ago today that 2008 was going to end with me being enrolled in a masters program in a foreign country working on projects with people that are not just from different countries but different continents I would have laughed as I strolled back to my office to spend another few hours on email and yahoo finance while preparing to teach my evening spin class which, for arguments sake was most likely the most important event of that day.

So as we count down the last few hours of 2008 I toast to the year that was and to the year that soon will be...and who knows maybe this year can be better than the last.

You Move I Move

2008-12-30T20:06:00.003+01:00

Several days ago I filled an afternoon with a thrilling compilation of Ted Talks. For those of you who may not know what those are prepare yourself to be amazed. TED can loosely be defined as an ideas showcase in which the worlds best and brightest present topics they are experts on. TED stands for technology, entertainment and design, but the subjects covered far extend this original framework. From the intense to the obscure, the entertaining to educational I promise that an afternoon with TED will leave you more conscious about the world you live in....

I recently watched a TED talk with Steven Strogatz. Steven is a mathematician and biologist who researches ways in which mathematics and biology intersect. His TED topic of discussion was synchronization and how creatures seem to take pleasure in synchronization void of being told to do so. This means that in nature creatures tend to synchronize without intention and in doing so share some sort of collective peace and pleasure. I thought the topic was interesting and his talk was well done (as all TED talks are), but I didn't think much more about it after the fact. That was until today....

I have been battling a credit card/debit card cluster fuck of an ordeal that has left me penniless and hungry for the better part of a week now. In doing so I have found activities that are free to keep me engaged in society. Today's free activity was people watching on the main street in Lund. There is a pedestrian mall where people seem to stroll all day from one end to the other. The street is only a few blocks long but it always seems to have people wandering its length. I sat in the middle of the street for a bit on a small bench in front of a 7-11. I hadn't sat there for more than 5 minutes and Steven's talk about sync hit me like a two ton truck. People were moving in exactly the same fashion. Their movements were in symbios with one another. The pace of their steps and the movement of their feet were identical. Now, I know what you're thinking...so what...people are not too different from one another and therefore they walk similar, and the fact that they are walking similar is not a coincidence at all, in fact, it’s the way you would expect it to be so what’s the point.....

Here is what is interesting. The movements of the people were manufactured. They were unnatural ways of walking. The typical person when walking walks with their head in one of two positions (typically)....head facing forward, eyes basically straight ahead, or their head at a small downward angle viewing the ground in front of them. This leaves our weight distributed in a equal manner across our feet and creates a solid base. Watch people on an icy day in the winter....you will never see anyone walking with their eyes to the sky...it would be suicide to do so...walking with your eyes looking up at the sky shifts the weight of our bodies on to the heels of our feet rather than keeping our weight over the balls of our feet which is more stable and reactive (especially on ice). A less exaggerated version of how we walk on an icy day is how we walk everyday. These people on the main street weren't walking like we typically walk. They were walking as though they were snubbing their nose at society. They had their heads at a small upward tilt looking at the world around them. Their pace took on a slower movement and their gate moved more in a sashaying side to side manner rather than a forward one foot in front of the other movement. Ok, so what right...these were holiday shoppers out for a stroll.....right?

I decided that I wanted to split the street up into three parts. An entrance, the middle, and an exit. I had been sitting in the middle portion of the street where sync was definitely occurring. What was happening at the ends?....how were people entering this street and how were they exiting it? I changed locations....Now I sat at the far west end of the street. There is a disorganized park there with a host of criss-crossing paths that cut through it.....I was only there for a few minutes and could tell there was no pattern whatsoever to how people were coming onto the street. Most were coming at a brisk, all business, head down typical Swedish way of walking. It was unorganized chaos compared to the sync in the middle of the street as they funneled onto the thoroughfare. The initial parts of the street as they funneled on proved as an organizational strip. The actions of people in this space resembled jockeying for position in a car race in which the faster cars take a line through the slower cars and prepare to pass them. What was simply amazing about this is that just a few steps past this transition strip of cobblestone the people would slowly sync their pace to that of their neighbors. It mainly happened where those who were moving fast slowed down. In doing so they repositioned their heads and strolled....in perfect sync. Let's move to the other end of the street...the exit.

The exit to the street gives several choices. You can cross a main north/south street and enter a small city square or you can go left or right on that same main street. One option requires you to pause (and check for traffic), where the other two options allow you to simply turn and keep going. There was no real pattern to the way people moved when they exited the street. It was similar, yet more precautionary than the way they entered the street from the west. So, that being said, it was clear through my observations of the 'ends' of this street that the people were independent of one another. Meaning that they weren't all shoppers out for a lovely stroll...they were different people that expectedly would move with different intentions while they walked. What was simply amazing however, was that when they were in the middle portion of the street they moved like one another. In perfect sync. Now, how does this relate to happiness? Is it that as the people moved together they felt happiness, or is it that the ambiance of the street made them feel happy and therefore they moved together by showing 'happiness' in their movements? That's a question for another time I guess...at this rate I don't think my new debit card is showing up anytime soon so I should have plenty of time to fish for the answer.

Berlin's Boar Problem.....Boring

2008-12-27T09:01:00.003+01:00

An appropriately timed article in the Wall Street Journal Europe caught my attention the day before I set out on my latest travel escapade. The article was titled 'In Berlin's Boar War, Some Side With The Hogs'. The article describes the 'battle' that city officials are having with the rowdy swashbuckling swine who have established residency within the city proper. City officials report that there are over 7,000 wild boars living within the cities parks and open spaces at present. The piggies most prevalent crime has been the ongoing destruction of gardens, uprooting of city shrubs and bushes, snorting around in cemetery plots, and a recurrent trampling of the training grounds of Berlin's beloved Herta BSC professional football team. In addition to the growing list of victimless crimes, the boars have been responsible for more serious acts including the death of several residents pets, as well as the death of an 'urban hunter' who, after shooting the boar (apparently not where he was aiming), was gored to death by the angry pigs razor sharp upwardly curving tusks. At 113 kilos the adult hogs are nothing to mess around with.....which is exactly why I planned to seek them out to do just that during my time in Berlin.....

The Berlin city plan contains countless parks that pepper the landscape. The city has everything from small inner city platz to massive expanses of vegetation like the centrally located Tiergarten. I covered endless miles of the city by foot walking to and fro the endless villages of the city. Setting out shortly after sunrise and coming home well after sunset each day. Granted I was in exploration mode and wasn't solely searching for swine but, I did train my eye to habitually scour the shrubs and gardens of the cities parks as I strolled along. To no avail did my efforts yield.....the closest I came to an encounter with the beastly animal was the ham on a sandwich I had for lunch the day after I got to town.

Twas the night before Christmas.....

2008-12-24T11:58:00.002+01:00

Dear Santa,

You've always been really good to me, so much so that I think you should take the year off. Don't worry about bringing me anything. I'm pretty happy with what I've got. However, if you want to fly in for some digestives and a glass of milk that would be fine. We could rap about the north and complain about the cold together. Oh, and I don't really have any milk so if you do come could you bring a litre with you?

Happy holidays,

Back from Berlin!

2008-12-23T10:49:00.009+01:00

Berlin is a wonderful city. Massive, by European standards, in both size and inhabitants. The German capital is alive with vigor and culture and openly will warm itself to those who dare to dig into the many sides of the metropolis.

Despite being awake for roughly 24 hours before I touched down in the capital city I felt immediately upon my arrival, that Berlin was a place I was going to like and sleep (or lack there of) was not to be of concern. I can't do the city justice by simply summarizing it in a single blog entry, so I'll break it out into sections...pieces, that like the city itself, are all connected yet somehow not....I'll post them as I write them with pictures to boot....it won't be all in one entry, but keep checking in and you'll see more as it's added. After all, I'm stuck back in Sweden with no means of monetary exchange nor heat (at the moment)....so I guess the best I can do is write to keep hunger and pneumonia from setting in more so than it has.

Holocaust Memorial:
2,711 gray concrete blocks sit in silence forming a profile from afar that is wavy like a contorted topo map. As you walk into the middle of the assemblage you suddenly realize the stones are now taller than you are. They appear waist high from the perimeter, but from the interior they become giants much taller than a man. We found a rose on the street the morning we went to see the exhibit. There were some delays getting into the exhibition hall that resides below the monument, so we decided to play around a bit with our find. The humidity droplets from the morning mist were hanging on everything in sight. We used the stem of the flower we found to try our hand at some ultra temporary street art. The gray background, gray stones, and red rose somehow produced a reflection of the mood that was rather appropriate. When the exhibition finally opened we made our way down the stairs into the main hall. The exhibit itself winds through several rooms filled with photos. The introductory room had two pictures on its wall that I don't think I'll ever forget. It was a two part photo....the first photo was a group of women undressing in a ravine under soldier watch. Some of them were naked and some were in the process of becoming so. Their clothes lied in piles under their feet as they were being ushered up a small hill. The second photo was the same women's naked bodies piled on top of one another lying dead at the base of the small hill after having been executed from behind. They were mostly face down, but several were turned right side up as they must have rolled down the hill after being shot instead of just simply sliding face down. There was one lone woman who wasn't dead in the ravine. She had her arm reached out grasping in agony for help at some invisible hope that was in front of her. Her back was black with blood from the several holes that were now in her. To her rear was a German soldier raising his rifle at point blank range to finish the job by putting a lone round in the back of her head. The expression on the soldiers face was void and dutiful. I can't comprehend how someone could possibly commit such an act.

With accounts of nearly 6 million Jews being exterminated during the time period memorialized you lose focus that this was an incredibly personal experience for all of those victimized. That sounds stupid and trite to say such a thing, but when I would read or hear stories about 'victims of the holocaust' my mind immediately lumped those so called victims into a singular group that was homogenous. It somehow softened what that really meant....6 million piled up bodies....it's not something that is easily comprehended and therefore impossible to digest. The memorial brings a personal element to the tragedy and makes you realize that there are 6 million awful stories of perish like the one described in the two photos described above. I wonder if we'll ever stop hating each other enough to make 'this time' truly the last.

Berlin Wall (east side gallery):
I grew up in a household where my parents watched the nightly news. We didn't do the whole Leave It To Beaver, Pa in a sport coat at the dinner table talking about our day while Ma served up a 4 course affair in a nicely pressed cooking apron complete with lace trim....no, we were more a burrito in front of the television type of bunch....for that I thank them. I remember watching the day the wall came down. I had no idea what 'the wall' was at the time or why it was significant. I would have been about 8 years old so it may not have been that I even knew where Germany was, yet there was something significant about it. So much in fact, that I remember a video clip of that day. The video was a man (probably about my age now) standing with black boots on the top rung of the wall. Leather coat on his shoulders with a t-shirt underneath and tight fitting denim jeans that were stonewashed (the style at the time). He had a wooden handled pick ax in his hands and was swinging it wildly trying to crack pieces of the wall off for the on lookers on both sides. As someone who use to understand the business end of such a device I know you can't simply smash it into solid concrete for very long before your hands and body are in pain if not broken. Yet he kept going...swinging wildly. It was raw emotion in its purest form.

20 years later a 1.5km stretch of the wall is all that remains. It lies in the southeast corner of the city marking the eastern edge of the regentrified Kreuzberg neighborhood. As I walked along the wall I saw endless murals on its surface. Most proclaiming peace as the central message. Some murals condoned the actions of the eastern block leaders of the past, but most were hopeful. "Give me a wall so I can escape" an anonymous quote etched into the eastern side of the wall.

Fernsehturm (television tower):

This landmark dominates the skyline at the center of the city. It's visible from most places in the outlying city which makes it a handy landmark to navigate by. Below are some pics of it in its glory...the pics capture a few other of Berlin's famous landmarks....do you know which one Karl Marx is?

Murals (street art):

Street art is a constant theme in Berlin. I call it art as opposed to just tagging or rattle caning because it mostly had meaning and wasn't just someone throwing their initials on something. Most the time if you looked close enough there was a message. Below are some large scale murals. I think they're quite well done for being such a massive scale.

The Day The Earth Moved

2008-12-16T07:51:00.006+01:00

Today was an interesting morning....woke up around 6:20 to the feeling of my bed shaking. Normally I would blame some late night burrito or a sour bout with a kebab for such an incident but this felt oddly different. I sat straight up in bed and immediately fell back over landing on my pillow. Being the trained ninja I am I rose again and this time took note that my bed was in fact shaking! You can probably guess what it was....yes, an earthquake in Lund!

It's being reported that the Skane (southern Sweden) region had a 4.7 magnitude earthquake early this morning. The epicenter was north of the southern coastal city of Ystad and east of the city of Malmo. If these things could be a bit more timely I could avoid ever setting an alarm again. I thought a couple of t-shirt designs were in order to celebrate the event. I mean, if you can't laugh about destructive forces of nature what can you laugh about......?

Blue Cows and Black Magic

2008-12-10T19:21:00.002+01:00

I've desperately wanted to travel to Latvia ever since I made my way to Estonia earlier this year. There is something about these Baltic states that lure me to them. I'm not sure if it's the drab emotions of the inhabitants, the slightly rough around the edges city centers, or the constant presence of the never too far Kremlin to the east. While not specific, it's certainly something that steers me in their direction. While staking the lay of the land from the confines of my consistently chilly Swedish abode I have discovered a 'lore of the land' that shall be a foci for my travels which embark tomorrow. Blue cows and black magic!

Pagan roots to blame? Perhaps for the magic, however, the cows come natural. My travel partner for the trip informed me of such a species earlier today. The blue cow as it's cleverly titled, is said to dawn it's aqua skin color as a byproduct of the Baltic sea water it has drank for generations. Legend has it that the copious amounts of milk they produce and the blue blood that runs through their veins is a symbol of aristocracy among bovine. Or so the legend goes....

Black magic on the other hand is less elusive yet more exclusive to ye who dare. It's a recipe that goes back 300 years and has been produced in Latvia (and no where else) ever since. The syrupy liquor that's dark as ink and thick as custard is said to have medicinal powers that have cured such majesty as Catherine the Great. With a bit of luck (and on time flights) I shall settle into the lore sometime around this time at the right time tomorrow.....

A Simple Experiment

2008-12-08T10:32:00.004+01:00

I would like to describe a thought experiment that has been rolling around in my head the last couple of weeks. It's a thought experiment that I've been trying out to see if it would change the perceptions I have of the world around me. It's oddly simple, but so far, most insightful.....let's play along shall we.

The object of the game is to come up with a universal model (picture) that can be applied to any situation in which there are differing opinions for the given situation. In order to create this model you have available only four pieces (3 dots and 1 circle). For each situation you must place one dot for you, and one dot a piece (for a total of two) to represent the extreme polar opposites of the situation. Everyone's views must be accurately represented. These dots must be placed in relation to the circle so that a clear picture of where everyone stands is represented. Here is a simple example....

Meat eating: I eat meat....I eat far less of it than I use to and maybe only eat it three times a week since I moved to Sweden. The extreme sides of this case would be those who eat meat all day long at every minute, and those who have never eaten meat and will never eat meat. A model of this may look like the following...... The continual carnivore would be in the center of the circle, the dot representing me is above that and to the left....the person who has never eaten meat is outside the circle (outlier).

Now, we have a problem with the above picture. Remember, the goal was to create a universal model applicable to every situation that reflects everyone’s position on the issue. The above picture would not reflect the perception of someone who is a vegetarian. They would not see themselves as outliers in the society (circle)…that person’s picture would have one dot in the middle and two dots outside the boundaries of the circle. So, what shall we do now……well, let’s redraw the circle….let’s stop thinking of the circle as a circle at all…..after all, a circle is a single line that is connected at it’s ends in which (despite my poor freehand drawing skills) every point is equal distance from a central foci…if we were to cut the circle at one point and lay it flat we now have a line to work from as our base. So, the second attempt at the model may look like the following in which the two opposite ends of the issue are represented at the ends of the line and I am somewhere in between……
Ok, now this is starting to get better however, we still have a problem. I said that the only tools we had were a circle and three dots. So, while the circle is in fact a line, a line is not a circle….we must repair the circle to achieve the objectives of the experiment. By definition of a circle we will simply grab the two ends of the line and connect them. Now we’re left with something like this…..

I think we’re getting closer, but we’re still not there. In the above picture we’ve now happily married the vegetarian and the continual carnivore. We no longer can distinguish between the two parties and therefore…per the objectives of our game, not everyone’s view is being accurately represented….we must try again.......

Ok, let’s start with defining what is meant by ‘extreme polar opposites of the situation’. I am going to make a bold claim here that is the key to our puzzle. The claim is that no single person can accurately define what the absolute ‘extreme’ is. Understanding the ‘extreme’ is laying claim to the understanding of infinity….it’s not something that we as mortals can process. Here’s a great way to think about my above claim….think of the largest possible number you can think of…got that in mind, now, just add one to it and that’s a new ‘extreme’ in your world…..this cycle would go on infinitely and you would drive yourself to drink well before you came to the ‘extreme’ numerical answer. Same applies to society. If we think we know what the ‘most extreme’ behavior is in a society we can simply think of that behavior and ‘add one’.

With this in mind let’s take one more shot at our puzzle. Let’s start with a flat line again (a circle that has been cut at a single place). This time I have moved the dots off of the ‘extreme’ ends of the spectrum as we have proven that we don’t know what ‘extreme’ is……

Now, let’s connect the two ends and we’re left with something like this……

Ok, I think we’ve got it. Let’s test it to see if it truly is universal and a breakthrough in how we can think about life’s perceptions. Choose anyone of the single dots regardless of position. Think of your eating habits with regards to meat. Now, work your way around the circle to find the person that occupies the shortest distance from the dot you selected….you will move either clockwise of counterclockwise depending on which dot you selected….this is the person that is most like you (even if you are different). Now, go back to your dot and find the person that is furthest from you. This person is least like you (and your perceptions).

What can we deduce from this? Well there are a couple of take away points in my opinion:

1) No matter which dot (perception) we are we are never that far away from the other dots (perceptions) on the circle (society).

2) By working through the problem we ended with a picture where every dot (perception) is on the circle (society). Everyone is included in the macro society. Each view occupies equal importance and space. The first, horribly wrong, attempt we made at constructing this model left one dot outside and two dots inside (one as a central focus). This is the worst picture of all as it is completely centered on a single perception and voided the dot on the outside. No one’s perception is ‘wrong’…..if it is their perception, well, it is right to them and therefore not completely false to everyone (as they would be included in the group ‘everyone’).

3) It is always a shorter distance to visit all three dots in succession rather than to visit one dot, change direction and return to our dot, and then move on to the third dot. So, if we want to explore a topic it is most efficient to explore the other perspectives available on the topic rather than to explore one side, return to our base, and then explore the other.

Happy Birthday Grandma

2008-12-06T22:36:00.002+01:00

Before I left for Sweden I began a project to better understand the history of my maternal side of our family. The work I wanted to conduct was a combination of family history and gastronomy. I wanted to combine food and culture in some format. I wasn't entirely sure what the outcome of the project would be, but I figured it was a low risk way to glean a little self understanding and was therefore worthy of a time commitment of some sort. Over the course of several days I had an intimate opportunity to interview my grandmother on the history of her life and related perceptions. My plan was to take the oral history I was to receive and morph it into written form at the same time weaving in some reflection into the stories. I wanted to do this while looking through a filtering lens of 'food', and specifically German food. Some of the writing I did I am happy with, some of it I am not....therefore the project never completely came to fruition and is yet one more 'pet project' that will remain on the ever expanding to-do list. That being said, the time I got to spend with my grandmother was the outcome of the project. What she shared was a reminder that the most important things in life aren't things at all....they're each other and specifically in this case, they're family. Despite failing to produce a physical work of my efforts the learning I gained from this experience has sat in the forefront of my mind and continues to impact me. So, in light of my grandmother's 87th birthday I have decided to post a snippet from what I compiled......

Wurst not, want not.

It seems to be a common trait among my generation to perennially take for granted the readily accessible meat options we have available at our local grocer. Not only do we have a host of critters from air, land, and sea for our ready consumption, but we have those options available in organic, farm raised, wild caught, all natural, or any combination of such. It wasn’t always as simple as a glass case and some butcher paper to gather your ‘kill’….no, at one point in our evolution people had to butcher their own animals, cut their own filets and stuff their own wurst.

My grandma explains the process as it once was. Typically you would slaughter both a pig and a cow at the same time. The men of the family would bleed out the animals so as to minimize the amount of spoilage that would result from some sort of blunt trauma (like a gun shot) to any other part of the animal. Not to mention that all the parts of the animal were to be used in the process and any waste that could be avoided was desired. Once the initial killing was finished the animal could be divided into its various parts. At this point it was all hands on deck. The animal would be split in two starting just below the underbelly where the ribs connected to the sternum and cutting all the way down to the asshole. The organs, intestines, and other innards were removed and given to the children to process. Next up was the removal of the head. The head was cut clean from where it attached to the neck. It was then sawed in two right down the middle the long way. The brain and tongue were removed and added to the pile of ‘top chops’ that were being compiled by the men who were busy at work cutting, chopping, and sawing the animal into its various parts. Sometimes the women of the family would sneak the brains into the kitchen and fry them up to give to the children who were hard at work scraping the small intestines clean for sausage stuffing. My grandma describes the cooked cranium as having the texture and properties of scrambled eggs. Light in color and the perfect consistency of clumped mush that perfectly replicates scrambled ova. It was just reward for the kids who were hard at work with their dull kitchen knifes scraping intestines (both the insides and outsides) clean on wooden boards, the smell of the swine’s partially digested last meal permeating the air as its waste removed. The casings would soon be loaded into the orifice of the family meat grinder where sausage links would be stuffed using a hand cranked, human powered KitchenAid. The last part of the process was to take the skin of the animal, once all meat and edible parts were removed, and slice it into 2-4 inch strips which were placed on a baking sheet and cooked to a crisp. The end product was a baked form of pork rinds known as ‘swara’.

The barbaric depiction above gives us insight to a concept we have pushed aside in developed times. The idea that waste is just that; waste and not a desired outcome for anything of use. I struggle to understand when this paradigm shifted and we felt empowered to trounce on the very resources that facilitate our highly elevated living standards that those of us in developed countries reap. Perhaps the butchers of the old world were true environmentalists that those of us who claim to be in modern times embody. I know for certain I’ve never understood the waste and recklessness that surrounds us in modern society. Does a field of trees have to be cleared for that mountain retreat so that one can be more ‘nestled’ among nature? Do we have to get our water from plastic bottles with life spans many times our own? Do we need to keep our homes hot in the winter and cold in the summer so as to numb the four seasons? The obvious answer to all of these questions is a resounding NO. Encouragement and awareness that the ‘feet and ears’ are ok to eat is the metaphorical thinking that will allow us to pass the torch to the next generation while maintaining eye contact, for we know that the lies of our environmental abuse have been unearthed and solved rather than buried under a mound of deceit. Our ancestors could then be proud.

Hey Detroit....I Just Annexed You To Canada ah?

2008-12-02T23:03:00.003+01:00

The city of fire and flame (actually I don't know their city catch phrase, so I'm assuming here) seems to be making headlines more so than usual these days. It appears as though the auto industry of our fine country is soon to be road kill on a lonesome highway. Ironic don't you think that the country that invented the first automobile, thanks to Henry Ford, should have got out of the business of producing such products 40 years ago? Now I suppose that we could sit around and blame uncompetitive labor practices or unfair competition from abroad for the short comings of this blue collar enterprise but that would lead to some long winded debate that, to be quite frank, I just don't have the 'drive' for this evening. So, let me go on record to place the blame squarely where it's deserved....Detroit.

Some would say Detroit doesn't deserve to be blamed for this. Two such naysayers that would be included in that list of objectors would be Detroit's former mayor Kwame Kilpatrick and GM's CEO Rick Wagoner. Unfortunately Kwame Kilpatrick is unable to comment on the matter as he is currently serving a 120-day sentence and facing a $1-million restitution fine after pleading guilty in September for lying under oath. Kwame, or 'the kam' as his buddies call him, also is responsible for some of the worst courtroom fashion atrocities since Dennis Rodman (ok, not from Detroit, but he played ball there for 8 years). The second dissident of my above claim would be GM's CEO Rick Wagoner who plans to spend ten hours in one of his companies lovely hybrid Chevy Malibu's driving to Capital Hill to beg for a lump sum of $12 billion to keep the company afloat. While it is an American past time to 'road trip' and explore our fine country at the helm of the wheel, the best time to do this typically isn't when the company you manage is about to implode and vaporize 100 years of operational history. I tried to reach him for comment on this matter but couldn't get through as he was having engine trouble somewhere outside of Toledo.

The solution here isn't an easy one......some people might even get a little teary eyed when the reality hits them that the city that gave us Rosa Parks, Ted Nugent, Robin Williams, and Eminem has now been annexed to our friends in Canada. Then again, others probably won't notice. Start the bulldozers Toronto...you might want to push this little gift into lake Erie.

Glogg and Nazi's....

2008-11-30T19:21:00.004+01:00

Today was the official Sunday kick off of the holiday season in sleepy little Lund. There was a carnival in the city center, several holiday markets in various cultural buildings, marching bands, glogg (holiday cider) on tap, winerkorv (bratwurst) cooking on open flames, a celebrity policeman named Patrick, a neo-Nazi protest/rally and another marching band. It’s surreal to sit here and think that I managed to pack that all into the course of only about 6 hours.

Hanife asked me a week ago if I wanted to go with her to explore the cultural offering Lund was going to have on Sunday. I obliged and so it was set….We set out shortly after 10:30 this morning. As we trudged to the city center things appeared calm and ordinary. The giant cathedral was the hub of the morning commotion as the faithful poured in to bless all that is their life. We ushered inside as I still had yet to see the inside of the large church in Lund. Not an empty seat in the house….standing room only. The whole place was filled with candles; the illumination lit the faces of everyone inside. The bell tower struck 11:00 and the sermon was soon to start. We shuffled back outside and continued on our day…..

The second stop was Kulturen where the large holiday mart was underway. There was a 30sek fee to go inside. Me, the perennial cheap skate felt that it was a bit ridiculous to pay for the privilege to go shopping. We made our way around the perimeter of the fortress…looking for a side door or a narrow window in which to enter. To no avail we gave up….

Moving on, we entered the first city square of Lund. Kids were singing holiday songs on the temporary stage and the smell of (non-alcholic) glogg was in the air. I opted for a delicious glass of the sugary cider and bought Hanife one for good measure. At that exact moment I spotted Lund’s most notable celebrity…Patrick the policeman. Notably, Hanife is completely in love with this guy. This was our chance to make her wishes come true and snap a photo for her to swoon over forever more. We began to creep into close proximity to the elusive Patrick. We snapped a couple of paparazi shots with him in the background. The excitement of the sighting paralyzed us with adrenalin so much so we were unable to approach him to ask for a posed photo. A fleeting moment it was as he was signaled away to a ‘call’…..

