Montezuma's Revenche - another cacatory post



Urgent matters



After being half of a year in Mexico I totally agree on certain statistics saying that not sunstrokes or insect bites are the most common travel illnesses, but diarrhea. A wonderful initial position for writing a new cacatory post;)

Imagine the 40-60% of tourists who are affected by said illness. Then imagine 150.000 German tourists in Mexico every year.  What shitty constellation that still gives fame to Montezuma, maybe the only Aztec ruler known outside Mexico.

What does he have to do with backdoor trots?

Montezuma ruled over Tenochtitlan, one of the most developed cultures in those times. They are the ones who say the world might end next year. He did his job quite bad – Tenochtitlan declined under his sovereignty. And he definitely wasn’t the most innocent here.

Montezuma was a very religious man. Religious means: he sacrificed a lot of his fellers. A LOT. He started wars just to achieve captives for more sacrifices.

So when the Spaniards arrived they had no problem in convincing the suppressed Mexicans to fight against their own king. Montezuma on the other side tried to beg the Spaniards to go with the help of gifts made of gold. That was as stupid as the fact that Montezuma didn’t even fight against the Spaniards when they eventually arrived in Tenochtitlan, thinking they must have been some kind of gods.

Too much mistakes in a row; he got killed and it is said that his course raised a new army under his reign; E. Coli troops.

**Moctezumas Rache: Der Origninaltext ist auf der Teff3-Homepage zu finden. Link**

One Week as a Vegetarian (Part III)

...not this week;)

Christmas Eve without meat. Let's see how that worked..


Days 5+6

After getting it right with the protein it was a lot easier to be veggie. You can really get stuffed by a salad as long as you don't forget the protein shake. Now I could try out some fancy new things: double cheese sandwich with cherry jam topping, spaghetti with salsa made of beans, orange-watermelon-banana juice, vegetarian pozole which is corn stew with mushrooms and squash blossoms instead of meat.

Another great thing is to recognize that eventually I don't really have to order something whenever I'm passing a Taco stand. This really feels like getting back my own self-determination.

Day 7

It's Christmas eve and my last hours of being a vegetarian. I was invited to celebrate that day at a friend's house - fortunatelly he is vegetarian and was responsible for preparing the food. So there was salad, lasagna and a fruit salad made of apples and nuts. Also vegetarian and very delicious: The Glühwein I prepared. It's kind of a German tradition to get drunk on every possible festive day. During christmas it's Glühwein that is helping a lot here. Red wine, rum, a few spices and sugar, altogether heated up to 90 degrees. So warm alcohole with lots of sugar...mhh yummy; that keeps you warm all night and in bed the next day;)

Speaking of the next day; yeah I had some fried eggs again. But when it came to choose between tripple cheese sandwich and cutlet sandwich I took the first one. Well, in that case it wasn't about the calories I guess. But seriously that week showed me that it's possible to live without meat. Not that I'm a vegeatrian now, but up to Men's health eating meat 1 time a week is far enough. There were some nice side effects that week as well:

- no feeling of having eaten far too much
- no sign of montezuma's revenge
- opened up my mind to a totally new life style
- got to know the taste of soy meat (well, at least it was an experience)

**Die vegetarische Woche ist vorüber. Und ich bin nicht mal über das erste bisschen Fleisch hergefallen. Vollblut-Vegetarier werd ich wohl trotzdem nicht...btw..geht das überhaupt?;)**

One Week as a Vegetarian (Part II)

No fish this week! But Tofu!;)

My vegetarian week goes on. This time with a personal low; and it's solution.

Day 3

After I went to the gym in the mornging I was hungry all day! I ate lots of bananas, made pasta, had some energy bars..Still I couldn't kill my appetite. After leaving my house with lots of everything in my tummy I was asked at a friend's house if I was hungry...Half an hour later. And I couldn't resist.

So I had some veggie-tacos and not being quite sure if I was hungry or not we went shopping. We went to IDEA what is IKEA but in Mexico. It really looks the same, just 5 times less variaty.

