Chicago bans Foie Gras

Yet another historical moment in U.S. - the Chicago City Council decided to ban the sale of Foie Gras in shops or restaurants citing inhuman treatment of animals.

Now isn't that a nice, high priority issue to keep ourselves busy with in these 'peaceful' times?

Here's the IHT article.

Standing 'seats' in economy class

As if we weren't cramped enough in economy class - Airbus wants to 'revolutionize' yet again airline travel by proposing a 'standing' room concept in their A380. This will allow them to squeeze 853 people in.

Now isn't that a nice prospect? I understand that oil prices are growing, but that's pushing it ...

Here's an idea of what those seets would look like. The full IHT article is here.

20 year anniversary of Chernobyl explosion

20 years ago, the nuclear powerplant in Chernobyl, Ukraine exploded.

I still remember how the teachers interrupted the classes and gave us all some pils to counter the radiation. Then we were allowed to quit school and go home. At the time I was actually quite happy because I didn't go to school for the rest of the day so I went to the movies and saw some chinese martial arts movie.

The funny thing is that at the time I was less than 700 km from the blast site.

Of course, we didn't really know what was going on, I think Ceausescu didn't want to allow the news to spread.

So here I am, 20 years later, wondering whether this explosion will change my life or not ... or perhaps it already did?

Here's a slide show from the International Herald Tribune

Opening Gala of the 2006 Melbourne Comedy Festival

My gift to myself this year was a ticket to the Opening Gala of the Melbourne Comedy Festival, held at the nice & cozy Her Majesty Theatre.

The festival is currently in its 20th year and the Gala was used to raise funds for Oxfam, the well known NGO involved in a lot of charity work.

Reading the local papers I hear this one is considered one of the top three such events in the world together with the Edinburgh and Montreal festivals.


I don't know how much truth is in all that, but this thing seems pretty bug, with 233 shows and more than 3000 performances.

I truly enjoyed myself during the 4 hours of laughter and it was a great opportunity to discover some of the great names of the genre.

As you can see in the pictures here, the night was full of strange characters, altough none as spacey as the Spymonkey group from the UK that you can see jumping around on the stage in their Adam costume. In good faith, there was also an Eve there, you can see part of their performance here.

I am very curious how this thing will be shown on the Aussie channel 10.

The end was matching to the whole performance in its grandeur. Fireworks and confettis ensured this will be a performance that will not be easily forgotten.

Hopefully I'll get to see a lot more of this during the 4-day Easter WeekEnd :)

The day that changed the world

12th of April is just one of those days that will forever stay in the human history as a turning point.

Of course, there are several reasons for that:
- Four hundred years ago, on April 12, 1606, England's King James I decreed the design of the original Union Flag (also referred to as the Union Jack), which combined the flags of England and Scotland.
- In 1961, Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin became the first man to fly in space, orbiting the earth once before making a safe landing.
- In 1981, the space shuttle Columbia blasted off from Cape Canaveral on its first test flight.

But most important of all, in my humble opinion, is that in 1977 I was born. ;)

Thanks to all of you who have wished me happy birthday already, and thanks to all who will continue to do so as this day slowly moves around the globe.

On my end I will be celebrating in style at the Opening Gala of the Melbourne Comedy Festival.

The street has won, yet again!

Just found out that Jacques Chirac has given in to street pressure and will cancel a law that was supposed to offer a minimal reform for the labour laws in France. You can look at the IHT article here.

For those of you who were out of France, the law allowed companies to have a 2 year 'trial' period for employees under 26. Why 'Trial period' ? Because under French law, once you are hired, it is very difficult to be fired unless you are in this 'Trial' period.

It is said that this law was meant to give a boost to the employment chances of people from the 'banlieu' or outskirts that lack good schools and that are generally left out of the employment market.

It is therefore funny to see how all the other people, who in most cases are not really impacted by this law managed to scuttle it. It is a clear case of parochial interests blocking the greater good, just as it was the case for Social Security reform, retirement reform and so on.

The French parliament has approved this law that was signed then by Chirac. They are the elected representatives of all of France. Letting students & unions that defend their own narrow interests block that reform is not the way forward.

Melbourne International Flower & Garden Show

Altough this week-end was a working one, I managed to squeeze some time on Sunday morning and visit the Flower & Garden Show here in Melbourne together with Olivier.

