lundi, octobre 12, 2009
Califorina is preparing for the big one!
This is something that would definitely not see in Belgium. Californians are going to participate in an earthquake drill on Oct. 15, 2009 to prepare for the upcoming BIG ONE. Last year, the drill was held solely in SoCal, but the initiative is carried out throughout the state this year. Check out the website for more info!
samedi, février 14, 2009
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lundi, septembre 01, 2008
Scaldis - Bush Ambrée
Hey folks!
It's been a while! Yeah, I know. But let's get down to business!
Here is an interesting thing I saw this weekend.
Bush is not Bush in the US... It's named Scaldis!
Here is the bottle:
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Same font, same everything. Just the name changes. I think I might have an idea why though...
Are we thinking about the same thing?! Here is a link with different reasons why beers get aliases...: http://beeradvocate.com/beer/profile/604/34071
Don't forget to get a taste of it! It's simply awesome!
vendredi, mai 23, 2008
Wild fires kinda close to us...
Check this out! We were thinking about going to Santa Cruz and around this weekend, but I think we'll have to postpone the trip... Who knows? They have 20% contained at this point, but the fire is huge (3100 acres in damage):
http://www.mercurynews.com/breakingnews/ci_9357531?nclick_check=1
dimanche, avril 20, 2008
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vendredi, octobre 12, 2007
Calls for a breakup grow ever louder in Belgium
Article from the New York Times written by Elaine Sciolino, published on Spetember 21, 2007.
Filip Dewinter, the leader of the extreme-right Flemish party Vlaams Belang, held a cake Tuesday celebrating Belgium’s 100th day without a government after the last general election.
BRUSSELS, Sept. 16 — Belgium has given the world Audrey Hepburn, René Magritte, the saxophone and deep-fried potato slices that somehow are called French.
In the southern region of Wallonia, members of a political group expressed their desire for the region to join France.
But the back story of this flat, Maryland-size country of 10.4 million is of a bad marriage writ large — two nationalities living together that cannot stand each other. Now, more than three months after a general election, Belgium has failed to create a government, producing a crisis so profound that it has led to a flood of warnings, predictions, even promises that the country is about to disappear.
“We are two different nations, an artificial state created as a buffer between big powers, and we have nothing in common except a king, chocolate and beer,” said Filip Dewinter, the leader of Vlaams Belang, or Flemish Bloc, the extreme-right, xenophobic Flemish party, in an interview. “It’s ‘bye-bye, Belgium’ time.”
Radical Flemish separatists like Mr. Dewinter want to slice the country horizontally along ethnic and economic lines: to the north, their beloved Flanders — where Dutch (known locally as Flemish) is spoken and money is increasingly made — and to the south, French-speaking Wallonia, where a kind of provincial snobbery was once polished to a fine sheen and where today old factories dominate the gray landscape.
“There are two extremes, some screaming that Belgium will last forever and others saying that we are standing at the edge of a ravine,” said Caroline Sägesser, a Belgian political analyst at Crisp, a socio-political research organization in Brussels. “I don’t believe Belgium is about to split up right now. But in my lifetime? I’d be surprised if I were to die in Belgium.”
With the headquarters of both NATO and the European Union in Brussels, the crisis is not limited to this country because it could embolden other European separatist movements, among them the Basques, the Lombards and the Catalans.
Since the kingdom of Belgium was created as an obstacle to French expansionism in 1830, it has struggled for cohesion. Anyone who has spoken French in a Flemish city quickly gets a sense of the mutual hostility that is a part of daily life here. The current crisis dates from June 10, when the Flemish Christian Democrats, who demand greater autonomy for Flanders, came in first with one-fifth of the seats in Parliament.
Yves Leterme, the party leader, would have become prime minister if he had been able to put together a coalition government.
But he was rejected by French speakers because of his contempt for them — an oddity since his own father is a French speaker. He further alienated them, and even some moderate Flemish leaders, on Belgium’s national holiday, July 21, when he appeared unable — or unwilling — to sing Belgium’s national anthem.
Belgium’s mild-mannered, 73-year-old king, Albert II, has struggled to mediate, even though under the Constitution he has no power other than to appoint ministers and rubber-stamp laws passed by Parliament. He has welcomed a parade of politicians and elder statesmen to the Belvedere palace in Brussels, successively appointing four political leaders to resolve the crisis. All have failed.
