YGB's Blog

Update: BGF World Mining

2010-11-28T19:26:00.003+01:00

Quick update - If you would have invested in the fund after my posting in May, you would have seen a share price increase of more than 30% :-)

Fund: BGF World Mining A2 USD

2010-05-26T22:28:00.003+02:00

I received a lot of positive feedback on the Amag Pharmaceuticals articles (apart from the usual spam) and therefore decided to write something about another investment opportunity I found out about recently. This time it is a fund: BGF World Mining A2 USD. I read an article on handelsblatt.de, where investment experts were interviewed on how people should invest with the danger of high inflation rates expected in the near future. One of the experts suggested investing in commodities, as companies in this sector can change prices quickly based on current market situations, therefore not being as strongly affected by rising price levels. I did some research and found the Blackrock World Mining fund which looks really promising. As the name already suggests the fund invests in mining companies, mainly with a diversified portfolio of mining activities. The regional spread shows around 75% of stocks from Europe and North America. Commodities like gold, copper and others are suggested to show rising prices in the future which should positively affect the companies within the fund, which should result in a very good long-term performance. It’s definitely in my virtual portfolio!

You can find the fund’s factsheet here!

Up to 2 GB for free

2010-03-23T22:28:00.003+01:00

I have been looking for a solution like this for quite some time. While other file sharing services like YouSendIt only offer you 100mb, WeTransfer allows you to share files with up to 2 GB.

https://www.wetransfer.com/

Turkish Ice Cream Man

2010-03-23T22:23:00.000+01:00

The Idea Swap

2010-02-20T21:51:00.004+01:00

Nice website where you share an idea and in return get to read the ideas of other people. Some are really interesting, some are just funny. Try it out!

http://www.theideaswap.com/

UMTS/3G in India

2010-02-19T17:29:00.003+01:00

There has been a lot of buzz going on about the growth potential of mobile internet. Google’s Eric Schmidt recently said “Everything that Google will create going forward will be done so through a ‘Mobile First’ lens”. (siliconrepublic.com)

I think it is fair to assume that we will see a lot more mobile web usage in the next years, especially in consideration of the huge success of the iPhone with all of its online apps.
Actually, this should be good news for network operators. In Germany though, the providers are struggling with small margins and tough competition in the market (faz.net)

But let’s look at another very interesting market. India. According to a report from handelsblatt.com

India has adjourned the auctioning of their UMTS licenses for the sixth time now. There seem to be political issues which kept the government from holding the auction of the licenses on February 12th.

Even the number of licenses for sale hasn’t been answered yet. There are some voices saying there might be four though. Assuming there are four, let’s look at the companies who will be in the front row when the auction is finally taking place. The three biggest ones are Bharti Airtel, Reliance Com and Tata Indicom. Probably more than one of them will have a big stake in the mobile network once the licenses are sold and that should driver their profits. Definitely some interesting investment opportunities.

100 Years Of Special Effects

2010-02-12T22:17:00.002+01:00

Who would have thought...

Ever thought about a movie plot...backwards??

2010-02-05T23:24:00.002+01:00

Our new EU commissioner

2010-01-31T13:13:00.004+01:00

Günther Öttinger our new EU commissioner gives his first speech in English. Let me tell you.. he has got his own very unique style. Shortly after his speech he told a German newspaper that he will practice his English.

Maximum Energy in 10 Simple Steps

2010-01-21T23:24:00.002+01:00

Browsing through my bookmarks (there are quite a lot), I stumbled on the following article on how to be more energetic during the day. Pretty interesting, I guess most people already try to follow the advice given in the article. Nevertheless, worth sharing.

Energy Producing Habits:

1. Deep Diaphragmatic Breathing. Do this exercise first thing in the morning and then at least 2 more times during the day. Anytime you find yourself waiting, use this to pass the time. Or if you feel sluggish, that is another good time to do this. It will also supercharge your Lymph system which is your body’s immune system powerhouse.

* Blow all the air out of your lungs.
* Take a slow breath into the bottom of your lungs by letting your stomach relax out. Continue==>>
* Next keep breathing into the middle rib cage. Continue==>>
* Finally finish the in breath by filling the upper lungs.
* Use this timing formula. In for 1, Hold for 3, Out for 2. Example if you breath in for 10 seconds, then you would hold for 30 and then Release for 20.
* Repeat this 5-10 times per session.

2. Get Enough Rest. Figure out how much sleep YOU need. I need 7 -8 hours of sleep per night to feel good in the morning. Less (or even more) than that and I feel sleepy all day. It’s been said before, but if you want more energy, now is the time to make it a habit. How much do you need? Be kind to yourself and ensure you get it!

3. Reduce and then Avoid Caffiene. I know, I know. I can hear the shouts already, “But I need my caffiene!” I know how you feel. I felt that way too. I’m here to tell you that You Can Do It and that it will make you feel better in the long run. Caffeine robs Peter to pay Paul. It is a nice little high, but it comes at a price. After the high wears off, there is that irritability which stems from robbing future energy. You have to pay for it sometime. Does this sound familiar: After drinking coffee there is that high feeling of “I can do anything!” followed by a furious amount of action or thinking or talking. Then there is a leveling off of energy and finally a feeling of being impatient and easily aggravated. If this is not your pattern, maybe you can stick with coffee without suffering energy consequences. But if you do recognize yourself in this pattern, then at least begin to explore the idea of reducing and maybe even eliminating coffee. I have it now only as a special treat and I’m always reminded why I’m better off without it when I do. :-)

4. Meditation “Naps.” This is something I learned from rocking a baby to sleep. By accident I found that when I was rocking the baby to sleep or giving a bottle feeding, I would also close my eyes for the 10-15 minutes it took. I found that I was incredibly rejuvenated afterwards. I used the time to let my mind rest, by either focusing on the breath or by trying to focus on a mantra word. It didn’t matter what the word was. I recommend doing this when energy is lagging. for those times when you would ordinarily go for a cup of coffee, do this instead.

HOW TO DO THIS: Sitting in a chair, close your eyes, lean your head back and focus on your breathing. Take slow diaphragmatic breaths. Relax your eyes, jaw, and face. Maybe do some neck streches and some arm stretches, all with your eyes closed. After stretching just relax your whole body. Let go of what you’ve been working on. It will be there when you return and you’ll be better able to handle it then. Continue to focus on the breath and perhaps also focus on a word or sound that helps keep your mind from trying to work on problems. The word might be “calm” or “peace” or “om,” whatever works for you. As thoughts come into your mind, notice them and just come back to the breath or your focus word, your mantra. After 15 minutes or so, slowly open your eyes, stretch a little, take a couple deep breaths and enjoy the rejuvenated feeling! (Try to use your internal clock for timing. You’ll be surprised how accurate you are.)

5. Avoid Sugar. This one is easy and hard. Easy to say, hard to do. Start slow by starting to read labels. Keep sugar in your diet to a minimum. Try Stevia in your decaf green tea instead. If you are going to have something sweet, try to combine it with fiber to lessen the blood sugar spike. Good choices are low glycemic fruits such as apple, plum, or oranges. If you want something a little more “decadent” and good for you, try some Kashi Cookies.

6. Avoid Alcohol and Tobacco. Smoking makes you tired in the long run. It robs your body in so many ways. Quitting is hard, but here is an inspiring story of how someone quit smoking. It’s not easy, but You Can Do It! Alcohol is like caffeine in that you are robbing Peter to pay Paul. You’re robbing future energy for some “high” energy now. Yes, alcohol can be fun in moderation. If you want more energy, and you use alcohol daily or frequently, consider cutting back. See how your energy changes. If you like what you feel, then keep going. For some, alcohol is not an easy relationship, but remember what ever you want to accomplish, You Can Do It!

7. What to Drink Instead of Coffee. “Long Life Cocktail” is something I learned from Louise Gittleman’s book, “Fat Flush,” which is an excellent book on learning to eat more healthy. Here’s the recipe: 8-10 ounces of water, 1 ounce PURE cranberry juice, and 1 level tablespoon of ground flax seed. (The PURE Cranberry juice you use should have no other ingredients. You can find it in the health section of the grocery store. Look for Sun Mountain brand, for example.) This drink cleans your liver and the fiber is great for your digestive health. Flax seed is a “super food” and has many benefits including lowering cholesterol, lowering tryglycerides, lowering blood pressure, reducing cancer rates, in particular breast cancer, and more. The drink is a little strange at first, but I’ve grown to love it. I have it one to two times a day.

The other drink I use once a day is a “Green Drink” called Green Vibrance which is a nutritional supplement drink that has many immune, energy and digestive benefits. It’s a little pricey, but I like all the benefits. Try it in a healthy smoothie and you’ll have real energy that lasts all day long!