While disappointed that we missed our big chance, we pushed on to the other city square. There were the typical market offerings, mixed with holiday nick-knacks available for purchase…..we decided it was time for a cup of coffee. We moved on to the local 7-11 where we knew we could sit and watch people walk by on the street. As we sipped our coffee life unfolded. Patrick…again! Only this time he was coming in to the same store as us to have himself a cup of coffee. Could it be…twice in one day? We tried to play it cool…Hanife’s heart was about to pound a hole straight through her new woolen coat….this time we had to act. I stood up from my perch and said ‘Patrick…hello, my name is Jeff…do you think my friend could get a picture with you?’ We nervously introduced ourselves and engaged in some chit chat which led to the climax….a picture with the policeman. After Hanife regained consciousness, we moved back outside. It was time for the festivities to begin.

We moved back to the small square where I had a winerkorv med brod as we watched a live auction raising funds for something that my limited Swedish couldn’t translate. It was about this time that we learned of a protest to a subsequent rally in which a gathering of neo-Nazi faithful were to show their faces in Lund. The rally was to kick off at 2:30….

We hustled to the main train station where the protest was to be staged. As soon as we got close we could hear sirens amidst frequent booms that sounded like small bombs. Smoke bellowed from a distant street corner. Policeman in full riot gear created a barricade on the main road and were advancing on the gathered group of several thousand strong. Cobblestones from the very street in which the riot was unleashing were being dug out by masked hooligans wielding screwdrivers as shanks. Bottles and cobblestones were launched at the police from within the crowd. The scene was madness. Hanife and I found ourselves smack dab in the middle of this….somehow on the front line of the altercation. I couldn’t disseminate who was who in the clash and if we were in danger or not. I kept her close as I thought the last place a Muslim Turkish girl is safe is alone in the midst of a neo-Nazi anything. Muzzled dogs were at the officers sides….chanting from the crowd drowned out the barking. The scene was anarchy. We made our retreat to a safe rear of the action. It was at this point I asked a Swede what was going on….he informed us that the group we were watching was the Nazi protestors. They wanted at the neo-Nazi’s assembled at the far end of the street. With that knowledge I now knew that we weren’t in any real danger…other than the unlikely misfortune of a bottle or brick to the head from a misguided projectile tossed from our flank. I decided it was safe for us to make our move through the police line to the assembly at the opposite end from where we were. After all, we had both been looking for something exciting to do all day…. I’ll be damned if I wasn’t going to be in the middle of this little trife. As we shuffled along another commotion broke out….the police were retreating and moving to a new post….the protestors were trying to flank the assembly from another street. As the police turned and trotted to a new post we followed, now at the front line of the advancing mob…we moved stealth like to a vantage point where we could see both sides engage for the first time. The organized neo-Nazi congregation was completely surrounded by uniformed officers. Their members held homemade shields and red colored wooden clubs. Despite their collected prowess there was absolutely no way they would leave Lund unharmed if it wasn’t for police protection. At the height of the altercation the pro Nazi followers were easily outnumbered 100 to one. We chased the action around the city for about an hour or so…at one point the mob moved to the center of campus where there was a marching band playing holiday songs outside….it was a surreal contrast. A giddy marching band complete with baton twirlers, over their shoulders bottle throwing hooligans engaging a riot with uniformed officers. Children in strollers and happy families munching saffron knackerbrod while nearby, masked misfits rummaged through last nights bar rubbish looking for unbroken bottles to arm their efforts. I guess there are stranger things in this life…..

Shortly after, we lost interest in the now mild riot that was all but smudged silent. We returned to ground zero (city square) and purchased another round on glogg to sip on as we reflected on what we just witnessed. We strolled through the people packed streets and did a bit of window browsing under the many holiday lights that now are strewn about the main streets. Say goodbye to November. December is almost here.

Thanks....

2008-11-29T16:17:00.003+01:00

Thanksgiving is by far my favorite holiday of the year....as an adult (relatively speaking) I no longer generate many 'wants', at least the kind that come gift wrapped and fit under a tree, so Christmas is every year a further and further second to the annual gluttony of Turkey Day. Whether you call it Thanksgiving or some other derivative, the core (eating and drinking) family gathering should be essential in every culture. If it happens to center around the consumption of a 10 kilo bird than even better....

This year I can be especially thankful for what life has afforded me. I long yearned for 'distant shores' and a new perspective on this marble in which we live. Some sort of adventure to belittle the not always humble me. So, on the heels of that confessional I will give thanks to all those who came before, those who showed up today, and those who I have yet to meet in the always present future.

Condoms & Kangaroos

2008-11-26T09:20:00.002+01:00

Yet another interesting week here in Swedish society. The big news from the north comes from Västtrafik (Gothenburg transit operator) who removed a 'potentially offensive' print ad from their transit displays. The ad featured a young man (with another young man in the background) with the words 'Vill du se oss sätta på en kondom?' printed across the top. The translation: 'Do you want to see us put on a condom?' Underneath the print ad in smaller letters was an invitation to text message a code through your mobile phone to a server in which you would be returned a 'tongue in cheek demonstration of how to put on a condom'. Now, here is where I started thinking, what exactly was the 'potentially offensive' part of the ad? Doesn't the mainstream media, politicians, countless non-governmental agencies, national boards of health, your family doctor, your future partners, your 5th grade human growth and development teacher, your parents and rap sensation 50 Cent all preach safe sex and the use of such contraception? It seems like that's not the reason why the ad was offensive.... Ok, so is it the fact that the ad may portray homosexual relationships as safe and responsible instead of the gin fueled cocaine snorting orgies that 52.3% of California residents voted as their perceived reality when deciding on prop 8? It seems like this is unlikely as well. We live in an era where technology creates virtual relationships with no meaning, in an era where realities are twisted on Wisteria Lane and than streamed through your Tivo during prime time, in an era where the odds of a couple getting married (straight or gay) and NOT getting divorced are less than half, in an era where a vice presidential candidate can force a shot gun wedding in the national limelight to appease her religious neophyte following by demonstrating 'responsibility' against all odds, in an era where we still continue to exaggerate the differences between one another despite the continual rhetoric about equality it seems like if we each took a quick gut check we'd come to the conclusion that we should stay the hell out of each others bedrooms (and lives) and shouldn't let a silly thing like who's sleeping with who bother us. So, if homosexuality isn't the offensive part than that leaves only one possibility....cell phones! That's it...this may be our culprit. The use of the mobile to solicit the video makes the advertisement interactive. While that may sound brilliant it generates yet one more opportunity to use this intrusive devise that already consumes more time than reading in most people's lives. Funny thing is that I say that on the nose of a large pitch today as the financial arm of a mobile platform development start up that we're trying to launch from within our program. I guess hypocrisy is an unavoidable reality to progress. Oh, and lastly, the interactive display would be way cooler if it used QR codes to access the video. SMS is so 2007.

Moving on to a more uplifting topic.... Walter, the 8 month old orphan kangaroo living in Ystad had a chance this week to hop around and play in the snow. His development is moving along nicely and with any luck he'll soon be healthy enough to move on to a new life in the zoo with some of his fellow 'mates'. Walter, what an adorable name for a joey, was orphaned when his mother suddenly died of a heart failure. It's reported that Walter is eager to get on to his new life with his fellow marsupials, so much so that he even scratches at the door of his keepers home in an attempt to get closer to those he now can call friends (mates). Good luck Walter!

The Week In Review....

2008-11-23T10:07:00.004+01:00

Busy times here in Sweden. It's been a roller coaster week....extremely positive though. This past Monday I learned that I was a finalist in a business idea contest that I entered. The contest was part of Global Entrepreneurship Week sponsored by the Kauffman Foundation. The prize for four lucky winners was a trip to Hong Kong. I was extremely happy about being considered for this prize. The ceremony was in Copenhagen at the Copenhagen Business School on Wednesday. Since I really enjoy Copenhagen I wanted to make the most of my day. I set out on the 9:30 train from Lund and made it to Copenhagen an hour later. When I got to the city I basically set out to wander around and see what I could see before I needed to hike the 5k to the school for the ceremony.....

The building above is one of the cool things about Copenhagen. It's a weather dial more or less on the side of a building. The temperature is shown by the neon lights, and the forecast can be found by looking at which statue is present on the top. If it's the girl with the bike then it's sunny and nice, if it's the girl with the umbrella...well, it's rainy and not so nice. When it's half and half...well, that's just Scandanavia this time of year I think.

Further down I found this great outdoor food bazar. It was an international food market complete with FREE samples!! Lunch was served. Since I was dressed nicely for the afternoon presentation, I was able to get three full laps in on the sample trays before people started looking at me with that typical 'here comes that scumbag again' look. Meats from Germany, crepes from France, candies from the UK, palella from Spain, and wooden shoes from Holland? Maybe Holland missed the part about 'food' on the international food market invitation flyer....

Everytime I've been to Copenhagen, wheter it be really late at night, early in the morning, raining, or sunny, there are always people out and about, walking on the main pedestrian streets. It makes the city inviting to explore.

Of course no trip to Copenhagen is complete without at least a stop off in Nyhavn. The harbor borough sits at the end of the long pedestrian causeways in the city. It's a simply stunning place if you catch it on a sunny day. For me the weather was gray, but the place still had its charm. The boats looked somber and tired for winter was ahead.

At this point in my day the weather turned a bit colder and the rain came in a bit harder. I thought I should find shelter, get my bearings and prepare my route for the hike to the ceremony. What better place to do this at than a (covered) street meat kiosk! One french hot dog later I was off to the ceremony. The walk itself took me to the north and west of downtown to the district of Frederiksberg. I really liked this place as I walked through it. It was a bit rough around the edges in that 'you're totally safe here' kind of way. There were cigar and tobacco shops that lined several blocks....occasionally you'd get a whiff of an old salty Dane pulling a puff from his wooden pipe as he passed you by on the street. Finally I arrived at the school. I made my way to the ceremony and mingled with the masses until they announced the winners. Sadly enough I wasn't selected. After learning the scope of the ideas they did select I was happy to pass on this trip. I've found more exciting concepts starring into a bowl of bean soup then what these people came up with. Boring.

Anyways, the rest of my week was pretty much focused on program work. There is an incredible amount of opportunity here, it seems like I learn about something new every day that excites me. However, it's that age old problem I have where I want to be a part of all of it and I spread myself too thinly across the board.

A few sidenotes to the week. It snowed here in Lund...we got probably 6 inches, which translates to three inches of snow and 34" of ice....I'm thinking it would have been good to bring crampons and an ice ax from Colorado.....

I have been doing a bit of environmental work while I've been here. The main topic has been micro carbon credits and their use as an economic driver of rural development in under developed countries. As part of that I reached out and reconnected with Dr. Henry Liu who is the inventor of the Green Brick. There are some really positive things happening with that project right now....as you know, I'm always up for a good chat about fly ash.....

The group I've been working with on developing a mobile platform for cellular phones landed a huge meeting for this next week. We're meeting with the largest aggregator of mobile technologies in Sweden. I'll have to dust off the suit for this one.....

Last but not least, the holiday lights are up in the city center now. It really feels like the holiday season is upon us. I tried to convince a group of my classmates that we should go caroling to finance a holiday party......I think I had them sold on it until I mentioned that I wouldn't actually be singing, but that I would be handling logistics and management of the operation. The wheels kind of fell off the pitch shortly after.

Sunshine....You're Mine....

2008-11-17T21:29:00.004+01:00

Today was an interesting day......I awoke a bit groggy as I stayed up until about 2:30 last night looking at highly complicated Ryan Air flights around Europe trying to make total use of their 1 million seat blowout sale. Despite the roughly 5 hours of sleep I awoke a bit inspired....and on a Monday? It was kind of a strange sensation...I didn't know what it was at first and then I realized....the sun was out!! It wasn't raining!! There was an amazing sunrise that hung low in the sky and painted the whole of Lund in an amazing array of pinks and pastels. This is one nice thing about living in a place where it's dark both late into the morning and early into the night this time of year...you get to see the sun come and go each day without having to alter your routine to do so. I really do think there is something magical about the way the sun comes and goes in this part of the world. So, while all you Colorado natives will look at the pics below and think...what's the big deal about sun on a building? Well, let me tell you bucko...you just go on and enjoy your 300+ days a year of the beaming rays....I'll get my sunshine from pictures (god that's depressing)....

Sleepy little cobblestones....

Sunshine....is that you I see?

My glory...my goodness...I think it is....

Yes! That's it....Let is shine!

Sunshine at last....maybe it will last all winter?

Barry Gibb, Britain's Real 'Liquidity' Problem, and a Policeman Named Patrick

2008-11-15T19:12:00.003+01:00

Today was kind of a lazy day. By lazy I mean completely useless and a total waste of oxygen. At one point I made my way to my kitchen and grabbed some peanut butter and a cracker, but that was about the extent of my output. That being said, I did have a chance to catch up some much needed news and internet surfing. So here goes, some b-side news from across the pond.

This past week I celebrated the 7 month anniversary of my last haircut. Now while it's my intent to make it a full year without chopping these flowing locks it is starting to turn into a bit of a rat's nest atop my skull. Therefore I have been keeping my eyes open for a certain 'look' that may just enhance the overall appearance I present on a daily basis. Enter Barry Gibb. Now for those of you who don't know this former king of pop here's a link to his Wikipedia page. Highlights from his past....formed the Bee Gees, married a beauty pageant winner, and was voted biggest heart throb ever in 2008 by Rolling Stones magazine (somebody should check me on that). Sounds like we've found a winner.

In an episode of this week's Colbert Report, Steven mentioned a story that was breaking in London. Apparently the British are low on sperm donors and their (sperm) banks are about to fail. Now, I understand that we are in the midst of a global economic meltdown, but come on....are we really that uneasy about the solvency of the banking system that we're unwilling to part ways with even these kinds of deposits? Ryanair (European discount airline) is having a 1 million seat blowout extravaganza all weekend long. You can book flights for Dec/Jan at incredibly low prices....for example, a flight from Goteborg Sweden to Frankfurt Germany is 2 euro round trip with taxes and fees if you book it before Monday. You can see where I'm going with this..... I'm thinking as a little Christmas treat to the Brits I use a few days of my winter break to jump on a jet...buzz over to Britain....fill a few tubes...take in the sights, snap a few pictures of Big Ben and make it back to Sweden in time for Christmas. As added benefit, I may be able to solve this little visa issue I'm still having at the same time. I mean, if I have a 'bun in the oven' in London I don't think the EU wants to kick the babies father back to the states before the 'big day' do they?

The second day after my arrival in Sweden I attended a welcome meeting for all incoming masters students. It was a basic meet and greet presentation. The highlight of the presentation was a policeman named Patrick. Typically I would be the last person to feel any bit inspired by the boys in blue, but this guy was genuinely great. He was funny and informative as well as (according to every female in Lund) incredibly handsome. On a side note, I recently joined the masses of people in this world that participate in the social networking site Facebook. So far my membership in this 'community' has caused far more trouble than good, but it is the single source of information about what's going on in Lund so I'm kind of trapped. The other day I was posting a note on the 'wall' of a friends profile in Facebook and noticed that she is a member of a 'group' called 'Patrick The Policeman In Lund'....this guy has his own Facebook group? Yes he does in fact, and he has 204 members (stalkers) who have joined the group. There are pictures of his patrol car as well as numerous threads about his ruggedly handsome good looks. I've begun working on tshirt designs to capitalize on this opportunity.....stay tuned.

Dublin and Belfast Exposed

2008-11-12T10:46:00.006+01:00

I finally got batteries for my camera. I know that's not a good excuse for not posting pics sooner, but it's all I got. So.....here's some pics and a brief blurb on each.

Trinity College Campus. Quite the courtyard.

A nice walking street in Dublin. All roads lead to the church...you sinners!

St. Patrick's Cathedral. The tower is under construction so I left that side out of the photo.

The real institution of Ireland. The Guiness Brewery. Notice the gravity bar to the left side of the tanks....it's the highest vantage point in Dublin and a great place for a pint!

A 'thirsty' Jeffrey and Justin.

Sunset from the gravity bar....high atop Dublin.

The river Liffey in Dublin.

Breaking bread in Belfast. Irish stew and some pints at the Crown Bar.

Main city center in Belfast. The union jack flies proud from her perch.

Belfast is a bit rough around the edges.....razor wire around the churches is a nice touch.

Belfast city center at night.

Good morning (unless you're the pig of course)! Breakfast at the market square in Belfast.

A UK version of an SUV.

Queen's college in Belfast. The picture doesn't do the place justice.

The infamous 'black cab'. These hunks of iron provide taxi service on the cheap around Belfast. Make sure you have enough pounds for the fare ahead of time. These cabs have a strange way of making people 'disappear' in the night.

Swedish (full contact) Sport Of Queuing

2008-11-10T20:26:00.004+01:00

This afternoon my project partner and I spent a great deal of time working on our current marketing plan for a concept we'll be pitching later this week. It was a productive session and should pave the way for a productive rest of the week. As a treat to myself, to celebrate the work we had done, I decided I would stop by Netto on my way home and pick up some Nordic Cake. These tasty little treats are one of the best discoveries that I've stumbled upon since I landed in Scandinavia. They are basically miniature pies with a buttery crust, sugary mash of an inside, and toasted almonds on top. Yummy!

The grocer that is right near my home is a discount food retailer called Netto. They are a Danish company that specializes in no frills shopping. They carry the basic staples of a Swedish diet, but little else. They are the perfect place to stop in for a jar of tomato sauce or (in my case) a package of Nordic Cake on your way home from campus. Once inside a Netto you are bombarded with randomness. For example, tonight when I walked in the door there was a giant crate of ramen noodles, next to a giant crate of coffee, next to a giant crate of a product called Gloog. No prices on any of it (assuming you wanted to buy any of it). It's yet another thing I've just come to accept about this place. Anyways, I grabbed my Nordic Cake and a package of potato hash for the morning and made my way to the checkout. Here is the best part of a trip to Netto. The queue.....

Swedes refer to any line (of people) as a queue. Anyone who is in a queue is referred to as queuing. Anyone that queues competitively is locking horns in the Swedish sport of queuing. And last, but not least, is the famous Swedish dance, the queue shuffle. An evening trip to Netto and you may get to see all of it at once. Tonight was one of those nights....

With my two items in hand I took my place at the far end of the lengthy queue. There was a lone checker working at the only open kasa. The line of people in front of me was a bit anxious and I could tell this was no normal queue. I anticipated an additional kasa opening any minute. I wasn't alone in my hunch. An older lady with a small cart came up along side me. She had a look in her eye that indicated she wasn't just interested in the shampoo and the Fisherman's Friend throat lozenges that were shelved to my side. I could feel her cart slowly angle in towards me. I'd seen this move before....she was creating a block so that when the next available cashier opened her kasa I (along with everyone else behind me) would be trapped. She wasn't technically violating any of the countries long upheld queue laws as she wasn't cutting in line, she was simply 'shopping' near a potential queue that may open.... Sure enough, out of the rear emerged an additional cashier. Kasa number two was open for customers! The queue erupted into a full fledged Swedish queue shuffle dance. Men, woman, children, all of them shuffled to an imaginary beat as they reorganized themselves into now 2 lines. The lady in front of me swung her cart wildly....taking out an entire rack of pastries as she roared her head back exposing her aged fangs still dripping lingonberries from the meatballs she slayed at lunch. A small child tried to make a move ahead of her....he was no match...simply a road bump in the process. I dove for cover behind a perceived respite of toilet paper and counter top scrubs. It was no use....I had already sustained material damage. As I lied motionless near the candy aisle I weighed my options. I knew it was unlikely that I'd ever walk again....that I was ok with. However, my fear was that if I popped smoke and signaled the rescue choppers she'd discover my location, and finish the job with the toilet brush she just bought. I knew I needed help....time was running out.......

I guess I must have blacked out after that. The next thing I knew I was in my corridor kitchen enjoying a tasty meal of spaghetti and meatballs. I had a warm mug of tea on the table right next to an unopened package of Nordic Cake. Looks like heaven shined favorably on me tonight. Que'ers beware....that lady is still out there somewhere...you never know when she'll show up in a queue near you!

Inmates and Soul Searching

2008-11-09T11:48:00.003+01:00

As I sit here in the friendly confines of my corridor room I'm reflecting on what was another interesting week in Lund. The election dominated the news and conversation of my day to day as everyone seemed to request a forecast of the next 4 years. When asked, I gave a bipartisan canned response of 'I think it's a positive change for Americans as well as our friends around the globe." Other key events of my week included a couple of highly insightful conversations around carbon markets and their place as an economic driver for development in emerging societies. I met a wonderful gentleman here at Lund who most recently worked for Eco-Securities on projects in South America. It's his vision, similar to mine, to look at the role micro projects can play in the larger (soon to be ratified) global carbon market. Some of you will remember my obsessive harping of fly ash bricks...well, this is round two in that fight. And last but not least, the big news out of Stockholm is sourced by one of my new favorite publications The Monocle, in which an article describes a newly formed arrangement between graduating fashion design students at Beckman's College of Design in Stockholm and the roughly 260 female inmates in Sweden that have a new fashion line to look forward to. Apparently the university students have been commisioned to design a more functional and flattering line of inmate apparel that will allow women in the system to secure their identity while being held in the system.

I've begun thinking about the future of my studies here at Lund. The semester has about a month left before we resign for our winter break. After we resume classes, post new year, it will be a fire storm of action leading up to our commencement in June. Not a lot of time in the grand scheme of things. There are days when I feel like I have a clear picture of the next steps in life...there are others where I'm utterly confused. I've identified a handful of things that I once thought I would be great at, that I now know would never be dynamic enough to stimulate my microscopic attention span. On the other hand, areas which I never once considered seem to be emerging as interesting and thought provoking.

I recently watched an online program about our subconscious. The research presented within the show illustrated that we as humans really are agents who act in a long series of patters. Thus the phrase, you can't teach an old dog new tricks. Whether it's what detergent we buy, or what job we take, our past actions in our lives can indicate our likelihood of either making that decision in the first place, or maintaining that decision in the long run. The lead researcher on the program posed an argument that if we could identify some of these patterns within our lives we could make better choices that have better long term results. So for me, I thought back in time to identify memorable items and events that may hold the secret code to what the hell I'm suppose to do after grad school....here is a short list of what I came up with and some analysis around each.

Creativity & Innovation - Legos were a favorite toy of mine. These little building blocks are a wonderful way to imagine and create a world that extends from your mind to the physical realm in which we live. They provide immediate feedback (and gratification) as you build. I had other toys as a child, but none that I really remember spending as much time with.

Projects - For some reason I was always very good at putting together puzzles. I would often put them together without turning all the pieces over, and I never followed the age old tradition of 'edges first'. Despite my usually non-existent attention span, I would labor for hours undistracted over the small pieces in front of me. I ruined endless holiday family gatherings by rushing to the puzzle table (after someone else took the time to turn all the pieces right side up) assembling large chunks of it as quickly as possible (infringing on others territories) and going so far as to hide a single piece in my pocket so that I could conclude the exercise by inserting the final piece and raising my hands in victory while sashaying to the kitchen in search of some more cheese log. Oh, and it was a cold day in hell when I actually stuck around long enough to participate in 'cleaning it up' by putting the pieces back in the box. Once it was done...I was done.

Negotiations - a good day for me in the summer time when we were out of school was when I could get my sister to enter into some sort of negotiation with me. This usually revolved around some chore list that our mother had left for us. I could typically persuade her to enter into legally binding arrangements that were both complex and highly advantageous to my desires....the one fatal flaw of these contracts was the executive veto that could be executed by our parents.

Arbitrage & Value Identification - there's not an MBA grad from any top ivy league school that can sit down with a copy of the Thrifty Nickel (local classified newspaper), read an ad for a dozen free chickens and immediately conclude the profit potential of such an item, distribution channels available to them, current selling price of live chickens in the broad market and inventory costs associated with holding said item; without doing any research ahead of time. Whether it be chickens, appliances, or other inanimate objects I've always had a certain knack for noticing things that are mis-priced.

Sales - the best job I've ever had in my life was selling Christmas trees in the winter. The unfortunate aspect of this higher calling is the seasonality. There was nothing more satisfying than concluding on a market equilibrium (price) that a buyer was willing to pay for an object that is both dead and soon to become a fire hazard that will jeopardize their families safety throughout the seasonal festival. My one fatal flaw in sales is my inner 'softie' which means I'm pretty much a push over when it comes to 'driving a hard bargain'. For example, if a family came in that looked a bit hard on their luck it really wasn't in my nature to extract top dollar for the balsam fir they selected. Instead I'd give them a steep discount moving the product at a price barely over cost. I'd encourage the family to invest the savings in a larger frozen turkey and an extra quart of egg nog. We sold more trees (at a lower cost), there was a rise in grocer sales of large-extra large turkeys, and I slept better at night.....republicans would call that socialism.

So, what's one to conclude from such exercise? Well, for me I think the above self check indicates that I should try to find a gig that is: project based and requires problem solving within an innovative field (or product) where value is not being appropriately calculated by the overall market. It should include negotiations that create an advantaged position on behalf of our interests, while requiring the use of sales skills to do so....at the same time keeping a conscious eye towards less fortunate actors in the space we operate to ensure that everyone wins. If I could somehow include a bow saw and smell like rich pine forests when I returned home each night...well, all the better.

You Bastards

2008-11-06T11:39:00.003+01:00

Here's some news for all you travelers out there. Don't trust the airlines. Ok, so maybe that's not news to anyone. I think we've all been burned by lost luggage, intimate anal cavity searches at FAA security check points, over priced sandwiches at terminal quick marts, and of course the endless delays. My latest experience is a new one though.......

September of this year Lindsay and I planned a great holiday for the two of us to commence shortly after Christmas and run through the new year. The plan was to go from Lund to Copenhagen to Amsterdam to Antwerp (maybe Brugge) and then to Frankfurt for her to fly home from, after which I'd spend a week in Germany making my way back up north to Sweden. 90% of the trip can be done by train.....it's the 10% in the air that kills a fella.

I found some great tickets out of Copenhagen to Amsterdam. Sterling Airlines, $90/ticket. We jumped on the deal and I booked them straight away. Little did I know that I should have simply went to an ATM, pulled out the equivalent amount of cash, and set fire to it.

Apparently the airline that we booked the tickets through, Sterling Airlines, decided to become insolvent on October 29th. What do I mean by insolvent....well, basically it means they put up an IOU on their web page (in several languages) and wished everyone good luck on traveling with another airline because all their flights were grounded and no one was getting any money back....apparently it had something to do with oil prices. I guess the concept using futures contracts to hedge price risk of operating expenses escaped their finance department's brain trust. Now, normally something like this would send me into a tailspin at which point I'd probably get arrested at the tarmac trying to steal a set of tires from one of their grounded planes to then sell on ebay to an airline with money (if such a thing exists) to recoup my lose. Instead, Linds and I simply booked another ticket (at twice the cost) with a different carrier and we used a credit card to do so. See, the fatal flaw in my deal was that I used a debit card (as I don't have a credit card) to complete the transaction. Once you use that the deal is done. Lesson learned.

Now, you may be thinking to yourself....ok, you got burned on two plane tickets...what's the odds that's going to happen to me? With Sterling's announcement they became the 64th airline to go belly up in 2008. The whole airline industry is a total sham....carriers that you think are reputable run their operations in the red and they all use current revenues (ticket sales) that are for future liabilities (future flights) to finance current operations. Therefore, the companies are in a perpetual cycle of using cash now for something they have to deliver in the future....while losing money the whole time. Think about that the next time you hit the friendly skies.