Anyway we had some Sushi afterwards. Without fish of course. The good thing is that Sushi in Mexico is not really similar to what Sushi is in Germany or, well Japan. You usually don't put wasabi and they don't consist that much of rice but are filled with cream cheese, avocado or mango. It's not unusual that the rolls are fried. And what should I say: The first time of the day I was full up!

Later that kept me thinking and I recognized that allthough I had lots of food that day I dind't have any proteins. That is why I could go on eating all that salad-something-crap and still wanted more.

So this was about to change.

Day 4

That day's resolution was to have more proteins. I started with cereals with milk. My roomie told me that I should eat soy meat for lunch. I was wondering what meat made of beans would look like. So I went to a natural food store.

Soy meat..a treat for the eyes

I think the lady in the shop couldn't really estimate my look when she showed me the soy meet - sort of disgust meets interest. It looks like in the foto on the side by the way. I was asking: "People really do eat that?" And my look became even weirder when she told me that they come with beef flavour or chicken flavour or anything similar. I was asking: "Why vegetarians eat meat substitutes that tast like meat?" She couldn't answer that;)

Soyfoods are low in saturated fat and contain no cholesterol. Soy is the only complete plant protein equal to animal protein and contains all eight essential amino acids. In addition, soyfoods are high in dietary fiber, iron, calcium, vitamin A, vitamin D, and other essential nutrients. I'm feeling healthier just reading that;)

In the end she sold me a package of already prepared soy meat. I cooked my everyday dish: rice, tomato sauce but with soy meat topping this time. And it was good acutally. It tasted a little bit like fish and I put too much garlic. But not that bad. And I wasn't hungry for hours.

**Rückschlag am dritten Tag. Ich aß und aß und wurde nicht satt. Später nach einem ausgedehnten Sushi-ohne-Fisch Gang fiel mir auf, dass ich den ganzen Tag noch kein Protein gegessen hatte. Also versuchte ich es am nächsten Tag mit Fleischersatz aus Soyabohnen. Nicht schlecht wenn auch ein wenig fischig**

One Week as a Vegetarian (Part I)

Since I came to Mexico I got to know a bunch of people with two certain qualities: either they are called Alejandro or they are vegetarian. Don't ask me why is that because I thought that both of them are not really Mexican "qualities". But this is what's happening to me at the moment. So I wanted to try it out (not the thing with being called Alejandro*g) and decided to live as a Vegetarian for one week.

Passing all the Taco stands for now this seems impossible to me. Nevertheless Saturday 18th dicember 2010 at 00:00 a.m. my vegetarian week began...

Day 1

It's all started with having a look into my fridge. The turkey ham I already got to my roomie. I wasn't quite sure if you could eat the 5-minutes-china-noodles. On the package it says "beef flavour" but I really doubt that there is really meat inside. I called a friend of mine who told me: no meet flavoured soup or china noodles or whatever. So I had some cereals. I really thought that I couldn't do anything wrong with that. Cereals+milk+banana....Well, yes you can! Did you knwo that there were different types of vegetarians?

• Ovo vegetarianism includes eggs but not dairy products.
• Lacto vegetarianism includes dairy products but not eggs.
• Ovo-lacto vegetarianism includes animal/dairy products such as eggs, milk, and honey.
• Veganism excludes all animal flesh and animal products, including milk, honey, and eggs, and may also exclude any products tested on animals, or any clothing from animals.
• Raw veganism includes only fresh and uncooked fruit, nuts, seeds, and vegetables. Vegetables can only be cooked up to a certain temperature.
• Fruitarianism permits only fruit, nuts, seeds, and other plant matter that can be gathered without harming the plant.
• Su vegetarianism excludes all animal products as well as vegetables in the allium family: onion, garlic, scallions, leeks, or shallots.
• Macrobiotic diets consist mostly of whole grains and beans.

