All the world was amazed by the absurdity of a show where a kidney would be given away!

Fuck, what a good show!

Sign up, people! Get registered as a possible donor!

[and it's not scary, I have been one since I was 14 and my parents had to co-sign with me!]

2007.05.02 11:29 AM

ICE 122, carriage 23, seat 081 - Utrecht CS

In a relatively empty second class carriage. My seat clearly shows my seat is reserved. But the seat next to me (chair 083) isn't - I am hoping this train will not fill up, so that I can sit this out in peace. Announcement just came on "Due to delayed approach of train at Frankfurt Hbf, the train will be departing slightly later." Alright, so this trip already starts with a 2 minute delay: what a shock!

Am in the fast train, it seems, as we are traveling at 250 km/h now, and we are showing no signs of stopping at any of the stations between Frankfurt Airport and Cologne Central Station (keep your fingers crossed, because you never know what will happen). It was great to get together with Katie again, and I cannot wait till the time she will find a free spot in her busy researcher's life to come visit me.


2007.05.02 1:30 PM

Leaving Duisburg, with only about a 10 minute delay. I'm hoping I can still catch my transfer connection to Den Haag when we arrive in Utrecht, but seeing as this train arrives at the platform from which my other train leaves, I see no problems there.

More and more people have gotten on the train, and I hope I can get my small suitcase out of the holding with relative ease when we reach Utrecht CS. I can only imagine other people's stuff on top of mine!

Photos of my trip to Katie in Frankfurt, Germany.

[more detailed posts will follow/precede this one]

All photos: Frankfurt @ flickr 

20070501 Worms, and meeting Frank

Today Katie and I traveled to Worms. At least, that was our plan. We went via the Max-Planck-Institute, because Katie had some cells to wake up. Wow! That is certainly a completely different world! They even keep frogs there to harvest their eggs. I still don't quite understand what Katie is researching, but I'm hoping she will explain it again to me some time. From MPI, we took the bus (number 26) back to Eschersheim Station, and we stepped onto the S6 towards Frankfurt Hauptbahnhof.

While Katie took care of my ticket, I went and got us our daily Starbucks coffee. After grabbing something to eat, we went down again to the S-bahn, to get on the S8 to get our connection to Worms. Unfortunately due to May 1 demontrations, we did not really get out of the suburbs of Frankfurt and the train went back to the central station. After checking to see my ticket would still be valid, we went on another train (regular Regional Bahn / Regional Express this time), hoping it would bring us closer to Worms. I must say, I have discovered that the DB is not as perfect as we dutch regularly are made to believe. Our train was delayed, and thankfully Frank was sweet enough to pick us up at Bensheim. Instead of a tour of Worms, he had decided to use this opportunity to take us upto the Auerbach castle (gorgeous). Afterwards we walked through a wonderful area in Bensheim, called Fürstenlager. We sat in the sun, talked about the combined history of Germany and the Netherlands, and I even sang the first and sixth stanza of the Dutch anthem (never ask me again, Frank!).

As Katie had predicted (mostly to herself), Frank and I really hit it off. We talked about religion a bit, and I cannot wait to talk some more with him about this topic, because it is obviously something that we both have a strong opinion about. Should see if I can send him some more books, and perhaps suggest (or send) some books which my grandfather wrote (note to self).

Frank took us back to Worms, and he showed us where he lives in the Dominicaner monastery. It's gorgeous, and while I find it difficult to understand his choice of life, I can see the reason for living there. Frank told us

Our trip back was relatively unremarkable.

2007.04.27 1:40 PM

In ICE 221, carriage 27, seat 031 - Frankfurt Hauptbahnhof

At 11:15 AM I closed my frontdoor (actually, I don't have a backdoor) in the Paramaribostraat and I walked towards the tramstop for line 9 towards The Hague Central Station.

At The Hague CS I bought some snacks at the AH-To-Go and as the Intercity to Arnhem was late, I was able to catch this train, instead of a next one. On the way over to Frankfurt this trip, I am travelling in style. The guy at the International Trains desk had secured a first class train ticket for me, for a lower price than a simple second class ticket - I still have no idea how he managed that! So, here I am seated comfortably in first class, by myself (a single seat), waiting for the train to really pick up speed.

Arnhem is the next stop, and after that, I'm hoping this ICE will really show its class.

It seems more people decided to travel to Frankfurt at this time, because this carriage is filled with dutchies ready to conquer Germany. This unfortunately includes a bunch of loud and obnoxious, roudy group of people. So far, they have consumed at least 4 beers (and this only from what I could with starting point Utrecht - they got on the train at Amsterdam), and I'm afraid they'll travel all the way to Frankfurt with me.

Hopefully, however, they will get off at Dusseldorf or Cologne.