8. Yoga and Stretching. Deep breathing massages the lymph system and the net cleansing benefits are increased energy. Yoga gives you this in large doses. The other thing it gives you is actual physical release of stored stress. When you stretch your muscles they release into a more relaxed state. When they do this stress chemicals are released. Through deep breathing, your lymph systems is stimulated to carry these toxic chemicals to the blood stream where they are eliminated from your body via expiration (breathing) and through the liver and kidneys. The net result is more energy. If you’ve done yoga you know what I’m talking about. If not, get yourself a yoga video or to a yoga class soon. You will love it. And then make sure to schedule it into your life on a weekly basis. And try to do at least 10 minutes of stretching everyday, especially after any workout.

9. 30 Minutes of Aerobic Exercise Per Day. Keep it simple. Brisk walking or jogging are low cost and highly beneficial. Rotate your activities to keep yourself interested. Play some tennis or soccer or running races with your kids. You get the same benefits even if you break it into shorter chunks, say three 10 minute sessions per day. Try walking to work if possible. Leave work clothes and shoes there to change into. Park in the farthest away spot. Take a walk after dinner to enjoy the early evening. Make it a priority, get it done, and you will be excited by the extra energy you have when you do this. The other added bonus is you will sleep better too.

10. Laughter and Smiling. This activates deep breathing again. And it also releases endorphins, your body’s “natural high” chemical. Find opportunities to laugh, especially when the going gets rough, tough, and ugly. Rent funny videos. Seek out your funny friends and family. Work on your own sense of humor. Laughter is the best medicine. Laugh at life and life laughs with you. Let smiling and laughter be your favorite exercise.

Source: http://lifelearningtoday.com

Healthcare in the US

2010-01-21T08:07:00.002+01:00

As healthcare has been on the political map for quite a while now in the US, I think I found a good documentary discussing the issues with healthcare systen and why the US hasn't been able to insure its 47 Million citizens without health insurance.

The documentary series is from the BBC and offers a lot of other great reports on other topics as well.

DocArchive: Health of a Nation - Part Two
Mittwoch, 20. Januar 2010 11:05

DocArchive: Health of a Nation - Part One
Mittwoch, 13. Januar 2010 11:10

Now I know what this FarmVille is about...

2010-01-19T08:21:00.001+01:00

Have you also wondered why some of your friends always post this FarmVille stuff? Well, here is a video explaining what they actually do all the time...

Nintendo Wii is kind of expensive...

2010-01-07T18:40:00.003+01:00

So I was thinking about getting myself a Nintendo Wii. I remembered how cool it was to play Tiger Woods on it so my guess was that it would be quite cheap by now to get the Wii. Well…

First, you need the console plus two controllers. Nintendo also came out with a new type of controller, the “Wii Motion Plus”. The new controllers are even better at tracking your movement and supposed to give you an improved gaming experience. Okay, so I need two controllers with Wii Motion Plus and the console. Oh… yeah and of course some games. Usually with the Motion Plus controller and console package you will get the game “Wii Sports Resort”. In the beginning one additional game should be enough… I would get the latest Tiger Woods.

Here is what we are looking at (prices from amazon.de):

Nintendo Wii console black incl. 265 €
Wii Sports & Sports Resort + Motion Plus

Additional Motion Plus Controller 74,99 €

Tiger Woods PGA 10 62,94 €

TOTAL 402,93 €

Hello??? 403 € for a gaming console? That’s 577 $. Maybe I should give it another year…

Free Ebooks

2010-01-05T16:03:00.002+01:00

Nice collection of 35 websites that offer free eBooks. Click here!

Have you seen this man?

2009-11-26T10:17:00.003+01:00

Apparently the above child-like photo fit helped the Bolivian police to find a killer, after it had aired on national television. Click here for the full story guardian.co.uk

Google Wave

2009-11-23T20:40:00.009+01:00

I just read a Google Wave review on danieltenner.com. If it really offers all the functionalities described, it would be a great corporate tool, especially for collaborating on documents that have to go through numerous reviews, which you will definitely have experienced plenty of times... His summary describes Google Wave as a tool for "getting work done." Well, if that holds true, I want to have it! By the way, if you have an invitation left, let me know :-)

Berlin Berlin

2009-11-22T22:27:00.008+01:00

I was in Berlin last week for four days and I have to say, Berlin is probably my number 1 city in Germany at the moment. It has amazing architecture, a rich history and beautiful atmosphere.

We basically biked through the city for four days straight, which is itself one of the great features of Berlin, lots of bike lanes! Berlin at night was also great fun, with nice restaurants and bars and a great variety. Berlin is also very cheap compared to other European capitals.

Tea Infuser

2009-11-18T21:45:00.005+01:00

Awesome design job by Pablo Matteoda. I would buy it in a minute!

Source: lookslikegooddesign.com

Google's Core Values

2009-11-17T20:57:00.002+01:00

Google Mission: To organize the world’s information and make it universally accessible and useful.

Google Core Values

1) We want to work with great people

We hire great people and expect a lot from them
We create an environment where people can flourish and grow
We treat people with fairness and respect
We challenge each other’s ideas openly
We value diversity in people and ideas
We are a quantitative company that uses data to make decisions

2) Technology innovation is our lifeblood

Build the world’s best technology and products
We apply technology and creativity to solve important problems

3) Working at Google is fun

We expect our people to know and enjoy each other
We have a challenging/energetic work environment
We celebrate our successes and each other’s accomplishments – both professional
and personal

4) Be actively involved; you are Google

Honor commitments
We openly communicate and trust you with a great deal of information and we expect you to honor our confidentiality
Understand when you are representing Google and act appropriately

5) Don’t take success for granted

Think and act like an underdog
Be humble with success; don’t be arrogant
Be scrappy and resourceful

6) Do the right thing; don’t be evil

Honesty and integrity in all we do
Our business practices are beyond reproach
We make money by doing good things

7) Earn customer and user loyalty and respect every day

Create, enhance and maintain great products and services

8) Sustainable long-term growth and profitability are key to our success

Think scale and efficiency
Every dollar is yours
Do things that matter

9) Google cares about and supports the communities where we work and live

We encourage and enable our people to support local community involvement and expect them to participate

10) We aspire to improve and change the world

Aim high; think BIG, take risks
A healthy disregard for the impossible

Source: http://www.askstudent.com/google/list-of-google-core-values/

Human Development Report 2009

2009-10-05T20:46:00.007+02:00

Human development is about putting people at the centre of development. It is about people realizing their potential, increasing their choices and enjoying the freedom to lead lives they value. Since 1990, annual Human Development Reports have explored challenges including poverty, gender, democracy, human rights, cultural liberty, globalization, water scarcity and climate change. (source: UN)

The report features a massive amount of information on global mobility as well as the quality of life in different regions and countries. So who is going to print the 200+ pages for me :-)

It also features the Human Development Index (HDI) which measures the average achievements in a country in three basic dimensions:

a long and healthy life, as measured by life expectancy at birth;
access to knowledge, as measured by the adult literacy rate and the combined gross enrolment ratio in education; and
a decent standard of living, as measured by GDP per capita in purchasing power parity (PPP) US dollars.

The 10 countries with the highest HDI

The 10 countries with the lowest HDI

Germany ranks 22nd.

Source: http://hdr.undp.org/en/reports/global/hdr2009/

The Best and Worst of YouTube in Four Minutes

2009-10-04T20:32:00.003+02:00

Source:
http://www.time.com/time/arts/article/0,8599,1927076,00.html?imw=Y

PEACE ONE DAY in Stuttgart

2009-09-24T17:08:00.005+02:00

I took part in an adidas raffle last week and won a ticket to a bundesliga football match, Vfb Stuttgart vs. 1.FC Köln. It was not just the tickets though, as part of the PEACE ONE DAY campaign sponsored by adidas and Puma, I was going there with a bunch of other adidas and Puma employees! During the half time we were all going down to the pitch and threw mini footballs into the stands, great fun. All in all a very cool day with some very friendly Puma employees.

The campaign also featured a mixed adidas/Puma football game at the adidas stadium which took place on Monday. Very special moment, as adidas and Puma have been rivals for over 60 years!

More info and also an interview with the adidas and Puma CEO's here!

50 Most Popular Tourist Destinations

2009-09-22T20:35:00.002+02:00

Interesting...

I would have never thought that Sea World has more visitors per year than the Taj Mahal.

Funny signs

2009-09-20T21:18:00.006+02:00

Click here for more of those!

Create your own font!

2009-09-09T21:39:00.004+02:00

This great site allows you to use your personal font! Try it out. You just need to print out the font template, fill it out, scan and upload it back to the website. And voila, you have your personal font!

http://www.fontcapture.com

Wie funktioniert Baseball?

2009-06-29T20:11:00.005+02:00

Very nice video on the rules of Baseball. As a lot of people in Germany do not know anything about Baseball, I think it's great to give people some idea about the game and get them interested.

Flee market in Stuttgart

2009-06-21T16:28:00.001+02:00

When we left the house yesterday morning, we walked down the street to the bakery and were surprised by masses of people filling the street.

There was a big flee market at our little marketplace as well as along the street. We ended up buying a "little" mirror. We still don’t know what to do with it, we'll see.