Election Coverage

2008-11-05T21:21:00.002+01:00

I was thinking to myself that perhaps I should write some lengthy post election analysis about the pros and cons of the results. Detailed predictions about what I see for the world going further, etc. Instead, I found this little piece.....I think this guy does a far better job summing it up than I could do. Enjoy.

It's Over....

2008-11-05T07:56:00.002+01:00

That's it. It's done. Obama is in the white house. Senate and house are both soundly secured. Colorado swung blue and Markey ousted Musgrave from the house.

Belfast Divided

2008-11-02T13:13:00.004+01:00

Ireland is a country quite dear to my heart. The first time I came to her green isle shores was in 2002 with my best friend and his folks. We did the quintessential Irish tour. 10 days starting in Dublin, proceeding due west to dingle and on around the southern shore line making our way back to Dublin for St. Patty's day. Fairytale bed and breakfasts, full Irish breakfasts, proper fish and chips for dinner and of course countless pints for the 'strength' required to complete the trip. An unforgettable experience that I'll make sure to bore my children's children with long after I've lost my mind in an easy chair. For about the same price as a souvenir shamrock t-shirt from the Guinness factory in Dublin, you can buy yourself a one way ticket on a 3 hour bus that drops you off smack dab in the middle of a civil war. The shirt I bought in 2002 is nice and all, but this trip I chose the bus.

A mate of mine in Lund, whose from Manhattan, decided it was long overdue for him to hit the shores of the land of the leprechaun. I opted to 'guide' the event as I had been there before. Early Thursday we hit the road. One hour train to Copenhagen, 2 hour flight to Dublin and a 30 minute bus ride to the city center; we were ready for a celebratory pint in the city that Arthur Guinness built. We toured the city on foot, hitting all the major sites to see. Trinity College, the book of kells library, Grafton Street walking mall, Marion Square, St. Patrick's cathedral, temple bar area, St. Stephen's Green, Bank of Ireland, boardwalk on the River Liffey, and of course the gravity bar at the Guinness Storehouse where we watched the sun set from the highest point in Dublin. Yes, we saw it all (and it was pretty much as I left it 6 years ago). After checking in to our hostel (10 euro/night per bed) it was time to revamp and get ready to go see the other tourist sites in Dublin...the pubs. Oddly enough the one mainstay of Dublin (the pubs) is what has changed the most since I last bellied up. The crowd was younger (maybe I'm older) and uninterested. The old men that dotted the wooden institutions of the historic city seem to have disappeared (or died). You can't find a true peat fire near a quaint in all of downtown, and the only cabbage that I saw was part of a trio of vegetables that were adorn as costumes on some pear shaped Irish gals that skulled a few too many pints in their prime (which are now long gone). McFadden’s and O'Sullivans are being replaced by Jimmy Chong Thai Buffets and Abrakababarah Turkish Falafel houses.

After a night of pints and John Denver cover songs it was time to head north....destination Belfast. Here's where things got interesting....2 plus hour bus ride from Dublin city center and you're in the UK. No more Euro my friend, this is the Queen's country where a pint costs you a pound and some pence. The bus dropped us in the middle of the modernized city center. The first task...cash. We needed to pull out some pounds as the money bouquet (Euro, Swedish kronor, Danish kroner) we had was no good here. The first thing I noticed (besides the out of order sign on the ATM) was that the bank notes in Belfast aren't actual pounds. They're this hybrid of GBP and stamped money printed from the actual banks in Belfast. I'll have to research it more, but I think it's basically the Queen's form of allowance to her Irish neighbors. After we grabbed cash it was time for a pint (of course). We found ourselves at the Crown Bar across the street from the Europa hotel. This place is amazing...words do it no justice. The booths where you eat have chest level half walls that surround the tables with a door that closes you and your dinner mates in so you can talk in private. The ceiling and bar back are paneled with carved wood stained blood red. Every window is a stained glass masterpiece. It's just the kind of place that the IRA (Irish Republican Army) would have hatched their latest fire bomb, or perhaps watched it smolder from as the hotel Europa (across the stree) has been bombed 34 times during the conflict. After some pints and some stew we moved on to explore the city. The north side has a great metropolitan feel with loads of renovated modern buildings that pepper the main drags. Further south (where the city gets seedy in a hurry) lays Queen's college, which overlooks a big central green. Queen's is an imposing and intimidating looking institution that would make any student think twice about a spit ball or pissing off a morning class from too many pints the night before. The college campus dropped us right on top of our room and board for the night. Yet another hell hole hostel with bunk beds and 12 of your (newest) friends. We revamped and it was time to hit the streets. Halloween night was in the air. We didn't make it 50 yards before we saw our first fist fight. Apparently there was a big footie (soccer) game tomorrow and the local 'queens men' were influencing the outcome a night early. 6 blocks of broken bottles, trash littered across the street, windows in all the buildings knocked out and no street lights, we finally hit the main drag again. We somehow stumbled into a place named John Hewitt's bar. Classic local dive. Jazz music pumped from the true wooden instruments of the 4 man band, resonated off the walls and landed square in the foam on your Guinness. This was a get in and blend in kind of place. I quickly spotted an older couple with a lovely daughter that my mate took a keen eye to. I noticed they had a bit of available real estate at the corner of their table, so why not introduce myself. I took the mum head on, handed her my hand and said hello. To my delight she offered up the available spot to her starboard. I obliged and quickly extended an olive branch to her husband across the stool. Once I had the corner secured I motioned for my mate and he made the move for the daughter. Brilliant! Apparently the husband was a local blues musician that carried some clout. It was a steady flow of locals coming over to pay their respects, at the same time giving us ours (guilt by association). We followed our new found family to a hole in the wall known as The Spaniard. It was a classic place. Two floors, cheap pints, and not a tout (IRA narc) in sight. At this point we were 10 strong as a group and my new best friend was the ugliest looking lad in Belfast weighing in at a bit over an iron cannon. It turns out his good looks weren't the only thing this guy had going for him. He's also the owner of a pub not too far from where we were located. Our next stop, and so it goes....

The next morning my mate woke up with a head in need of a full Irish breakfast. Apparently the blues mans' daughter doesn't play nice and likes her pints by the dozen. He should have spent more time shouldered with me taking in some foul jokes about the Queen. After a bite at the open air market it was time for a black cab tour. This is one of the things I was a bit unsure about doing as it was expensive, involved a car, and seemed like a tourist trap...boy was I wrong. Our cabbie for the deal was a rounded off god fearing Catholic gent that's been driving cab his entire adult life...going on 40 years now. We headed off for the north of town....Shankill Road. This place is probably 4 city blocks from the metropolitan center of the city. Again, broken windows, glass throughout the city 'park', hills of random dirt that look like foxholes for fighting and random shit thrown about. Not exactly the place you brave an Irish tricolor (flag) on your shirt. There are giant murals on the sides of the brownstone row houses. Each mural signifies different killings, militia groups, and loyalist activists that were either killed in battle or are still in passive operation today. A strangely surreal place. While none of these are easy to take in, perhaps the most disturbing is a painted image of a hooded sniper with a shouldered rifle that 'follows' you around the park as you walk. No matter where you are on Shankill, if you can see the mural of the sniper he's got a bead on you. I watched a 'slightly chubby' kid about 12 years old kick around a half flat football beside a backdrop of a two story mural dedicated to Stevie 'Top Gun' McKeag who's a hero in this part of the world. Stevie murdered 14 (identified) people as the commander of the Red Hand Commando....He died in 2000, a hero on Shankill. Around every corner there's a full mural with the Queen's mark. Names of 'soldiers' lost from each neighborhood have plaques built in front of their families homes just in case the kids and grandchildren ever forget. At closing time of the local pubs everyone rises and sings 'god save the Queen' before they go home. Make sure you know the words if you go.

Our tour continued to the edge of the protestant part of town. Here there is a massive steel wall that dominates the skyline. It stands 20'-30' tall and is a solid barrier to keep trouble segregated to it's own side of the city. There are big gates at the ends of the streets that connect the two sides. On Friday evening the city closes the gates and doesn't reopen them until Sunday morning. The wall that separates the two sides is littered with graffiti and paintings... some promote hate, other promote peace. An awkward scar on the landscape of the city, and a constant reminder that a maltove cocktail is only a throw away. We drove around the barriers to the Irish side of the city to continue our tour. Here the place was much cleaner. The row houses had similar murals and memorials, but all and all it was a likeable place. Gardens were well kept and the monuments looked much nicer than the hooligan fueled mosaics on the other side of the wall. Our guide made it a priority to insert his biased beliefs into the tour by making an extra point of noticing how many innocent children and woman had been killed in the random (and sometimes organized) acts of violence. The lists were astounding and the point was made. Further down the same neighborhood giant murals promoting peace and bringing attention to global injustice became the theme. A strong message is clearly spelled in paint as the title reads America's Greatest Failure. The picture is of Bush with money bubbles spewing from his ears as he sucks from a straw hooked to a well in a smoldering middle east which lay in ruins. The straw is supported by a 'British support hook'.

Our guide left us with one last story about a building that looked very eastern block. Grey concrete, no real windows to note, square, and completely boring. Its function was the headquarters for the IRA commanders to run their efforts from. Entrenched among Irish supporters who lived in the building, the commanders were able to shot call from a high perch above the city. The building itself has a full length garbage shoot that was occasionally used as a human garbage disposal for any bodies that may need rid. A strange departing story to a strange city that still has a long ways to go to bury (no pun intended) the ills of its past.

While Belfast is defiantly not the Belfast of old (according to those who we spoke to), the city is still on edge with its relatively youthful 'peace status' established a decade ago. As a sign of the times a lady, whom offered to help us find where we were going on a map, offered us some sound advice about the parade that was scheduled for the city on Sunday. The parade was a homecoming for the British military returning from battle in the middle east. She wanted to make sure we weren't planning to be around for it. Her fear was not that there was going to be any issues (despite the massive security increase in the city). Her fear was that if the unlikely outcome of violence happened, we wouldn't have had any means to any arms to take up ahead of time. She wasn't taking that chance and planned to be 'ready' for the event.

Belfast is an interesting place in an interesting country. With any luck the divides of the old will shed way to the hope of the now and bring the sides together to formally bury the hatchet once and for all. Belfast could become the Berlin of the Irish isle at which point everyone wins. A last quote from a mural on the Catholic side was next to the most photographed painting in Belfast; the mural of Bobby Sands. Bobby Sands was an IRA volunteer who died on hunger strike in a British detention facility after capture for having arms in his possession. His 1981 death spawned an uprising in the independence movement and the activity and recruitment of the IRA. His death was felt across Europe as reactions to the news caused outrage in many nations. The words he spoke, captured on his mural, read "our revenge will be the laughter of our children."

The Final Hours...The Final Post (maybe)

2008-10-27T22:03:00.004+01:00

We've just about made it. Election day is in sight. Obama holds a comfortable lead in the national polls and all signs point to a democratic congress to boot. My fingers are frail from the typing and my voice is horse from telling the same story, "America has problems right now, there's no doubt about it....but, give us a chance, give us another look come election day as we vote in a new era in our country. Don't give up on us yet (insert country from where listener calls home)." This is the political turning point in my generations lifetime. We've cast our ballots before, but many of us have never been on the winning side of the coin flip. It's a disconnect that infects the wounds that one day we (not the older majority that passed on this burden to us) will attempt to stitch shut from our salaries and daily salt. Bitterness aside there is one last stake I must drive in this fight.

Nazi, socialist, communist.....80% of the American population couldn't accurately detail the differences between those labels and over half probably don't know there is a difference in them to begin with. Oddly enough, that same counter cult insists on blurting them out at McCain/Palin rallies in defiance of any mention of that tickets current election opponent. Joe the plumbers, Tito the construction workers, and all the other single name + the + occupation puppets that have sprung up in the waning hours of this campaign can rest assured that Obama doesn't intend to take their wealth and redistribute it....No Joe, your wealth has already disappeared. There's nothing left to spread.

The concept of wealth distribution has been publicized by the 'right' media ever since the race took an undesired turn to the 'left'. The image they present involves the 'left' taking everyone's money out of their pockets, laying it on a table, and dividing it up equally. Overnight you'd have a homogeneous society that occupied a tightly constricted wealth band. A kitchen table cure to the age old disease of 'mo money, mo problems'.....I bet you could even find a few bankers that need a day job who could help out with bean counting.

The real redistribution of wealth, that is mis-represented by the above portrayal, involves fundamental class warfare waged on the lesser by the more over the last 6-8 years. It's a bold claim, but luckily I don't have to make the point alone. My alley in this cage match is none other than the much published, always feather ruffling, Noam Chomsky.

Noam Chomsky is a well known MIT professor whose published work spans the better part of 6 decades. He's known for his controversial stands on American foreign policy, his philosophical views on humanity, his contributions to modern linguistics, and last but not least, his infamous cameo on Ted Kaczynski's (Unabomber) hit list.

One of Chomsky's greatest works (in my opinion) over the last decade has been his American Empire Project. This work is a series of papers, books, interviews, and muses related to our countries actions in a global world since early 2000. A recurring theme in these works is the relationship of social inequality to the puppet strings our government pulls to dictate which direction we'll move. Let me explain in a bit more detail. Picture the annual tax revenues (regardless of their source) that the government collects. Picture those same revenues being pressure loaded into a giant fire hydrant with a hose attached. When budget time comes around the government basically decides which direction they're going to point the hose, how wide open the valve is going to be when they finally turn it on, and how long they're going to let it run to ensure the 'fire' is out. In recent history, democrats (Clinton) have pointed that hose at domestic issues that needed addressed in hopes of having a bottom up effect, whereas republicans (Bush I, Bush II) have pointed it at defense spending and institutional subsidies that are intended to trickle down (from the top) through society. Nothing stimulates an economy like fighting a war (especially on credit)! Current history aside, there are completely valid arguments on both sides of this debate as to which policy is better, when and why. I could make a case for both...this is not the point.

What is the point? The downside is the point. What happens if you bet wrong as a nation? What if what is behind door one turns out to be a lemon? Then what? Under the one scenario you get limited return (if any) when it fails. You get softening in the overall economy, you get some cooling in consumption and perhaps some new strains on social (oh no, not that word) welfare programs. Bottom line, is you're not really that much worse off than when you began. Failure under scenario two leaves a bit more of a wake. One side effect, and perhaps the most notorious, is the potential to accumulate a massive national debt. Now, who ultimately gets to pay for that? That's right, Joe the plumber, Tito the construction worker, (insert name here) the taxpayer. Yes Joe, you get to make payments on this well into the future....long after the smoke cleared from the fire fight it funded you'll get to pay for that fighter jet instead of receiving an SBA loan that may have been used to grow your business. Tito gets to pay for it by footing the full bill to send his kids to college whereas before there may have been educational assistance programs that could have helped him out. So, the next time you hear something about wealth redistribution from the McCain camp, spend less time thinking about what they'd like you to perceive that Obama is proposing to do and spend more time thinking about what HAS been done to you already. I rest my case...go vote.

Pucko..... That's What I'm Talking About

2008-10-26T17:33:00.003+01:00

Ah yes....Sunday funday. Oh what a day. It was a pretty typical Sunday here in Sweden. I woke up (to the sound of the rain) and looked outside to the gray skys above. At that moment I decided today was going to be best spent in front of a computer and a book. After I checked the news of the day I decided to see what I might have in the fridge and make myself some breakfast. The usual, yogurt, toast with a bit of (illegally imported) peanut butter, and to chase it all down....a smooth glass of Pucko. What's Pucko you ask? Good question, and even better lead in to today's 'A Cup For Your Cups'.

Pucko is a chocolate milk who's lore is legend in these parts. I've heard it's known to cure colds, warts, messy relationships and small motor squeaks if added to the oil in the crankcase of your SAAB. It comes in a number of containers....single serve glass bottles when you're on the go, 1 liter tetra pak boxes to stock the fridge, and even 2 dl boxes that you can....... ok, I really have no idea why you need this container as an option, but so be it. I typically buy the liter box so I'm sure to have it on hand when I need a glass. A slight rip of the sealing foil from the spout and you're in. Now, once inside the box the journey continues. You have the option of pouring yourself a glass of the chocolate goodness or simply put your lips on the spout and tip it to the sky. Ummmm....yummy Pucko. I've attached a link to their web page below. Feel free to order yourself a t-shirt or equip your cell phone with their ring tone? Either way you can't go wrong with Pucko. So, to Pucko. Skoal! Today's 'A Cup For Your Cups'.
http://www.pucko.se/

It's Friday....How About A Beer For Your Cups?

2008-10-24T17:32:00.002+02:00

Today's submission is in part thanks to my uncle who I picked up the feed from. It had been rumored that there was a magical brew available in Europe known as Boza. The brew claims to have 'breast enhancing capabilities' when consumed. I had heard rumors of such potion for sometime now, but thought they were mainly an urban legend. Could there really be such a thing? I hit google to see if I could find out. Here's what I came up with.....

The brew itself is a long standing Bulgarian tradition where you simply combine the standard ingredients of flour and sugar and allow to ferment (with the aid of a fermenting agent). The brew can contain up to 4% alcohol by volume. A number of different flours are possible to use, the best (and most favored) is however, millet flour. Below is a standard recipe for those 'do it yourselfers' out there. Please note, I'm not responsible in any way for potential gut rot resulting from a bad batch, nor responsible for any slaps to the face when you try to serve this to that 'special someone' in your life.

Ingredients:
5 l water
2 teacupfuls flour
2 teacupfuls sugar
1 teacupful boza or home-made ferment

Directions:
Slightly roast the flour (to become rosy in colour). Take care not to get it burnt. Mix it with only a bit of lukewarm water. Pour the mixture into the pot filled with the rest of the water and put it on the plate. Add the sugar and leave the liquid to boil stirring it once in a while. Keep boiling for 5-6 minutes still stirring. Remove the pot from the fire and let it cool. Add 1 teacupful boza or home-made ferment. Leave the mixture in a warm place for 2-3 days to cause fermentation. When the boza is ready, pour it in bottles and store in a cool place (refrigerator).

Ingredients for home made ferment:
1-2 spoonfuls slightly roasted flour
1 teacupful tepid water
1 spoonful sugar

Directions:
Mix the slightly roasted flour (take care to keep it from burning) with the water and stir well. Add the sugar. Leave the mess in a warm place for 2-3 days to ferment, stirring it from time to time.

Ok gang, there you go. Boza, one of the many benefits associated with Bulgaria's joining of the European Union. Now, whether it makes you more plump or not will have to be left to some empirical trial and error on your behalf. Enjoy, and Skoal a big glass of Boza to 'A Cup For Your Cups'.

'A Cup For Your Cups'

2008-10-23T17:28:00.002+02:00

Today's cup comes from a little corner of the world that I'm quite fond of: Fort Collins. Yes, when you want to combine brilliance with a steady dose of goodness look no further than the little foothills community nestled in Northern Colorado. Today I will introduce you to a concept that is absolutely brilliant. The company: Quattro Vino. The concept: deliver wines for a reasonable price in packs of four.

Now, you're probably thinking to yourself how is this special? Well, here's how. Quattro vino allows you to select 4 packs of wine by your favorite grape, your favorite region, or your price level. They also offer packs you can select that they put together for special occasions like holidays and what not. What's cool about this is that you don't need to be a wine expert to pretend that you are. It's one of the greatest concepts I've ever seen in action. So, spend a few minutes and check out their site. Lift a glass to the misses and have 'A Cup For Your Cups'. Skoal!

http://www.qvwines.com/store/

Lund University - Research You Can Grab On To

2008-10-21T21:15:00.005+02:00

In today's Local I picked up an interesting article about some monumental research that was conducted at the prestigious Lund University. The research was conducted by Helena Jernström whom is a lecturer in experimental oncology. Helena's research led to the conclusion that "drinking coffee can have a major effect on breast size". Now, before all you men out there start paling around with Juan Valdez and grinding beans by the kilo let's note that the 'effect' is a reduction to breast size, not an increase. Studies carried out on almost 270 women showed that there was indeed a clear connection between coffee and smaller breasts. The work has been published in the British Journal of Cancer.

It's not my style to take news like this and let it roll off my chest. No, no, there is a need here to help the woman in our lives drop the joe like a bad habit. So in response I have decided to promote a full fledged (week long) campaign titled: 'A cup for your cups'

'A Cup For Your Cups' has a simple mission: to promote non-coffee beverages to the world that may (god willing) be more appealing to the fairer sex than coffee.

Today's find comes from Nantucket Nectars. The company was started by two men (Tom & Tom). It's a wonderful tale of classic juice making with a certain down home feel that only Nantucket seems to be able to provide. The companies motto is 'real is better'. How appropriate. Here is a link to their site http://www.nantucketnectars.com/home.php. Spend a few minutes checking these guys out. They've got a great business story and (I say this seriously) a great selection of products. Oh, and did I mention that under each bottle cap there is a fun fact for you to amuse your friends with? Let's raise a cup to Tom & Tom.

Sweden's On Sale!!

2008-10-20T23:48:00.002+02:00

I had the opportunity to have lunch with some of my peers last week. It's something I try not to get in the habit of, as it can be pretty expensive (compared to what you get) to eat out here, but last week I had to say yes to the invitation. So, off we went to the cafeteria that's nearest to the main economics building at Lund. I skipped breakfast that day as I had a hunch we may be going to lunch and wanted to maximize the potential value I could obtain from the event. The lunch that we go to is buffet style and includes salad and coffee. I've been able to condition my body so that I can go there on a day when I skip breakfast and not only get my fill for the first half of the day, but get my fill for the whole day by successfully pulling off a 'one meal deal'. I guess some things about college never change (regardless the level of study).

The meal itself was nothing special. Pasta with a chicken veggie mix, rice with a veggie chicken mix, and a vegetarian option pasta with a rice veggie mix. Variety is not the spice of life in Sweden. After fully drenching the meal in tabasco it was time to enjoy. As we sat around the table talking about the news of the day and the news of the weird one of my peers gave an insightful quote that just about caused me to upchuck a broccoli spear across the room. Ernst (Sweden) was describing how he had prepared for the current economic downturn by simply quitting his job before he could be fired from it. Brilliant we thought!! Simply brillient!

Reflecting on Ernst's comment I thought it would be a good idea to check the current dollar to kroner exchange rate. It's the single most important number to myself and all my fellow American exchange pals. To my surprise it's now 7.5sek to $1. Yahtzee! That's a whopping 15% appreciation from when I first hit the shores of this foreign land. As with any 'gravy train' you know it's eventually going to hit the 'end of the line'. But for now anyways, it's living the good life. You want to eat an extra packet of top ramen with your lunch? Go for it! How about a banana when you wake up so you don't have to listen to your own bowels eat themselves all morning until lunch? Have two!

What's Mine Is Mine.....

2008-10-20T10:48:00.005+02:00

Sweden has some of the cutest kids I've ever seen anywhere in the world. They're all blonde haired blue eyed cute as can be. The colder climate forces mothers to dress them in all sorts of silly hat and glove combinations and various full length snow suits (even though there's no snow here - yet). It's a daily parade of comedy as the kids waddle along with their mothers in route to wherever they need to be.

This picture made me laugh everyday last week as I passed it on my way to the university. On the morning after, having watched (for the hundreth or so time), the Big Lebowski I couldn't help but be reminded of the brillient quote in that flick by Walter Sobchak (John Goodman) late in the movie when the dude, Donny and himself are under attack from the Nihilists after setting the dude's car on fire (finally killing it). Walter (while winding up to hurl a bowling bowl into the belly of a sword wielding Nihilist) says calmly, "What's mine is mine". Notice the bike lock. Classic!!

As Defined By Webster

2008-10-17T10:57:00.003+02:00

His´to`ry
n. 1.
1. A learning or knowing by inquiry; the knowledge of facts and events, so obtained; hence, a formal statement of such information; a narrative; a description; a written record; as, the history of a patient's case; the history of a legislative bill.

2. A systematic, written account of events, particularly of those affecting a nation, institution, science, or art, and usually connected with a philosophical explanation of their causes; a true story, as distinguished from a romance

I usually don't post other peoples work on my blog figuring that if you wanted to see that work in the first place you wouldn't be on my blog. Today I'm breaking my own rules.

The above definition Webster provides defines history as a 'true story, as distinguished from a romance'. The irony is that the history of wars is always presented as a romantic affair. Media helps the masses fall in love with the technology of wars, heroic moments of bravery within the wars, the triumph of good versus evil. They strike upon our emotional chords when we are most vulnerable to let us know that we are good, we are upholding the laws of liberty despite the costs. Whether it be our living rooms or our school rooms; romance, not truth is the special of the day. We balk at the idea of teaching children sex education at an earlier age; while at the same time we insist on the prostitution of their minds with an endless supply of media propaganda that makes any Playboy look like a Nancy Drew novel. One sided media blitz's help to secure our insecurity as a nation about what we're doing to the world. The close minded, eyes half shut, snow globe that plays out on nightly television is a promotional catalyst to ensure our ignorance to what the rest of the world knows is the 'rest of the story'. Media romance must die if we are to move from the dark of ignorance to the light of enlightenment.

Buzzkill In The Baltic

2008-10-15T21:31:00.006+02:00

Here's a brief recap of October 15th, 2008.

5:30 am - Awaken by rowdy corridor mates who were just turning in from a long night celebrating a mates 21st birthday.

7:30 am - Wake up to shower. Hit head on lamp next to bed on my way out of bed.

8:00 am - Attempt to make single egg on stove to eat with a tortilla. Stove is broken and doesn't heat egg.

8:10 am - After finally getting egg cooked on the second stove I place in tortilla and bite into it. Yolk was still runny and scalding hot. Burn top of mouth on molten yolk.

8:11 am - Step outside to rainy weather.

9:00 am - Arrive at my destination (relatively damp)

9:02 am - Receptionist at Ideon informs my partner and I that our meeting this morning has been canceled since the lady we were going to meet with is home sick.

9:10 am - My partner and I decide to get a cup of coffee from the Economics building and talk about our assignment.

9:11 am - Accidently hit girl with backpack and cause her to spill coffee on her shirt.

10:25 am - My classmate and I go to the computer lab to work on our assignment.

11:30 am - Message comes on computer screen that says all systems will be shut down at noon due to administrative rebooting.

12:01 pm - Computers shut off.

12:30 pm - Decide to walk over to technical college to see about a cheap sandwich. Apparently today was popular sandwich day with the students. All that was left was a liverwurst sandwich and some rolls. (I opted for the roll).

12:45 pm - Return to computer lab to work on assignment.

4:30 pm - Leave lab to attend final meeting of the day. Realize that today was an innovation bar at the Economics department where they have food and booze and networking starting at 4:00pm. Too late now. We're off to our last meeting.

5:00 pm - Show up to final meeting of the day. Realize that I misread the schedule and the seminar is solely in Swedish.

7:00 pm - Seminar ends and walk home (in the rain).

7:45 pm - Warm up bowl of soup. Burn fingers when pulling soup bowl from microwave.

7:46 pm - Burn mouth on hot soup while forgetting about molten yolk that burnt mouth earlier in the day.

