Review June 14, 2010
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Got a little review published, it can be found here:
http://www.campsitereviews.com/english/site_000717.htm
=)
April Fool’s day! April 1, 2010
Posted by Hege in Culture, News.add a comment
Today the 1st of April is a fun day to read the news. The origin of April Fool’s day is much disputed but hoaxes on this day has been going on since atleast the 1930s.
According to the Museum of Hoaxes the best, or most famous, hoax “as judged by notoriety, creativity, and number of people duped” is the BBC Panorama “Spaghetti harvest” from 1957. According to the Museum of Hoaxes, people called the BBC and asked how they could grow their own spaghetti tree. The answer from BBC was “place a sprig of spaghetti in a tin of tomato sauce and hope for the best.” Brilliant…
Some of today’s funny articles is one in Daily Mail that includes some (nicely?) photoshopped pictures.
If you understand Swedish, you might like this one about the UN planning to restrict internet usage to 5GB per month per person.
My personal favourite is the article in The Independent which made me laugh out loud. I mean, who could possibly say no to something that might create a black hole in central London?
It’s nice to have one day a year when reading the news acturally makes you giggle instead of being troubled. In fact, it makes me wish there were more of these days when we can relax and take everything just a little less serious.
Updated: I came across this one late afternoon, and I have to say this one is my new favourite prank this year. Thank you The Economist for raising the concern about peak oil… peak olive oil… Pay extra attention to the graph, that really made me laugh.
News on the new terminal in Malaga airport… March 24, 2010
Posted by Hege in News.Tags: News
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The new Terminal 3 in Malaga airport had a smooth first day and reports no complaints after more than 10,000 passengers and nearly 4,000 bags had passed through its systems. “Until 5.30pm we have not registered any incidents or claims related to the actual working of the T3,” says airport director Mario Otero.
This will come as a relief to operators who used 3,000 volunteers to test the systems before opening. The extensive testing was done to avoid incidents similar to those following the opening of Terminal 5 in Heathrow, where hundreds of passengers were left stranded or without luggage following technical malfunctions.
In his speech at the inauguration, King Juan Carlos said that the new terminal would energise the tourist activity in Andalucía and reinforce its prominent position in the airport network of Spain.
More than €400 million has been invested in this project and it is expected to more than double the airport’s passenger capacity.
Portraits on the Way by Hanna Quevedo March 19, 2010
Posted by Hege in Culture.2 comments
Just a little something I did for school:
The exhibition ‘Portraits on the Way’ by internationally acclaimed photographer Hanna 
Quevedo is currently showing in Fuengirola. Hosted by the local photography collective Colectivo Imagen, it aims to capture contemporary America through the portrayal of people’s lives, feelings and beliefs. Ms. Quevedo’s style of photography leaves much to the imagination with each picture merely hinting at a narrative. As said by a visitor: “It’s interesting to make up a story behind each portrait.”
The exhibition consists of a sample of 20 pictures taken by Ms Quevedo from various parts of the United States. It takes the viewer on a tour through San Francisco, Texas, Denver and New York and is a display of cultural diversity as well as an illustration of individuals from different social and economical backgrounds. According to Ms Quevedo there are so many stories behind each photograph that they can’t be counted. Photos range from traditional family portraits to snapshots of people at work or at the playground.
The 29 year old photographer is a Senior Technician in Artistic Photography and has a Bachelor of Arts from the University in Malaga. She has participated in numerous exhibitions and has received awards globally. Currently she is located in San Francisco, California, where she is a professional photographer and editor.
Visitors to the studio of Colectivo Imagen might find it difficult to locate. It lies on an inner yard in Puebla Lucía, a group of houses clustered around a lush garden, on Calle Maestra Aspiazu. One must knock on the indistinctive door of number 21 to gain admittance. The ambiance of the studio is also different from what can be expected. As it is used for both exhibitions and courses in photography or photo processing, one may have to view the collection in what appears more of a class room environment.
Monkey business March 2, 2010
Posted by Hege in Uncategorized.5 comments
Yesterday was constitution day in Spain, so we hired a car and went abroad. All of Spain had thought of the same idea of course, so we ended up in a traffic jam for an hour to go across the shortest border inte the world over to Gibraltar. The weather couldn’t have been better though, 23 degrees and sunny made the day seem like a Swedish summer’s day. On the main square we enjoyed some Brittish food and a pint before heading up on the Rock to see the monkeys. I have been there before, but the view always strikes. The sea is scattered with big container ships, the shore scattered with little marinas. Across the water there is a clear view of Marocco.
Last time I was here, there were nearly no tourists so the view was all mine to enjoy. This time there was no pause between the minibuses stopping to show the monkeys. Guides was picking monkeys up and put them on people’s shoulders for the ‘I’ve been to Gibraltar!’ photo. I was sad for the mother monkey with a little baby that wasn’t trained enough for any shoulder to earn a little treat. Instead she was nearly kicked by a guide and ignored by the tourists as she retreated to pick her child’s fur.
Here’s some pictures I took from the top of these incredibly charming animals.
If Flipper was a Baiji dolphin, would we have cried? February 26, 2010
Posted by Hege in Climate, Environment.1 comment so far
I was watching Free Jimmy the other day, and it brought me to think about zoos. The movie, for those that haven’t seen it, is about a poor elephant in a circus that is drugged to keep calm between shows. Of course, zoos are a bit different than circuses. I still believe circuses should be banned, if not only for the animal cruelty then for the cruelty of exposing children to clowns.