So after 10 minutes living the vegetarian way I already failed to be an ovo vegetarian, vegan, raw vegan, fruitarian, su vegetarian an macrobiotic dietist. Well, at least I decided to keep the eggs. That is why I'm officially a lacto vegetarian this week. Nice to finally find oneself.

Later that day I went to the supermarket. I never had to think that much about what to buy .. or what not to buy. Is hazelnut spread ok? Yoghurt? Cheese? In the end I bought a lot of rice, tomatoes and beans. I recognized that I'll have to cook a lot if I don't want to live on chocolate all week long. So I had rice, tomatoe topping and vegetables. But I couldn't quit the feeling of being hungry! Maybe it's the new feeling of don't stuff myself with meat?

In the evening there was the first really hard moment. I was helping to paint the walls of a friend's room. Still hungy of course. And he offered chinese food..with meat! What a burden to eat bretzels in that moment...

Day 2

I'm with a vegetarian today. There is orange juice, salad and a main course made with lentils and rice (of course;) Really good acutally. The popcorn and coffee afterwards killed my appetite entirely. In the evening I had more rice and a power bar.

I'm feeling good - is this already detoxication?

**Diese Woche versuche ich mich als Vegetarier. Der erste Tag war hart, denn ich konnte irgendwie meinen Hunger nicht stillen. Außerdem habe ich mich mit meiner Milch im Müsli schon für vielerlei Art von Vegetarier disqualifiziert. Der zweite Tag wurde zum Glück besser**

My first pilmgrimage

The sacred cloak (not the flag!*g)

It was 12th December 1531 when little Juan (what other name he possibly could’ve had?) gave proof to a Spanish bishop that Our Lady of Guadalupe appeared to him: his cloak showing her picture and the flowers blooming on the hill of Tepeyac where then the first sanctuary in honor of Ms. Guadalupe was built.

Now there are three of them. The first one is too little, the second one is sinking as a result of the weakness of the ground, the third one looks like a huge congress hall. No wonder, it was built by the same architect who built the Aztec Stadium and the National Anthropology Museum as well - all three of them count to the most visited edifices in Mexico City. The Basilica of Our Lady of Guadalupe is even the most visited sanctuary in the world. About 20 million people visit it annually. But in the night of the 12th December people really having a blast in the city and 6 million people crowd the streets in the north of DF.

The entrance to the basilica

So we started our tour about 2km from where there is the basilica. That is pure luxury in comparison to where the Mexicans start their tour that can take up to weeks. There are people walking hundreds of kilometers starting from where they are living. Some are walking barefooted, some crawling on their knees.

The coolest thing is that on the way to the sanctuary there are people giving away something to eat and to drink. I love the Mexican food it is so good and cheap. And here you’ll get it for free! So after 10 minutes we had all kinds of sweets, coffee, rolls, juice etc. in our hands and were walking up De Guadalupe Street. There weren’t that much people in the streets because we went there at 8 pm. The real party starts at midnight. Just in the end right in front of the basilica it got stuffed with people wearing drawings on their back, priests splashing holy water into the masses, ambulances and speakers announcing: “Pepe from Puebla is searching for his girlfriend Carmen. Carmen from Puebla please come here to meet your boyfriend Pepe”.

Starting the tour

People sleeping in front of the basilica

Inside the basilica there is not much more to see than said cloak and thousands of Mexicans praying to Virgencita to cure their illnesses or change their life or something. And passing all the pilgrims sleeping on the ground in front of the sanctuary (ok, the winter here is not the same as in Germany. But still it’s freaking cold at night!) you’ll have a stunning view over Mexico City right from the hilltop of Tepeyac.

**Am 12. Dezember pilgern um die 6 Millionen Menschen zur Basílica de Guadalupe in Mexiko Stadt; der meist besuchten Kirche der Welt. Vania, Fabian und ich waren 3 davon und konnten auf dem Weg dorthin dem kostenlosen Angebot mexikanischer Küche frönen**

Anti-Anti

There was this one party night when I was told the following in a conversation with an abrupt ending: "I don't like drunken people" (poor one..being at a party at 4 a.m.). "Also I don't like the smell of cigarettes" (that I understand). "As well I don't like it when people drink coffee for I don't like the smell of it" (and I was gone).