2007.04.27 2:40 PM

In ICE 221, carriage 27, seat 031 - Frankfurt Hauptbahnhof

Train is stuck at Emmerich, because of small fires next to the traintrack. An announcement has just come on to explain that we are allowed to leave again. The annoying rowdy group of people is now shouting amongst themselves trying to find out about their connection, but because of their loud mouths, the rest of the carriage is missing the announcements!

Hmm, good news however, the roudy lot will need a connection to another train at the next stop (Oberhausen), so they will get off the train!

Meanwhile, I need to go to the bathroom, but I will have to shut off the computer, pack it and bring my bag with me.


2007.04.27 3:55 PM

In ICE 221, carriage 27, seat 031 - Frankfurt Hauptbahnhof

Okay, in the Netherlands it is easy to bad mouth the national transportation system because it is so shitty, but after a 50 minute delay, the always admired Deutsche Bahn (DB) seems just as prone to random delays as the Nederlandse Spoorwegen (NS).

As we're not stopping at Cologne (this was announced at the Dusseldorf station), this train is finally picking up speed. Getting less and less bumpy (slow travel is so annoying), the displays over the doors are indicating a current speed of approximately 150 km/h.

I have been SMS-ing (text messaging) my friend Katie each hour, keeping her up do date on the itinirary. With all these delays, she might even be able to pick me up from Frankfurt Hauptbahnhof herself. The roudy party has left the train - they had to change trains to Berlin at Duisburg station - and it is certainly much quieter in this carriage now.
When I leave again on Wednesday, I'll be traveling second class and I hesitate to wonder what that will be like!

I'm glad I have taken my already trusty MacBook Didius with me on this trip, as I will be able to check out some of the movies Katie must have on her PC, and I will also be able to keep all the photos I'm going be taking.

Announcement just came over the intercom, we are stopping at Cologne! All these poor people who were sitting comfortably in this train, were told to change to another ICE train at Dusseldorf.

So far this train has been delayed by:
- late departure from Amsterdam because of small fires alongside the tracks, which resulted in a late departure from Utrecht
- between Arnhem and Oberhausen, the train was stopped by main control, because of small fires alongside the tracks just north of Emmerich.


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So I have adventurous parents. Some time ago my mom came up with the idea to see if they could travel to New Zealand. My dad, at first, wasn't all that enthousiastic, but as my mom's plans began to unravel, he became more and more interested in the country.

About an hour ago, I received a phonecall from my mom. Their plane had arrived safely at Auckland International Airport. They'll be staying in New Zealand until March 16, at which point they will fly back to Hong Kong and spend a few days. March 21 they will arrive at Amsterdam Airport again.

All I can say: awesome! And I am jealous beyond words. I almost managed to climb into one of their suitcases ;) and I begged them to take me with them.

Mom, Dad - have fun! And take loads of pictures!

As for their itinerary: they will rent a car both on North Island and South Island. They have planned various trips - one which includes whale-spotting!

[more on New Zealand: Official Tourism Site, Wikipedia entry]

A Polish student has won a competition to design a logo for the EU's 50th birthday celebrations next year.

I've always been enamoured by the European Union/Council of Europe and its ideas, and I hope it will grow to its full potential in the next fifty years.

Congrats, EU!

[Logo Competition 2006]

134340

Pluto

The Planet Formerly Known As Pluto

Pluto - Wiki

Pluto - BBC Science

Normally I do not care much for football, but now with the World Cup fever all around us, I cannot help but root for my team: NL.

Tomorrow night NL is playing against Argentina. Always a heavy game, but with both teams secure in their place in the next round, no one seems to know what kind of game we can expect.

Thanks to my mom, I even have 3 NL team gadgets: Wuppies!

[more wuppies from me and others on Flickr, tagged "Wuppie"]

Mother Earth had us hanging in there, waiting and waiting before she gave us any warm weather, but today the Sun was out in full force!

As it was a day off for me, I went to the Hortus Botanicus (Botanical Gardens) in Leiden, together with my housemate Mirell.

Took my camera with me, and boy, it was a joy to take all these photos!

Click on the following link for a view of the photos I've taken: MoK @ Flickr May 4, 2006

This something you've always wanted to make, right?

Go make your own: Cookie Generator

[via BoingBoing]

If you've ever been to any Olympic event, at any of the Olympic Games, you probably experienced the 'Olympic Spirit'. Even though all the Games have been inundated with commercialism (I was at the 1996 Atlanta Olympic Games), to me it always seems as if something's right with the world for a few short hours: only during the opening event (and perhaps the closing even more), however.

I get a little emotional watching all these countries carrying all these symbols. And last night with the opening of the 2006 Turino Games, there were two instances when I was choked up.

The beautiful dove and the 8 kick-ass women carrying the Olympic flag. Man, these organizers know how to play on people's emotions!

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