On one level, there is normalcy and calm here. The country is governed largely by a patchwork of regional bureaucracies, so trains run on time, mail is delivered, garbage is collected, the police keep order.
Officials from the former government — including former Prime Minister Guy Verhhofstadt, who is ethnically Flemish — report for work every day and continue to collect salaries. The former government is allowed to pay bills, carry out previously decided policies and make urgent decisions on peace and security.
Earlier this month, for example, the governing Council of Ministers approved the deployment of 80 to 100 peacekeeping troops to Chad and a six-month extension for 400 Belgian peacekeepers stationed in Lebanon under United Nations mandates.
But a new government will be needed to approve a budget for next year.
Certainly, there are reasons Belgium is likely to stay together, at least in the short term.
Brussels, the country’s overwhelmingly French-speaking capital, is in Flanders and historically was a Flemish-speaking city. There would be overwhelming local and international resistance to turning Brussels into the capital of a country called Flanders.
The economies of the two regions are inextricably intertwined, and separation would be a fiscal nightmare.
Then there is the issue of the national debt (90 percent of Belgium’s gross domestic product) and how to divide it equitably.
But there is also deep resentment in Flanders that its much healthier economy must subsidize the French-speaking south, where unemployment is double that of the north
[A poll by the private Field Research Institute released on Tuesday indicated that 66 percent of the inhabitants of Flanders believe that the country will split up “sooner or later,” and 46 percent favor such a division. The poll, which was conducted by telephone, interviewed 1,000 people.]
French speakers, meanwhile, favor the status quo. “Ladies and gentlemen, everything’s fine!” exclaimed Mayor Jacques Étienne of Namur, the Walloon capital, at the annual Walloon festival last Saturday.
Acknowledging that talk of a “divorce” had returned, he reminded the audience that this was a day to celebrate, saying, “We have to, if possible, forget about our personal worries and the anxieties of our time.”
Belgium has suffered through previous political crises and threats of partition. But a number of political analysts believe this one is different.
The turning point is widely believed to have been last December when RTBF, a French-language public television channel, broadcast a hoax on the breakup of Belgium.
The two-hour live television report showed images of cheering, flag-waving Flemish nationalists and crowds of French-speaking Walloons preparing to leave, while also reporting that the king had fled the country.
Panicked viewers called the station, and the prime minister’s office condemned the program as irresponsible and tasteless. But for the first time, in the public imagination, the possibility of a breakup seemed real.
Contributing to the difficulty in forming a new government now is the fact that all 11 parties in the national Parliament are local, not national, parties. The country has eight regional or language-based parliaments.
Oddly, there is no panic just now, just exasperation and a hint of embarrassment. “We must not worry too much,” said Baudouin Bruggeman, a 55-year-old schoolteacher, as he sipped Champagne at the festival in Namur. “Belgium has survived on compromise since 1830. Everyone puffs himself up in this banana republic. You have to remember that this is Magritte country, the country of surrealism. Anything can happen.”
Filip Dewinter, the leader of the extreme-right Flemish party Vlaams Belang, held a cake Tuesday celebrating Belgium’s 100th day without a government after the last general election.
BRUSSELS, Sept. 16 — Belgium has given the world Audrey Hepburn, René Magritte, the saxophone and deep-fried potato slices that somehow are called French.
In the southern region of Wallonia, members of a political group expressed their desire for the region to join France.
But the back story of this flat, Maryland-size country of 10.4 million is of a bad marriage writ large — two nationalities living together that cannot stand each other. Now, more than three months after a general election, Belgium has failed to create a government, producing a crisis so profound that it has led to a flood of warnings, predictions, even promises that the country is about to disappear.
“We are two different nations, an artificial state created as a buffer between big powers, and we have nothing in common except a king, chocolate and beer,” said Filip Dewinter, the leader of Vlaams Belang, or Flemish Bloc, the extreme-right, xenophobic Flemish party, in an interview. “It’s ‘bye-bye, Belgium’ time.”
Radical Flemish separatists like Mr. Dewinter want to slice the country horizontally along ethnic and economic lines: to the north, their beloved Flanders — where Dutch (known locally as Flemish) is spoken and money is increasingly made — and to the south, French-speaking Wallonia, where a kind of provincial snobbery was once polished to a fine sheen and where today old factories dominate the gray landscape.