8:45 pm - Log into hotmail account to check on days messages.

8:46 pm - Realize Skype is giving me fits and not sending messages through.

8:47 pm - Open email from consulate informing me my visa application has been denied.

8:50 pm - Look on yahoo finance and see market is off 500 points with no floor in sight.

8:53 pm - Decide to have an overpriced beer and call it a day.

Dow's Up 900? I'm Going Long On BigFoot

2008-10-13T21:58:00.004+02:00

Tonight's news will inevitably be dominated by the record day on wall street. Dow Jones Industrial Average closed a lofty 936 points higher than it closed on Friday. Not bad for a Monday. The real story of the day however, comes from our friends down in Georgia.

You may remember back to a breaking story that took place August 15th of this year. Two Georgia hunters claimed to have stumbled upon a pod of Big Foot's (Saschwatch for you Canadians out there). The hunters found the pod huddled around one of their own that laid dead. Despite the hostility of the remaining Big Foot's (or is it Big Feet's) the Georgia hunters carried the corpse back to their shed (house) and made the announcement to the world that they had discovered and recovered a real Big Foot. They made the announcement complete with pictures and well coordinated stories. The story set off a firestorm of news coverage (translate: FoxNews sent two vans to the area) as well as an all out man hunt for the hostile pod of remaining creatures. Since one of the brave hunters was a local police officer the boys in blue joined in the hunt. While the world (isolated southern part of Georgia) sat on the edge of their seats glued to the coverage of the would be events. I immediately dismissed the story as false.

Now, you're thinking to yourself, how did I know that a story about a 500 pound corpse of a gorilla like man being bravely wrestled from a hostile pod of his brethren in a remote Georgia forest by two 'hunters' with bourbon stains on their t-shirts was fictitious? Here's how.... It's a known fact that Big Foot exists and has been sighted in numerous locations as far north as Canada and as far south as Florida. It's also a known fact that Big Foot is a large creature (500 pounds as an adult). Those details of the story are accurate. What's not accurate, and why I immediately dismissed these guys as frauds, is that Big Foot is NOT a hostile creature. You're asking yourself how I know this? Four words: "Harry and the Henderson's".

Anyone that has seen this non-fictional documentary about a Big Foot that was innocently hit on the open road by a family traveling on a road trip knows the story the lads from Georgia told was a lie. Despite the initial rampage that Harry goes on upon his revival from unconsciousness at the Henderson's home, he quickly assimilates into a functional member of their family unit. He shows compassion and kindness towards the children, and even lends a helping hand with household chores. Reports of such a creature turning hostile in a Georgian forest are as far from the truth as one can get.

As the summer wore on, and the heat intensified on the two hunters they finally admitted that the whole thing was a hoax. Big surprise huh? The 'body' that they claimed to have found was a costume they purchased and filled with road kill possum guts. There was a rubber mask involved to give the thing a face. They stuffed and arranged the 'work' into a large ice chest from which they shot the pictures to provide to the news media (Fox News). Remember, these are southern boys we're dealing with here.

The one participant, Matt Whitton who was the cop, lost his job on the force, and the other party, Rick Dyer received a slap on the wrist. Finally to today's story. The party that was damaged in this whole mess the most was an Indiana man that fronted the money to pull the whole thing off. While it's tough to have sympathy for someone whose buddies come to him to request a $50,000 handout to buy a gorilla suit that they're going to stuff with possum and parade on national television, these are tough financial times and every bad loan must be looked at the same if we're going to dig out of this steaming economic heap of possum entrails. Whitton and Dyer are obviously no good for the cash, or they wouldn't have asked for it in the first place, so the only logical solution is to generate some cash flow from the hoax.

Enter to the story a serial entrepreneuer named Joshua Warren from North Carolina. This financial wizard comes up with a fool proof plan to recover the losses and square the tables. Sell the (slightly used) suit including the basement freezer it was stored in on Ebay for top chop...entrails sold seperately. Now, before you start to draft paperwork to annex this entire quadrant of the United States to Cuba, let's look at the results. The ebay listing has a current bid price of $85,100 (as of the time of this posting)!!! That means that these idiots, minus the cash due to the original financial backer of this project stand to make $35k for this deal. Oh, and that's not the best part even. The best part is that if you are the winning bidder of the auction you get all the stuff mentioned above as well as a guest appearance by Dyer and Whitton who will come to your home with papers of authenticity to be proudly displayed next to your purchase. I hope when they're at the winning bidders place they also dole out a swift kick to the nuts and french kiss the guys wife while they slap down a flyer on the counter for the exact same suit that you can pick up on http://www.horrordome.com/ for $450 (delivered).

A Date With The Danes

2008-10-12T12:04:00.003+02:00

A couple weekends ago I set out for the small Danish island of Bronholm. With the help of Uncle Keith I made contact with the distant relatives that we have on the island. They were happy to host me and told me to come on over! I had been excited about this opportunity since the day I decided I was moving to Sweden. I rushed out of my late Friday afternoon class, caught a bus to Ystad and caught a ferry from there that took me to Ronne, Bornholm.

The ferry ride itself was quite an adventure. It was the first time I had opted for the high speed catamaran style ferry (usually I save the money and take the 'slow boats' in this part of the world). As we left the harbor the sun was starting to set and lit the sky a blaze with a collection of pastels that highlighted the undersides of the low hanging clouds over the Baltic. The boat itself literally launches out to sea. By the time it hits full speed you are working to keep yourself on balance on the top decks of the ship as the wind coming across you works its best to push you over. The spray rises 3-4 meters off the back engines of the boat as it cuts this enormous wake in the rolling waves. The boats themselves are always a strange mix of characters. Half the people were Danish, half were Swedish, a handful of Americans, and some other vacationers from places in between. I bought a beer from the bar and settled in for the short ride.

Arrival:

Kenn-Erik and his two children, Kevin and Naya, greeted me at the ferry dock. Naya was carrying an American flag and Kevin had a sign with my name on it. Classic! All of us jumped in the car and we whisked away from the harbor up the steep streets of Ronne to the top of the hill where their homes were. We went directly to where I would be sleeping, Kenn-Erik's parents house, Carl and Lydia. I was greeted with open arms and kisses on the cheek. Wine and candles on the table, cheeses and meats, breads and spreads, grapes and fruits, I was in heaven. We ate, we drank and got to know one another until the wee hours of the night. Kenn-Erik and Carl planned out an appropriate route for us to tour the island the next morning. Kenn-Erik then took his children and went home for the night. I thought I would get to turn in as well, but Carl had other plans. Carl is this salty sailor type that made his living as a photographer. He's incredibly knowledgeable about the island and the history of Denmark. Thanks to the few glasses of wine he had during our evening snack he was now starting to open up a bit and trust his English a bit more. We sat by the stove for several hours looking through history books and newspapers about Bornholm and it's role in the second world war. Now, as a general rule of thumb I don't care much for history. I prefer to look forward and not back, but it is an interesting subject when you hear stories from Europeans. They lived in it, while we simply participated in it...there's a big difference in perception of the events. Bornholm was bombed heavily by the Russians two days before the surrender of the Germans (who were maintaining occupation of the island). The German refusal to surrender to the Soviets led to two days of sustained bombing raids that took out 4000 civilian homes in the two major cities. The casualties were mainly collateral and included woman and children. During the raids, the radios that transmitted communication to the mainland of Denmark were silenced as the government didn't want to spoil the liberation dances happening in Copenhagen.

Day 2:

I woke up right on time and began preparing for the day ahead. As I made my way from the small little shed that I had slept in to the kitchen I stopped by the bathroom to try to calm my unruly locks and brush my teeth. We ate a typical Danish breakfast of toast, spreads, a sweet roll and a couple pieces of salami and cheese. Lydia packed Kenn-Erik and I a lunch and we were off. From the north to the south of the island it's really a tale of two islands. The landscape changes dramatically from one end to the other. The north is dominated by a midevil castle and jagged stone beaches. The south has white sand beaches and reed grass that blows gently in the wind. Along the way you find true Danish charm around every bend. Along the roadside there are makeshift apple stands where the owners simply leave a box of produce and a can that you can deposit some money into if you feel like a snack. City after city the island builds on its character. All roads seem to lead to harbors within the small city centers. Some hold only a few boats, but all cities have some form of a port. Salty sailing vessels sit silent from the crashing waves thanks to the protection provided by crudely constructed rock walls that break the ocean waves. Each city has several herring smoking houses that would have run at full capacity when herring was the primary commodity of the island. Now, with the globalization, the fishing industry has taken a huge hit. The herring became less and less in that part of the Baltic and with the price of labor being so much cheaper in eastern Europe the fishing has moved to other countries like Poland and Estonia. Kenn-Erik use to work at a fish processing plant, but since the plant shut down he had to examine his future and is working to obtain a teaching certification so he can make a career change and stay on the island.

A quick jaunt up the ultra steep (14% grade) streets and we quickly find ourselves high above the villages along the shore. Once there the view is amazing. Red tiled roofs stacked in tightly with the ocean in the background. Postcard after postcard shows itself as you make your way around the island. The highlight for me was on the south of the island where the landscape turns to white sand beaches and reed grass. Rolling sand dunes that lead down to the water. I dipped my feet in the water to say that I dipped my toe in yet another part of the Baltic. After we watched the waves crash for awhile we headed back home for dinner.

Dinner was a great combination of chicken, potatoes, red cabbage, and gravy. Dessert of course, and coffee was a must. After the meal I entertained the kids with some 'magic' tricks and taught them how to make fart sounds with their armpits. I fielded questions about home from the adults into the late hours of the night. I had been in Europe exactly one month that day. It was the first time since I got here I felt like I was 'home'.

Day 3:

Lydia decided that since it was my last day on the island we were going to start the day with some schnapps. A shot or so later topped off with two cups of strong coffee and a sweet roll, we set off for a short tour of the interior of the island. The interior of the island is a forest mixed with farm fields that are scattered about. Fall was in the air as the temperature was cool as the farmers were plowing under the crops from the summer in prep for the winter ahead. Our first stop was a lookout tower that is the highest point on the island. As we climbed to the top the rain picked up. When we got to the top the view was gray and drab on this gloomy morning. After the tower it was time to see where our family hailed from. The church Hans Theodore was married in, the house he grew up in as a boy, and some spots along the way. It was a short trip as I had to catch an early ferry to head back to Sweden. We wrapped up the day with a feast of Thai food that Kenn-Erik's wife Nit cooked for us. I gave the kids some chocolate bars that I brought from Sweden with me and thanked the family for hosting me and showing me such a wonderful time. I have an open ended invitation to come back anytime I want. Perhaps I'll try to make it back over in the spring when Carl-Erik launches the sail boat for the summer.

The ride back:

As I sat on the ferry watching the sun set over the ocean I thought about the sterotype that gets told a lot in this part of the world....the stereotype that Danes are the happiest people in the world. Since I haven't been everywhere in the world it would make it hard for me to make an accurate assesment, but if I had to pick between the folks I've met from across the Nordic countries I've been to, I would say that in fact the Danes win the prize.

Captive Audience

2008-10-09T23:02:00.004+02:00

Found this little gem on FoxNews today. This is a photo taken October 8th by a Reuters photographer on hand for a Palin campaign stop in Pennsylvania. Captions are below.

- "I won't be able to go to college now that I blew my tuition savings on the campaign dinner ticket that got me into this deal, but man, these seats are great!"

- "Lucky bastard that gets to put the shine on those heels."

- "Dude, we've been here an hour and she hasn't even taken her top off. There's bouncers everywhere, and the drinks are way over priced. How much did you pay for this gal?"

- "I wish I could sit down, with all this blood rushing from my head it's a bit hard to stay upright."

- "Mr. President, do those legs go ALL the way up?"

- "I wonder if the girls are having as much fun at the bachelorette party?"

- "Cheney is such a prude."

And finally....

- "I would be SO dead if my mom knew I was here on a school night."

Condi Rice I'm Coming For Your Job - Part Five

2008-10-08T16:04:00.002+02:00

It's hard to remind ourselves during these times of economic meltdown that despite all the bad in our wallets and red in our investment accounts most of our lives are quite good. Yes, an occasional blunder on a poorly timed ag sector investment or perhaps a few extra bucks for a bag of groceries sure does complicate life...there's no doubt about that. But, at the same time there is a population on our globe that prays and wishes those were the kind of problems they had to deal with. Thus the segway to this edition of Condi Rice I'm Coming For Your Job.

Googol (note the spelling) is a mathematical term that is equivalent to a 10 followed by 100 zeros. It's slightly more than the US deficit (keeping in mind that McCain has another $300 billion waiting in the wings that should get us fairly close to that if it passes). Google (the company, not the number) decided to showcase this number by announcing a contest to save the world as a 'present' to themselves for turning the ripe age of ten. I think I got a Bart Simpson t-shirt when I hit that milestone. Must be nice to be Google huh?

Here's a link to the contest http://www.project10tothe100.com/...check out the site, watch the clever youtube video and let your creative juices start flowing. No problem too big, no problem too small...the point here is impact. Who can we help the most? Oh, and did I mention Google is throwing $10 million bucks into the ring for project funding and implementation? Well they are. Again, must be nice to be Google huh?

Since my current residence is abroad, I thought it would be wise to enlist the help of the international community (my corridor mates) by having them participate in some good old fashion brainstorming led by yours truly. I called an impromptu meeting of the corridor that conveniently revolved around the dinner hour. Genius!

As folks wandered into the common area looking to prepare a hot meal I quickly pounced on them for their knowledge and know how. I explained in detail the plan (that we were solving the worlds problems) and asked them if they wanted to help. Mixed reactions....Nico (Germany) asked me "If this was like the time I wanted to calculate the break even point for how many liters of alcohol we would have to bring back with us to sell in order to pay for a trip to Poland?".... similarly Amandine (France) asked me "If this involved Iphones?"....and Emma (Canadian) mentioned that "The last great plan I suggested involved 5 of us buying a 5 kilo cheese wheel and splitting it 5 ways thus freezing the part we didn't eat that week and saving 'big bucks' by buying in bulk". Fine, I thought, we don't need their help anyways. Fewer names to fit onto the Nobel.

With the advisory board assembled (5 of us in total) we began. I scribbled notes on the white board with my new dry erase markers (thanks Linds) as we talked. While we didn't really come up with a one gun solution we did manage to spend three hours chatting about the problems and opportunities we see in our countries and places we've been. No one pointed fingers, no one tried to 'sell' anything to anyone, and no one felt uncomfortable in sharing. While we probably won't win the Google prize for our efforts, our efforts may have yielded the magic bullet that can be the backdrop for the winning submission. At the end of the night we all decided that 'despite our problems and despite our differences we are far more similar to one another than we are different'. Despite the challenges we think we have in our lives, and the conflicts that our countries have with one another, we would do far more good in this world if we worked in cooperation with one another as opposed to wasting our energy against one another fighting over things we can't define.

Albert Einstein once said that "If I had only an hour to save the world I would spend 55 minutes defining the problem and 5 minutes solving it". Perhaps that's the google prize.

That's My Girl...

2008-10-06T19:03:00.004+02:00

This last Sunday was a cold and rainy day here in Lund. It was the kind of day that you curl up in your room with a hot mug of tea and some youtube videos. When I first entered the site the video tag 'Couric on Palin' immediately sparked my interest. Talk about a 'win-win' if you know what I mean. The interview was a wonderful display of catty nail scratching, clothes ripping, mud wrestling, sorority style slip and slide. Keep the 'straight talk express' running outside John, you can sit for the first few minutes, but after that this is the girls show.

While I won't recap the entire ordeal, I'll highlight a couple of wonderful points and sound bites the lovely Ms. Palin made. Take note, there's some things we all can learn.

- Foreign policy....when asked specifically what newspapers and magazines she reads to keep up on the issues, she responded with "I've read most of them, all of them, any of them". As an avid reader and consumer of such fodder I find this amazing. I struggle to get through The Economist, Business Week, Inc. and Wharton's Know publication in a timely fashion. So, in response, I have decided to skip eating breakfast and will add Far Eastern Economic Review to the weekly mix.

- Foreign policy part deux....when asked how Alaska's proximity to Russia enhances her foreign policy credentials, Palin explained that "Well, it certainly does. Our next door neighbors are foreign countries." Following this logic, here is the list (in no particular order) of additional states in which governors would have equal foreign policy credentials....Hawaii, Washington, Idaho, Montana, North Dakota, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan, Indiana, Illinois, Ohio, Pennsylvania, New York, Vermont, New Hampshire, Maine, Rhode Island, Conneticut, New Jersey, Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, Florida, Alabama, Louisiana, Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, California, and Oregon.

-Economy....when asked about the bailout proposal Palin insisted on bringing up John McCain's leadership with regards to regulation. When Couric countered with the factoid that John's record has almost always put him on the side of less regulation Palin responded with "John McCain is the maverick. Taking shots from both sides, trying to get people to understand what he's been talking about...." This point really made no sense what's so ever, but I think after several rewinds I can now officially translate. I think what Palin was trying to say is that "If you take enough shots of anything (preferably Russian vodka to stick with the foreign policy theme) and watch the hit film from 1984 staring Mel Gibson titled Maverick, you will see that a simple game of poker can solve domestic challenges. Now that's what I'm talking about."

As the days drag on, with November no where in sight, this campaign continues to be a boil on the ass of America. The only good that seems to come from it is Tina Fey's continued role as Ms. Palin on late night television. I think this has to be one of the few times in the history of Saturday Night Live where the writers simply can transcribe what comes from her mouth and put it directly on the air.

Coffee with Kofi

2008-10-02T20:53:00.002+02:00

Tonight was a special night in Lund. The city was graced with the presence of nobel prize winner and past secretary general of the United Nations, Kofi Annan. This was the second part of a multi part lecture series sponsored by Lund University. Needless to say I made it a priority to attend (despite a final exam tomorrow afternoon). I arrived a little more than 2 hours before the event was scheduled to start. That proved not to be a minute too early as the que was already nearing the outside of the main university hall by the time I arrived. Another 15 minutes of delay in my arrival and I would not have been granted entrance to the lecture hall. As we filed into the large ballroom of the university's stately looking main building we knew we were in for a treat. The balcony was packed to the brim and the aisle ways were standing room only. I picked a perch near the front, about 20 meters from the stage. I wanted a clear view of both Kofi and the audience. I really enjoy observing the audience at events like this. You can tell a speakers abilities by watching the way in which people are engaged by their words.

After an introduction by the president of the university it was time for Kofi to take center stage. He started out with a typical ice breaker about being confused for Morgan Freeman by some tourists after he retired from the UN. The crowd loved it. He then moved into his speech. The topic was "Establishing a Culture of Prevention". The nexus of the speech was centered around the idea that "There is no peace without development, there is no development without peace, there can be no security without development and there is no security without the respect of basic human rights".

Now, say what you will about the UN. Their hesitation to aid in Rwanda during one of the worst genocides of our time to lack of resources available to aid in the conflict in Darfur to the minimal power they can exert on world leaders intertwined in the Arab-Israeli conflict....it's easy to argue that as an institution they are becoming less of a power as the clock ticks. What can't be argued though is Kofi's vision that he guided under. Despite potential missteps and hind sighted criticism that is easy to proclaim when the past is available for critique, he made a commitment to serve and enforce the umbrella policy this world agreed to known as the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. This document could be argued to be one of the most significant pieces of legislation that the world has come to know. Kofi believed in this and made it his mission to protect its enforcement.

It was that document that supported the outspoken criticism of the United States invasion of Iraq. Kofi made 100% clear that he was not in favor of this form of diplomacy in the instance of Iraq before the invasion was initiated. His speech tonight centered around this injustice the United States committed. He stated that "we will feel the ramifications of Iraq for years to come. The illegal invasion has drained resources from the international efforts to protect from injustice everywhere. The effects are being felt far from the center of the conflict in places like Georgia where Russia committed equally hasteful actions despite international resistance."

As I stood there and listened I felt a sense of unease spread through me. It's a feeling I'm becoming more and more accustomed to as the image of our country is presented in different contexts. It's now a daily event where I can find strong dissent and disappointment for our actions in the global arena. Whether it be newspaper headlines or comments from my peers, this is undoubtedly not our finest hour as a nation.

As an editorial side note I personally think all is not lost. Far from it I would argue. But I know that the rest of the world is not willing to play dead and lay along side our feeble remains as we engineer a plan to improve ourselves. If we rely on our historical dominance and an ethnocentric attitude that we somehow 'deserve' to be the world leader based on an ancient manifest destiny than we will undoubtedly find ourselves right where we deserve to be....not at the top, and not at the bottom, but somewhere in between as an ambiguous shell of a once world power.

Kofi ended his speech with words that can serve as a battle cry in the months to come...... "A government that is accountable to its people remains as desireable as ever."

Bornholm

2008-09-29T23:32:00.001+02:00

The Island

My Package

2008-09-29T18:25:00.002+02:00

Well it finally arrived. The package Lindsay sent me TWO WEEKS AGO finally made it to Lund. Here is a brief description of the route it took from Fort Collins, CO to my place in Lund, Sweden.
Sept. 15th - Postmarked Fort Collins, CO

Sept. 16th to Sept. 20th - Circled globe 8 times (3 times counter clockwise and 5 times clockwise) due to accidental error in bar coding.

Sept. 21st - Package is located inside Russian borders by remote controlled drone completing intelligence operations near the Kremlin. The KGB is notified of the intrusion and the package is confiscated. Upon inspection of the contents the package is deemed a non-weapon of mass destruction and turned over to postal workers working inside Moscow.

Sept. 26th - Notification of arrival in Sweden is conveyed to me by Lindsay who used the reference code to access a secret United States Post Office database that confirmed it was in fact within Swedish territory. Here's where the story gets interesting....I thought I could simply pick the package up at the post office before my class and my weekend departure for Denmark. Upon arrival at the post office I was informed that my package was not at the central post office (that is maybe 5 blocks from my flat), but instead it was at the western most office which is probably 50 blocks from my house. Makes sense right? Anyways, knowing that I would already be short on time due to a printing mishap earlier that morning (mishap was that no one in this bloody country owns a god damn printer) I decided the package would have to be picked up on Monday.

Sept. 29th - Following lunch with a friend I decided it was time to make the trek to the post office to pick up my package. I seized a moment of pause in the "on again, off again" rain shower (that's suppose to be here all week) and set off. About 10 minutes into my 'hike' I wanted to reference the map. Travel Tip #248: anytime you check a paper map during any sort of storm that contains moisture, that storm will intensify upon the sight of the map leaving your pocket and inevitably dump moisture in quantities that make the map useless and completely impossible to read. Finally, I was close (and by close, I mean I was on the wrong side of a major highway that has 6 foot high wire fences protecting it). I made my way the last 40 miles or so and finally saw the flag signifying the post office. The sun even came out a bit as though it was congratulating me on my trip. I grabbed the door handle and....what? It's locked. Are you kidding me? Oh, right, there's the sign. Apparently this post office closes for 5 hours a day in the middle of the day. From 10:00 to 15:00 "no mail for you"! Most people would think this is quite odd and inconvenient, but those people are rational and not living in Sweden. At this point I've spent the better part of an afternoon trekking in the rain and there is no way in hell I'm turning back without my package. So I wait it out. Half hour under the overhang of the front door to the post office.......finally, signs of life. I show the lady my confirmation number along with an ID card. She smiles to me and retrieves my package. It's over now...I've got what I came for.

Goodbye To Another Week - Hello To The Danes

2008-09-25T21:49:00.004+02:00

Oh my, what a week. This was the first week we really got after it in the program. Opportunity recognition week. It was time to take all the theory and rhetoric that we'd been presented over the last couple of weeks and apply it to the host of ideas we all brought with us to this program to narrow down the list of things we would research and develop over the next 9 months. Now, the goal of the program is not that we all work together all the time, but that we continue to work in teams so that we are all familiar with one another for when we finally have selected our projects for the term and decide to build out a 'team' to complete them. While personally I enjoy everyone in the program, professionally the story is mixed. There is a huge difference between people that have worked in industry and those that have came straight from university life whether it be at a masters level or bachelors. I guess it's all part of the exercise.

So, since we signed non-disclosure agreements with one another I'm not able to go into specifics of the projects folks are looking at, but I can give a brief description of some observations and potential gaps in the current market place that I've witnessed that I'm focused on for some of the concepts I'm pitching.

- Global shortage of potable water supply.
- Housing and shelter solutions for short term needs in areas that suffer from demand bubbles.
- Increased desire for consumers to better understand their own purchasing habits.
- Creation of markets where there are inefficiencies in pricing or restrictions on participation.
- Aggregation of existing technologies to supply more meaningful data to consumers on demand.

Sometimes I wonder if I over think things. I mean think of the guy that made the first port o' potty. He simply recognized that people would rather go one/duce inside a shelter as opposed to dropping 'presents' in the alley behind the corner store. That sounds a hell of a lot simpler than 'creating a market to more efficiently price niche and unique circumstances'. Enough on that topic.

Moving on, it's vacation weekend. Thanks to Uncle Keith and his connections to some long lost cousins on the Danish island of Bornholm I'm headed there tomorrow evening after class. Here's the plan....

Class out 16:00
Bus leaves Lund City Center 16:23
Bus arrives Ystad Sweden 17:45
Ferry leaves Ystad Sweden 19:00
Ferry arrives Ronne Denmark 20:15 where I'll meet Kenn-Erik Grenander whose picking me up with an american flag in hand. Gotta love the Danish hospitality.

The big question is do I chance it and just wear my corduroys that may have a full crotch blowout at any point, or do I throw in a pair of jeans with a bit more lasting power. Oh hell, who am I kidding....we're family!! The jeans can stay in the dresser.

Photos Amigos

2008-09-24T17:56:00.006+02:00

Ah yes, fall is in the air. You can see it everywhere. It's quite nice actually (except for the part about winter following on it's heels). I've been completely slammed with program work, reading, and group assignments that are starting to make me want to strangle a select few of my peers in the program. I thought that was a good indicator that I should take a little time to go on a simple walk through the lovely campus here at Lund. Here's a few photos from my jaunt. Oh, and by the way..... classmates are clear of danger. The fall colors calmed me down a bit.

I'm a real sucker for spiral staircases. If you stare at the stairs long enough you'll go cross eyed.

I'm also a sucker for ivy on brick. This photo bleeds academia.

From the outside looking in.

Some rare sunshine filtering through. Soak it up....it will be dark soon.

I call this little gem 'snack time'. This bountiful beauty sits outside the Ekonomi Centrum where I have class. It's quite the show to see me wiggle up the center of this thing during coffee break to grab a treat. Sure, there's apples on the lower branches, but in a country with social health care it seems just stupid not to take a small chance and go for the gusto.

Condi Rice I'm Coming For Your Job - Part Four

2008-09-18T20:56:00.002+02:00

For some time now I've thought the world could use a little more humor when dealing with global foreign affairs. Therefore tonight I seized a great opportunity to pass an olive branch of worldly joy to my corridor mate Johannes by introducing him to pollock jokes. Johannes and I are quite fond of comedy and seem to have a similar sense of humor about the world (poor Johannes). Despite that, and the fact Johannes is from Germany, he was totally unaware that there was an entire library of jokes related to picking on the polish (say that five times fast and you'll actually sound polish). What an opportunity!