Amag's Feraheme approval close

2009-05-04T13:35:00.003+02:00

It seems that Feraheme will be completely approved shortly. TheStreet

Stocks are now at 49$, up from about 33$ in December of 2008. That might not be the end of the story...

Subway wtf?

2009-04-28T22:43:00.001+02:00

I recently went to a local Subway restaurant and got myself a 12-inch sub. I asked the lady working there if she could wrap up half of the sandwich, because I would like to eat one half there and the other half later. She then told me: “I am sorry but I would have to charge you for to 6-inch subs if I do that”. What? What is the big deal? I asked her why the hell she couldn’t do it, of course she didn’t know. Have they ever heard about customer service? I wonder if it’s different at Subway in the US?

Some impressive marketing ideas

2009-04-18T23:19:00.001+02:00

Those are some very interesting marketing campaigns by non-profit organizations. You really get that “wow” feeling and they will definitely catch the viewer’s attention.

Here is one of them:

Click here to see the others

Great way to go about shopping!

2009-04-17T22:57:00.001+02:00

I especially like the move with the security guy.

http://www.break.com/index/awesome-ways-to-grocery-shop.html

Back to the Future Part II got it right

2009-04-15T09:10:00.001+02:00

How did they know about all of that ;-)

http://www.11points.com/Movies/11_Predictions_That_Back_to_the_Future_Part_II_Got_Right

Update: Amag

2009-03-31T21:49:00.003+02:00

When I first wrote about Amag, there stocks were at 33,57$. Today they stand at 36,90 although they still haven't received feedback from the FDA regarding Feromoxytol yet. Seems like investors are positive about the company's future, we shell see.

Solarworld

2009-03-31T21:46:00.001+02:00

„In just a few years, SolarWorld AG has grown from a solar trading house to an international solar concern. The expansion began after it started in the year 1998: With subsidiaries in Germany, Spain, Asia, Africa and the United States. SolarWorld AG today is one of the largest solar concerns worldwide.” (Source: Solarworld.de)

Solarworld stocks dropped from around 33 Euro in August 2008 to 15.78 Euro currently, as a result of the financial crisis. I personally think that Solarworld is a good bet if you think about investing long-term. Solar energy will most likely continue to grow strong in the future and Solarworld seems to have no issues refinancing there current debt of 700 Mio. Euro.

Société Générale says „buy“, Credit Suisse says „underperform“, your choice.

Zattoo

2009-03-19T00:03:00.002+01:00

I have to mention the online software Zattoo today, I love it. It offers around 116 TV stations (in Germany) as a live stream. 116! Pretty good! I have to admit that most stations are public stations, still you have channels like MTV, DSF (German sports television) as well as niche stations like the Poker Channel which definitely adds to the “entertainment” factor of Zattoo. All in all I think it is a phenomenal concept. I do not have any insight into their financial concept, but for now they only show one very short commercial at the beginning of the stream. Meaning when you click one channel you will see like a 15 seconds commercial, that’s it. Seriously.
Now if you sit at home and don’t have any satellite television or cable, this is a great and free alternative. I mostly run it in the background while doing stuff on the computer.
BUT, most of the private TV stations do not broadcast on Zattoo which is a shame. Stations like ProSieben, to mention one of the biggest privat stations in Germany, has its own online TV stream on its website, with a painful amount of ads. On top of that it’s not really a stream, just a collection of some selected shows.

I hope that Zattoo will soon cover the big private stations as well, it would totally rock to have all stations on Zattoo and just forget about regular TV. To be fair though, I have to admit that the quality is far from “high def”. It still offers a very decent quality though.

www.zattoo.com

Porsche Museum Stuttgart, maybe next time...

2009-03-15T21:02:00.005+01:00

We wanted to check out the brand new Porsche Museum in Stuttgart today, but a bunch of other people obviously had the same idea. I will try a weekday next time. Waiting in line for like 2 hours was not quite what I was looking for...

Nevertheless, the architecture of the building was pretty impressive. You can find more information on the Porsche Museum in Stuttgart here.

Chris Brown-Rihanna case survey

2009-03-14T19:47:00.004+01:00

I hope this survey is not representative at all... A survey conducted by the Boston Public Health Commission showed some very scary results. 200 teenagers (age 12-19) were interviewed on the Chris Brown-Rihanna case. Those are the results:

71% said arguing was a normal part of a relationship
44% said fighting was a normal part of a relationship
51% said Chris Brown was responsible for the incident
46% said Rihanna was responsible for the incident
52% said both individuals were to blame for the incident, despite knowing at the time that Rihanna had been beaten badly enough to require hospital treatment
35% said the media were treating Rihanna unfairly
52% said the media were treating Chris Brown unfairly

Sources: Boston.com; Boston Public Health Commision

Test Your Knowledge

2009-03-14T19:41:00.002+01:00

I have completed "The Countries of Europe" quiz a couple of times already, still having problems with Eastern Europe. Pretty nice looking game, it will certainly annoy you after a while though, trust me. http://www.purposegames.com/games

"Slumdog Millionaire" protests

2009-03-01T21:49:00.003+01:00

Some people in India, as well as Indians living abroad have loudly protested against the movie "Slumdog Millionaire" due to its use of the word slumdog as well as it being "poverty porn". Here is an interesting article on the roots of these protests. Click here!

Family Guy & Christian Bale

2009-02-15T08:04:00.002+01:00

Christian Bale going berserk on Family Guy's Peter Griffin on the latest Family Guy episode. It's hilarious.. www.tmz.com

What's up with Amag?

2009-02-06T20:55:00.001+01:00

I wrote an article about Amag Pharmaceuticals in December and I guess it's a good time to take a look at what happend since then.
Amag is still awating FDA approval for Ferumoxytol their key product candidate.

Looking at their stock price from December 30th 2008 to February 5th 2009, we have an increase of 5,2%, from USD 35,93 to USD 37,80.
Actually, what I am still waiting for is the final FDA approval which should boost their stock price significantly. But we will see what happens.

Below is a link to a recent article on Amag which basically summerizes what the current status is.

http://www.xconomy.com/boston/2009/02/04/amag-pharma-awaiting-fda-word-on-new-iron-replacement-drug/

mi adidas online store live!

2009-02-06T18:30:00.004+01:00

The mi adidas US online store just went live on Monday. It allows US customers to buy customized adidas shoes. You can basically customize all of the shoes attributes, like color, material and design. Try it out! The configurator allows a 3D view of your own mi adidas shoe! The shoes availble range from the cool orginal shoes to the top-notch performance shoes like the Predator Power Swerve and many others.

Check it out! miadidas

How the way people code "Hello World"...

2009-02-02T20:53:00.002+01:00

Pretty funny description of how people would code "Hello World". Definitely has some truth to it...
Click here!

Baseball World Championship 2009

2009-01-28T18:57:00.004+01:00

In September 2009 the first round of the Baseball World Championship will be played in Regensburg, Germany. The teams will come from the USA, Venezuela, China and Germany. I am sure there will be a huge crowd each day and a lot of stuff going on besides Baseball during the four day event. The stadium in Regensburg has been upgraded to provide an even better experience to its visitors. (Click here to get more information on the stadium in Regensburg).
Although the prices are pretty steep, I think its definitely worth driving there to see high class Baseball in Germany. To get tickets for the games, go to http://www.baseballwm09.de/

Google app

2009-01-15T16:20:00.004+01:00

About a week ago I stumbled upon a very interesting web app. It was called State States, but since, I think today it redirects you to Google Insights. What this app basically does, it lets you search for any word and will show you the search volume sorted by state for that particular word.
I think you could come up with some interesting studies on which areas are for example affected by certain things, of course you would have to compare the results with other statistics to prove a point. Lets say for example you type in "flu" and a certain state shows an extremely high search volume, you could assume that a lot of people currently suffer from flu in that particular state. It will be pretty tough to find evidence to prove your point, but maybe some people will come up with some interesting stuff.

Click here to get to Google Insights

Stocks: Amag Pharmaceuticals

2008-12-30T11:02:00.003+01:00

A couple of days ago I stumbled upon this very interesting pharmaceutical company. The investor relations section of their homepage describes themselves as

“a biopharmaceutical company that utilizes its proprietary nanoparticle technology for the development and commercialization of therapeutic iron compounds to treat anemia and novel imaging agents to aid in the diagnosis of cancer and cardiovascular disease.”
(Source: Amag Pharmaceuticals)

Their number one product in the pipeline is Ferumoxytol, which could be an effective iron replacement drug, especially for patients with a chronic kidney disease, but also for other patients which suffer from iron anemia. It can also be used as an effective MRI contrast agent and therefore solves more than one medical purpose. Amag already submitted a New Drug Application to the FDA in December of 2007 and is now awaiting final approval.