After that I had a chat with the friend who was with me at the party and we defined 5 types of Anti-people you never would like to have around. Those people are not just against a certain behaviour, but they ALWAYS want to talk you out of doing something. It's more than having principles, those guys just suck for not having the capability to accept other people's gustoes and destroy a gathering with comments noone wants to hear.

1. "I don't like the smell of coffe"
Coffee is great. Shut up and drink your milk.

2. "I hate it when people need alcohol for partying"
Of course alcohol is not healthy. Seriously, although science guys couldn't find out whether one glass of red wine is healthy or not. We all know it's never enough with one glass of wine. But do we learn from the headache the next day? No.
But isn't it obvious that those people who are strictly against other people drinking alcohol are always standing in the corner complaining first that the others drink alcohol and later complaining about the others having fun?

3. "I don't like pop. Or rock. Or electro. In fact, I don't like music"
Those guys are against party in whatever possible appearrance. Not that they are against the clubs you are suggesting (what could happen if you're in Hamburg or something...). They also are against having a drink at home, BBQ-picnics, snowball fights etc. So the best thing that could happen to them is you sending them home while you enjoy your life, isn't it?

4. "Why do you kill animals?"
It's totally ok to be a vegetarian. Or fruitarier. Or I-just-eat-apples-ian. Anyone who already has seen what happens in a slaughterhouse understands that. But what is it with those guys whose only small talk topic is how they nourish themselves? One day we brought potato salad to a party, because a friend who gave the party asked us to bring something to eat for her anti-meat roomie and his anti-meat friends (often there is more than one of them). So we brought potatoe salad. I was stirring it with a knife when said roomie told me: This knife already cut meat. I won't eat this salad. ...

5. "It don't have fun and I don't know why"
The worst ones. Because there is always a reason why they dislike what's going on - the other people, the weather or their own stupidity.

**Es gibt einige Arten Mensch, die man nicht um sich haben möchte. Hierbei gehts nicht um Verneiner oder Prinzpienreiter, sondern um Leute, die absichtlich ein Happening zerstören möchten, weil ihnen etwas nicht passt. Und die Themen sind of die gleichen: Sie sind gegen das Trinken von Kaffee oder Alkohol, Musik, Fleisch essen oder sowieso gegen alles.**

What cacatory post!

I adopted a word! I'm a proud linguistic father!!! 

SaveTheWords.org is a really cool homepage where you can adopt a word and hereby help to keep it from extinction. So my word is cacatory - isn't it a cute name?

cacatory (adj): accompanied by loose bowels; exp: For the diners, the effects of the chicken cacciatore, alas, were cacatory.

flicker: g_u evaporato

Cute name, shitty meaning;) 

I scanned the www a little to get more information about my little baby and stumbled upon this web page here. Forthright, a.k.a. Steve Chrisomalis is listing some rare words, and cacatory is one of those. The idea behind the page appeared very interesting to me. He says he encountered Googlewhacking in 2002, where people put any two legitimate English words into the Google search engine to find as a result a single page containing both words. Now he took that idea to extremes and searched for extremely rare words which are found in some dictionaries and yet which are found on no web pages that are accessible through search engines.

He points out that the word cacatory goes back to the 17th century and is now in danger of extinction. So I scanned through the 1230 google results for cacatory. And let me say, it's not the fact that you won't find it, but the result is poor.

So there is Larissa Lyons blog - she describs herself as clown, tax analyst and a pig castrator, and is into writing erotic stories for women (interesting combination...). She also adopted cacatory and describes her experience the following way:

First off, let’s face it…those of us with very…um, elevated?…senses of humor still find enjoyment in simply saying the word shit. But now, we have a fancy word to say it with. And we’re no longer talking about plain simple poop, of course not. We’re talking about the smelly, gassy, runny cacatory type of doo doo.