Now, at the same time, I feel foreign affairs should be a give and take relationship. You scratch my back and I'll scratch yours. For a large part of the day I had contemplated how to get a paper printed for class tomorrow morning without having to pay the traditional 1sek/page price at the library. I just so happened to know that Johannes has a printer in his room so.....I leveraged that opportunity and viola! Assignment two hot off the presses and ready for Professor Hans in the morning.

Now it was time to make good on my end of the bargain. So we began. I quickly sent Johannes an email link to www.polishjoke.com. This site is pretty run of the mill. For most of us raised on a steady diet of school yard shenanigans you're not going to find anything here that you didn't know about in sixth grade. But, for a newcomer like Johannes this was the holy grail of happiness. He roared with laughter as he scrolled the pages soaking in each pandering poke at the poles. I sat back with my lingonberries and wheat crackers that I was snacking on and thought to myself 'now that's what foreign relations should like look'.

Here was one of Johannes' favorites (obtained from another site):

The Polish were entrenched on the front opposite the Germans during one of the battles of WWII. As hard as they tried, the Germans couldn't hit any of the Polish soldiers because they kept low in the ditches.

Finally one of the Germans hit upon an idea. "Hey Krachevski, is that you?" he yelled at the Polish trench. Krachevski stood up in his trench and said, "Yeah, it's me!" and was immediately shot by the Germans.

The Polish soldiers pondered this over and decided that it was a good idea. "Is that you, Wilhelm?" one of the Polish soldiers yelled to the German trench. "Yeah, it's me Markowski," replied one of the German soldiers. "Why don't you come over here?" "OK, I'm coming..."

What's Up On Wall Street

2008-09-18T07:50:00.002+02:00

Yikes! Prices are falling on wall street like an after christmas sale at Costco (ticker symbol: COST). 500 point drop on Monday, 450 points lost yesterday. A meltdown of 7% in 3 days. What's going on here....

I thought I'd offer up some food for thought on a couple of the major headlines from the first part of this week, and follow that up with a couple of bold predictions that are self serving in every sense. First off, let's discuss the general market trend (negative). While the manner in which we arrived at this lull is a bit unique, there was a majority of analysts on the street forecasting this general market direction for this year. Many thought the sub prime hangover would have cleared by Q3 of this year (which it hasn't), but almost all agreed we'd see a declining stock market for the biggest part of the year. There wasn't, and still is not, a strong case that can be made for a sustained turn around in the broad market (my opinion). Sticking to a nice cost average purchasing strategy over time will allow you to pick up some bargains during this downturn that will pay off in the long run.

Next up. Lehman. Well done boys. You managed to sink a 158 year old company in a little under a weekend. I wonder who has dibs on those giant televisions that cover their times square office? Hang a couple of those in the courtyard of my complex here at lund and we could have a nice little side business charging 50sek a person to watch Sarah Palin interviews on the 'big screen'.

Merrill Lynch. This company has been included in my 'axis of evil' for sometime now. They once employed a woman who was once my boss who is the closest thing to the anti-christ you can find this side of Hades. Good riddance (to both).

AIG. Wow, nothing like having to shore up the liquidity of an insurance company right in the middle of hurricane season. This deal however, is worth commenting on. The basic jist of this deal is that AIG is going to be given a high interest rate (11.5%) loan from (you) the taxpayers in return for roughly 80% of the equity in the company and a promise to repay. Now, here is why this deal is a good deal (kind of). The government has long made a tradition out of NOT taking an equity stake in companies when they provide assistance to them. They have essentially loaned money to companies at a (below market subsidized) rate the company is believed to be able to pay them back at. If the company can pay it back, then fine. Taxpayers essentially are squared on the deal. The problem with that arrangement is that there is no added return for the government taking on the high level of risk associated with simply lending a failing company money. For the added risk, the bank (in this case the fed) should get to participate in some of the upside appreciation of the equity in the firm. Well, that's exactly what's going to happen with the AIG deal. The government (you all) now own 80% of AIG. Assuming they are able to pay back the loan (which by all accounts they should be able to) and that in turn raises the value of the companies equity (share price), everyone will win. Here's some food for thought.....now, with a virtually endless supply of capital that the majority shareholder of the company sits on, it seems unlikely they will allow this operation to fail as they have an 80% interest to protect. Therefore would it be wise to partner up with your federal government and buy a stake in the $2/share company? Discuss among your friends.

With all that digested let's look at what I think are some screaming deals on wall street.

Goldman Sachs (GS) - This stock hit a low yesterday of $97.78/share which would give it a PE ratio of 4.66. Historically banks are bargains when trading around a PE of 7 (assuming said bank isn't out of money and named Bear Stearns). Now, it did recover late in the day to a close of $114, so tread cautiously as more bad news will continue to sink it in the short term.

John Deere (DE) - I originally purchased this stock after the first of the year at $90/share. I wanted to take advantage of the hype in ag. While the hype continued as predicted, DE wasn't a benefactor of the rise and has since dropped to $60/share (thank you oil). With some short term trading, some double downs, a lot of profanity and a couple of dividends I managed to eek out a small positive on this play for the year. With the dust settled, deer trading in the 50's is a steal. It's close yesterday was $59.92. If it gets much lower (despite the fact I should probably remain liquid) it will be time to back the truck up and load up!

I guess there's always next year right?

Tila Tequilla You Killa-ing Me

2008-09-16T20:27:00.003+02:00

Nico the German lad on my corridor found a television at the second hand store in Malmo for 50sek. (~$10). At this price it was IMPOSSIBLE for him to pass up such a sweet deal. So, after years without one I now again find myself with a boob tube at my finger tips. In addition, I've felt a bit under the weather the last couple of days, so I thought to myself, "what better way to take my mind off research and cognitive output than to watch a little tv?" We get about 6 different stations:

1) A station that does nothing but advertise ring tones for teenagers cellular devices.
2) A sports programming station that's in Swedish.
3) Swedish equivalent of like an ABC or CBS. Sitcoms and news in Swedish.
4) A station that basically bastardizes and copies American game shows in Swedish. For example, Who Wants To Be A Millionaire in Swedish. American Idol is called (simply) Swedish Idol.
5) A station called 'Steve' that seems to show 80's music videos on a continuous loop.
6) MTV

So, with the limited Swedish that I know, along with everyone else on my corridor, we end up getting stuck on MTV. For the last two nights I've been glued to the thing. Sipping tea and starving my cold, while my mind wastes away. Something occurred to me during this process......'my god, what is our programming telling the rest of the world'? Here's a sample of the last two nights tele....

MTV Music Awards - this year's awards show was hosted by Russell Brand. Russell is a degenerate Brit who got his fame cleaning urinals for the Sex Pistols in the early 80's and now has achieved some level of fame in Britain. He claims to be a stand up comic first and foremost, but I would consider him to be simply a joke who can stand up. I would liken his routine to an orthodontic visit. When Russell wasn't leaving the audience in stitches Brittney Spears was accepting awards for her mega hit Pieces of Me which ironically over half of the male guests in attendance had already had. Yes, it was a magical night in Hollywood.

Next - this is a dating show in which there is a single person (male or female) that is going to have an opportunity to sift through 5 possible suitors of the opposite sex. The idea of the show is that as each potential suitor is introduced they are to receive $1 for each minute that they're on the date. As soon as the single is bored or turned off by one of the potential suitors they simply yell out 'next' at which point the suitor is given their money for the corresponding minutes they were on the date and returns to the bus. The next suitor is then introduced from the bus and jumps into the middle of the date....etc. This show would be far more entertaining if instead of introducing the people from the bus, they simply lined them up in front of the bus and floored it.

The X Effect - this show is spicy. Ex lovers are reunited for a weekend escapade of which their current lovers can spy in on without the others knowing. At the end of the show the truth is revealed that the current lovers have been watching and listening to everything that the ex's were doing on their weekend together. Now, here is an interesting question regarding the IQ of the participants. Why do the ex's seem so flabbergasted when it's reported to them that their current lovers were able to watch in on their weekend? Did the camera crew, lighting crew, stage hands, and pool boy not tip them off that something may be up.....

The Hills - is a reality tv show in which a group of snobby rich kids from 'the hills' deal with life's many ups and downs. Major issues like, so and so's boyfriend going to see so and so in so and so's new bmw, and so on. Not a one of them lives in a house that's worth less than Luxemburg's GDP and that's just their college pads. The only redeeming quality of this show is that you're constantly keeping your fingers crossed that your buddy from high school who didn't graduate with flying colors (or at all for that matter) is going to suddenly appear on the show and somehow convince one of the super modelish gals to 'let him stay the night' at which point PAY DAY! Daddy's little girl has a 'bun in the oven' and daddy's willing to pay just about anything to make sure their newest 'gift' is raised with an abscent father.

A Shot At Love - my personal favorite. This show was first introduced to me on my return flight from Manhatten at which point I got to watch the better part of the first season while seated next to my girlfriend (that wasn't awkward was it?). Now, the show features an internet model Tila Tequila who is a bisexual bombshell that got her start in scholarly journals Stuff & Penthouse. She has a successful on line clothing company, fake breasts and (I quote) 'has performed compromising stunts and tasks for rock legend Ted Nuggent'....not exactly the girl next door type. Now, the show is the bisexual version of the bacherllorette in which 15 men and woman compete to be 'the one' who grabs Tila's attention. It's an odd mix where the men wax and the woman prefer not to shave period.

Now, imagine watching this tremendous line up in your college dorm with your best buddies and a twelve pack. Fine. Now, imagine watching this with your corridor mate from Tehran who's father is a highly educated engineer and has barely been able to afford a single room apartment for which to raise his three children in. I wonder why there is some resentment towards the good ole US of A when put in that context. Ashamed, I think I'll go back to watching Sarah Palin interviews on youtube. While the content is equally as bad at least her breasts are real.

Forget Disney Land, I'm Going To IKEA

2008-09-13T15:24:00.006+02:00

My plan this weekend took a major turn this morning when I woke up. Originally I was planning to go to Copenhagen to check out their modern art museum and attend an 'international' brew festival (culture and booze, great combo). It's supposedly an ad hoc version of Oktoberfest (which I think I've given up the idea of going to). Anyways, I woke up this morning and learned my friend Hanafe was in need of a trip to Ikea with her friend Ezge. Apparently Ezge was having a dinner party tonight and she needed a 'carpet' to cover her room floor. The word emergency was used more than once in the description. Anyways, the gals asked me if I wanted to go along. I figured what the hell, when one needs a rug, one needs a rug!

We jumped the express train to Malmo from Lund city center. Ultra quiet, ultra quick train takes about 10 minutes to get there. We used our train tickets to transfer to a city bus and we were off. One more bus transfer and we finally caught site of mecca. We walked in the main doors, hopped on the people mover and we were shopping. Now, normally shopping leads me the kitchenware section where I try to take my own life with the latest ginsu but this place, no need for bloodshed. This place is something special. Everything (really, everything) is so well thought out and designed. I've never seen anything like it before.

First thing I noticed was the shopping carts. They have 360 degree movement. They swivel and maneuver like a ferrari. That being said, the time to 'experiment' with this functionality is probably not on the people mover on the way to the first level, as a Swedish family just about lost their children today as a result of my demonstration. Anyways, all the things that Ikea sells are out for display in various sections. The first section we came to was the couches, ottomans, etc. The next section was cabinets, kitchens, etc. Glass, bright colors, sleek finishes, functional yet modern, EVERYTHING!! Anyways, the gals found a couple of fairly large mirrors that they liked. Time to make our first purchase. Now, normally at a traditional store you would simply grab one of the items from the floor, schlep it around with you and then pay at the register at the end. Not at IKEA. Here, you simply fill out (on IKEA recycled paper with IKEA recycled pencils, need a paper tape measure? metric or american? they have those for your disposal as well) a couple of key numbers from the discreetly placed tag on the item. You essentially are making a list from which to collect items from in the warehouse at the end of your journey (I'll come back to this). Moving on we made our way through the store. The layout is such that you essentially have to travel through the whole place to get to your final destination, the cash register. The girls found lots of stuff along the way. Towels, rugs (carpets), some dishes, etc. which they loaded into their cart.

Side note, here was another amazing part. The prices! In a country where you have to sell a kidney to afford a sandwich this place made Target look like Saks 5th Ave. Now, while I love the Finns, I have to take a shot at them here. The Finnish glassware that I brought back from Finland was quite expensive for glassware. I think the 4 glasses from Iittala that I brought home cost around 40 euro. Now granted, it was a gift, uniquely Finnish and something I wanted to bring home to tell the 'story'. At Ikea, similar glassware (cast molded, colored, functional, well designed) costs around 40 kroner (about $1.50/glass). Literally one tenth the price. Kitchen sets, everything on down the line. Discount in comparison to the exclusive Finnish brands.

Back to the story. So, as we meandered our way from store section to store section and as the girls found more and more stuff they wanted to buy I realized that I was not invited on this trip as just another pretty face. No, no, these broads had plans to turn me into their own personal sherpa. Immediately my focus turned to calorie calculations. Two bus trips, a train trip, several miles walking in between, oh god, I needed to feed. I was running dangerously low as it was and that was minus the multitude of 'baggage' these gals were soon to strap to me. I didn't think the lingonberries and musli I had for breakfast was going to get the job done. Like a sign from the heavens there it was....the food court. I seized the moment. Yet another delightful surprise, two wienerkorv (cooneys) and a coke 12 sek ($2). That should get me through till lunch.

Last stop on the shopping trip. The warehouse. Here is a brillient business strategy. All the large items that you choose to buy during your trip are kept in a warehouse that you collect them from at the end of your journey. For us, we referenced our shopping list we made, found aisle 6, item 45. There it was. The mirrors they decided to buy at the start of our journey. They, (along with everything at IKEA) were flat packed (meaning they fit into a flat box that is easy to move and pack) and easy to carry. On a side note, there are stacks and stacks of pallets and boxes within the warehouse. Everything is organized and when an item is 'out' of stock, there is a pallet above it with the identical item that can simply be dropped into place with a fork lift. Ikea is able to do an analysis of their inventory on those products by simply glancing at the racks and ordering more of the corresponding items. We made our way to the cash register. The girls paid, and it was time to organize our loot and figure out the best methodology to load it onto my body. There is a wrapping station that has butcher paper (recycled), string, whatever you need to secure your load. There is also a shipping station if you want to ship something that is perhaps too heavy to carry on the bus or train. We secured our load and off we went. Found the bus to the city center and that was that.

I've got some pictures below from the day that was. A couple from downtown Malmo, the train station, main city square....can you spot the trademark blue Ikea bag?

Don't let the bag size deceive you. It weighs more than a Toyota.

Gals at the city center fountain.

Some swedish babes discussing the many produce options available on this fine day.

Flower market. Winter is coming soon!

New meets old. Cobblestone streets and freshly purchased items from Ikea.

The stately senate square.

The best I could decipher was this was some sort of iron chef sweden style. The lads on stage were cooking against one another.

Central rail station in Malmo. Since the city sits on the ocean there are numerous boat ways that run through the city.

Done and Done

2008-09-11T10:16:00.003+02:00

It seems like I've solved a MAJOR problem I was having in Sweden. Let me explain. One of my favorite web sites is www.pandora.com. I think this web site is pure brilliance. It allows you to create music stations based on artists you like. For example, let's say you absolutely love 'Herb Albert and The Tijuana Brass', you can simply type that into the interface on pandora and it will most likely play a song from the band, as well as create a music station around similar music. As songs and artists play you have the option to give the system a thumbs up or thumbs down. If you thumb up a song it will record that and play songs similar to that song more often. The opposite happens if you thumb down something. Accounts are free and you simply use an email address and a password you create to log into the system. The system archives your 'stations' and will play them uninterrupted (no commercials) for hours with no attention at all paid to the system. Like I said, brilliant!

Brilliant, that is until you leave the United States. Finland, Estonia, and most recently Sweden are all places pandora won't play due to licensing agreements with the artists on the platform. Buzzkill!! So for weeks now I've been trying to solve the problem of silence and trying to figure out how to get some tunes going in my humble abode. Enter www.last.fm This site essentially does the same thing pandora does and more. It's interface isn't quite as simplistic to use (in my opinion), but it is far more informative and 'social' (if you like those types of things). Essentially it works the same way as pandora. You provide some generic input (artists, songs, etc that you like) and then last fm takes over and creates an evolving and continuous play list that you can tune into as you like. Yahtzee!!

Has Anyone Seen My Bike, 2 Tires, Basket, Anyone?

2008-09-09T23:36:00.003+02:00

Sometimes life takes turns you can't see coming. Things that blindside you when you least expect it. Today was one of those days. LANCE is coming to the Tour in 2009!! This is one of the greatest pieces of news I've heard since the time Jon and I found a bus willing to take us from the north rim of the grand canyon back to the south rim after I about died in the floor of the thing. Yes, this is the news of the day. To celebrate this news I leave the readers with a moment of bicycle zen. Below are pictures from one of the half dozen or so large parking racks for bikes within Lund. There are probably 5 dozen smaller (maybe only hold 250 cycles) lots throughout the city, and countless single cycle parking places with bikes in every nock and cranny of the city. I'm sure my ride will turn up soon enough......

$16 Grocery Trip

2008-09-08T23:12:00.006+02:00

This last weekend I took an opportunity to seek out the 'greater' grocery store that is close to my home. I had heard rumblings that there was a larger grocery store with a better selection just on the other side of the 'highway' from where I live. So, despite the fact my initial plan was to bike there, I set out on foot to find the store. Sure enough, like an oasis in the Sahara there she sat. ICA (not to be confused with IKEA)! Upon entering the store I saw the typical Swedish grocery store sights, long check out ques, miniature shopping carts, video surveillance, etc. I grabbed a basket and hit the aisles. The store was great. There was so much more of a selection than the neighborhood market down the street from my flat and prices were the same on most everything. I quickly filled a basket (which is all I choose to carry back to my place at once). Here is what I got for 109 SEK ($16)

Digestive Cookie Biscuits (Log)
Spenat hackad (Shredded spinach - frozen bag)
Fettuccine Spenat (Dry spinach fettucini noodles)
Raksallad (Crayfish salad spread)
0.5l of Krusovic Cerne (Czech Republic beer)
Sommargronsaker (Vegetable medley - frozen bag)
Knackebrod (Grain crackers that are like slices of bread only dried and crunchy - large package)
Bruna bonor (Prepared baked beans - plastic roll that resembles a sausage)
Frigg ort-te (Green leaf tea - bags)

All in all a good trip. I got a few 'luxury' items (green tea and a beer) as well as a handful of meals with the veggies and the spinach noodles. I can snack on the raksallad and knackebrod and maybe make a meal out of the beans with a hot dog or something thrown in.

In other news, the days are getting cooler here. Fall is in the air. I took a picture of one of my favorite buildings on campus today. It's posted below. The building is the main library for the university. What's great about the building is that it's covered in ivy (as you can see). That same ivy, when a slight wind blows (which is virtually constant in Southern Sweden) makes the whole building wave to you as you pass by. The ivy also tells you what season it is. In the spring it starts to get green right in line with the sunshine hitting it, and like now, it starts to turn colors (from the top down) to represent that fall is here. When the colors reach the ground it's time for winter.

With The Good Comes The Sad

2008-09-07T22:13:00.002+02:00

Another week in the books. It seems like every day that goes by I figure out something new and things get a bit easier. This week had the usual frustrations associated with living in a foreign place, but it also had some moments of brilliance. One such moment happened this evening. One of the my program classmates Max scheduled an impromptu meeting of the minds informally billed as 'idea lounge'. The idea of this meeting was to open up a forum where the others in our program could share some things about themselves and explain in a bit of detail what their hopes and aspirations were for their year in Lund. The secondary goal was to outline a brief idea or two that they have for a possible business project. It didn't take long for the creative juices to start flowing. There were some really good ideas floated out and it seemed as though everyone was comfortable sharing information with the broad group. It was great to see how quickly people's personal barriers came down. As we went around the room it became apparent that all of us have something very positive to contribute to whatever projects we decide to work on. Optimism abound!!

Second really positive thing that happened this week was in conversation with Sergio who's from Chile. Sergio has lived in Lund for 7 years now and has studied at the university, has started several small businesses within the university and is well connected throughout the community. I expressed to him how I was having trouble gaining traction within Lund. While I'm meeting lots of new people and having lots of stimulating experiences I'm not necessarily connecting with the right people that can open doors and create opportunities within Sweden and the EU as a whole. I felt like after spending 6 weeks in Finland I could competently have a detailed conversation about how that society operates, how business attitudes are different, their general economy, and briefly how their government works. I left there with a network of contacts that I could have easily assembled into a 'team' should the need arise. That experience is something that I now want to replicate without the help of an organization like Rotary (which opened the doors for me in Finland). It's very important to me to know that I can develop a similar network on my own. It may be the most important thing I accomplish in the next year and will give me a great deal of confidence that I can replicate this in a 'new' environment should I find myself somewhere like this again. Anyways, I feel like I've spent two weeks in Lund and can barely wipe my ass (so to speak).

Enter Sergio; he pointed me to a couple of organizations that he thinks are well connected and people not only I, but our entire program should get to know. The main group he suggested was an organization known as FENA. They are essentially a non-profit organization for entrepreneurs and new business enterprises. They host forums and lectures that cover topics of interest to me. Additionally, he mentioned some regional development corporations that I will seek some meetings with. In Finland these groups understood what the government mandates and goals were for economic development within a given region. They often times hand held small businesses during various stages of development and would streamline funding if the company fit within certain parameters. Understanding this process will be of vital importance if (and when) something is to come from this program. Add these folks to my running 'to do' list.

In sad news, it seems as though the bike that I was just starting to kind of come around to has been stolen. Yep, I guess she found a better offer. I went out this morning to go to IKA (not to be confused with IKEA) and buy a few groceries. When I walked down to where it was stationed since Thursday after class the bike was gone. No lock, no sign of a struggle, no blood droplets or DNA. Now, bike theft is a really common thing here in Lund. It's kind of a 'war scar' that many students are proud to show. The police officer that greeted us and gave us a few street tips on day two of orientation mentioned the numerous things not to do with your bike. Don't leave it unlocked, don't leave it tied up just by the front tire, don't leave it just lying around people might think it's abandoned, etc. I did none of this, but apparently the temptation was too much for someone to bear. So for now, I've decided I'm going to live life on foot. It takes me about 40ish minutes to walk to class and a bit less to get home as it's downhill coming and uphill going. I've had a lot of bikes come and go in my life and with the exception of a few that I bought I always found them (I didn't steal them, there's a difference) and took them under my wing to give them a home in their lonliest hour. It's not so much the monetary loss (which is an issue, but negligible) it's more the sadness that I'm sure the bike is going to feel now as I'm sure it won't be as loved as it would have been with me as the owner. But, I guess, se la vie. Sad turn of events really. I guess it wasn't meant to be.

The Fat Lady Has Sung

2008-09-05T15:59:00.002+02:00

Well it's over. The GOP party finally wrapped up last night in dramatic (yawn) fashion with a compelling (yawn) speech by GOP candidate John McCain. It's now safe to replace the nightly glass of bourbon and aspirin with a pint of mylanta. Hug your children and love your wife, the nightmares might well last through October. What once seemed like a formidable challenge to Obama's run at the oval office now has turned into some off colored version of the brady bunch that stars twice as many children as the original and which Karl Rove has replaced Alice as the friendly yet can't be trusted personality that cleans up the mess left behind by the group and their children (I hope we don't have to see him in any sort of pastel apron). Yes, it was quite the event. We learned a lot of really important things about the party and their selections for the oval office......

I'll start with McCain. While we already knew about his patriotic actions in Vietnam as well as his road to the senate we learned some important things about him this week. Mainly his taste in women. His selection of Palin may have stunned the nation and caused republicans a moment of pause (mainly to figure out who the hell she was), but to any 20ish year old sitting by a computer screen the choice was really, really clear. Sorry Cindy, looks like your hubby just bumped you from belle of the ball to cocktail waitress. No hard feelings though, we'll let you keep your 7 figure salary from the family biz to ice the pain.

Speaking of Palin, let's move on to her. What a babe. This broad in a v-neck with her hair up can swing half the electoral college of Minnesota simply by 'dropping her pen'. She's popped out 5 kids, can field dress a moose in the dead of an Alaskan winter, beat the shit out of parents at PTA meetings when they disagreed with her 'executive power', can deliver medicine to eskimos via dog sled and snowmobile, was runner up in a 1984 beauty pageant contest and single handedly defeated a tribe of vikings that were trying to conquer the Aleutian islands from the north (the picture below proves it)...yes, this gals got balls (or at least the female equivalent).

Now, while I am in favor of a macro shift in politics from the good ole boy system to a more youthful (most likely less experienced) and different faced Washington I think this move was absurd. I commend McCain for taking a stride in a positive direction for the GOP by stepping up to nominate a woman as his running mate. He had to take a risk as his campaign was on life support. If this was managed properly and not such a haymaker punch from the back meant to swing female votes he may have pulled it off. As it sits I think he sunk his own ship (or is that crashed his own plane?). I believe that female voters will ultimately rebel against Palin when the count comes in come November. I think it takes more than parading a (hot) soccer mom around Minneapolis to win this highly contested election. The debates will prove interesting and should be a good litmus test for everyone involved. Obama should be able to talk circles around McCain as these should be the less interesting of the few debates. The real gloves will come off when Biden tries to keep his eyes off Palin and has to answer questions thrown at him while she squirms in her chair replicating the interrogation scene in Basic Instinct. Have a pack of smokes handy, you're going to need one when it's over.

My Mailing Address

2008-09-04T16:09:00.002+02:00

So, after some test runs from the US my first piece of mail showed up today. Here is the best address to send something to if you are so inclined. Please let me know what you are sending and when you ship it if it's a package. Letters or any other correspondence can just get here when they get here.

Engell, Jeff, A:315
Allingavagen 9
227 34 Lund
Sweden - SE

If you put those lines in the exact order I have them and written in the manner I've written them there shouldn't be any issues. FYI.

I Just Balanced Your Budget Asshole

2008-09-03T21:39:00.004+02:00

As it's no surprise to anyone that knows me I am grossly opposed to the current sheriff, Jim Alderdan, we have in our county (your county I guess as I live in Sweden now). I thought the loophole we (I voted against this) voted in to re-elect him was a joke. I thought his entire platform of wanting to build out a stronger jail and alternative sentencing system was a joke. I think his wife is ugly and I'd probably stoop so low as to kick his dog if he had one (I'm a dog person, so this is a bit extreme). In his latest edition of the Bull's Eye (here's the link : http://www.larimersheriff.org/BullsEye/Default.aspx click on 'revenue augmentation project blog entry dated 9/3/2008') he outlines and complains about a current short fall in funding for his distinguished consortium. While normally I would nit pick his poor attempt at sarcastic writing and use of the English language I will simply offer a solution to his conundrum......