Amag first received a Complete Response letter by the FDA in October 2008. There were issues raised by the FDA, prolonging the approval of Ferumoxytol. Amag is currently working on solving all issues raised by the FDA, which for example included its manufacturing facility. According to Amag, there were no issues raised concerning the clinical studies conducted by the company.
Therefore I would assume the product itself is ready to go and Amag just needs to fix some non-product related issues. Approval is supposed to come in early 2009 and Amag said it is ready to launch Feraheme(TM) (trade name for Ferumoxytol) as soon as possible.

Amag’s stock price fell $60.13 on December 31st 2007 to $33.57 on December 29th 2008. In case Feraheme(TM) will launch successfully in 2009 I would expect their stock price to increase significantly, but it is for sure a risky investment.

Day 7-10: Back to Banjarmasin

2008-11-18T14:25:00.000+01:00

After coming back from the jungle we wanted to sleep, badly. Knowing how exhausting the bus ride would be, we decided to stay another night in Pangkalan Bun. The next day we took the bus in the afternoon and arrived in Banjarmasin on Friday morning. Now, after only 16 hours!

After getting some rest, we headed to Duta Mall, where we spent the whole afternoon, shopping and eating pizza. At night, we relaxed at the hotel bar, the only place where you could get alcohol in Banjarmasin. They had a caraoke show, where they called up one guest after the other to sing. And let me tell you, there was not a single person, who could not at least sing semi-decent. They didn’t ask us to sing, fortunately for everyone…

On Saturday we went to see the diamond mines in Cempaka. It was nothing like I expected it to be, no security or anything like that. We still haven’t figured out how they make sure nothing is being stolen. The poverty of the people working there was greater than anything we had seen before in Indonesia. The workers dig all day for roughly 20 cents per day (according to one of our travel books). On top of that they get a very marginal cut of the diamond’s worth, if they end up finding one... Very marginal, as everyone else gets their cut first.

Afterwards we visited a famous mosque, called Mesjid Raya Sabilal Muhtadin and went to the shopping mall again. On Sunday noon, our journey ended when we took our plane home to Bali… Boeing MD 82, what a scary old plane!

Day 6: Tanjung Puting National Park

2008-11-18T10:33:00.000+01:00

The last day in Tanjung Puting National Park, Michael and I visited two more Orang Utan Camps and enjoyed hanging out on the boat.

Day 5: Tanjung National Park

2008-11-18T10:30:00.000+01:00

After a cold night under the mosquito net, Michael and I were woken up by the cries of monkeys. First of all we had a shower. I can tell you to shower on a boat without running water in the middle of the jungle, is not an easy task. But with a bit creativity and lots of water from the river, we finally made it.

Our shower/toilet

For a second we really felt clean, but soon the dream was over, our guide invited us to go on a jungle hike with him. Sweating heavily, Michael and I hiked two hours on a small path through the wonderful nature.

Janina and our guide Dani

The rest of the day, we spent in Camp Leakey. Michael and I could observe how Orang Utans opened water bottles stolen from some tourists.

Janina in our Dining/Sleeping/Living Room

Article about Borneo

2008-11-17T15:02:00.001+01:00

There is a nice article available on SPIEGEL ONLINE about Borneo and the radical deforrestation. Click here!
(only available in German)

Day 4: Tanjung Puting National Park

2008-11-17T11:40:00.015+01:00

At 8:30am the luxury of air-condition, shower and blankets was over. Our tour guide Harry picked us up for our trip to the Tanjung Putting National Park.
After arriving in Kumai, we got to know our “home” for the next 3 days. It consisted of a 4-man crew and a 2-deck boat, called Klotok. Michael and I lived on the upper deck, the captain and the rest of the crew on the lower deck. The mood on board was great, especially when our crew found out that we brought a bottle of Arak from Bali. We departed and drove up the river to the national park.

The water looked dirty and it actually was as our guide explained to us. Due to the many ships from Java as well as the toxic dump leftover from the gold mines in the area. After one hour, we reached the dark and almost black waters of the Tanjung National Park.

We had lunch watching monkeys in the trees and enjoying the cool breeze. Two hours later we arrived at Camp Leakey, where we were welcomed by Orang Utans sitting on the pier. Michael and I had quite respect for those huge creatures. Especially of the Orang Utan king called Tom.

King Tom

Our guide led us to the feeding platform in the jungle, where we observed about 20 Orang Utans eating their bananas and playing around.

The feeding platform

After this incredible encounter with these creatures, we headed back to our boat and drove to the crocodile lake, where we spent the night. Again, we had great food and hung out with the crew, with the Arak bottle’s content disappearing rapidly as well as any previous communication problems.

Day 2-3: Bus ride to Pangkalan Bun

2008-11-17T11:30:00.008+01:00

On Saturday we left for the bus station at 8am, having no idea what would lie ahead of us. We got different information on how long the bus would take to get to Pangkalan Bun, all ranging between 12 and 16 hours. Well, we ended up being on the road for 23 hours! On top of that we had to listen to hard-core techno music on the first bus, for 5 hours straight.

We had a 3 hour layover as well as a 2 hour stop in Sampit, where the fuel pipe started leaking and they somehow had to fix it. I think they used duck tape. It was interesting though. I thought the problem must have been with some kind of cooling liquid, I just couldn’t imagine people working on a bus with gasoline all around, while having a cigarette. Well, they did.

Janina during our 3-hour layover

Desperation

Day 1: Banjarmasin

2008-11-17T11:25:00.002+01:00

My birthday present from Janina: A trip to Kalimantan (Borneo)
We arrived in Banjarmasin at around 6pm and were lucky enough to find our hotel having an office at the airport. They got us a cab, which looked pretty solid from the outside, but…

I was sitting next to the driver in the front seat and noticed that our windshield had a huge crack all across it. And when the headlights of other cars pointed at us, you could just see rays of light. I assume our driver saw just as much as me, nevertheless he was flying, going 80 kmh, passing other cars left and right. Oh yeah, he was also on the phone most of the time.

Papa Ante Portas

2008-11-02T05:41:00.020+01:00

Have you ever hiked on a volcano with your dad? I did!

My dad visited Michael and I in our little paradise for three weeks. Together we toured around Bali with our driver whom my dad hired for the three weeks and we had vacation from university. I can tell you this service is pure luxury. You do not have to bother with maps or ask people for directions, you just sit back and enjoy the wonderful landscape.

During my dad’s first week Michael and I were still at university, due to this my father went shopping for our driver and housemaid. If you would have seen our driver’s old glasses which were just a mess and would have seen our housemaid creeping on the ground when she cuts the grass by hand, you will understand that his shopping tour was essential. Even for our own safety because being on the street with a semi blind driver is not that much fun. Though, especially shopping for a lawn-mower in Bali was not an easy task, after a couple of hours though my dad finally found one and bought some new glasses which cost as much as a one month’s salary (average) for a Balinese. I guess this explains the blindness of our driver, it was just too expensive to get new ones.

After our incredible stay in Ubud (see previous post), we moved on to Lake Batur. Again we stayed in a nice hotel where we had an impressive view on the lake. Only the fact that a rat threw Hinduism donations on my head during dinner was an interesting experience for me…

On the next morning we hiked on top of Gunung Batur. A really friendly guide did not only show us the way to the top but he also told us a lot about the Balinese flora and fauna e.g. hot springs, hidden caves and cute puppies. But I think for my dad, the most important thing our guide did was that he gave him a hand and strongly supported him in hiking six hours in the burning sun. We reached the top sweating, but it was worth it, the view on one of the biggest crater lake in the world was just gorgeous.

After experiencing Monsoon rain and fresh strawberry juice in central Bali, my dad, Michael and I drove to the north of Bali, where we relaxed in a wonderful beach resort and enjoyed swimming in the sea. Looking back my dad’s visit was just extraordinary. I can only recommend Papa tours!

Hotel in Ubud

2008-11-01T12:19:00.005+01:00

Last week, Janina her Dad and I spent 2 nights in the greatest hotel I’ve been ever been to. The view was just amazing. You could see the valleys of Ubud from down the infinity pool. The location was unbelievable. Unfortunately, the service did not hold to the same standard as the view. Nevertheless, we had two great days of relaxing, mostly in and around the pool, which you will surely understand looking at the pictures below.

Water Buffalo Racing

2008-10-26T16:24:00.003+01:00

Last week we went to a water buffalo race, which was kind a big thing in the little town where we have seen it. (sorry, can't recall the name of the town right now). It was fun, these jockeys rode the buffalos like crazy and were on some sort of racetrack. It was, I guess, maybe 800m long and had some tricky curves, which made some of the buffalo's leave the track and head for the fans. One time, one of the buffalos actually left the track pretty close to us and just went berserk. Pretty scary, but they were able to calm him down after about 30 seconds.

Klungkung Police and I - BFF

2008-10-26T14:28:00.004+01:00

When we went on to Gunung Agung two weeks ago, we stopped at the center of Klungkung to meet the guide. Once we got there, we were warmly welcomed by two policemen. They kindly asked us to have a coffee and have a chat. We talked about this and that, they gave us fruit and I ended up buying one of the cops a pack of cigarettes which he highly appreciated. We even exchanged numbers! (Isn't that kind of weird?). Even more weird, the cop send me a short message and asked if Janina and I would come again to hang out with them. Nicest cops we met so far in Bali, by far!