Sweet, but I think I won't erase shit in my vocabulary for doo doo*g
Another example is that guy from some kind of advice-from-a-doctor hompepage. 

2009-12-27

Dear Dr sb, My age is 30 years. I am unmarried. My problem is that some time I am suffered either in constipation or in cacatory (Pechesh/ need to go in toilet). Mostly I also have gas trouble. Pls suggest remedy.

Didn't work well, because:

2010-01-03  (!)

I am waiting for reply. Any one can help me.

... poor one.

But that's it. Didn't find a lot more cacatory content!

So how to spread the word? I don't want to post childish youtube videos or something...But how else get the attention for a noble thing like that. Ahhhh, cacatory, here you are!

**auf SaveTheWords.org kann man Wörter adoptieren, um sie vom Aussterben zu bewahren. Ich habe cacatory bekommen (etwas, das Durchfall hervorruft). Dieser Blogeintrag ist mein Beitrag zur Bewahrung des kulturellen Erbes!**

8 Things I Hate about Hamburg

There is a saying in Germany pointing out that there is no one who could say from the bottom of his heart he likes Berlin and Hamburg likewise. To my mind this is wrong. A lot better would be: The people who like Hamburg never got to know Berlin. Seriously, from all million-inhabitants-metropolises in Germany; Munich, Berlin, Hamburg and Cologne (from time to time), Hamburg definitely is the most disappointing travel destination. And I’ll give you 8 reasons why is that.

1. Is this beer or lemonade?

There are about 5000 sorts of beer in Germany. Two of them come from Hamburg: Holsten and Astra. Let´s say they aren’t amongst the top 1000. And there is this thing to mix up beer with lemonade, called  “Alster”, like the artificial lake in the city center. To my mind the same way you shouldn’t swim in the Alster you shouldn’t mix lemonade with beer.

2. Sightsearching

Let’s see what Hamburg’s tourism incoming points out as highlights:

Beatlemania

- the harbor quarters (well, it’s a habour in the end…)

- the hamburg philharmonic hall (not built yet)

- Reeperbahn (Hamburg’s red-light district. There is lots of party going on, but Amsterdam is a lot cooler though)

- Michel (a church, that is just a church in the end. It’s the same with the town hall by the way.)

So nothing special over there. Of course, there are a few exceptions, like for the Kaiserkeller (where the Beatles started their carrer), the Unilever building in the harbour and some locations at Reeperbahn. In comparison to the other big cities in Germany quiet nothing indeed.

3. The clouds are hamburg's sun

Very expensive flats in hamburg and clouds

The northern part of Germany isn’t known for it's good weather. A friend of mine summarized it quiet well when she woke up in the morning, watched out of the window, saw the cloudy sky and said: I think, we already reached today’s grey maximum (Ich denke, wir haben den Tagesgrauwert erreicht).

4. Where is the party again?

When you look into the party reviews in Berlin journal’s the pages are crowded with what you can do for having fun at night. In Hamburg it’s not about pages, it’s about lines. Although there are some cool places to be (Uebel und Gefährlich, China Lounge f.e.) you would've problems in doing some serious club-hopping.

5. Wanted: Championship

The hamburgs (or even more funny: hamburger as they are called in Germany*g) love their football teams HSV and St. Pauli. But St. Pauli never won the championship, and the last time HSV got the trophy was centuries ago. So what’s the excitement all about?

6. No Kebab at night

Hamburg-the city that sleeps at night. The metro closes at 11.30 pm during the week and as already mentioned the party scene is not that developed. If you’re not too drunk you would not want to go to Reeperbahn after 3 am. But where to head then? And even more serious: Where to get something to eat then? After my last party in hamburg I needed hours to get to my hotel. And doesn’t matter where I changed the tram, I couldn’t find any open restaurant at all.