“There are two extremes, some screaming that Belgium will last forever and others saying that we are standing at the edge of a ravine,” said Caroline Sägesser, a Belgian political analyst at Crisp, a socio-political research organization in Brussels. “I don’t believe Belgium is about to split up right now. But in my lifetime? I’d be surprised if I were to die in Belgium.”
With the headquarters of both NATO and the European Union in Brussels, the crisis is not limited to this country because it could embolden other European separatist movements, among them the Basques, the Lombards and the Catalans.
Since the kingdom of Belgium was created as an obstacle to French expansionism in 1830, it has struggled for cohesion. Anyone who has spoken French in a Flemish city quickly gets a sense of the mutual hostility that is a part of daily life here. The current crisis dates from June 10, when the Flemish Christian Democrats, who demand greater autonomy for Flanders, came in first with one-fifth of the seats in Parliament.
Yves Leterme, the party leader, would have become prime minister if he had been able to put together a coalition government.
But he was rejected by French speakers because of his contempt for them — an oddity since his own father is a French speaker. He further alienated them, and even some moderate Flemish leaders, on Belgium’s national holiday, July 21, when he appeared unable — or unwilling — to sing Belgium’s national anthem.
Belgium’s mild-mannered, 73-year-old king, Albert II, has struggled to mediate, even though under the Constitution he has no power other than to appoint ministers and rubber-stamp laws passed by Parliament. He has welcomed a parade of politicians and elder statesmen to the Belvedere palace in Brussels, successively appointing four political leaders to resolve the crisis. All have failed.
On one level, there is normalcy and calm here. The country is governed largely by a patchwork of regional bureaucracies, so trains run on time, mail is delivered, garbage is collected, the police keep order.
Officials from the former government — including former Prime Minister Guy Verhhofstadt, who is ethnically Flemish — report for work every day and continue to collect salaries. The former government is allowed to pay bills, carry out previously decided policies and make urgent decisions on peace and security.
Earlier this month, for example, the governing Council of Ministers approved the deployment of 80 to 100 peacekeeping troops to Chad and a six-month extension for 400 Belgian peacekeepers stationed in Lebanon under United Nations mandates.
But a new government will be needed to approve a budget for next year.
Certainly, there are reasons Belgium is likely to stay together, at least in the short term.
Brussels, the country’s overwhelmingly French-speaking capital, is in Flanders and historically was a Flemish-speaking city. There would be overwhelming local and international resistance to turning Brussels into the capital of a country called Flanders.
The economies of the two regions are inextricably intertwined, and separation would be a fiscal nightmare.
Then there is the issue of the national debt (90 percent of Belgium’s gross domestic product) and how to divide it equitably.
But there is also deep resentment in Flanders that its much healthier economy must subsidize the French-speaking south, where unemployment is double that of the north
[A poll by the private Field Research Institute released on Tuesday indicated that 66 percent of the inhabitants of Flanders believe that the country will split up “sooner or later,” and 46 percent favor such a division. The poll, which was conducted by telephone, interviewed 1,000 people.]
French speakers, meanwhile, favor the status quo. “Ladies and gentlemen, everything’s fine!” exclaimed Mayor Jacques Étienne of Namur, the Walloon capital, at the annual Walloon festival last Saturday.
Acknowledging that talk of a “divorce” had returned, he reminded the audience that this was a day to celebrate, saying, “We have to, if possible, forget about our personal worries and the anxieties of our time.”
Belgium has suffered through previous political crises and threats of partition. But a number of political analysts believe this one is different.
The turning point is widely believed to have been last December when RTBF, a French-language public television channel, broadcast a hoax on the breakup of Belgium.
The two-hour live television report showed images of cheering, flag-waving Flemish nationalists and crowds of French-speaking Walloons preparing to leave, while also reporting that the king had fled the country.
Panicked viewers called the station, and the prime minister’s office condemned the program as irresponsible and tasteless. But for the first time, in the public imagination, the possibility of a breakup seemed real.
Contributing to the difficulty in forming a new government now is the fact that all 11 parties in the national Parliament are local, not national, parties. The country has eight regional or language-based parliaments.