Gunung Agung

2008-10-20T03:36:00.014+02:00

Last week, we went to climb Mount Agung, the highest Mountain in Bali with a height of about 3200m. In total we were 8 people, 4 other students from our program as well as Kathrin and Georg who visited us from Germany.

Near the Besaki Temple

We met our guide on Thursday afternoon about 30min away from the mountain. He then brought us to our run-down hotel (it smelled so bad…). We spent the afternoon there, just hanging out. Sleeping was not possible, no sheets and a strong smell of sweat in the rooms… Then we had, what our guide called “breakfast” at 8pm. After that we got ready for what would be the most exhausting experience for probably most of us.
At 10pm we took off from the hotel and drove another 15min by motorbike to the Besaki Temple which is located right below the mountain. And then our 8 hour hike, well I should rather call it climb started. We were equipped with headlights, everyone but me, because our guide only had 7 with him… It was so exhausting. You really had to watch every single step you make, as the route takes you along dangerous and very narrow paths. The first hours were pretty easy, but everything after maybe 2am was just a fight, getting from one break to the other. When we finally got to the last plateau at about 5am, we were all cold (it had about 5 degrees there), wet and tired.

Unfortunately, we were not able to hike up to the top of the mountain, which would have taken us another hour. It was just too dangerous. Wind was blowing so strong, that it could have blown someone of the narrow paths down the mountain, literally.
After about an hour long break of eating, watching the sun rise and making photos, we went on to our 6 hour return trip down the mountain. The next two days were needed for recovery, sleeping, sleeping, sleeping.

The view from up the mountain

Our guide Wayan. This guy is 50+ years old and climbs the mountain about once a week. Of course, he didn’t need any breaks on our way up…

Down the mountain...

Jalan Jalan...

2008-10-04T05:26:00.006+02:00

Today we just got back from our two day trip to the North of Bali. I can tell you, it was a really exhausting. Not only driving 3 hours with the motorbike on quite difficult roads with holes like moon craters and as curvy as corkscrew stairs, but also hiking on a 2000m high mountain and not knowing where to go, is a challenge. Together with my friend Phil who came over from Jakarta last Friday together with his German colleagues, we went to the less touristy area of Bedugul. Actually we were quite surprised when we started our hike which was described by the Lonely Planet guide as “a difficult path which takes 2 hours”. I guess the authors of this part have never hiked there because it was more climbing in the jungle than hiking on a path. Our equipment was in the same state as the Lonely Planet’s description, way off.

Some of us wore sneakers and Phil even wore slippers. You can imagine that we needed more than two hours. On top of the mountain there should have been a temple but after 3 hours mountainous hiking we decided to return to our motorbikes which we had parked somewhere in the woods. Parking in that remote area was not the best idea, because my helmet had somehow disappeared… some jungle creature must have really liked the green colour…Fortunately not the scooter so we drove soaking wet and exhausted back to the Lake Buyan where we got a hotel which was also recommended by our travel guide. But this time, the authors were right besides the fact that the street to our accommodation was a cross-country track. Anyway we were glad to get a hot shower and nice comfy bed.

On the next day we visited the Gigit Waterfalls. Those are more touristy which means no long hiking, our muscles thanked us.

Besides this crazy tour to Bedugul, our group also went to Ubud on Monday. We had hired a driver and a vehicle which should have been a jeep but I am not sure if it was, it seemed more like a plastic truck. But anyway the driver knew the area, so after some sightseeing in Ubud, we went on a walk around the rice fields and villages. This was really gorgeous and quite relaxing compared to our Jungle Hike. The colors and the silence of the nature were fascinating. And we even had the chance to visit a temple with neither salesmen nor tourists. A real rareness in Bali!

The other days of the week, we spent on the beach, playing beach ball in the waves or reading. Except one day where Michael and Phil went golfing in Sanur and I took my first Yoga class at 6 o’clock in the morning which was another challenge…

Gili Meno

2008-09-25T15:15:00.010+02:00

This update comes kind of late, but Janina and I have been busy working on a case study for the last days… great fun. Before that, more exactly from Friday last week to this Monday we have been to the beautiful Island Gili Meno.
It was Janina’s birthday on Sunday so I figured that trip would be a great gift. We left on Friday morning in Kuta. We went to Padang Bai by bus where we then got on our ferry. The trip to Gili Meno took about 5 hours. The ride on the ferry was really exhausting as waves hit us pretty hard and the ship just went back and forth and from side to side. Especially weird was when we heard the engine go out. After a minute or so one of the crew members announced that it was not a serious problem, just some air in the gas pipe. Well, I am not quite sure if this is NOT a serious problem….But anyway the engine worked again after a couple of minutes, nevertheless kind of scary. It didn’t help that it was already dark and there was no land in sight yet. We arrived safely though and when we saw the lights on the three Gili Islands we were already thrilled. The scene reminded us of a movie. Tiny Islands with only some sources of light and a great silence with the volcano in the background.

We then got on to smaller boats and were dropped off on Gili Meno… or let’s say near gili meno, so we got the chance to experience the water with our feet and luggage…After our little ocean walk. When we arrived we got picked up by a horse carriage. We took it a couple of times the next few days on the Island, as it is basically the only form of transportation. It is really cool, you feel thrown back into the 18th century…
Our villa was just unbelievable. OneA big room and two bathrooms, one outside and one inside. On top of that we had a Gazebo as well as an outside daybed, which we pretty much laid on half of the time for the following two days. It was seriously the most relaxing two days of my life.

Our outside dining area and Gazebo

On Saturday we walked around the Island and found a nice little Restaurant where we had fresh fish and spend the most of the night talking to the locals at the bar.

It is just a great place to relax. All tourists on the Island really wanted to have their time alone which you could notice, as people walking by seemed not wanting to communicate with anyone, understandably. All in all it was just a great time and we are already thinking about going back for a couple of days soon.

Diving in Tulamben

2008-09-14T14:39:00.012+02:00

On Saturday we had a university excursion to a diving center in Tulamben. It was awesome, although the 2 hour drive was not too much fun, hot and bumpy. The diving center was great. When we got there, we first had an introduction into diving and some safety instructions. We then grouped up into 10 people and started diving! It was a blast, each one of got to dive for about 15min with one of the diving instructors. We went about 10m deep and were able to watch some of the corals and fish which are located at the dive resorts waterfront. Now we have the chance to get the first diving license which would enable us to dive in up to 18m deep water anywhere in the world. For a great price! The diving center is managed by Austrians, all of them very friendly and helpful. On top of that, they told us that we would get a discounted price on their rooms! And as you can see on the pictures, the rooms are sweet! www.tulamben.com

Pizza Hut

2008-09-14T14:31:00.003+02:00

Seriously, I really like Pizza Hut. But the service at the Bali Pizza Hut was weird, very weird. So we went there a couple of days ago. We passed it on our way home and I figured why not have a little snack. We got to our table and got the menu. Everything fine so far. We looked at the menu for a couple of seconds and then the waitress suddenly came back to take the order. After maybe 30 seconds! We apologized for taking so long, and asked if we could have another couple of minutes. When she asked us for the drinks, I said I would like to have a beer, which made her laugh at me and tell me that they don’t serve beer. She looked at me like I were crazy, but so far they served beer at every restaurant I have been to in Bali, excuse me! Janina asked for some water and was then asked whether she would like cold water. Of course, considering the 30 degrees outside she wanted cold water. When the waitress came back with the drinks, Janina’s water was warm, no ice cubes in sight. We also got appetizers and after finishing them, the waitress took Janina’s fork and knife. Janina then politely asked her for a new fork and knife, which made the waitress ask her: “Why do you need a knife and fork, you ordered pizza?” Sorry, we didn’t know you are not supposed to eat pizza with knife and fork. She then of course forgot about the knife and fork, so we had to ask her a second time until she finally gave them to Janina…

We ordered a pepperoni pizza, medium size, for 2 people. After about 15min a waiter came to us with a small pan pizza, pepperoni and said it was free?! Our guess is that they just messed up our order and made a small pizza instead of medium size, so they figured they would give us the small one for the waiting time. Actually a good move, but they could have told us... Nevertheless, we ended getting our pizza, which was by the way really tasty. I finally gave her a regular size tip, but when the waitress picked up the tip, she just put it on her plate and walked on. What happened, is that the bill I gave flew away and landed on the neighboring parking lot… she just laughed about it… I then picked up the tip from the parking lot myself when we left… funny twist, maybe fate, something or someone didn’t want her to get a tip…

Graduation!