7. Come on, grow up

Hamurg-musical city. Funny to promote the city like that with a zero-variety of musicals. There are three Disney-related movie/musical adaptions going on at the moment: Lion king, Tarzan and Sister Act. Nice, but definitely not classy. Another two facts were kind of interesting to me:

A Hamburg-inhabitant-stereotype

Hamburg’s “cathedral” (Dom) is a funfair in the end. And smoking is officially prohibited but neither the people nor the establishments care.  I mean, it isn’t  difficult to install proper aircon, is it? Why do all cities can do it, but Hamburg not?

8. People from Hamburg

They say that people from the northern part of Germany are very reserved. But my stay in hamburg taught me, that hamburgs are really nice guys. We were helped without asking and got to know some really cool people. So this is my 8^th hate fact: I can’t write anything bad about people from hamburg!

**8 Dinge, die ich an Hamburg hasse: das Bier, die fehlenden Sehenswürdigkeiten, das Wetter, die nicht wirklich große Partyszene und somit auch ein Nicht-Angebot an Nach-Feier-Fast-Food, der Trouble um die Hamburger Fußballvereine, die magere Auswahl an guten Musicals trotz der Bezeichnung "Musical City" und dass ich nichts über die reservierten Hamburger schreiben kann. Die sind nämlich cool und können ja nun nix für ihre Stadt;)**

**Mehr Szene-Infos aus Hamburg von mir gibt es überigens auf ThreeWords** 

Why do you have that awkward mustache?

In a bar at Reeperbahn/Hamburg (what is comparable to the red light district in Amsterdam..but without any glamour) we talked to some guys from England. One of the guys had this freakish-looking mustache. We were all like:

 

...well, maybe not*g

 After a while a friend of mine asked the question I had in mind from the first moment on but didn't dare to ask. Well as a women I think she was in a better position asking that: "Why do you have this awkward mustache?" 

And the guy wasn't insulted at all. I thought he'll tell us about all the advantages growing a mustache could have, like for example:





Anyway, he told us he grows his mustache for charity reasons. That answer seemed a little strange as well, but after a little research I have to say he really stands up for a great project. Let me introduce to you: the Movember.

The rules are simple, start Movember 1st clean-shaven and then grow a moustache for the entire month. The moustache becomes the ribbon for men's health, the means by which awareness and funds are raised for cancers that affect men. 

He got £317  for looking a lot
cooler after having grown his mustache
uk.movember.com/mospace/761948/

Women can participate as well. She raised £538 with a little paint uk.movember.com/mospace/684644/

 

 

 

Mustaches grow better on men's faces than on women's faces, well except for this beauty blog: fraumitbart. Now there is the clue: A man is 35% more likely to be diagnosed with prostate cancer than a woman is to be diagnosed with breast cancer, experts say. Don't know if a men's beard grows 35% faster than a women's beard also. Maybe someone should ask the woman from the blog...

The projects runs astonishing good:

- Last year in the UK alone, £5m was raised.
- Halfway through the month, that heady total already crushes the $7.8 million raised by 35,000 men in Canada in 2009
- 627,000 mustached men have raised more than $100 million over the last four years

Movember is an idea conceived by a few fellers in Australia in 2003 – to bring back the moustache for one month a year and do something good for men’s health. The Mo Bros as they are known, set themselves on a course to create a global men’s health movement. 

Nowadays the money people raise by growing a mustache is donated to the Prostate Cancer Foundation (PCF) and Livestrong, a nonprofit organization founded by Lance Armstrong that fights to improve the lives of people affected by cancer.

Don't know what it is with you but I'm definitely thinking about growing a mustache the next year;)

**Im "Movember" lassen sich Männer in bis heute englischsprachigen Ländern Oberlippenbärte wachsen um damit für gesundheitliche Aufklärung im Bereich Prostatakrebs ein Zeichen zu setzen und um Geld für den guten Zweck zu kämpfen. Ich find's super und werd mal in November 2011 drüber nachdenken;)**

Encore: Berlin

Let's put another Dj(ane) from Berlin [Anja Schneider] and watch some pictures:

After writing my last blog post I stumbled upon this intersting book: Smiling Berlin. Lasse Walter shows Berlin's mentality via pictures. The coolest ones I could find I like to share with you.