The organisers boast that they are biggest Flower show in the Southern Hemisphere.

I have to say that it surpassed what I was expecting. The creativity of the stands was impressive and I particularly salute the way intrinsec relation between flowers and ... women :) that you can see in these pictures here.


It was a great discovery, actually flowers and gardens can be interesting ;) and hey! it was a good opportunity to breathe some fresh air.
 

Campaign for Real Beauty

Here's an interesting poster from the Campaign for real beauty that's in full swing now over here.

They ask some interesting questions - basically trying to de-Barbie the female psyche. Go to visit the site and tell me the answer to your first question.

I've also added some new pictures over here from the Formula 1 and from Brisbane. Enjoy ;)

Here are some updates from the Campaign for real beauty, now we have billboards that hold the score live in the city:

Visitors from all over :-)

Last night I put a tracker on my blog to see if anyone is actually reading it and I was pleasantly surprised to discover that in less than 24 hours I got 42 page views from people all over the world as you can see in the image on the left. I started out using StatCounter, but they only keep 100 visits in their logs, so I moved over to Tracksy now that keeps 25,000 visits a month, which is great.

I'd like to thank you all for coming back to this blog, it really means a lot to me, and I'll try to keep finding interesting things to share with you.

Here's a preview of things to come in the near future:
- Multiple language support: I'll try to add my posts in French, Romanian, English and perhaps Czech if Eva will have the time to help
- Picture of the day: as I move around and see interesting things, i'll post them for you. The 'Virgin Loo' one was just a first
- The Melbourne International Flower Show this we: sounds like a great opportunity to see some nice flowers :)

Image of the day 05/04

I will try to add some interesting images every now and then to show the unexpected nature of life here, down-under ;)

This one was taken in the airport in Brisbane, I'm not sure I understand the reason for separating the virgin from the rest, but hey, who am I to argue with the law of the land ;) 

Can deregulation go wrong?

Here's an interesting article from International Herald Tribune about how deregulation can sometimes go wrong:

William Pfaff: Deregulation gone mad

While I'm a market oriented guy, seeing all those commercials in France about choosing among 18 different telephone-directory providers makes one think that the world has gone mad. How can there be enough space in the market for something like this?

And the airline industry example is thought-provoking. When I was in the States, a Pittsburgh-Washington DC ticket was twice as expensive as a Boston-Pittsburgh and 4 times as expensive as a Washington DC - Boston one. Altough it's a much shorter flight.

Formula 1 in Melbourne - The People

All is in the title ;)


 

Formula 1 in Melbourne - The Race

And here it is, the race itself. Pretty eventful, at least 3 pilots have abandoned due to accidents, Michael Schumacher being one of them.
As you can see there were fences everywhere, since debris can fly off at any moment.

 

Formula 1 in Melbourne - The Flying

I've decided to go today and see my first Grand Prix ever. It was in some ways better than I thought, and in some ways worse.
It was better because I didn't see the time fly. The race was over before I had the time to do everything that I wanted to do.

It was worse because I discovered that for $99 you don't even get a place to sit. The privilege of sitting down costs you at least $350 . Once inside you navigate a real maze of 'Corporate' stands, Grandstands, etc and of course you're not allowed to trespass their 'holy' land. What I found really revolting was that the start line was all in corporate land, as a normal ticket holder you could not get to see the race start!

I've come back with the strong impression that these guys are expert salesman. The real race lasted for less than 2 hours, nevertheless the whole thing lasted for 4 days. To be able to make so much out of so little you have to be a genius.

Nevertheless, it was a fun day, filled with attractions. Here you can see some of the flying demonstrations performed just before the race: First the Roulettes, an elite corps of the RAAF did their magic, next is a F/A 18 Hornet showing us what it can do. Further down there's a Seahawk helicopter of the Navy and last but not least, one of the helicopters in which you could buy a ride over the circuit. 

Skype is Cool

Just signed up for Skype, great tool indeed. Great to call out over oceans and seas for next to nothing. One hour call to France for 1 EUR :)

NOW THAT'S COOL !!!

Tonight we do the time change, we delayed by one week here due to the Commonwealth Games, so I get an extra hour of sleep.

And tomorrow sounds like a busy day, there's the Formula 1 Grand Prix here in Melbourne and I'm moving to my own flat in the afternoon.