Oddly, there is no panic just now, just exasperation and a hint of embarrassment. “We must not worry too much,” said Baudouin Bruggeman, a 55-year-old schoolteacher, as he sipped Champagne at the festival in Namur. “Belgium has survived on compromise since 1830. Everyone puffs himself up in this banana republic. You have to remember that this is Magritte country, the country of surrealism. Anything can happen.”
As Belgium goes... so goes Europe?
Double click on the images to enlarge them. The article "As Belgium goes... so goes Europe"? (written by Pryce-Jones) was published in the National Review magazine on October 22, 2007. The Belgian issues are getting hot!!! Is it still gonig to be Belgium next time I go back? I'm getting worried!
Is Belgium Breaking up?
Double click on the article to enlarge the picture. "Is Belgmium Breaking up"? (written by Patrick J. Buchanan) is an article from The American Conservative magazine published on October 8th, 2007. Is Belgium going so bad that even Americans need to talk about us? ... This is not the only article... It's getting really scary!
mercredi, octobre 03, 2007
Fake attack at the Belgian King's workplace!
Here is another of the really funny things that happen in Belgium.
Check yhis out on YouTube. Some fake tourists managed to fake an explosion in front of Royal Palace! Click here for the first part and here for the second part (where you can actually see that it's a really video of a made-up event!).
What is this going lead us to?
mercredi, septembre 19, 2007
No gov't in Belgium
The person in charge of foming the new governement gave up. Belgians voted in May and they are still waiting for a new governement (in september!). What if this was the best time to split Belgium in two parts?! Let's hope that this is just a hard time...
lundi, juillet 30, 2007
Coca Cola Plus (part 2)
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You've seen the design in the US, now here is the design in Europe! Merci au photographe à la fourrure jaune!
mercredi, juillet 25, 2007
And what about them?
They criticize 24/7, but it doesn't seem like they actually know why... Europeans pretend doing everything better than the Americans, but sometimes -often, Americans are way more advanced! Here is the sidewalk example:
In Belgium:
And now you probably think that it's a brand new thing right?! Nope! It's been decades! Yep! They are way ahead of Europeans...again...again...and again! And you also probably think that we just have a couple of them right? Nope! There is no one sidewalk that is still without a ramp!
mercredi, juillet 18, 2007
Foothill College's Mountain Lion
Here is the e-mail that every Foothill College (De Anza's sister college) student received today:
Foothill Fusion for Students & Community Members
UPDATE: Stay Alert While on Campus Pathways Law enforcement authorities report that a mountain lion was sighted Tuesday, July 17, in a creek bed near the Foothill College campus in Los Altos Hills. The animal was not seen on the Foothill campus. The sighting occurred in the O'Keefe Preserve in Los Altos Hills, which is located approximately 1.5 miles north of the college. Authorities recommend that students, faculty, staff and community members use caution and remain alert while walking, jogging or biking on the numerous trails and pathways that surround the 122-acre campus. Should you see a mountain lion, get to a safe location and immediately call 9-1-1.
Here is part of one of the many articles that circulate on the topic:
"Anyone who spots a mountain lion nearby should never run. Instead, make eye contact and stand your ground, and try to appear big and aggressive. Throw stones and branches without bending or turning away. If attacked, fight back".
Rue Neuve vs. Alves Drive
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Here is the equivalent of what we have in downtown Brussels... Check it out sometimes... I still have the pic somewhere if needed...
mardi, juillet 17, 2007
T-shirt
An XXL in Europe is probably like an L here. No wander why they come up with these stupid tees.
jeudi, mai 24, 2007
Harry Potter and the political matters!
We are waiting for the last book of the Harry Potter series that won't be out this upcoming summer... Americans have reinvented the titles featuring the current events... Why not?!
Magic Bullet: a full-of-crap head!
It's still here! The Magic Bullet is now available outside the TV network! Don't miss it (you can't miss it anyway...but just in case). I posted this for some of my Belgian friends... ;)
Two thumbs up and your body down !!!!!
I watched this impressive movie yesterday, and I figured I would cut down on fast food! It's amazing how we destroy our body step by step -day by day! No doubt, Amercica is sinking under the weight of greasy food and fat people! I would say that it's even really scary! A two-thumbs-up movie that perfectly depicts the whole situation!
samedi, avril 28, 2007
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