 ...

Brunching in Berlin takes hours and hours. Love to watch the crowd consisting mainly of the three PARs:

-party hoppers

-party poopers

-parents

                                     ...

Graffiti is part of the Berlin cultural self-concept. There is said to be a graffiti saying "Pups mal" (Just fart)                             

There is art in every corner of Berlin. Sometimes there is a stylish store, or a painted wall (of course, there is East Side Gallery where they painted on the Berlin wall what is now the biggest freestanding outside-painting in the world), or just a mushroomish kind of thing:)

...                        Never leave a place out where you could be creative;)                                                  ... Dancing outside in the streets is the greatest. Unfortunatelly Berlin no longer carries out the Loveparade (neither does another city after what happened this year in Duisburg). But there are a lot more festivals in Berlin where you can freak out: Karneval der Kulturen, carnival, festivals inside the different boroughs or the Christopher Street Day where about 600.000 gays and friends are going crazy half-naked.

**Noch ein paar Berlin Impressionen fürs Fernwehkonto hier**

A virtual Berlin party night

Berlin is a great place to be. I've lived there half a year while writing my final paper for my studies. Kind of a crazy time being the student by day and.. well the student at night as well*haha
Today I'd like to post the most special things Berlin had to offer while I was there. Let's start a virtual party night!

00.00 Getting in the tram (S-Bahn)

Berlin's tram is not very cheap but in exchange it's punctual (of course;) and an experience as well. I love to watch the people who are in the same waggon with me. Berlin consists of different boroughs and every single of them has it's own style. So there are the polo-shirt-wearers from Ku'damm, the village people from Schöneberg and the people from Prenzlauer Berg who, let's say, don't care that much;)

If you're lucky you'll get into an illegal party going on in one of the waggons of the S-Bahn circle line. But keep your eyes open for the police so that you don't have to pay the surcharge!

But personally to me the best thing is the sound you hear when the tram is leaving. Watch Paul Kalkbrenner recording that certain sound, the most popular electronic DJ from Berlin:



2:00 Getting the party started

Partys in Berlin start late and go on. And go on...The excess supply of good and interesting partys is both blessing and curse. Underground partys are what Berlin is famous for. But with the fame there come the masses. That is why the Watergate which was set  on the 8th place in the list of the best clubs of the world (DJmag) two years ago is now overcrowded and not worth anymore the trouble of standing in line for an hour or so.
The good thing is that the event people are very inventive here. There was this one party when I had to go to the bathroom and got into a room where there really was a toilet, but a dj booth right next to it and dancing people around it. There was this other party where you could get your face painted at the entrance. Or those illegal partys in the woods of Karlshorst.

.. and there are the best electronic DJs in the world. Seriously, there is no other place on earth with such a variety of perfect electronic party nights. Just give Geschwister Schuman a try to convince you:


By the way, of course the clubs around Warschauer Straße and Ostbahnhof (Berghain) are the coolest. But I was said that there is a new underground scene coming up at Ostkreuz (K-pax that you can see in the youtube stream, or about blank f.e.).

7:00 Getting a bite

Berlin is famous for Currywurst (sausage and curry dip) and Döner (doner kebab). There is no better way to leave a party. The invention of currywurst is attributed to Herta Heuwer in Berlin in 1949 after she obtained ketchup, Worcestershire sauce and curry powder from British soldiers. It's important to know that there is currywurst with sausage casing and without. Last one they eat mostly in Eastern Berlin. And because of the party is going on over there you'll probably get to know currywurst without casing;) The oldest currywurst you get at Konnopkes in Prenzlauer Berg. They introduced the currywurst to Eastern Berlin in 1960. Yeah, this is my style of sightseeing.
Döner is made of meat, salad and three sauces that vary in Germany, but in Berlin you get garlic, herb and a spicy sauce. Yummy

15:00 Getting entertained

In summertime you could chill in one of Berlin's parks or artificial beaches at the Spree. In wintertime you'll probably go to one of the after-hour-clubs. Anyway in the afternoon there is some cool stuff going on in the Mauerpark. Someone is singing over there and about 2000 people are watching him! A star? No, just an ordinary guy doing karaoke. Definitely worth seeing it!