Jimmy boy, if you want to cover the shortfall in appropriations simply have your staff park their cars at the shop each night. They, like the citizens they 'serve and protect', can find their own means of transportation to and fro their place of employment (the grocery store, their childs daycare, their wife's hair appointment, Friday night dinner at Applebee's, the Bronco's game at Invesco, and the many other off duty uses that help to keep us safe at night by maintaining a 'visible' law enforcement presence on the streets). The petroleum, maintenance, potential fleet reduction and depreciation expenses that are saved on the fleet will more than offset the few bucks you are short in the kitty.

In the short term, beware citizens of Larimer county. The second to last statement in his article promises to make up the shortfall by eliminating positions and through revenue enhancement. Another way of saying that is the 'shortfall will be eliminated by trimming some of the fat from our glutinous payroll and writing all of our citizens more tickets'. As the Aussies say, 'Fuckall'.

School Bells

2008-09-01T18:14:00.003+02:00

First day of classes under my belt and I'm already feeling smarter. Class today was mainly a chance to introduce ourselves to one another and for the professors to introduce themselves and lay out the expectations for the coming year. As anticipated the class is comprised of people from all across the globe. There are a couple of swedes and a couple of americans, but the rest of the group is from everywhere in between. I sat next to Leonard (Dutch) and Yanna (Swedish). Since Leonard was the first Dutch lad I had met I took the opportunity to ask if the wooden shoes are just a tourist novelty, or if in fact people actually wear them. Leonard, without hesitation, informed me that they were once widely popular, but now have been replaced with rubber knock offs similar to crocs. Thank you Leonard. The Swede was the typical 'you have to say something to me before I'll say something to you', so I started the conversation as I'm finding is necessary to do in this country. Yanna informed me that she studied graphic design at Malmo university and was now continuing on with her education in this program. Yanna asked how I enjoyed living in Lund and asked me what I missed about home. Today the answer to that question was black bean burritos. Damn if I can find any black beans over here. Anyways, we exchanged some more niceties and it was time for class. The program is going to be perfect. We start out the first 3.5 months with three intensive classes where we conduct market/industry analysis on the present economic landscape on a global scale (not just within Scandinavia), as well as a specific class on market exploitation and resource acquisition for venture projects. Once we blast through those we're off for our winter break which lasts about 3 weeks depending on how the testing gets scheduled at the end of the semester. Looks like there will be plenty of winter possibilities for vacation destinations as pretty much every developed country in the world is represented in my class and I can make friends with just about anyone. After the winter break we return to an intensive class line up dealing with venture growth and management of the growth process. It's those classes mixed with our project work that runs right up to commencement in June. It's going to be intense. It was also made quite clear today in the overview that the goal of this program is to identify and build out a high growth potential venture while at Lund. If the venture has legs come commencement the university will place you and your team in the on site innovation incubator and let you have a year of free office space, technical resources, communication resources, academic resources and mentorship. I can't imagine a scenario outside of academia where such an opportunity would exist.

Literature of The Baltic

2008-08-31T22:35:00.004+02:00

I brought with me to Sweden only two books. Both very different in nature, but both quite representative of my station in life. The two books; On The Road by Jack Kerouac, and the owners manual for my BA II Plus Financial Calculator written by Texas Instruments. Now, while this seems like a stupid rant to go on about books and there meaning blah blah blah, it's actually a pretty important part of my life. I left behind roughly 6 boxes of stuff in the states (residing in an undisclosed location due to their top secret and awesome content). 3 of those are filled with books. Therefore, roughly half of what I own is either in hard cover or paperback.

Now, I have been reading both books as of late. Kerouac's I had cracked before, but never was in the right mind set to dig deep into it. I read the first half of it since arriving in Sweden and have decided to go back to the begining and start again...this time I want to highlight the best quote, description, and phrase from each chapter to provide reference points to refer to over the next year or so while I too am 'on the road'. The owners manual for my fin calc has also been a nightly read. I figured it might be a good way to clear the hangover that still lingers from my last job where I could have derived the correct answer to the majority of the 'challenging problems' and 'difficult analyses' by using a combination of my fingers, toes and the surplus ballpoints I kept in my top drawer. Yes, these are the days of our lives.....

Condi Rice I'm Coming For Your Job - Part Three

2008-08-31T21:24:00.003+02:00

Last night my plan was to relax. Catch up on some emails and make it an early night as I finally felt sleepy after a week of jet lag. Well, that was all fine and well until a couple of lassies (Annika and Eeve) from Finland and a lad (Primoz) from Slovenia showed up to our flat with a liter of Finlandia and ill intentions.....

We sat around in our kitchen and introduced ourselves. It seems like the German front is multiplying at an alarming rate as everyday there are a couple of new ones that show up out of no where to join in our fun. After the formalities were over we could finally get down to business. It turns out that Viktor is going to be studying in the same program as me. It was great to finally meet someone from my program as I had yet to do so.

I spent most of the evening talking to the two Finns about how great of a time I had in their country and throwing around the half dozen Finnish phrases I know (apparently my pronunciation is great). It seems as though I have seen far more of Finland than they had (and they live there). Their favorite story..... the time the over grown bearded woodsman rubbed goopy peat moss across the back of my naked body at an outdoor smoke sauna.

Anyways, after I was out of embarrassing Finland stories I moved on to the Slovenian lad who is in my program. We talked mainly about Russia and the influence that country has over that entire eastern block region. It seems like what is happening in Georgia could easily be replicated in a handful of eastern countries. While that message was conveyed by a gal I met from Belarus a couple nights ago, the lad I was speaking with this evening went in to much greater detail on the subject. Sparing the history lesson, the basic summary is that such incidents would eventually cause the EU, or more likely, the UN to step in with some sort of intervention (which would ultimately rope us into the middle of the whole shooting match). Is there any chance we can get Bush out of the white house sooner than planned?

Midnight, one, two ish, the festivities were coming to a close. We sent the Finns on their way as well as forced a retreat from the Krauts. At this point my Primoz was going to have to kill a couple of hours before his early morning train left for Helsinborg (city to the north of Lund) at 4:40am. Being the perennial host that I am I invited him to either crash on my couch for a spell or join me for a bit more conversation. We choose the latter.

We talked mainly of our expectations for our studies at Lund. It's amazing how similar him and I are to each other despite our geography. He's very charismatic, forward thinking, excitable, and eager to get going (if I can toot my own horn). His philosophy on market opportunities and technology advancement are identical. If my entire class is similar in mold this will undoubtedly be one of (if not the) most important years of my life, and absolutely accomplish what it is I came to Lund to do.

Since we had so much time we moved away from our expectations for Lund and talked in detail about specific differences in European and American economic systems. After much Q&A from both of us we boiled our entire conversation down to a fundamental difference in legal philosophy. See, in europe the law dictates and outlines what it is a person or entity CAN do. In America our laws dictate what a person or entity CAN NOT do. This may sound like the same thing repeated, but it's not. Think about it. If you come up with a great idea for something you want to do, and you want to move fast on it what is one of the first things you do if you're American? You look to see if there is some law or something somewhere that says you can't do what it is you want to do because of (list the reasons). So, absent of some finding that says you can't do something, you are basically able to interpret that as though you CAN do anything you want that isn't explicitly said otherwise. Take the same idea in Europe. You first go to the law and see if the law says you can do what it is you want to do. If it's something really new and creative the chances of historic law covering the subject are slim. Therefore you have to go ask 'permission' and see if the law can be ammended to allow what it is that you are trying to do, so as to specifically allow you to move on your idea. To phrase it another way you could say that the economic philosophy in America can be summarized as 'it's easier to beg forgiveness than ask permission'. This is a huge difference. It allows the American economy (for better and certainly at times for worse) to move quickly when opportunity strikes. The sub-prime mortgage backed bank credit crunch is a great example of this. So is Sarbanes Oaxley. American markets moving at break neck speed that get out of control and then have to be reeled back in by legislation saying that what ever is going on CAN'T go on anymore. Law is then introduced so the next guy with a similar idea gets his aspirations crushed from the start. Gotta love those free markets!

A Jaguar At The Beach

2008-08-29T15:26:00.007+02:00

Ever since my arrival in Lund I've been seeking out a bike. It's one of the reasons I wanted to live in Europe. No more driving. The city is packed with bikes. There literally is a bike for every person. So, being a bike dude as I am I have been jealous of all the fun everyone has been having on their two wheelers. After doing some market research and visiting the local bike shops I concluded several things.

1) Swedish people are far more into fashion that function when it comes to their iron horses.
2) Men and women ride women's' bikes. (Now, it should be noted that I once had a woman's bike in Fort Collins. It was a green retro schwin cruiser. It was one of my favorite rides as it was so easy to get on and off of. A classic 'pub crawl' trolley, but not much good for a long haul.)
3) The bikes here cost a fortune if you are going to buy them new, so you have to hit the secondary market bar none!

I had budgeted $200 for a bike before I left the states. I was hoping that for that price I could get a decent single speed or fixed gear messenger bike. (I've attached a picture below for reference) Similar to the rig I left behind in the states (only this one would have brakes). It was the euro dream for me. I even brought pedals and a cat eye to soup it up. A swanky little 'fixie' that could pedal me to the Tour De' France in July when my program was over. Reality check, since I still don't have a visa, and since I'm doing this whole thing on a shoe string budget, I should probably just let my euro dream ice a bit and get something to get me to and from class (at least until the Swedish government kicks me out of the country). After searching the town it became apparent that if I wanted to own a messenger style single speed I was going to either have to ship it from the states or fly to London and hack one off a delivery boy. Both options seemed expensive.

I happened to catch wind of a bike auction that was happening yesterday on campus. My Manhattan buddy Justin told me about it and we made plans to go. I figured for sure I would find something there that I could pick up for around 500 sek ($85 bucks). We stood patiently in the rain with 7,000,000 other people all waiting for the doors to the 'bike barn' to open. When they did I was heart broken. Everything in the shed was total garbage. Pedals missing, brake cables laying loose, rust on the chains, a sad sad sight I tell you. Justin shared my disappointment and we both walked back to our side of town with our tails between our legs. Later in the evening I received some info on the auction from a gal who stayed to witness the sale. She said people were paying crazy prices for pieces of junk. 700 - 800 sek for bikes that didn't even pedal. I decided my original price point of $200 (1200 sek) was probably closer to market value if I wanted something that I didn't have to tinker with to get on the road.

Despite the lack luster auction, as usual, I had a back up plan. I found a flyer on campus earlier in the day with two offers for bikes for sale. I sent an email to the one lad after the auction disappointment and we agreed to meet this morning to see if we couldn't make a deal. He showed up with the chariot a bit past 11:00. It was a standard issue swedish designed uni-sex bike. I purchased it on the spot for 1000 sek. I negotiated a bike lock and got him to throw in a bag of bananas (no joke) which he just had purchased at the open air market.

As I began to pedal towards home I became more confident in my purchase and felt as though I had found a good deal. That won't however, keep me from listing it at a higher price immediately to see if I can turn a quick buck while the market is HOT! But for now, the bike is mine.

Upon arrival at my place I decided I wanted to take advantage of the beautiful weather in the city today. It has rained every day since I have been here so some sun sounded nice. I decided that I wanted to get out and see the countryside a bit and clear my head from the week that was. I decided to head due west to the sleepy little coastal village of Lomma. I grabbed the bike, filled a water bottle and hit the open road. Now, back home I can ride my racing bike around 30km/hour with little effort. My fixed gear I ride around 20km/hour with the same effort. The journey to Lomma is a 10km trip according to Google maps. That being said, even at a snails pace it shouldn't take more than 40 minutes to get there. Well, that was on my old bikes. I forgot to calculate the weight of this rig into my calculations. An hour and ten minutes later I still had yet to see the ocean. There was a strong head wind blowing right into my face and I was pretty confident I could have ran faster than I was peddaling. Argh!

Anyways, a little while later I finally laid eyes on the ocean. I found a nice little pier to sit on and watch the waves come in. It was a lovely conclusion to a tough journey. I sat on the dock for an hour and read while the wind from the sea blew through my hair (kind of blew through my hair I guess as I haven't showered since Tuesday and it's a bit of a birds nest). While I was sitting there I watched a handful of sail boats come into the harbor, and I even got to see a couple of topless sunbathers (apparently this is the norm in Sweden). Below are some picture of my bike on the pier. Can you spot the bridge to Denmark? How about the spiral tower in Malmo Sweden?

Culinary Adventures In Sweden

2008-08-29T04:00:00.003+02:00

With every foreign place comes foreign foods. Sweden of course is no different. So far I've been only able to eat 'finger foods' and things that I can eat straight from the container as our shared kitchen has no pots/pans/silverware/plates/etc and I'm WAY to cheap to go buy any of that stuff for my own use. So, as a result the diet has been a bit repitive and oddly disruptive to my digestive track. There is a small grocer about a block from my front door. It's kind of a gray drab discount type of place that carries only the bare essentials. Since I live on a side of town that's not dominated by students, the store mainly caters to the locals. As a result all the labels and everything are in Swedish. I've made several trips there now, each time seeking out something new, or trying to find something specific that I have a hankering for. My diet to date has been the following:

Breakfast - musli and yogurt (yoghurt)

Lunch - 2 slices of heavy multi grain bread with two slices of cheese and three pieces of lunch meat (unsure of animal due to packaging and limited swedish)

Dinner - not much really. Sometimes I'll have some milk or something, but with my schedule still being really screwed up from the flight I haven't had much of an appetite at night.

The only other thing I have eaten since I got here was a calzone type thing from 7-11 (of all places). As a side note, the 7-11's over here are nothing like the one's we have at home. You can get a gourmet coffee, calzones and freshly baked breads and pastries, fruits, etc. They're basically like bakeries and small grocer marts all in one.

Anyways, I had been wondering why my stomach had been so upset this week. At times I have felt just awful. It really hasn't made any sense. Well, tonight (or this morning, or whatever the hell time it is) in one of my jet lag sleepless nights that have become the norm this week I decided I wanted a little 4am musli. I went to the fridge, grabbed my yoghurt and began pouring in some musli. It was at this point that I thought "gee, maybe I'll read the side of this carton to see if I can make out any of the Swedish", that will be fun I thought. So, thinking to myself...Turkish yogurt huh, wow, this stuff is so much thicker than the yogurt I'm use to. It really sticks to the musli. Then, upon further inspection I read the words kebab and dip sauce followed by 10% fett. I think to myself, hum, 10% fett, I wonder if that means 10% fat? Sure enough....10% fat in my yogurt. Apparently I purchased the stuff that is used in kebab's and gyros. It's basically sour cream. So, looking back on the week I have basically eaten a quart of sour cream with some grain mixed in. Houston, I think we've found our problem.

A Few Changes To The Blog

2008-08-28T11:20:00.002+02:00

I've made a few changes to my blog template and layout. I also deleted/added a few 'links of interest'. In an effort to appeal to the masses I removed all advertising. If I've deleted something that you liked (links of interest, etc) or there is something that you think would really add to the blog please comment. I'll either take your suggestions and use them or I'll send the KGB to hunt you and your next of kin like small varmits on a Kentucky farm eventually roasting you over an open fire pit while preparing a delightful chutney to serve as a side dish.

Condi Rice I'm Coming For Your Job - Part Two

2008-08-27T14:09:00.002+02:00

One of the primary goals of my time in Lund is to gain some understanding and meet some people from the middle east. I, like almost everyone in the west, have limited perspective on the true identity of these people and know very little about their cultures outside of the negatives that our governments propaganda machine portrays. Their countries are rich in concentrated wealth, their people span a very wide economic moat of haves and have nots, and they occupy a geo-political region of the globe that is absolutely paramount to the rest of the worlds production. What better way to start bridging this divide than to invite Farhad (Iranian) and Jim? (Turkish) over to my apartment for an archived episode of John Stewart's Daily Show.

Now, as a side note, I absolutely love John Stewart. I think he's one of the sharpest minds on television (not to mention that you can watch all of his shows in their entirety on the web which is a huge benefit for someone who lives without a tele).

John has taken a week or so off from his show, so we were forced to watch an older episode. I pulled up the August 6th 2008 episode that featured Sen. Chuck Shumer as the guest. The episode starts off with a back and forth on Obama's and McCain's energy plans, tire pressure gauges, McCain at Sturgis motorcycle rally. Classic Stewart!! The boys seemed to be liking it. As the show progressed the usual topics of war, oil dependancy, foreign policy f-ups by the state department, etc...they were all covered in classic Daily Show fashion. Then, enter Sen. Schumer. The lads really liked this part of the program as they didn't understand why a politician would subject one self to such abuse. I explained the concept of 'softening' a politician and making them appear more humaized. Ah, the beauty of being able to pause the video at any time and explain any questions that come up. Love that internet! The show, as always, ends with a moment of zen. This episodes' ends with McCain standing on a stage at Sturgis fumbling over words about gas prices. He babbles in a circle for a few seconds and then finally spits out what he was aiming at from the begining. This series was met with belly roll laughter from the boys. Jim said, "he sounds about as good as Bush." Farhad replied, "No one's that bad".

Condi Rice I'm Coming For Your Job - Part One

2008-08-27T13:41:00.002+02:00

Last night the minature German gal from across the hall invited me to hang out with some of the folks from our floor in the 'common space'. I was pretty busy at the time charting some stuff on yahoo finance, but I accepted the invite anyways and headed to the main room.

Tonights topic: Germany. As I mentioned before there are a number of German kids on my floor, who are here mainly to study the hard sciences (biology and physics). Below is a summation of our conversation and what I learned.....

Musli - a popular grain cereal mix that is commonly eaten for breakfast and snacks throughout Germany. It can contain dried fruit in various proportions, as well as 'exotic' nuts like almonds and cashews. It goes well with yogurt and milk, or can simply be eaten from the palm of your hand like trail mix. It just so happened that I had a bag of the holy oats in my possesion. I retrieved it from my room for critique. Here is what was deduced....I purchased the 30% fruit mix. Apparently this is a mild mix of fruit and is a good beginner musli. They suggested that I slowly work my way down to a 10% mix so to maximize the nutritional value of the mixture by thus removing some of the sugar that is contained in the fruits. "If you feel you need more sugar you can always drink more beer" thanks Hans (pseudo name). The gal also chimed in that if I purchased the paper bags of musli, rather than the plastic, I would be less vulnerable to having a bag blowout where the musli would spill all over the floor. I guess she noticed the current condition of my bag which fell victim to my 'thrashing' when I first opened it.

Slang - I wanted to test drive some of the 'Germanic' phrases that our family has adopted over the years. This was an entertaining exercise. Below are the words/phrases covered and the verdict on each:

Kutzen - means to throw up or vomit. This is a real german verb!!

Kutz simony - means total disbelief, shock (I think). This threw the group for a loop. After many iterations of it and different pronounciations we determined this is not an actual phrase.

Hadda gutz enhiema - means oh my gosh. This again was met with grave stares as the group had no idea what this could possibly be.

So, in conclusion, our family is batting a .333 average which by most standards is good enough to make the bigs. Not too bad.

Ahoy Sweden!

2008-08-27T13:05:00.002+02:00

Well I'm finally here. A year's worth of planning has finally come full circle. I arrived in Sweden mid afternoon on Monday. As always, I didn't sleep on the flight from the states and therefore was a bit disorriented upon my arrival. The train from Kobenhavn (as the danes spell it) was filled with fellow grad students and even a couple of families that were relocating their entire tribe to Lund (pronounced looooond). As predicted I had the most luggage out of the bunch, but now that I think about it, I am twice the size of the asian kids that were sharing the train with me, so perhaps in all actuallity we were schleping about the same amount of gear.

Upon exiting the train in Lund I was greeted by a host of mentor's from the university. They promptly signaled a cab for us and took us to the arrival/check in buidling on campus. Check in was a typical Scandinavian cluster-f$%* where everyone kind of stands around and looks at each other with no real help or direction (these were common in Finland and apparently are a fad here as well). After spending 40 minutes in the wrong line I made my way to the correct line: housing! I felt very fortunate that I had already booked a room to rent and had paid for my first month of living. There were probably 20-30 international students waiting for word from a rental agency as to where they might be able to find accomidation. After sigining my contract I was handed my keys. I then was escorted by the hosts to my place.

My place lies on the western (ocean) side of the city. It's actually a little further than I had pictured from the city center and campus. My part of the campus is about as far away from my apartment as it could be. I guess it will be good exercise getting to and fro. The place itself is a bit run down on the outside, but is completely new and modern on the inside. I have a bed, a desk, a couple of book shelves, a couch, my own bathroom (shower) and a floor lamp. Good living!! We have a shared kitchen where we each have a spot in the fridge labeled with our room number, and we have a spot in the freezer labeled the same. My room itself over looks a large center square that has some benches, trees, and bushes. I'd compare it to living on sixth avenue in Manhatten and the view to central park (maybe a bit exagerated).

As for the people in my building I'm slowly introducing myself to them. I only know a couple of their names, but so far everyone seems nice. My immediate neighbors are a russian guy who eats only cheese apparently, an english teacher chick from Greece, a dude and a gal from France, Farhad a lad from Iran, a turkish fella named Jim?, Brett from Berkley, CA, a couple of german dudes that enjoy horror movies and loud rock music (they're at the end of the hall), and Margarita (or Juanita, I can't remember) from Columbia. That's only 2/3 of the people on my floor. The building has 4 floors and their are 4 buildings in our square. Should be able to meet plenty of new people during my stay here. Valkommen!!

Dentist - Behind The Mask

2008-08-22T20:53:00.006+02:00

Routine cleaning day at the ole dentist. I wanted to get one more debit from my dental plan before it expired at the end of this month. The dentist (or should I say receptionist) was most accommodating in 'squeezing me in' before my departure this Sunday. I promptly arrived for my appointment a few minutes early. After the usual 'oh it's nice to see you'....'how have you been?'.....'you're moving where?'......'oh that's terrific'....my number was finally up. The hygienist escorted me back to the room. As we moved down the hallway I was taken back when I noticed what I thought to be a spike covered bull whip hanging out from her left pant leg and the outline of a tightly strewn S&M outfit under her Kermit the frog scrubs. I figured this was part of the act and I'd let it go for now.

First things first. Let's check the gums. Whomever invented this procedure had only their gums to worry about as I'm sure the first person they did this test on immediately kicked their teeth out as a 'thank you' for the gum check. The test involves taking a rusted out ole crook of wire attached to an iron handle and smashing it with force into your gums to see how far they pull away from your teeth. You are then scored on a sliding scale from 1-5 (1 being the best and 5 being GUM DISEASE). Each tooth is prodded 6 different times (3 in the front gum, 3 in the back). The scores are then shouted out by the hygienist to a waiting assistant where the numbers are entered into a computerized scoring matrix (simultaneously the same numbers are used by the patients in the waiting area to complete the daily sudoku in the Coloradoan). Once the numbers are entered the assistant leaves and the results are reported. The matrix indicated that "your gums are healthier now than they were a year ago" to which I responded, "great, next time I come in why don't you just have the receptionist bust my face open with a seven iron when I come through the door. Bloodshed will be the same, we can skip the whole poking thing, and we'll all save everyone a little time!"

Next step: pick and clean teeth to prepare for polishing. At this point the assistant is gone and it's just me and the hygienist mono a mono. I'm reminded of the fact that any shout for help will be muffled by the puddle of blood pooling in the back of my throat, and that if I want to leave here outside of a body bag I should just "sit still". I'm handed a 'tube' that has vacum like properties that is to be used to drain my mouth as the assistant rinses blood from my gums while picking at any tarter or plaque. At this point pain has numbed my entire upper body and my face looks like some sort of tribal bush mask used in hunting ceremonies in the Serengeti.

Time to polish and shine. I really don't know why this part of the visit is referred to as a polish. The only thing that gets shined in this ordeal is the blood splatters on the chin bib as the hygienist's latex hands move across them in a circular fashion. "All done!" as she hands me a mirror...."How's it look?".......great if I were a prize fighter and just completed a 10 round draw with the champ. "Terrific! Great!" I mumble.

Enter the doc. After some light chit chat (to which my mouth and continued bleeding didn't allow me to participate in) it was time for the doc to mask up, throw on the latex gloves and take a look inside. As he moved from tooth to tooth not really doing anything I thought to myself, "what exactly am I paying him for". Every time I've ever been to the dentist it's the same routine. Act 1 - Hygienist and assistant punish and torture you with pokes, punches, and mechanical polishers. Act 2- Token male comes in, pokes around a bit, asks about how you're doing personally, tells you your teeth are ok and then gives you a tooth brush and some floss as if to say "I'm sorry you won't be able to eat solid food for a week, but maybe this $0.40 toothbrush and $0.20 travel paste will persuade you to come back in 6 months where we'll trick you out of more of your dental insurance premiums yet again". Today wasn't going to be that easy for the doc though. I needed to know......

"So, doc, I must admit, I like your practice, I think you do a lot for the community, I'll continue to come here when I get back to the states, but I have to know, what the hell is the point of whatever it is you do when you come in to check on us after the cleaning?"

The doc looked at me gasping for breathe! I could hear the hygienist moving in on the scene. The record stopped in the lobby to which came "We've got a live one, GET THE GAS!"

I didn't waiver. I sat there cool and collected. Blood spilling from my mouth as I reared back to defend myself from the initial attack.

Puzzled, the doctor responded, "I don't believe anyone has ever asked me that before".

I knew now that I was done for sure. Kill or be killed. As I made a motion towards the x-ray machine, prepared to pump the evil hygienist full of radiation, the doctor called off the hounds.

"Truth be told, for someone like you, I don't really do too much. You have healthy teeth and no real structural issues". Buttering me up I thought. I'm not taking my eyes off you yet...... "What I'm mainly looking for are small changes in your teeth that may signify larger problems. For example last year when you were in here I noticed no noticeable stains on your teeth. I noted that on your chart because it's something I like to check for, cosmetically and for other health reasons. This time, there was a small dark stain on one of your back molars. I removed it rather easily. I've noted that so we can look at it again next time. Additionally, I wanted to inspect your gums. I see they've improved over last time and I wanted to make a mental note of that. Do you have any other questions?"

I began to relax, satisfied by the response. As my blood pressure returned to normal I felt a little bad about the x-ray gun I had ripped from the wall mount, and the broken over head lamp that I used as a catapult to extend my arsenal's reach. But, as I helped the doctor right the electric patient chair which I had overturned and used to barricade myself in the back corner of the room, a sense of happiness came over me. I felt relieved that the system worked. The doctors job is to take care of and care for their patients. If that comes in the form of an overzealous S&M dominatrix spilling two units of your blood across a carpeted floor on a Friday by repeatedly bashing you in the face with a metal sawzall while laughing hysterically then that's what it takes. Doctor knows best.

Democracy Now!