2008-09-11T10:47:00.017+02:00

We've only spent a couple of days at university and already graduated. This study programm is really amazing!
After attending our first lectures on marketing, bahasa indonesia and indonesian history, we all got dressed up in robes for our graduation photo. It was an interesting feeling to "graduate" not knowing if we pass the final exams or not:)

Our studies begin at 7.55 am. Udayana University places great importance on punctuality due to their strict code of conduct. It is hard to get up at 6 o'clock but after driving in the crazy traffic in Denpasar, we are wide awake within a couple of minutes on the bike.
Our professors are Indonesians who studied abroad, mainly in Australia. It is interesting to listen to their point of view about economic topics as well as learning about their culture. Especially Bahasa Indonesia is an essential subject for us, because a lot of Balinese don't speak English and communicating with bodylanguage can be quite exhausting...

Our fellow students come from all over Germany and Austria. Almost all study economics. Some even seem to be in love with their studies, one guy attends his 17th semester in Bali...

Our favorite Beach

2008-09-11T10:24:00.013+02:00

Mostly we go to one and the same beach. It is a 10min drive from our house and in a very quiet area. Unlike the busy beaches in Kuta and Legian, you only see few people hanging out there. There are also only a handful of people trying to sell you stuff on the beach, and they pretty much leave you alone if you tell them to. We already have our personal "salesman" who greets us every day. Most of the time we have a quick chat about Bali. The strategy is to buy something at the beginning of your stay. Meaning after a couple of times at the beach without buying something, you get a necklace or something else he offers you for about 2 or 3 euros. After that he won't bother you and even more important, he will make sure that no one touches your stuff while you are out in the water.

While I was taking pictures of the beach I found out that there was a balinese wedding taking place in the hotel. I took some pictures of the whole wedding set up. Really beautiful. It was taking place in the hotel which lies right above our beach. I can really recommend the hotel, as we have had some drinks there a couple of times. It is really clean, quiet and with a nice staff. Awesome place if you really want to have some time to relax, away from the busy areas of Kuta and Legian. It is called "Legong Keraton Beach Hotel" and has affordable prices.

Tanah Lot Music

2008-09-09T13:54:00.002+02:00

I have been trying to upload this clip a dozen times, but it never worked. Now it finally showed up on my YouTube account. It's really interesting music they have been playing at the Tanah Lot Temple while we were there a couple of days ago.

Udayana University

2008-09-08T13:53:00.004+02:00

On Saturday we had the welcome party at the beach in Jimbaran, with I would assume, around 120 of the 140 German students showing up. Everyone got to introduce him or herself briefly and after that we all had dinner and drinks. There were a lot of really nice people, and I am sure we will have a great time here together. After the introduction we grouped up in 4 and mixed our own cocktails. We all got our own coconut as well as sugar, lemon juice and Arak. Arak is the local Balinese schnapps and as most of us had never had it before, or even heard of it, some really had a few too many drinks, or at least a bit too much Arak. Very nice evening though and we met a lot of interesting people.

On Monday, we all got together again at the Jimbaran campus of the Udayana University. We were introduced to the whole program staff as well as divided into teams of 2-6 people. Every team now has to organize certain events or excursions for the whole group during the 4 month semester. It’s part of our so called “Empowerment” training, and I am really looking forward to the excursions, as the first one will already take us diving somewhere on the Northeastern shore of Bali this weekend.

Hati-Hati!

2008-09-06T06:00:00.006+02:00

Driving itself is difficult enough in Bali. But you also have to keep inmind that police controls are almost a daily routine. Especially if you arenot Indonesian... or let's say Indonesian looking!

After spending a week in Bali, we went through 3 police controls. 2 were free of charge but the last one cost us 10 Euro and a nice conversationwith the police officer. It was about 9pm and Michael tested out his new Balinese driving skills until a police officer stopped us. We had to sit down with him and got an informative lesson about missing stamps in our international driver's license as well as traffic dangers. Actually Michael was taught about those and I got compliments...

The good thing about it is, that negotiating in Bali is even possible in a police control. We got 50% discount...

Tanah Lot Temple

2008-09-06T05:58:00.004+02:00

We went to probably the most famous temple in Bali, the Tanah Lot Temple. It is only about 25min from our house and situated in the ocean, literally. Personally, I like the Uluwatu Temple a lot more. Tanah Lot was just so crowded and so touristy, unbelievable. On the walk down to the Temple, you could see nothing but one store after the other. Nevertheless, pretty cool to see the Temple lying in the ocean. Watching the sunset down there is said to be beautiful, maybe we will check that out another time.

Janina: Balinese Massage

2008-09-03T17:39:00.007+02:00

After enjoying Seminyak beach and long driving with our scooter, Michael and I decided to relax from our "stressful" life at a spa center.

You can have a massage in Bali basically everywhere. Even at the beach, when you are wet and covered with sand, some random old women will offer it to you...

After our first, a bit wierd experience with a spa center next to the highway... we picked a more touristy type of spa in Kuta. At the entrance a friendly lady takes off your shoes and you take a seat next to about ten other people. They offer you one of their "special packages"... I can say, it is really hard to stand this tempting offer... even Michael chose a package of manicure, pedicure and footmassage. It is hard to believe, but having a massage in Kuta can be kind of exhausting...two highly motivated ladies start with manicure and foot massage at the same time. You have to concentrate on the reflexion foot massage while the other lady removes the cuticle from your fingers can be challenging...
Anyway the price-ratio is amazing. The whole package costs about 8 Euro and takes 1,5 hours!

If you look at the picture below, you see what happens when you get a bit too enthusiastic about their offers... I finally ended up with red fingernails and flowers on top...

Dunkin‘ Donuts

2008-09-03T17:33:00.002+02:00

First Janina and I just wanted to go there to get a donut, which is of course always great at Dunkin‘ Donuts :-) There we decided to go for a so called “Nik Nak”, which seemed to be some kind of menue. One donut and a coffee. And the coffee was just great. Normally people in Indonesia drink the, let’s say Turkish-style coffee, where you boil water together with the coffee powder. Janina likes it way more than I do, but we both miss the regular German-style coffee. Luckily, Dunkin’ Donuts in Indonesia has awesome coffee. I love Dunkin’ Donuts, except their restrooms…

Taman Ayun Temple

2008-09-03T16:52:00.008+02:00

This morning, Janina and I took the scooter to the Taman Ayun Temple which is located about 16km north of Denpasaar. It's the second biggest temple in Bali. The temple was really beautiful and there were ladies making some kind of rice cookies, which they were nice enough to share with Janina as you can see below.

Uluwatu Temple

2008-09-02T07:27:00.005+02:00

Today, Janina and I took our scooter to the Uluwatu Temple. The temple is about half an our south of our house on an peninsula. It was just amazing. The Temple is built up on a huge cliff and surrounded by beautiful trees. You can walk all along the cliffs up to the temple.

Unfortunately, you find some areas which are really not being taken care of. And thanks to the tourists, you find this dump on the way up to the temple.

Temple Monkeys

2008-09-02T07:15:00.007+02:00

First of all, monkeys are my favorite animals. I mean there is genetically only a very slight difference from them to us, they are just so cool with their small hands and funny moves. We found yesterday that there are tons of monkey around the Temple area of Uluwatu. Right when you get into the temple area, people sell you peanuts to feed the monkeys, and there are tons of them…

And then there was this one monkey, he was at least 3 times the size of the others. I guess, he has had a few too many peanuts and must be very successful at fighting for the peanuts...

Our Gas Station

2008-09-02T05:58:00.000+02:00

There are some bigger gas stations in Bali, but in most cases, people just stop by one of the many shops on the streets to get gas.
Below is our little shop, we go to for gas. Prices are between 6000 and 7000 Rp. pretty much everywhere, which is about 50c/liter.

Friday night!

2008-08-30T08:43:00.002+02:00

After the experiences with traffic and so on, we decided to go to a nice sushi restaurant we found in our tourist guide. We took a taxi to Seminyak, which seems to be the fancy area of Bali, with a lot of fine restaurants and shops. That’s when we got scared, because normally those would cost a lot of money. We realized though that even there you don’t pay very much. A main course is about 4-5€, which is still very very cheap. Sushi was amazing, especially the California Roles. For the both of us, with drinks and a lot of Sushi, we paid 17€ total (!). When you go to a restaurant in one an area like Kuta though, you will not pay more than 3€ for food and drinks.

After the dinner we headed out to check out the numerous bars we saw back in the cab and found a very, let’s say interesting place. It was an American style Karaoke bar with mostly tourists, or lets say European-looking people. It was a blast, they had a live band which played classic Rock songs. Every now and then people got up to the stage to sing a song supported by the band. First there was this American (I guess) guy singing, he was really into it as you can see in the video. And then we had a Taiwanese guy singing a love song for his wife, heartwarming.

But, it seemed a little strange that all “older” people in the bar, were there with local women. Maybe it was just a coincident…dunno

Bali!

2008-08-30T08:14:00.006+02:00

Wow, where do I begin. The week started off pretty crazy, wrapping up things at work and then having my last day on Tuesday. Thanks everyone from the mi adidas project team, I had a great time. And special thanks for my really sweet gift!