18:00 Getting some sleep, cuz we'll start again:

00:00 Getting in the tram (...)

**Partytouren in Berlin starten wohl gegen Mitternacht in der S-Bahn. Der Osten der Stadt hat einiges zu bieten mit dem Ostkreuz als derzeitiger Geheimtipp. Eine Currywurst oder Döner nach der Party gehört genauso dazu wie das Karaokesingen im Mauerpark**

Social Media in Tourism Marketing

Me at GATE

         This time I'd like to share some interesting information about a more business related topic. I was invented by the non-profit organization GATE to present on the topic "Social Media in Tourism Marketing".

         Why is it important to deal with Social Media?

         Why is Social Media important for the tourism industry?

         What is Web 3.0 about?

         Social Media in Tourism Marketing

         Social Media in the Tourism Communication Process

 

GATE Social Media

View more presentations from vorsprung.

More information on "GATE - Netwerke, Tourismus, Kultur e.V." here (german)

**Die gepostete Präsentation macht Euch fit für die touristische Vermarktung mit Hilfe der Social Media**

Jiabao! Tell us about philosophy!

Wen Jiabao (68)
Premier of People's Republic of China

A few days ago Hu Jintao was elected to be the most powerful person on the planet (Forbes). So I think it's time for having a closer look on what the Chinese government is standing for. Lately I read about Wen Jiabao who is perceived as a liberal voice in China's ruling elite, and about his favourite reading while travelling. Adam Smith - The Theory of Moral Senitments, and Marcus Aurelius - Meditations. So maybe take a look here.

Ugh! - philosophy in short

Adam Smith was kind of a guru in my university economy courses. He is known for his thoughts about the free market. Also his book An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations gave birth to macroeconomics. So he really was a genius assuming that he wrote abouth free markets and macroeconomic in a time when there was no such thing as economic science known.

Quite up-to-date were his thoughts about the inefficiency of decreasing interest rates down to zero. Anybody remembers the FED decreasing their interest rates to 0,25% and bought $600 billion of treasuries to stimulate the American economy and avert deflation? Smith would turn his grave...

In his book Meditations he assumes that people are watching each other's actions and estimate what is good or wrong by sympathy what could be translated with having a similar culture. Actions are jugded on if they are based on commonly shared rules and morals than on benefit.

Marcus Aurelius on the other hand was a 2nd century Roman emperor. It was not easy for him ruling over the country with my great-great-etc.-great grandfathers the German tribes becoming a pain in the ass for the emire. So he started focusing on what anyone should do while there is war: writing an autobiography and dealing with stoic philosphy;)

Stoics were concerned with the active relationship between cosmic determinism and human freedom, and a life in accordance with nature. They thought that the best indication of an individual's philosophy was not what a person said but how he behaved (what is similar to what Smith said). Furthermore they believed the mind to be a "tabula rasa", so that individuals are born without built-in mental content and that their knowledge comes from experience and perception.

Aurelius himself didn't really was into Christianity and he disliked laziness and pomp.

"Get rid of the judgment, get rid of the 'I am hurt,' you are rid of the hurt itself."

"Or is it your reputation that's bothering you? But look at how soon we're all forgotten."

He cherished the expression of opinon and equal rights for anybody. To my mind this is today's second most important contribution when thinking about our modern society.

**Chinas Premierminister Wen Jiabao liest auf seinen Reisen Adam Smith und Markus Aurelius. Smiths ablehnende Haltung gegen ein Zinsverbot und Aurelius' Forderung nach freier Meinungsäußerung sind wohl immer noch sehr moderne Ansätze**