2008-08-16T18:52:00.003+02:00

As you may know I have lived void of television for several years now. While I'm not morally opposed to the boob tube for it's content and devaluation of the 'American family', I live said life as a protest to the business model of cable and paying for the privilege to have my life periodically interrupted by overly enthusiastic c-list actors and actresses trying to summon my consumption for things like 'the blowout KIA event of the year'! As part of my divorce from the babble box I have also been insulated from political ads that pepper the fall programing during any election year. As I sat watching a come to Jesus ad for the 'original Maverick' (McCain), which interrupted last nights Olympics, something quite profound dawned on me. I have yet to ever vote for a presidential candidate that ended up in the White house. Now granted, at the ripe age of 27 (I just turned) this will only be my third presidential election that I will have voted in, but none the less, the above observation burns a bit of an apathetic hole in my enthusiasm for the democratic process. The past two elections, and I'm quite proud to admit this, I voted democrat and can honestly plead the fifth for what happened to our country since. 2000 election my vote aligned with the masses in which Al Gore won the popular vote. However, thanks to our pals in the electoral college as well as some support from a southern boy named Jeb, GW made his way to Pennsylvania Avenue to begin his reign. In 2004 the only votes that mattered in that election were those from Ohio in which the Republican party convinced Howard Dean and John Kerry there was no need for an audit.

"We're quite confident it all worked out the way of the people"- Karl Rove.

"This is a great day for human rights, health care, education policy, Iraq relations, our continually deployed troops mothers, wives and new born's, the economy, same sex marriages, stem cell research, domestic spending, and the environment." - Dick Cheney

"Has anyone seen my hat? No, not that one, the one that I was wearing when I was on my ranch vacationing during 9-11. Yes, the one that I had on the day I decided it was time for some good ole Texas jihad (pronounced 'gee-had') on those Iraqi's (pronounced: 'e-rack-ees')" - GWB

Enter 2008. Time for another 'historic' vote. For me it will be yet another year of my vote not counting. I will be stationed abroad on the southern shores of Sweden when it comes time to punch my chad. I'll be voting absentee in a process know informally as the 'if we need your vote we'll send the interns out to the mailbox and they can count them if they get a minute'. Now, while traditionally this dynamic would have heightened my complacency towards the November circus, this year is different. I really feel this is the first time in my lifetime where the person I say I want in the white house will end up there (despite my say not being heard). With any luck, enough peers from my generation that have been equally disappointed by their lifetimes politics will turn out to ensure this country finally bucks the trend and can feel as though we have a say in the direction this country is headed. Now, any chance you all can have that deficit paid off before I get back to US soil?

Blood Money

2008-08-12T21:31:00.004+02:00

I'll preface this tale with an apologetic disclaimer as my poetic theatrics are jaded by the present lack of proteins and glucose in my system. The morning task was to waltz into the local ZLB plasma center, provide documentation, hook my arm up to a machine and 'donate' my sacred fluids for a one time (introductory) wind fall of $40. The process had been explained to me several times and details had been readily available over the last couple of weeks as my sister (who is now a tenant at my home) is currently an employee of ZLB. She made it sound so simple and pure, almost healthy at times. Like picking up an extra shift at a restaurant or perhaps working an hour or so of overtime on a weekend. The true story is this is no place for the timid (or medically uncomfortable).....

The horror started around 8:00 am when I walked over to the center from my home. The place itself is housed in a drab 1980's era strip mall with stereotypical tenants that you would expect in a college town; sandwich shop, phone database call center, tattoo and piercing parlor, kung fu dojo and of course a Starbucks across the street. The receptionist in her over sized white lab coat, small framed glasses, and welcoming grin greeted me at the sign in sheet. At this point I was number 5 in line. I was the only patron that wasn't visibly coming down from their last high. Granted I had a couple vodka and pineapples before bed last night, but these people, man they would wash down cannonballs of ether with such a mix. I began presenting my documentation declaring that I was who I was, that I had an address and wasn't homeless, and that I hadn't had sexual relations with anyone from the remote parts of the amazonian Congo since the early 70's. Define 'relations'......

I returned to my seat (fearful of sticking to it) and waited my turn. The lad to my left with the raiders tattoo and full body under armour outfit had music pouring from his I-pod. Something like that of which 'Iron' Mike use to listen to before he knocked the shit out (or bit some one's ear off) of someone at Ceasers. I fully expected Don King to show up any minute and start waving a flag as the poster propaganda around the lobby made you feel like you truly were helping the greater good with your donation......

Next step in the process. Reading comprehension. At this point the friendly nurse that greeted me was replaced by a maniacal looking heathen that that was forced to speak through a clear filmed welding mask that covered her entire body (maybe it was just her face). She pointed to a printout on the wall and ordered me to 'READ aloud please'. I began, "I fully understand that I will most likely get aids and die a miserable death as a result of my donation today". Apparently I passed the test as she moved on around the counter to the PC where I was to be logged into the global data base of dead beats who sell plasma, cultivate kidneys, and procreate as a form of export tourism. Name please.....

Feeling relieved that I passed the reading comprehension I returned to my seat which was now being occupied by a 110 pound (minimum weight) brunette that was audibly speaking to her significant other about 'hooking up' once she was done with this 'bullshit'. I'll be the first to admit that nothing gets me worked up like a good set of track marks on the small of a broads elbow....

"Jeffrey E?" was shouted from the hallway. It was go time on the compulsory physical that precedes a donors first deposit. The physical was a combination of a warm handshake and a proctological exam into my personal life. Poke here, listen to your heart, piss in a cup (I filled above the line of course) and now I'm going to ask you a few questions. The questions are more of an interrogation if not accusation about having sexual relationships with homosexual men and congoian inhabitants. The only thing that kept my person from tearing up was that the administrator of the exam was the nice nurse from the reception desk and she happened to know my sister. I think she took it easy on me. After repeatedly pleading innocence to the for mentioned accusations I was granted permission to begin triage....

Fransansisco was the nurse in charge of taking my vitals. Get on the scale, let me prick your finger, how about a blood pressure exam, are you sure you're not sleeping with anyone from interior Africa? Tests came back fine and I was allowed to return to my seat.....

"Jeffrey E?" was shouted from the hallway. At this point I'm too frazzled to answer any more questions related to my sexual past and am praying we can get to the needles. Sure enough, I'm escorted down the hallway to the 'floor'. The floor is this sterile lobby of over sized red lounge chairs aimed perfectly at televisions playing the latest Reese Witherspoon smash hit. The only difference between this scene and the chamber at San Quentin is that the butch head mistress roaming this floor could handle Laci Peterson solo whereas it takes a whole team at San Q.....

I'm instructed to sit (my ass) down and not move. Pick which arm I wanted to donate from and remain silent unless my eyes begin rolling back into my head or my heart stops. All the techs are wearing the same clear colored welding shield that the nurse at the front had. The purpose of these remained a mystery, but I'm assuming it's eye protection for the rare instance that a donee causes a scene and they have to reverse the machine thus pumping all his/her blood across the 'floor' like a fire hose on the fourth of July in the bronx. The process is explained to me. Pump my fist when the cuff tightens, relax when the cuff is loose. My blood is to be drained from my body, spun through this tape recorder like contraption at which point all the good stuff is removed from it, and then the left over shit that no one wants is to be pumped back in. Any questions?

The process begins with a series of tubes being taped to my chest. A needle the diameter of my nostril is then thrust into my arm creating an open spigot to drain from. After an initial sample the machine kicks on and begins siphoning my cells. Immediately I can feel life leaving my body. The butch nurse stands directly over me and while flaring her eyebrows like a hooligan about to pounce she asks 'if everything is ok'. You bet, is this all you got!

My body begins fighting a psychological battle between death and life. Is that tingling in my feet suppose to be there? Why in the hell does this machine keep beeping at me....oh god, don't look....Is that my blood running like water through these tubes....I swear that's an air bubble coming through the return tube, it's going to stop my heart cold.....why is everyone looking at me....is it obvious this is my first time...how much more of this stuff are they going to take? Ok, I don't care about the $40, I simply want to live to see another day....don't make a scene...relax, I'm sure that bright pink colored fluid they're pumping back into me is suppose to be that color.

I decide that the only way I'm getting out of here is to relax and try to make sense of this chaotic scene that I'm living. As I scan the room full of hopeless depressants all hooked up to these machines I begin to eavesdrop on their vile conversations. The lad to my left seems to be quite popular with the floor staff. So much so that the head mistress describes a past (hopefully much distant) Halloween costume that consisted of a black g-string, black leather hat and a black vest. She continued to emphasize that 'there was nothing else'. As I swallow the bile that filled my mouth after an unnatural visual of that description I move on to the next conversation. It appears that the lad to my right is engaged in a conversation with another nurse who has this Dr. Jekyll Pippy Longstocking look going on. It appears as though she's planned to go to the Grizzly Rose tonight for the sake of finding someone to supplement her failing (yet three month old) marriage with. If I was that lad I'd return to the Tom Wolfe book in his lap (even if he is only pretending to read it). Fist pump, fist pump....come on you damn machine hurry up!

Now things are getting serious. The canister next to me is over three quarters of the way full and the machine is making a different pitched beep than before. I brave the elements and look over. To my horror, the whole dash board of the thing is flashing red. The lights correspond to the label 'none'. They've finally done it I say to my self, they've sucked all the life right out of me. There's not a single drop of blood left in my being. I slowly come to grips with the fact these will be my last breaths.

Luckily (I use that term loosely) a neo-Nazi looking giant comes to my aid. Dressed in the full outfit with face shield he plays around with the tubing a bit and we're back in business. Apparently there is still some fluid left and they want to make sure they drain me dry. I continue to pump and sit.

Finally, the machine sounds the completion. My body is weakened beyond my wildest expectations and a large urn of piss colored fluid hangs from an electronic scale to my side. The over sized Nazi comes to my aid to remove the tubes from me and bandage me up. I'm encouraged not to smoke within the next hour and not to have a drink or engage in exercise for the next 6 months as it may cause fatal side effects. I'm given a small slip of paper that looks like a receipt from a dollar store. I'm to take the receipt with my PIN number on it to the ATM machine in the lobby at which point I follow the on-screen instructions and my money will appear. I'm hoping that I still have brain function left to complete this normally ordinary task....

I think today marked a historic low in my on-going battles with cash flow. Next time I need a cash infusion and desire the medium to be fluid I'll use Google to find a sperm bank and donate that instead. At least there you get to check out a few pin ups and to the best of my knowledge no ones wearing welding helmets (despite their ironically more useful application at such a place.)

Early Retirement

2008-08-04T21:54:00.004+02:00

Today I officially join the 8.8 million (and growing) other people in this great country that don't have a job. I must admit it feels pretty good. I thought to bring closure to my last gig it would be good to share some of the life lessons learned in the trenches.

First lesson: A corporation is built to make money for shareholders. The less they can pay you as an employee the better job they are doing of meeting shareholder expectations. Plain and simple.

Second lesson: You're 'five year career' plan that you spent so much time in creating is only important to you (that is unless you've left a copy of it in the men's' room and the toilet paper dispenser has run out. It may (and even then it's unlikely) garner some attention from 'senior management'.)

Third lesson: No good deed goes unpunished. I think this may be a biblical reference, but I bet those of you in your cubes reading this can come up with two dozen applications for the 'real world'.

Fourth lesson: No matter what job you have there is a 50% chance that you are working too hard. Others in the group are not working at all, but have (and this is no small feat) cut 3 strokes off their handicap since their last employer.

Fifth lesson: Age matters. Mid 20's, smart, respected, voracious reader, natural ability to get people to follow, curious about the world, personable, and creative; go to grad school. Try it again in 5 years.

While I'd like to continue I must admit that my morning yoga class took a bit more out of me than I had anticipated. I think it's best if I grab a short nap before meeting buddies for early afternoon cocktails. So long 9-5!

Call To Duty: Become Me For A Year

2008-07-06T20:18:00.004+02:00

As some of you know, and the rest of you will after Monday, I am going to take the next year of my life and study economics in the southern Swedish city of Lund in pursuit of a masters degree. With any major life change there are certain things one will miss about their current station Of course my family I will miss, my colleagues I will miss, my social circles of friends and acquaintances I will miss, the city (Fort Collins) I will miss, etc. Now, while I can deal with my own departure (as it's my doing) I've been trying to devise a plan to ease the burden of my absence on others. Today it came to me....enlist someone to become me for a year.

That's right. Today is the official launch date of the 'Become Me For A Year' campaign. The ideal applicant, upon selection, will be ushered into my world for a no holds barred orientation into the world of Jeff. During your orientation you will meet new people, be presented new opportunities, and get a taste of life as though you were me (even if just for a single year). Upon successful completion of the orientation program, and upon my late August departure you will in fact become Me for a full year. Our whole lives we spend wondering what it would be like to be someone else, well, here's your chance! Don't let it slip you by!!

The ideal candidate will have some (if not all) of the interests and skills below:

Interests:

- yoga, economics, bad jokes, tea/coffee (at non-corporate coffee shops), idea propagation, public speaking, the great outdoors, writing, reading, random conversation, hiking, traveling, visual arts, sushi, new york style pizza, my famous homemade margartitas, summer cookouts, spin class, 2-3 day beards, slack lining, brewskies with buddies or some vino with the danes, political stump speaking, opinionated banter, and most importantly a love of Fort Collins.
Skills:

- Ability to organize groups of people for events like 'brewfest' pouring teams and 'got carbs' challenges.

- Ability to make bad jokes or 'questionable comments' without first thinking about what you're saying (also known as putting one's foot in mouth).

- Ability to think outside the box (unless that box of course can be morphed into some great new idea).

How To Apply:

Send resumes, videos, letters, blog posts, whatever media you want (the more creative the better) to me at my email meforayear@gmail.com

The application deadline will be July 27th. At that point the eligible candidates will go through a fast paced interview process after which a final selection will be made. Good luck everyone!!

Hang On To Your Shorts

2008-06-30T21:08:00.003+02:00

Those of you that fall victim to my occasional econ 101 soap box rants are aware of the preaching I have been doing with regards to the yield on treasuries. I have, for a long time, felt the yields on treasuries were far too low and unsustainable at current levels. This would indicate an opportunity to short said asset and capitalize when the yield (which moves inverse to the price) begins to rise.

Historically, the mechanical implementation of this plan would have been far too cumbersome (and expensive) for a petty investor to implement on their own. Luckily the boys at ProShares created a couple of new ETF's to fill this highly specific niche. Almost every etf and ishare available is built to respond to price changes in a certain index (in this case the Lehman 7-10 year treasury index). Some funds prosper when the index price increases, some prosper when the index price declines. The latter is known as a short play. Some funds use leverage (loans) to add some 'ultra' price movement, which simply means that the fund will move $2 for every $1 the underlying index moves (positive or negative). The fund that I had been tracking and have now purchased is both a short play as well as a leveraged 'ultra' fund. The fund is ticker symbol PST and is appropriately named the ProShares Ultra Short Lehman 7-10 Year Treasury.

Here is some high level reasoning for this play and the timing of it. It seems like everyone these days tracks the Fed's monetary policy and their actions related to the fed funds rate. The fed has pushed the current rate down to 2% which is a historically low level not seen since December 2004. The lowering of this rate increases money supply and is intended to 'heat up' the economy. The downside is that it fuels inflation. I recently compared the historical spread between true (core + non-core) inflation and yields on the 10 year treasury. The current yield on a 10 year treasury is within a few basis points of 4%, current inflation 4.18%. At no point in the last 20 years of our financial markets has inflation out paced the yield on the 10 year. In fact, just a short ten years ago you would have been rewarded with a 4% spread over inflation by purchasing the 10 year note. Now, while a 4% spread may be a bit lofty for an investment that is void of credit risk, the point remains that the current yield on the ten year isn't outpacing inflation and therefore something will have to give. Either inflation will have to settle, or the yield on the 10 year will have to come up. The fed has stated that they are seriously ready to fight inflation....they would most likely do this with an increase to the feds funds rate. That move would knock inflation down and raise yields on the 10 year. Both of which are good for my latest buy.

Now, if Starbucks could find its way to $18 a share I might just about survive this latest market correction without having to pledge any unborn children.....that's a whole other can of worms....

The Last Laugh

2008-06-23T16:42:00.006+02:00

I write my post today with a heavy heart. The legendary George Carlin has passed away. For anyone that's ever laughed at an 'off colored' joke, told such a joke, threw a curse word at your favorite football team, or noticed something in society that's funny (yet completely inappropriate), let's honor the true father of the first amendment with a moment of silence.......Good bye George, we'll miss you. Your sinister demeanor, your 'in your face' delivery and your stage antics (all while wearing casual and comfortable clothes) will long outlive your passing.

My Worst Investment Ever. Period.

2008-06-20T18:35:00.002+02:00

Some of you may know that I am in the process of selling my car. The particular car is a 2005 two door, sporty Scion TC. These cars are very popular among 'youngsters' as they are cheaper than their more luxurious counterparts, yet offer all the same amenities and features that the more expensive cars do. Not to mention that they look good as well. As part of any sales process it's important to come up with a selling price. I've listed mine at $13,250. This value is based on several sources and should be a fair market value that is obtainable. I was quite encouraged to discover during my research that these cars have held their value so well. Another fine Toyota product (scion is a subsidiary of Toyota). Since I'm a finance guy by trade I thought it would be interesting to evaluate the true cost of this 'investment' over its lifetime.

Original purchase price: $19,470.51
Miles Driven: ~26K
Time of ownership: 34 months

I won't go into detail on this post but I did (of course) build a spreadsheet for this analysis. Bottom line, including taxes, interest expense, insurance, gas, plates and registration, depreciation expense, and maintenance this rig has cost me a whopping $17,356 over it's three year life span. Oh, and did I mention that there's still $9,595 left to pay on the note that I obtained when I financed it? Assuming I paid it off today, in cash, the total tab for this hot rod would run $26,951. At most it's worth $13,250, thus a loss of roughly 100%.

Couple of things to consider....I converted the cost number that I came up with into cost per mile driven. It comes to roughly $0.67/mile. Thus, even my meager 4 mile round trip commute to and from the office costs me a cup of tea and a fresh baked raisin cookie at Mugs.

Secondly, a large portion (37%) of the cost figure presented above is solely attributed to depreciation (mind you, that this is on a car that was voted one of the least depreciating cars in 2007 by Auto trend). Thus, as consumers, wouldn't it make sense for us to focus more heavily on that component when we're making our purchases? Looks like we just dealt another blow to Detroit.

Lastly, I use to own an entire fleet of vehicles at one point in my life; several small Toyota pick-ups and an old International Harvester Scout Rally II (all at the same time). That was at a time in my life when my average annual income was around $12,000. All of them were insured, all of them ran. The cost of all of those, including the gas for the scout, wouldn't have come within a bumpers width of the cost of the 'off the lot' little gray sports car that I'm trying to sell today.

Anyone have a scout for sale?

Notable Quotables....

2008-06-08T18:53:00.002+02:00

Robert Reich, author of Supercapitalism, some thought provoking quotes from his latest book on the transformation of business, democracy, and everyday life......

- "to confuse greed with opportunity is to confound desire with availability."
- "the boundary between enlightened self interest and broad empathy is blurry."
- "lonely forbearance can be the last refuge of a virtuous fool."

Tertvetuloa To The Mystery Voyage - Estonia to Helsinki

2008-06-08T18:42:00.000+02:00

While there may be many routes to take when traveling from Estonia’s capital city of Tallinn to Finland’s capital of Helsinki there is only one that I recommend….the late afternoon slow ferry booze cruise aboard Eckeroline cruise ships. Here’s how my trip played out, wave by wave…..

4:20pm – An unsuspecting young American boards a 3 hour ferry to nearby Finland. Should be an uneventful, relaxing end to a wondrous trip that was. The ferry itself is divided into 7 decks. The bottom two decks house cargo and cars. The third deck houses the reception area, ticketing booths, and duty free market. The fourth deck is home to the entertainment; a coffee shop and buffet take up half the deck and the other half is dominated by the lounge area and a make shift disco. The fifth, sixth and seventh decks are for sleeping. Cabins and rooms line the dimly lit and outdated hallways.

4:25pm – I planned to spend my ride in the lounge. Taking down a couple of Finnish beers and taking in some of the entertainment on the ship that I forewent on my initial (early morning) voyage to Estonia two days earlier. The lounge is more of a ‘den’ than a lounge. It’s about 4 tables wide and 20 meters or so deep. In the far corner there is a make shift stage holding a dated karaoke machine and a well worn Les Paul Gibson guitar (a serious sword for some rockabilly’s). Upon my entrance my attention shifted to the den of long drink fueled Finnish cougars eager to pounce their pray. The place was lined with them, each drunker than the next. There was a lone table in the center section of the barri that I thought looked inviting. Little did I know this is the sacrificial hot seat of the cruise.

4:30pm – Karaoke is announced. The Eurovision hopefuls waddle their way through the maze of oversized European purses as they approach the stage to grab a song book and make their selections. It’s now become apparent that this dingy (float or sink) is headed for a Gilligan’s island style voyage and the freshly shaven American at the center table is at the epicenter of the brewing storm.

4:50pm – “Pohjanmaan Kautta” (bottoms up!!) yells Kari; a middle aged machine shop owner traveling with his family, extended family, and friends from Karjala. The first Lapin Kulta (beer) of the voyage fills my bowels. The Finnish table mates who have joined me as though we were next of kin spring to action as it’s go time for Kari to unleash the Finnish ballad he choose from the karaoke list. Perfectisimo! Eat your heart out Lawrence Welk.

5:00pm – Kari and his travel companions return to my table. Jazzed up from the perfect solo performance seconds earlier it’s now time to engage in Finland’s favorite past time….historical recapping of the war (any of them really). At mention of this topic I immediately go into blank stare mode. The cougars are inching ever closer and I’m going to need my wits about me to fend them off….can’t waste brain power on Kari and the war that was.
5:05pm – Ship pushes out to sea. We are finally moving. God bless. I lean down to grab some euros that fell from my pocket and the first thing that greets me under the table is the overly pungent scent of rotting flesh and stale socks. It appears that the week old blisters from the third degree smoke sauna floor burn on my feet have hit a tipping point. I can feel the squishiness in my shoes as I’m essentially walking in a puddle of blood and blister juice that is continually secreting from my feet in an effort to drain the puss and infection collected from the (less than 4 star) Estonian hotel room that I was walking on bare foot for two nights. Should be a pleasant experience to share with my aisle mates on the10.5 hour flight from Frankfurt to Denver.

5:10pm – “America may be the land of possibility, but in Russia everything is possible”. Kari has moved on to Russian jokes now and his travel mates love every minute of it. It shouldn’t be long now and we’ll be off the topic of Finnish occupation and independence fighting. I’ll zone out for a bit more I think. The boat is now full steam ahead. Estonia is becoming a fleeting memory as the wake leaves it behind.

5:20pm – My attention shifts to what’s perhaps the most disturbing music video I have ever seen. It’s playing on the karaoke screen that faces the audience (just in case the audience feels like joining in). The video is of a 350lb. plus man in a gray t-shirt and sea foam colored sweat pants rolling around on his living room floor in a pile of filth, consuming everything in his reach; potato chips, beers, and cheetos…..confusion ensues as I try to decipher if this is some sort of twisted Sex Pistols cover or an Eastern block tribute to ‘free living’ and consumption…..either way there’s no turning back now the ship has set sail.

5:30pm – Thankfully the singing is over. The bloodshed from my feet continue, but the bloodshed from my ears can now subside for a brief. I decide to check back into the conversation with Kari and his pals….”In Russia they don’t even have washing machines, they smell like shit….we were never going to lose that winter war to those shit smellers”….the group explodes in laughter again….Kari’s 6 long drinks in since we boarded….elapsed time 1.5 hours.

5:45pm – Next on the program Steve Webb. Who the fuck is Steve Webb you ask? Good question….best I could tell he’s a dried up lounge singer from Liverpool trying to pass his time as a regular on the 3.5 hour eckoline tour from Tallinn. He’s kind of a cross between an early Mick Jagger (smaller mouth) and a 50’s style Buddy Holly (if you can picture that). His accent is heavy, his hair is dyed a jet black, and bright red converse chuck’s dawn his feet. Don’t kid yourself though Steve’s got a serious guitar and you know he’s just doing this gig until he can scrape together a few bucks, get the bus fixed, post bail for his long time bassist and hit the open road to tour the land……

6:00pm – My Finnish table mates have up and left and the heat intensifies from the cougar consortium that surrounds me…don’t make eye contact I remind myself….don’t make eye contact. Steve continues his assault on the steel strings. Clapton, Stones, Jimi Hendrix, and Stevie Ray blast from the single amp on stage.

6:10pm – The small group of Finnish dudes to the south of my vector seem to be taking quite the interest in Steve. “Freebird” shouts out the husky chap to Steve’s left…..are you kidding me I think to myself. Steve Webb isn’t some bullshit sellout. Fuck all if he plays that crap.

6:12pm – “Freebird” fills the air as Steve wails on his six strings. We get our first male on male ass slap of the trip. The perpetrator; a 6’2” curly haired bearded fellow, his victim; a 5’6” bald shaven pin stripped shirt wearing lad who’s outfit screams ‘I need attention’…..well, he got it. Combined BAC of the two; a point higher than my college cumulative GPA (I wasn’t that bad of a student).

6:40pm – At this point I’m on the downhill side of a 6 pack that seems to magically keep refilling the glass in front of me…the financier of this hoax is a well jeweled hoity-toity women 15 years my senior sitting to my immediate right. While I’ve acknowledged her generosity I’m hesitant to make more than a simple cheers motion in her direction for fear of attack. She’d be a VERY attractive women if it weren’t for her lop sided augmentation that seems to be straining the yellow cashmere she wears. On second thought, as the waves intensify, having a friend on board with built in floatation devices might not be the worst idea. Perhaps I should introduce myself….

7:00pm – I’ve made my way to ‘sunshines’ table to properly thank her and her friends for the cocktails. I learn that the group is on the first half of a journey from their home in St. Petersburg to Helsinki. It’s a girl’s only affair to celebrate their friend’s recent divorce. Congratulations I guess….

7:05pm – Time for another round. Cuba libres pass around the table like down cards in a hold em game. These ladies mean business. With the latest round of libations it’s time to snap a few pictures. 5 Russian women and one American lad can be arranged into 198 different combinations for the purpose of Polaroid. I think we took at least 200 pictures just in case we missed something during the arithmetic. I feel so used….

7:15pm – A group of grandma’s make their way through the lounge from the disco. Each one has a cocktail (vodka tonic) and in each glass is a blinking light up ice cube. In tow each has a metal dollie loaded with 8-10 cases of duty free ‘kossu’ (vodka). Each case has 10 bottles, each bottle is a liter. What’s amazing here is not the shear quantity of white lightning these broads bought; it’s the stamina that is required to move such cargo. Even with the mechanical advantages afforded by the dollies each one of them must have been schlepping 1.5X their respective weight. Borat is always looking for a woman that’s ‘good with the plow’……. maybe he should book a ticket on Eckeroline.

7:20pm – Elvis’ “blue suede shoes” blasts from the stage. It’s time to hit the dance floor. A little twisting and some shouting and the resting heart rate jumps to 120bpm. Luckily I can no longer feel the pain from the infection in my feet.

7:35pm – People begin dropping like flies. For many of the passengers they are on a day trip that began at 8:00am and has been going strong ever since. I observe Kari being escorted to his room by his wife. She looks ‘happy’ with his choices. I guess that’s one facial expression that knows no language barriers.