Janina and I then went to start our trip on Wednesday. We took the train to Frankfurt and flew to Doha, Qatar. Those six hours at the airport were really no fun at all. Bad food, people everywhere and a not so great duty free shop. We arrived there at 7pm and took the flight to Bali at around 1am…

The plane to Denpasar was a thrilling 12 hours long (I think) and ended in seeing the beautiful beaches of Bali. The first encounter with locals at the airport is described below… pretty scary. (see Interesting!)

Our maid, Kesi, really nice woman, picked us up at the airport and got us a cab to get to our house.

Now this is really amazing, the house is big, clean and in a great area. We live about 10min off of the real tourist area, so it`s a lot more quiet here and less traffic. Kesi is really nice as well, it still feels pretty weird though having your own maid. She basically lives in a room in the house and takes care of everything, seriously I mean everything. The first day she made us dinner right away, tasty nasi goring. She also cleans the house every day (!) and makes sure we have fresh clothes and so on. Communication is somewhat complicated, because she speaks little English and we basically speak no Indonesian, but we get along. We have our picture book which already helped us out quite well.

After sleeping for about 11 hours Janina and I got up to explore the area on Friday. We took a cab to Kuta, which is the tourist beach area and walked around. It is a totally different world. You see small shops and restaurant everywhere and the prices are just way below European price level. And the beach, unbelievable, the water is so nice as well as the sand, so I can’t wait to get in on Saturday.

We realized pretty quickly, that in order to get around in Bali, you definitely need a vehicle, if you don’t want to take a taxi everywhere. So we decided to get a scooter for 40€ per month. We took one for now, so Janina can see if she wants to drive herself or not. I have driven a scooter before so it wasn’t that difficult for me to hop on and get started. Difficulties due occur though, when you actually get into the real traffic. First of all, people drive on the left side. This is not too bad and you get used to it really quickly. Second, people drive crazy. There are basically no rules and people pass you by on both side, no matter if its cars or scooters. I kind of got used to that as well, you just have to make sure you know what is going on around you and if someone tries to pass you. Normally, people honk when they pass someone else, but still it is really freaky.

Interesting...

2008-08-30T08:07:00.001+02:00

After Janina and I finally arrived at the airport in Denpasaar, we walked to the Visa counter and noticed something strange. Take a guess…

Bali Trip Preparation

2008-07-27T15:40:00.003+02:00

We finally got a house for Bali, thanks to the support of two colleagues, one of them being based out of Jakarta. The house is super cool, we have 3 bedrooms and 3 bathrooms! More enough room to accommodate the guests we will have from Germany… We are nearly booked out, so hurry up!

The Visa papers also just came in, which means we are set to go!

Mike V. any plans from August to December ?

www.flickr.com

TV shows about expats

2008-07-21T19:49:00.004+02:00

Currently, there are tons of shows on German TV about people leaving Germany for a better live abroad. The format is made up like a documentary, showing how the people leave Germany and start their new live abroad and how it develops over the next couple of month.

I enjoy watching those shows, because sometimes you have people you would never think would be the type of persons leaving there old live behind and basically starting from scratch in a foreign country, and then actually make it. Meaning they are financially stable and live a good life in there new country. On the other hand, you have people, who have no clue what they are actually doing, they just think "oh it would be nice to live in (let's say) Paraguay". They have no idea of how they are going to make money, nor do they speak the language or investigate the culture of their new homeland.

Sometimes I really can't understand what those people were thinking. "oh yeah, let's go to XYZ, we will be rich..." Seriously, I think those shows are cool, at least most of them.

And you also have those people with these weird ideas, you would never think would work out, but end up being really successful.But it's not only about the people, I enjoy just seeing different countries in a non-travel magazine type of way. Hard to describe, let's just say it seems more real. There are some shows on the station VOX, pretty much every night.

Chiemsee Trip

2008-07-20T23:46:00.001+02:00

Janina and I have been to the Chiemsee a couple of weeks ago. Her grandparents own a nice apartment there with lots of room and in short distance to the Chiemsee. Of course this made our trip a lot cheaper, except for the horrendous gas prices! 1.50€/litre!

We got to spend 4 days there, hiking and biking around the Chiemsee and up the Alps.
Although the weather wasn’t nice at all, we still got some time to relax and didn’t actually mind hiking for 3 hours in the pouring rain, seriously I didn’t care, I had my weatherproof adidas gear on :-)

Really cool was driving to the Allianz Arena, where Bayern Munich plays. We got tickets to the charity game Goal4Africa, where players like Michael Ballack, Clarence Seedorf and even Michael Schumacher played in tribute to Nelson Mandela`s 90th birthday. It was a nice game, especially sitting about four rows behind the player benches (see pictures) was so cool.

www.flickr.com

Hiking in the Franconian Swiss

2008-07-07T22:51:00.004+02:00

Seriously, everyone I told about me having gone for a hike on the weekend said I was wierd. That might be somehow true, but I mean hiking is fun. For me its a form of relaxation, it feels like you are on vacation... such a big stress releaver you wouldn't believe it...

You take a whole afternoon to enjoy nature relax and just walk through beautiful nature without hearing a single car or any other noise your usually exposed to, every second you spend in the city... I will do it again for sure, although I underestimated how exhausting 20km of walking can actually be... which you will fully notice the day after...

Syncing Folders

2008-07-07T22:46:00.001+02:00

Recently I thought about an addition to Windows, which I think would make everyone’s life easier (okay not everyone’s, because most people simply won’t care).
So you might know that you can sync for example your blackberry calendar with your notebook calendar. You can choose which device will dominate, well I mean which device will win in case of a calendar conflict.

So why is this not available within Windows? For example, syncing folders from your internal hdd with your external one or syncing your USB stick with an hdd folder?

Oh and there is more… what if you try to sync you personal calendar with your work calendar… meaning I want to send out an email from my work calendar to my private mail address, open the email and then have all the data updated in my personal calendar... I guess that this somehow already exists, I am just too lazy to look it up at the moment...

Broaden your knowledge!

2007-12-19T23:56:00.001+01:00

Okay, this might sound a little weird, but to be honest, I think it’s really cool.

Since I bought my video ipod in the States this year, I started downloading a bunch of podcasts. Most of them are news podcasts and I basically listen to them pretty much every day, probably around 30 minutes per day. For example, when I am on the tram or even when I take the car (I got that sweet ipod fm transmitter, awesome thing).

The funny thing about it is, that now I really think I always pretty much know what’s going on in the world, at least that’s what I think. I mean, when I hear people talking about any kind of recent news, I am like “yeah, I know, but did you hear about this and that”.
So on n top of maybe seeming to be more educated that I probably am… I think those podcasts are entertaining too. I don’t know maybe it’s just me. Well, let’s take a look at some of my podcasts. Those are only the US ones, I also listen to some German podcasts, mostly news too.

- Anderson Cooper 360°
- ABC World News
- This Week with George Stephanopoulos
- The Larry King Podcast
- 60 minutes
- ESPN Radio – The Poker Edge (forget about that one, poker you know)

So Anderson Cooper, this is actually one of the podcasts, that I would not consider really “serious” news, just like Larry King, it’s like news mixed with some not so meaningful stuff, well and actually Larry King is a talkshow not news, sorry about that.
Anderson Cooper is a real video podcast, so you actually get to see the whole show on your ipod, if it has video, again, pretty sweat. What I really like about 360° these days, are their reports on the upcoming caucuses. You get to know all the candidates, get the latest news on the campaign trail and I really like the party where they show what one of the candidates said like a year ago, and compare it to what they say now, really interesting. Oh, by the way, not judging on his political skills or anything, Mike Huckabee cracks me up, funny guy, sort of.

And then you have “This Week with George Stephanopoulus”, these are real news, I guess (prove me wrong), it’s only on once a week though. Along with ABC World News and the German news podcasts, this is pretty much the afternoon session.
If someone tries some of those, I would really like to know if someone thinks I am just a total freak, or likes them just as much as me, maybe not just as much, but maybe a little bit.

Best tv shows...

2007-11-20T22:21:00.000+01:00

Okay, I have been really lazy with blogging lately. A lot of stuff going on, school is starting to get pretty busy with exams and all of that, and on top of that I have just been really lazy...

So here just some thoughts, here's my top 3 list of tv shows on air at the moment.

1. Prison Break
2. Heroes
3. Weeds

(1.High Stakes Poker, only for the insiders :) like Mike V.)

Amazing skills....sort of...

2007-10-17T17:58:00.000+02:00

See how much fun it can be to play with a little adidas "footbag". Alexander, one of the adidas "Azubis" and I spent about an hour playing around.. Then after making some unbelievable plays we thought it would be fun to record the stuff. Enjoy!

Just like X-Mas!

2007-09-28T11:44:00.000+02:00

I have been waiting for this for a whole week now, I have internet again!... The saying that "you really start to appreciate things when they are gone" (sort of like this) is sooo true.
No internet sucks. I had to spend 7 days straight without internet, can you imagine?