Now, back to the subject of zoos. I once watched a polar bear in Copenhagen Zoo. It lives in what to this large animal must be a tiny space, and at this particular time it was standing on its hind legs trying to see over the tall wall to watch the world outside. This brought on some cheering from the crowd watching him; people were pointing and laughing. The scene nearly brought me to tears. He is the largest predator on land and a known man killer. His kind is a symbol of a world disappearing as humans keep emitting carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. To see this magnificent animal being reduced to something funny was just more than I’d bargained for when I bought the entrance ticket.
And yet, did I have a reason to be sad? I know most people have seen a polar bear, probably in the same type of surroundings as when I saw this one. To see one live is to understand just how big and how powerful this animal is. As we don’t have polar bears in Kiruna as some would like to believe it is necessary to take a very long trip to a very cold place to see one in its natural habitat, but a zoo is the next best thing. If only a select few had ever seen a live polar bear, would he still be such a powerful symbol?
I was thinking the poor polar bear perhaps isn’t just a clown, but an ambassador. As sad as it is for this individual does his captivity give others a better chance of survival? Most of us have seen how magnificent this animal is. When (or hopefully if) the last free individual of his kind dies, surely we will be many to cry over what this world has lost. I did not see many tears in 2006 when the Baiji dolphin was declared functionally extinct. Then again, I’ve never seen one in a zoo either.
10 reasons why I’m better off… February 25, 2010
Posted by Hege in Life.add a comment
1. I don’t hurt anyone anymore.
2. I feel better and better every day.
3. I can say “No thank you” and actually have a reason when asked to try some.
4. Suddenly there is so much to the world that I haven’t noticed before!
5. That awful taste in my mouth is gone.
6. No more guilty conscience.
7. No easy escape, I have to make descisions now!
8. There are more colours in the world.
9. There is less death in the world.
10. Made me realise how much I love beans.
That were the 10 reasons why I’m better off…
… without eating meat. What’d you think I meant?
In response to a prompt at Mama Kat’s...
A gamer’s confession February 25, 2010
Posted by Hege in Games, Life.4 comments
I read an interesting article today in The Times Online about more women entering the world of gaming. This is interesting to read as I’m a gamer myself and normally I’m seen as a bit of an odd exception. But let me start off with this: I don’t play World of Warcraft. After trying it for an hour or so I had to give up my attempts to like it and return to my own safe haven in Everquest II. Mostly because the community is something very different in Everquest II. After one hour of gaming in WoW I was challenged to a duel by another player. Ok, that happens (although it has happened only once ever in Everquest II in my nearly four years of playing), I just press ‘decline’. The same guy challenges me again. Now, seriously, I’m not up for duelling as I’m brand new to this game, so I press ‘decline’. After about ten challenges from the same guy I had to log out. And I’ve never returned. I read later somewhere that the average age in WoW is around 19 and in EQ2 around 30. That could have something to do with it.
In EQ2 there are all sorts of people. I’ve met moms on maternity leave, housewives, fathers who play with their teenage sons, students and everything in between. I am a member of two different guilds with 
very different people in each. One is big and raiding, the other small, swedish and family-like. I also play a lot with my family, and as we haven’t been living in the same country for years this allows us to catch up in a way that a telephone simply can’t.
I too have friends that, like in the article, found love through the game. I went to an in-game wedding once. This was a roleplaying event so they probably had never met in real life, but it was still a beautiful wedding. I have spent evenings in a place with a good view just chatting with friends about everything. I have spent days running around with friends or family to hunt dragons, slay orcs, fly on griffons. At times, when I have been moving around, EQ2 was the only place I knew for sure I could meet and talk with friends. I’m glad the perception of gamers is moving away from something nerdy to something more ‘normal’. There are just so many aspects of the game to love. Anyway, here’s a picture from the newest expansion that was released last week. The girl is my main character, the horse took me nearly a week’s worth of work to get, but he’s worth it.
At the office February 24, 2010
Posted by Hege in Life.2 comments
One of the first things I missed when I stopped working was the office. Just going there, getting into the routines. In the morning, you would say goodmorning to everyone, sit and work for a bit while eating breakast (which everyone did) and then after half an hour or so going up to get a coffee. The best coffee breaks were the ones where you were followed by a colleague, giving you the opportunity to catch up on gossip. Then there was the computer, my lovely two screens and all the papers that lay scattered around my desk. No matter how much I disliked my work, the office was always safe, always there for you. A little like a second home, seeing how much time I spent in it.
But sometimes old routines must change. I’m here in Spain now and studying, not working. My mornings still include the coffee, but that’s just about the only similarity between my old office and my new one. I now start out with catching up on what has happened in the world and try to read as much interesting I can in a few hours. After that, it’s all really up to me. Today I set up my office at the beach. It was windy but the sun was warm and the sea as blue as always.
Changing routines and old habits can be a painful, stressful and even sad process. But with a little courage, a little creativity and a lot of will, it is possible to make new routines and actually find them much more rewarding than the old ones.
Good morning sunshine! February 23, 2010
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Today is not one of those rainy days I wrote about yesterday. Last week the only thing I heard was that this week was going to get even worse. So guess my surprise when I woke up to a clear blue sky and warm sunshine. I knew I had to go out, and around here there is one really obvious place to go: the beach. In February you nearly have it to yourself, even if it’s warm. One family here, one lazy stroller there, but you get a quiet piece of beach all to yourself.
I know I’m looking forward to the warmth of atleast late spring, but the fact that you get the beach to yourself makes me wonder if this might just be the best month of all. Either way, tonight might be a night of grabbing a bottle of Rioja and listening to the waves.
Another nice thing about going to the beach is you can collect shells. They have proven excellent for fiddeling with when stressed, or just to hold to help you think.