7:45pm – A gentleman in a flannel cut off advances on the lone table of unclaimed cougars left in the lounge. His lead in is an exaggerated air guitar solo of the Pearl Jam song Steve is strumming from the stage. I think he would have had resounding success if it wasn’t for the horrendous breath (a result of a dozen empty long drinks and a mountain of shelled peanuts that laid on his table) and the fact his fly was unzipped….Shoot, I hate that when that happens….his pursuit quickly retreats (insert war analogy for Finnish appeal).

8:05pm – A ‘Talking Heads’ cover launches the patrons into action. It’s twisting and shaking abound as this cruise ship is headed into port. The long narrow seaway into Helsinki is now being navigated by our captain, who god willing, is more sober than his passengers in the hull.

8:10pm – Did I mention that Steve has a handmade (homemade) guitar strap that spells out S-T-E-V-E in giant red puffy paint letters?....yeah, he does.

8:15pm – It’s time for Steve to regain control of this riot. “Imagine” by the Beatles ought to do the trick…ah yes, serenity. Welcome to Helsinki, we’ve arrived.

Beetle Kill Fun Facts

2008-06-05T22:42:00.002+02:00

Today's spotlight on CSU luncheon focused on the much heated topic of the Rocky Mountain Pine Beetle. These little devils are causing quite a mess in our lodge pole pine population. Here are some not so fun facts related to the epidemic.....

- There are currently 1.5mm acres of infested trees in Colorado. This pales in comparison to the 30mm acres of infected and dead trees in British Columbia.

- 2007 there were roughly 5.2mm trees killed by the disease.

- The cost to clean up the remains (dead trees) is $500-$1000/acre. That's a $750,000,000 opportunity (using the $500/acre number) for Colorado forestry business.

- Preventative measures can be sought after and applied for $10-$15/tree.

-The dead tree timber, despite its blue color tone from the residual beetle fungus, has no structural change and is perfectly suitable for use if culled within 2 years of death.

Send Jim Alderden Out To Pasture

2008-06-05T16:54:00.002+02:00

For a long time our counties sheriff, gun slinger Jim Alderden, has been able to convince our citizens that his rough rider BB gun policies are not only effective in the management of the wild west but are conducive to the propagation of a progressive society we hope to build along the front range. So convincing in fact that in November of 2005 'we' actually voted in an amendment that allowed this asshole a run at a third term (with that same amendment we got to keep Rennels on board for another term which is the ONLY positive out of that decision....see, I'm not so partisan after all am I).

Let's reflect on Jimmy's latest crowning achievement.....bicycle law enforcement. Apparently riding two abreast is not only a social no-no on the ole 10 speed, but now is punishable by fine, imprisonment, or decapitation. I thought in our evolution we would have delegated enforcement of this type of criminal mischief to the likes of junior high hall monitors and for hire PI's with bad tans and uncomfortably short shorts. It turns out that it actually falls under the umbrella of our sheriff's office (and is subsequently funded by our tax dollars).

When Jim was running for his latest appointment his platform was 'expansion of the jail and alternative sentencing program'. I wondered at the time where they would find more inmates to fill these requested beds. I guess I know now.

Citizens of Larimer County (and visitors from abroad) you've been warned! Our gun-slinging, straight shooting, sheriff is ready and armed to enforce bicycle laws on our open roads. If you're even thinking of wearing spandex, helmets, and neon clothing and hitting the open roads of Larimer county it's our sheriff's (and his Barney's) advice to not let sundown catch you in this town. Think I'm joking....Bull's Eye.

What's the nexus here....well, I'll put this into a context Jim can understand. When horses get old and decrepit, unable to do work and out of touch with the times, they're sent out to pasture to live out their dying days. Eventually they pass and they either get hauled to the edge of the property with a front end loader or shipped off to the 'factory' and turned into dog food and glue. Get the jist.....

Things that don't translate.....

2008-05-26T06:08:00.001+02:00

Travel Tip 108

2008-05-22T16:25:00.002+02:00

Anyone that has traveled has most likely suffered from a condition known as travel funk. This is the condition that is a result of stale airplane or hotel air coupled with an unsavory hotel shower and topped off by a slim layer of grim that evenly coats ones body as a result of wearing the same shirt for a week. Ah, the open road.....

To cure such a condition one needs to remember only one thing: department stores. These modern day meccas are one stop shops for travel weary people suffering from the funk. Simply find a department store and make your way inside. Meander aimlessly for a spell while making your way slowly to the cologne/perfume aisle. Once there begin examining the bottles in detail making sure to avoid eye contact with any of the customer service staff. When you find the scent you like simply plop a couple of shots onto your neck line and 'poof'....lovely and scented again. Ready for the day ahead.

Leaving on a jet train!

2008-05-14T09:19:00.003+02:00

" This is the end, beautiful friend....This is the end, my only friend....The end of our elaborate plans...The end of everything that stands....The end"....Jim Morrison (sometime before the overdose)

Today is the last official day of our groups ambassadorial obligations. Tomorrow; freedom. As some of you may know I´m headed to Estonia. I have heard nothing but positive things about the country and the capital city of Tallinn since I got to Finland. Things are cheaper, the language and people are different, the currency isn´t the euro, and apparently I´ll have an opportunity to get in that much coveted game of chess that I´ve been searching for since I hit the tarmac, as the game is alive and well due to the Russian population (40% of the overall country) living within their borders. Here is the plan (in typical JP fashion)....

4:00am....wake up at Hotel in Tampere. Grab cheese and ham sandwich (illegally bootlegged from hotels prior morning continental breakfast) along with luggage and get moving on foot. I have to make my way to city center to catch a 4:45 train to Helsinki. I timed the route this morning and at a brisk pace (void of the 80lbs. of luggage I´ll be carrying) it took me 20 minutes on the nose. Normally I would ´borrow´uncorraled grocers cart for such a trek, but in this country it costs you €1 deposit when you use one so people don´t just leave them lying around after they´re done using them...more on that when I return.

6:50am...train arrives in Helsinki. I then (fueled by a ham sandwich) will grab my luggage yet again and head to the harbor port. Note to travelers in Finland: when booking ferries make sure you know which port you sail out of before confirming your order. There are 2 seperate ports, and the second (cheaper and of course the one I selected) is about 15 minutes further by foot than the more expensive (traditional option)....I need to board the boat by 7:15 (good luck).

7:30am...board ferry and possibly deposit luggage at the ship lines long term lockers for pick up when I return to Helsinki before my outbound flight. I figure a pair of boxer shorts, a clean t-shirt and a pair of socks will all fit in my coat pocket so why not travel light....

10:00am....arrive in Tallinn! From there I´ll make my way to the hotel that I found and hopefully check in by 10:30 (the earliest possible check in time according to Svetlana; the hotel assistant).

Best parts of this painfully complicated plan......

-I´ll save about €10 by not taking a cab for any of the legs of this deal, as well as burn about 1000Kcal by totting 80 pounds of luggage with me (hiking season is right around the corner).
-I saved about €5 on the boat ticket as apparently there aren´t a whole lot of travelers that prefer some obscure boat that leaves at the ass crack of dawn from some remote port in a major European city.
-If all goes as planned (which it undoubtably won´t) I should by in Tallinn in time for morning coffee and have my first Russian in checkmate no later than noon!

Now, if I can just find one of those furry Siberian musk oxen hats......

Here we go again.....

2008-05-09T18:54:00.003+02:00

Tomorrow morning brings yet another change in location as our group will make a return trip to the big city of Tampere south of our current post. It looks like we´re going to be shacking up for the remainder of our time in a hotel in downtown city center. I have no doubt that it´s going to be a great closing week to what has been a life changing trip.

Some thoughts.....

During my time here I have had an opportunity to experience first hand a sterotypically closed and conservative culture in a very intimate manner. For four weeks (and soon to be 5) I have eaten like a Finn, drank like a Finn, saunaed like a Finn, played badminton like an American (but with Finns on my team), hiked like a Finn, and took to the forest like a Finn. The whole time the social barriers and conservative stereotype that western Europe has bestowed upon them; broke down at first introduction. Invited into people´s homes, shared meals in their children´s schools, saunaed with their friends, and toasted hockey victories in true Suomi fashion during the world championships that have been playing out during our visit. The only disappointment that I have about the Finns is that they didn´t do a good enough job reproducing. The whole country has roughly 2 times the amount of people as the Front Range. I think the world could use a couple million more.

The Finnish social economy is foreign to the American capitalistic way of thinking. Despite being a card carrying democrat supporting the ideaology that ´thou shall help thy brother out, for thou don´t knoweth when thou ends up in that situation´ I´m not sure that I had a clear understanding of what an economy looked like that truly built and inacted policy to support the pedagogy. Some things are better, some things are worse. It´s an apples to oranges comparison that´s too complicated to argue about. The Finnish private doctor that pays income taxes of 65% probably wishes the system had fewer social programs his income had to support. At the same time, if you ask him about it, it was the subsidized tuition free education that same social system provided for him to obtain the tools and knowledge to have the privlige of earning an income that pushed him into those higher brackets. He also sleeps pretty well at night (most likely in a modestly sized three bedroom house in the suburbs) not having to worry about how his two children will pay for college, or where his retirement money will come from, or if he can afford health care when he´s 85. When you think of the current consumption the doctor foregoes in the context of the big life picture, perhaps it´s not such a rub.

War to Finland is very real. It´s not something that they learned about while reading in a histroy book, it´s not some light show they sat and ate dinner in front of while Peter Jennings narrated, and it´s certainly not a power point presentation from the pentagon outlining a faceless nameless attack on terror. Instead, it´s something that landed in their back yards, that burned their churches, that killed their grandfathers, and all but cost them their sovereignty. Perhaps it those dark days that guides their foreign policy at present. Perhaps it´s their population of just over 5mm people that prevents them from taking global chances for fear they may end up in the wrong ´neighborhood´ for too long at too much a cost...whatever it is, it seems to be agreed upon that military force is a last resort, and not simply a political game of leap frogging from country to country in hopes of restoring justice by declaring marshall law. Isn´t that same cautious attitude what we ask our commander and chief to pledge to as well?

The saying goes (as we´ve heard many times) that ´few Finns have too much, but even fewer Finns have too little´. It seems as though every part of the Finnish system has been designed to hinder the class seperation that so many developed countries face. If there is a more homogeneous population mass on the planet please show it to me. This equality creates an interesting social dynamic. The Finns don´t brag about what they have, and they don´t audibly yearn for what they don´t since everyone has the same.

The ´Finnish dream´ is still alive and well. Every Finn wants a house (with a sauna) near a lake, a steady means of making money and supporting themselves, 4-5 weeks of paid vacation a year, and a small (often without running water or electricity) cottage that they can go to in the summer to ´get away from it all´ and spend time with their 1.73 children. This dream is achiveable for Finns. A modest job, a couple lucky breaks perhaps, and the dream can be theirs. It´s clear, concise, and obtainable. Now, go ahead and define the present day version of the American dream. Is it enough to obtain a modest house with a medium sized yard, a small (god forbid) fuel efficient car, 2.1 children, and a riding lawn mower? Probably not. What would the neighbors think?

Finns will never be as blonde, beautiful and boisterous as their neighbors to the west, and they´ll never be as cold, crooked nosed, and corrupt as their comrades to the east. This slots them into some sort of purgatory where their president more resembles Conan O´Brien than an international leader. It could be something in the water I suppose.

Postcard From Finland!

2008-05-06T16:54:00.002+02:00

Finlandia Update

2008-05-06T16:00:00.002+02:00

So, the last week has been a true week of travel. No internet, no cell phones (that part felt like home), and no big city life. First part of the week our group was holed up at a hotel in Hamelina. Fun time (I guess), as we happened to catch the infamous ´vappu´ (May 1st) celebration we had heard so much about from the Finns. Turns out (despite the name), the holiday actually begins on the last day of April. No one works that day, and the city (with the exception of the bars) shuts down early. Our guide for the days (daze) was none other than a Brazillian transplant named Lewis. Long story short, he ended up in Finland by following some dane who apparently was a great pastry baker....I may not be translating that perfectly as my Finnish has yet to become ´fluent´, but none the less..... We hit the town and unintentionally ended up in some odd karokee bar(s). Turns out Finnish lads don´t dance much, and we all know that Jeffrey does. You can figure out the rest. Next morning, it was time to meet for morning brunch (which consisted of champagne and nothing really at all to eat) for some good ole Finnish folk song singing. The town mayor was there as well as some other (apparently) important people, all of whom were wearing these white sailor hats with tassles that resembled victorian era curtain ties. It´s a good look really. Anyways, we started getting grilled about American folk songs and being asked to sing a couple.....the only one I could think of was Óld MacDonald´. So there we sat, with the better part of the Finnish parliment making animal noises. Add that to the already long list of ´things I should leave off my resume´.

Moving on, our group moved to a new location outside the rural city of Laukaa. We spent a few nights at the equivelent of a summer camp retreat on (of course) a lake shore. The place was grand! The sunsets were amazing. We had our own cottage.....row boat.... hiking trails.....and of course sauna. It was some much needed r&r!! We all took in some sun with the weather being exceptional for our entire time there. Record highs of around 24 degrees C. Who knew I would be wearing shorts and a t-shirt in Finland while wishing I had my flip flops? Our stay at the summer camp ended with a special treat. A traditional smoke sauna at a summer resort that a gentleman and his wife run as a hunting, fishing, sauna, ice fishing, eating, naked lake swimming, four wheeler rodeo, logging, camp. While smoke sauna is always a special treat, this one was even more so. The lumber jack looking lad who owns the place went ahead and prepared a special peat moss skin exfoliation rub for us. The men went first as the sauna was too hot for the ladies. After grabbing our thinly cut birch planks to sit on (CHECK FOR SPLINTERS) we went in for our initial warm up. A few minutes later it was time to hit the icy cold lake for a quick dip. Then it was time to lather up in peat. After the group was good and covered it was time to grab our planks and head back in. 20 minutes was the time goal with constant water throwing on the blazzing hot stones. We were being urged to take in water cups with us as we were going to be losing some serious fluids. As the steam engulfed us the peat turned to a gooey liquid that slowy melted off our bodies and piled onto the sauna floor making the whole place look like an unkept feed lot. 20 minutes later it was time to wash off in the lake. Add that whole experience to the already long list of ´things you never planned on doing with your pants off´.

Other experiences or notes from the week:

- We took part in some cryogenic therapy at a rhematory arthritis facility. The chamber is chilled down to -110C (-166F). It´s so cold that your breath freezes into little snow flakes when you exhale. You can only safely stay in there for 2 minutes at a time. Side note, I did this less than 2 hours after my morning sauna. If the sauna was roughly 80C (176F), that´s one hell of a temperature inversion. Felt great though.

- A rest room is not the same as a bathroom. A rest room is truly a room where people can rest. They have them in all the schools. They have a small cot in them and the school nurse checks on them while they sleep.

- Kids in Finland speak better english than anyone south of the mason dixon.

Finland On Table Service

2008-04-28T19:57:00.002+02:00

Throughout our journey our group hasn´t spent a lot of time eating in restaurants. We have mainly done a combination of home cooked prepared meals that our host families have been gracious enough to share, and buffett style lunches and dinners where you serve yourself. This seemed peculiar to me, and left me wondering why....now I know. It had been described by the travel books and several people that I talked to ahead of time that the Finns are notoriously bad at restaurant service. Let me put the ambiguity to rest. They are in fact horrible! We went to a meal the other day in downtown Helsinki. It was a regular restaurant, kind of a bistro bar with a Texas theme (if you can imagine such a thing in downtown Helsinki). Nothing fancy. First off we had to seat ourselves. Luckily we had a Finn with us who knew the protocol as apparently an open table doesn´t neccessarily mean you can sit at it and enjoy your meal there. After finally finding a table in which we could sit (and grabbing our own menus) we were informed that the table we were at was solely for drinking (meaning we couldn´t eat there). That was a new one.... Apparently the restaurants have seperate places for eating and drinking?? I haven´t really figured this out yet, but when you describe that you are looking for a pub type atmosphere where you can have some pub food and a beer the responses are pretty blank. Anyways, after relocating ourselves we finally were in a qualified eating area of the establishment. Our beers arrived (we had ordered them at least 15 minutes before their eventual arrival) and we requested some water. It was now time to order. A young lad came over to our table and took our orders. Let the waiting game begin. I think we waited at least an hour before our meals finally came. That wouldn´t have been so bad as it wasn´t like we had somewhere we were suppose to be, what was bad is that litterally not one single person came over to check on us. You would think at €5/beer they would pay attention to potentially parched patrons who could help boost the restaurant revenue run rate. I guess not....So, the meal finally arrived and we sat there eating. When we were finished we finally received a check (after asking for it), and we paid. It´s worth noting that there isn´t an expectation to tip in Finland. In fact it´s expected that you don´t as the price includes all taxes and tips (thank god). Here are my conclusions....

- Don´t waste time eating out in Finland at any sort of sit down restaurant. The food won´t be worth it, and the service will be terrible, so don´t go through the pain.

- Social systems create disincentive for people to go above and beyond the ´normal´ call of duty. This was clearly demonstrated with the restaurant service. Good or bad, the servers pay check is going to be the same. What difference does it make if the patrons resort to drinking their own urine in an attempt to quench their thirst?

- There are a lot of little kioski´s and street food throughout the streets. Eat at those places. While the food is in fact fast food and probably not that great for you, at least you won´t be sitting for such a length of time that you actually have to become concerned that your blood is clotting within your legs from lack of circulation.

- Lastly, don´t go anywhere without a cheese log and some crackers. If nothing else you can snack on them until your meal shows up.

Finland on Sports

2008-04-28T08:45:00.004+02:00

Finalnd seems to be a country that is quite interested in sports. They love their hockey, enjoy a friendly (my ass) game of badminton, love nordic events like ski jumping and cross country skiing, participate in rally car and forumla one racing, floor hockey is popular with the kids, and most of all they claim title (and host) to the interenational world championships of mölkky (picture a heffer cow choking on her cud as she tries to moo to pronunciate the word correctly). Mölkky is a game that is as old as the north country herself. It combines two things that the Finns know more about than perhaps any country in the UN....wood and math! The rules are simple....you start with 12 blocks arranged in a tightly packed group which slightly resembles the pattern of an 8 ball arrangement before you break. The blocks are about 4 inches high in the front, and 6 inches high in the back, each of which is cut at an angle across the top and a number (1-12) is engraved into them so that the participants can see the numbers from the ´throwing line´(which is roughly 4 meters away). The game begins by taking the ´widow maker´(my new name) which is an 8 inch log about 2 inches in diameter, and throwing it underhand into the upright blocks. If for example you hit down 4 blocks you get 4 points (one point for each block), if you hit down just one (and only one) block you get the score that corresponds to the number on the block. For example, if you hit down the 6 block (and only the 6 block) you get 6 points for that turn. Once the score has been determined the fallen blocks are then righted in the spot where they fell. The blocks start to get spread out as the game goes on. Teams (or individuals) alternate turns and tabulate their scores in route to 50. The first one to 50 (without going over, or you start back at 25) is crowned champion and glory is bestowed upon thee. Last night we played a grueling 5 match series Finland vs. USA. The heavily favorited Finns came in to the first match with their heads held high. It didn´t take long though before they realized the USA was here to play.

Game1.... Tie. The US had landed on 50 points first, but since we led to start the game the Finns got to take their last át bat´at which point they tied us.

Game 2....Finland jumped out early. As they attempted to deliver the final blow they started to one off some pins and tried to hit some higher numbered pins which stood alone. There was one stretch where they missed all the blocks in the field of play 3 times in a row. It was explained to the US team before hand that if this happened where 3 turns in a row yielded no points than that team lost. When the US team (mainly myself) started to celebrate the victory the rules magically changed and no longer was the 3 missed shot rule in effect. This judgement came from a partisan council made up solely of Finns. I have petitioned the international gaming commision and they are looking into the matter. After a heated argument that nearly turned to bloodshed the Finns went on to close out the game. Advantage Finland (pending audit).

Game 3.....The US team had their backs against the wall here. They knew it was now or never if they wanted to have any chance at laying claim to their own dignity. The team made it happen. A series of dead eyed rockets that assembled a perfect algorithem of pins carried the team to their first win. Series tied.

Game 4....The US team was 10 feet tall as they launched perfect shots to start the game. The lead grew faster than a paper birch in Helsinki until I made a fatal error in judgement. We needed only 4 points to close out the match at which point I thought hitting a group of pins (irrelevant of their number) would yield us closer to that magic number 50. My attempt failed to connect on a group of pins and instead hit the lone 10 pin. This put our total score at 56 and therefore we were back at 25. The Finns did leave the door open for us as they missed a number of late game wining shots that would have ended it. Finnaly the Finns connected and the game was over. Advantage Finland.

Game 5....The weather had shifted from sunny and calm to gale force winds and evening sprinkles. The conditions were dangerous at best and nearly impossible to predict the movement of your shots. The Finns thought experience would lead them through this game, the Americans were betting on pure determination. The teams went back and forth...as the crowd of on-lookers gathered to watch the titans in action the Americans finally got within striking distance. A single 9 would seal the deal. It was my shot. The lone block was standing tall behind all the others. It was a straight away shot maybe 300-400 meters (I still don´t know if I am converting the metric system correctly). It was at that moment when the heavens parted, the air grew calm, there was even a lone whopping crane in the distance that you could hear faintly chanting ´God Bless America´....the widow maker left my hand in a perfect rolling fashion. The world stopped dead in its cosmic rotation as all eyes watched where it would land. It was a perfect strike as the nine pin blasted from its foundation and gently came to rest. Game! Against impossible odds, in unpredictable weather, fighting the altitude, the Americans had done it. Held there own in the international battle. Series tied!

Finland on Cars

2008-04-27T22:49:00.005+02:00

Tonight my host family and I had a roundtable discussion about the costs of owning a vehicle in Finland. Here is what we found. On top of insurance (which is similar to that of the states) there are several other costs that are worth considering in comparison to owning a car. Let´s take for example the classic Colorado all purpose car, the 2008 Subaru Outback 2.5i (this is the station wagon looking rig that nearly 85% of people in Colorado own). New off the lot run of the mill no special options this car will set you back a rounded $23,600 in the states, the same exact car in Finland costs €36,900 which rounds off to an even $57,200 (at an exchange rate of $1.55/€). A new Toyota Land Cruiser 4.5 litre V-8 power house with gold trim will run you a smooth €145,000, which translates to just about as much as the average cost for a home along the northern front range. Crikeys (as the late and great Steve the Croc Hunter would say)!! Now, we all know that you can´t run a car without gasolina. Let´s look at that comparison....tonight we purchased gas for the family´s truckster (volvo station wagon) that I´m staying with. We paid €1.42/litre.... roughly 4 litres to the gallon.... at an exchange rate of $1.55/€ gives you a gallon of gas at roughly....$8.50! (As a side note, I am predicting prices around $4/gallon this summer at the pumps). Next cost....every year we pay some sort of fee for having our vehicles liscensed/registered on the road. The Finns arrive at this cost by taxing you on the CO2 your car puts out. That means that the large gas guzzling Land Cruiser will cost you much more (roughly 3 times) than the smaller more efficient Peugeot 107 that runs on a balls out 1.0 litre engine that is the size of the glove box in the new Ford F350´s. What does all this mean?

- People drive smaller, more efficient cars in Finland. In fact, a lot of people drive diesel vehicles. It turns out diesel gets mileage (or kilometers) per gallon (litre) of fuel similar in respect to what we get out of our hybrids (less 10% or so).

- People use more alternative transportation. Biking seems to be the prefered method for short trips. Busses and trains will take you a little further from home if need be. It´s a way of life in these countries. Walking is also hugely popular. Age doesn´t seem to have a whole lot to do with it either, because I have seen just as many seniors as teens using their feet to get from point A to point B.

- Roads are in pretty decent shape. Sure there are plenty of dirt roads in this country that suffer from similar issues (weather mainly) as those in the states, but it seems as a whole the system is in pretty good condition. This seems to be mainly a function of the taxation associated with EVERYTHING over here. The Finland budget allocates a portion of the taxes collected to dedicated road and infrastructure improvement. This is an issue that CO constantly deals with as an end result of TABOR (tax) which hamstrings our state budget with the mandatory (perennially increasing) requirements for education spending (which I am not saying is a bad thing, I´m only saying).

- Finnish people are forced to purchase cars by evaluating cost AND carbon output (emissions) when choosing a vehicle. This puts pollution into the equation and possibly drives (pun intended) some of the decisions.

Now, despite the issues that are described above I don´t want to sound like I am anti-vehicle here. I understand that our current infrastructure doesn´t easily allow us to effectively use alternative modes like the bus system or trains (at least in smaller towns along the front range, with the exception of Boulder) to get where we´re going when we need to get there in every circumstance. It´s comparing apples to oranges in that sense. But, I do know that I could walk from point A to point B a couple more times per week. Additionally, I like to have the option to drive a 4x4 up a steep rocky road to a high mountain trailhead with my gas grill, 6 of my best friends, an inflatable pool, four cases of PBR, a dog (any breed will do), three circus chimps and a cooler full of bologna, but I also know that those trips happen maybe once or twice a year at most for people and that the rest of the time a modestly sized Mitsubishi Colt with a 75 hp (lawnmower) motor would be just fine.

Finland on Thursday´s

2008-04-24T22:50:00.005+02:00

Wow, today was a real barn burner. Our group started the day by receiving copies of the weekly publication the Keski-Häme, which is the city Lammi´s newspaper. The second page features a 3/4 page spread of our team followed by an article (all in Finnish of course) about our travels. It´s a great article that I will keep as a memento of our journey. The only dowside to the whole thing is the angle at which the picture was taken makes my head look 3X as large as the rest of the team members. It´s so large in fact that on the last pages there are ads for a motorcycle, 2 liter coke bottles that are on sale, a JVC boombox, and a pull behind car trailer that ALL would fit into the surface area of my mug shot.

We transferred cities again today. While I thought we were going to be headed further into the woods we actually came to a clearing known as Lahti. Let me tell you that this place is fantastic. The city itself sits on a large lake. The city has lofts built up around it and a dock/pier area that comes straight out of the city center. There is a board walk that goes right around the shore, and a marvelous concert hall known as the Sibelius Hall (check out the architecture section on the attached link, the page is in Finnish, but just click around and you will find it). It´s basically a massive piece of wooden/glass art. We went to the symphony there tonight and it was amazing!! The enitre auditorium is essentially a box. It is insulated by a meter thick wall of sand that keeps all outside noises out. There are doors that surround the auditorium that open and shut with small cuts in them that allow the hall to be ´tuned´for whatever type of show they are going to play. The performance was a Beethoven symphony. There was a piano piece that was played as the lead that was truly impressive (as I have no musical talent at all). You truly could hear every note, every step on stage, every cough from the audience, and at one point there was even someone´s cell phone to my left that VIBRATED and you could hear that too. Travel note: not the place to go if you are having digestion issues.

I am now on to yet another host family. This family is Finnish, but I think the children have spent more years in other countries than in Finland. They speak perfect English (which still puzzles me as the Finnish language is so unique). The father is a business consultant that does M&A work and turn around consulting (as well as plays badminton on Friday´s, god help me). The mom teaches english. Yet again, I find myself in a fortuitous situation in a strange land.... funny how life works out sometimes.