I just started school Monday this week taking a math preparation course, it was unsolicited, only for people who think they needed to repeat some of the stuff they learned in school, like me. The real start date of school is actually Monday, October 1st, so that's gonna be the real deal.

The week has been pretty cool so far, I enjoyed being in school only half-days (8.30am-1pm) and spending the rest of the time walking/driving around Stuttgart. I also met some nice people at school, but I think I ll get to know a lot more people when we are actually starting to take the "real" classes.

Really cool was also, that my buddy Marlin came out to Stuttgart for a couple of hours two days before his flight back to the US. We went to the Porsche showroom had some food and walked around the city, I enjoyed the afternoon and he already said he is going to be back next year!

Stuttgart... What a nice city. Beautiful buildings, nice city center and a lot of parks. Really, Stuttgart surprised me, what is really fascinating about the city though is, that it is situated in kind of like a bowl, surrounded by hills. You can enjoy some great views around here. I will have to take some pictures soon...

My place... It's pretty much finished. All my stuff is here, I have my tv and all of that. I even cooked... grilled cheese!

I hung out with the other two adidas Azubi's most of the week, they both also have their apartments pretty much ready, and are at least as excited as me about the upcoming 3 month in Stuttgart.

Servus!

First few days

2007-09-09T12:42:00.000+02:00

I haven’t posted for quite a while, so here is an update:

I started the adidas “duales Studium” program last Friday. All of their new apprentices, “Azubi’s” as they are called here, met at the World of Sports to get an introduction and welcome.
They showed us around, introduced us to some people and gave us several presentations from employees and Azubi’s who are already in the program. All in all a very interesting day and I think they choose a great group of people. They actually even took a picture of all of us and interviewed two Azubi’s for a local newspaper.

We had more introductions and presentations last Monday and Tuesday and went on to have Microsoft Office training sessions from Wednesday to Friday.

Finally, the pictures of my new place!

2007-08-26T21:33:00.000+02:00

I went to Stuttgart on Saturday and got the keys for my apartment. So, I used the time there to take some pictures. The place is actually in a really nice area. I'll drive down there again this week to put up a bed, table and so on...

www.flickr.com

Back at work again!

2007-08-24T16:22:00.000+02:00

I spent some time at the office today working on some recruiting topics. This picture is not a fake, this is how I actually always wear my caps...

Update: What's going on?

2007-08-23T11:04:00.000+02:00

Okay, so right now I am enjoying some days off until I start again at adidas on Friday the 31st.
As you might know I also found my apartment and I am going to pick up the keys on Saturday and also take some picture of the place and put them on here.
I am still looking for a car, I kind of neglected that car search for a while, so I am trying to get this done by next Friday too.

I am a Digital Packrat!

2007-08-14T20:39:00.000+02:00

If your computer is full of useless stuff like mine, filled with documents you never even looked at, emails that are 2 years old, folders that contain only junk.... take a look at this!

I have an apartment!

2007-08-13T17:35:00.000+02:00

After visiting one apartment in Stuttgart last Thursday, I thought I found the right (cheap) place and called the owner a few hours after I visited the place. When I told him I want the apartment his response didn't sound to promising. I tried calling him back the next day, no luck. That's when I was pretty sure he already found someone...
So two days past by, and suddenly I got a call on Sunday, when the guy told me I get it. Yesss! No more driving back and forth to Stuttgart (2,5h each way...).
Pictures will definitely follow, I guess, by the end of next week when I pick up the keys.

adidas World Cup 2006 Contest

2007-08-13T01:22:00.000+02:00

I am sure some of you have seen those before, but they are just really funny. And by the way great editing by Mike V :)

Golf in Germany

2007-08-10T12:15:00.000+02:00

It was Tuesday afternoon, it was raining, and I sat at home thinking what the hell I could do to have some fun. Well, what about playing Golf?

So, I drove down to the executive Golf course in Fuerth and played a nice little round of 9-holes in the pouring rain. Great fun! It is probably the smallest and easiest 9-Hole Course I ever played on, but I mean, it's only 10 euro!

20 funny signs from around the world

2007-08-04T23:13:00.000+02:00

Check this out! Those signs are really funny! It sometimes makes you think "What the hell were those guys thinking?!" Click here!

Hablas Espagnol?

2007-08-03T16:42:00.001+02:00

At yesterday's baseball practice (by the way the first practice I attended since being back from the US) we had a new guy showing up. Nothing too special about that, but he only speaks spanish. He just moved here 3 months ago from the Dominican Republic.
So of course, I tried to talk to him for a little bit, you know, just a little small talk.
I was sure I could remember some of the Spanish I learned for the last 3 years in school.

Oh my god, I can't even put together just one sentence. All I did was spitting out some words I remembered, and tried to form some Spanish words by taking the English word and adding a "cion" or "ero" to it. For example:
pitcher = pitchero
bat= batero
As you can imagine, it didn't work out that well. I realized that if you get the opportunity to learn a foreign language in school, man, you should take advantage of it! I regret so much, that I did not try to really learn this language...

The little things that matter....

2007-07-31T23:07:00.000+02:00

Today I spent most of the day looking for a car. My brother and I were driving around, checking out a lot of car dealers, test driving some cars, basically all day. (I didn't find the right one yet...)

What I realized today is, that in contrast to the US, people really don't greet each other.

Well, they do, but only if you really know someone, or if you want something from someone (e.g. in a store).
I was just walking around looking at cars, while people passed by also looking for a car, so I said "hello!".
In the US (and I am sure it's that way in a lot of other countries) your counter-part usually says something like "hey" or "hey, how is it going?".
But in Germany, people don't do that. If you say "hello", people look at you like you are from a different planet. I think this is rather sad, a short "hello" doesn't hurt, and it actually makes you feel kind of good. It's just a small thing, but I miss that right away...

(Nearly) 10 Things I like/dislike about the US

2007-07-26T20:16:00.000+02:00

I am sitting here at the airport in Charlotte, for already more than 4 hours now, trying to finish my “10 things I like/dislike about the US” lists. I am somehow stuck and can’t think of more stuff right now, so the lists will end up a little bit shorter than estimated.
So, it’s going to be a list of 6 things I dislike and 8 things I like.

8 Things I like about the US:

Gas prices. It is so cheap. Seriously, soooo cheap.
Mac and cheese microwave snacks. Three minues and you can enjoy the delightful taste of Macaroni and cheese.
Costco. First of all, they have everything, for cheap. I bought about 5 pants there, none of them cost more than 20$, try to beat that! The real highlight though is the Costco food court. You get a hotdog and soda for only 1.50$!!!
Golf courses. You can find nice and cheap golf courses everywhere. Before I came out there I could have never imagined that golf is so big in the US.
Opening hours. Isn’t it awesome to be able to buy groceries at 10pm, or even later?
Donuts. I think I don’t have to comment on Krispy Kremes.
Refills. There was hardly any restaurant/fast food joint without free refills. It actually just makes you drink more, most of time unhealthy stuff like Coke, but anyways it’s awesome. Every time you leave a place, you can just grab a soda for the way home, for free.
Buffalo wings. Mmh, tasty hot sauce.

6 Things I don’t like about the US:

The blind structure of the “Viejas Casino” sit-n-go tournaments.(This is one for the insiders) You start out with only 1000 chips and 25-50 blinds that increase rapidly, forcing everyone to do the all-in gamble early on. That’s no poker!
Pickles. The pickles in the US don’t taste all that well. See normally I wouldn’t even bother mentioning it, but to my surprise, people seem to be eating pickles all the time. You get them with burgers, sandwiches and so on. So they should better taste good, I mean better!
Beer.
Traffic. Well, I guess this is a local problem in Southern California, but traffic sucks.
Grocery store bargains. For example, they offer you to buy 10 yoghurts for the price of 8, which sounds pretty good, but the question remains, are you going to eat all of them? I answered the question myself and have 6 yoghurts waiting for me in the fridge.
Starbucks. Okay, their coffee tastes great, but they are so expansive. It’s ridiculous to pay 4.50$ for a large caramel macchiato! I go there a lot…

And by the way, why do airports not have cinemas? I think they could make a lot of money…

Bruce Lee vs. Chuck Norris

2007-07-25T05:31:00.001+02:00

I never knew that they were actually fighting against each other in a movie...
Click here!

YGB is going home...

2007-07-24T07:04:00.000+02:00

First of all, thanks Stephanie for making me such a great t-shirt! You rock!

Today was my going-away party at Karl Strauss and I had an awesome time seeing all of you again, Kate, Erin, Kim, Zara, and my boys Marlin (see you soon at the Octoberfest!), Mike (you know you are one of my best friends buddy!), and my kick-ass roomate Brett!

Kate--- I can never thank you enough for making this such a great experience and beeing such a great friend! Hope to see you soon!

Kim--- You rock, be passionate about everything you do!

Talk to you soon!