Brain Activity

Work more with less money?? --> Slow IT

2009-09-03T16:41:00.002+02:00

Manifest taken from slowit

It's time for a change: Do less with less

Demands on IT are out of hand. Why it's time for the Slow IT way

For years, IT pros have heard that they must do more with less, as staffing is cut and outsourced, while demands to better serve the business and adopt new technologies continually increase. This is how it’s always been, but it doesn’t have to be how it always will be.

We've reached the breaking point, and it's time to make a stand. There is no more "more," so IT must do less with less. You already know how to draw the line: Stop doing the busywork with little value. Make the business choose its key priorities, rather than dump them all on you. Be smarter about letting users handle some of their own tech so that you can do what's truly critical. Help yourself eliminate aggravation while helping the business to reduce costs. Push back when confronted with impossible deadlines and requirements that have no basis in reality can actually be beneficial in the long run -- for everyone.

In a world of junk food and harried families, we saw the rise of the fast-food nation and the high price paid for its convenience. From that frustration was born the Slow Food movement, which promotes a healthy relationship with food. The Slow IT movement applauds that sentiment and seeks to apply it to technology management.

The tanking economy is the perfect excuse -- use it! Business executives across the globe are using the downturn to justify layoffs, cutbacks, closings, delays, negotiations, and all manner of triage. You too can play that game. After all, you only want what's good for the company. And if someone says it hurts, well, it's only temporary, right? This is an emergency!

Seek opportunity in adversity. Embrace the 10 tenets of Slow IT:

The 10 tenets of Slow IT

1. Stop trying to be a superhero. Unrealistic deadlines and workloads just lead to burnout and poor quality. You're asked to juggle an impossible set of priorities. Pass the buck back where it belongs. Be clear on each project's requirements (time and money), and tell the business to decide its priorities. New projects mean something else has to move down the list. It's not your job to decide which -- in fact, making it the business's responsibility will reduce the less-useful requests. But only if you deliver what you promise will business trust you're not just trying to slack off.

2. Let users manage themselves wherever they can. Many users can install their own software and manage updates. Let them, such as through a do-it-yourself server for licensed apps. And stop babysitting their use of personal technology. Unless specific regulations disallow it, let people install iTunes, Gmail, and the like -- with the clear understanding that if they screw up their computer, you'll wipe it out and reinstall the defaults, not troubleshoot any damage they caused. Likewise, make it policy that if they use personal e-mail, iPhones, or other personal technology, they are on the hook for any breaches or misuse. Make sure that everyone knows all the risks, and the reasons you’re doing this. After all, with freedom comes responsibility. And you've got more critical work to do.

3. Eliminate the makework. Go through your routine tasks and assess what value they actually bring. Chances are that you spend more time than necessary on monitoring and preventative measures for risks that are rare. It may sound like heresy, but it's probably more efficient to let some things go and fix them occasionally than to spend a lot of effort preventing the breakdown. With that assessment, you can reduce the makework and give business more of the tech benefit they really want.

4. Automate everything you possibly can. And point out that you’ve saved the company the cost of one or more employees by doing so. Make sure that your monitoring application knows everything about everything, from CPU utilization in your routers to random tests of inbound fax lines. Just make sure it’s understood that autopilot only works when the skies are clear.

5. Outsource your annoyances. SaaS and cloud computing aren't just the latest tech buzzwords; they're also ways to avoid managing and maintaining servers, storage, and applications. Google Apps, Live Workspaces, and the like are fine substitutes for the departmental or branch office filer -- and they're already available to everyone. Hosted applications are a bigger step, but the same principle applies. If you're supporting a multiplicity of marketing, sales, support, budgeting, billing, or project apps for as many myriad workgroups, it's time to rationalize the environment. Start pulling the plug on these servers, and consolidate these applications in the cloud. The most troublesome apps and noisiest users are first in line.

6. Target the sacred cows. Pushing administrative headaches into the ether is just one aspect of performing IT triage. Don't stop there. Look for every opportunity to eliminate the nice-to-haves for the sake of the truly important. The time is ripe to reevaluate the old valuables and to kill aging sacred cows. Is that creaky legacy system a business necessity, or is it a luxury the business can no longer afford? Do users really need Wi-Fi in every corner of the building? Unless management is living in a cave, new projects and planned purchases have already been reexamined. Now is your chance to put the costs and benefits of existing assets under a microscope too -- especially those that are feasting on admins.

7. Let downtime be downtime. Don’t open the laptop when you get home, turn off the cell phone, and let the spam pile up for the weekend. The quickest way to losing your marbles is to never learn how to relax. Take up a hobby, like single-malt Scotch. There are enough crises in every work week. Let the weekends and evenings sort themselves out -- unless there’s absolutely no other choice.

8. Refuse to get married to anything. Hardware, software, home, office, computers, routers, whatever -- just because you fixed it once doesn’t mean you are contractually obligated to fix it forever. In fact, you probably shouldn’t even fix it once. The next time someone brings their personal laptop in to have you “just take a look,” ask them something in their line of work that wouldn’t be acceptable. “Well, you’re in finance, right? Would you mind doing my taxes for the past three years? I just can’t get the hang of them.” Turnabout is fair play.

9. Keep the joy of tech alive. Yes, everything is said to be urgent, but you can't let the fun and innovation of tech get squeezed out of your week. In fact, you need to keep that fun going as a motivator. The company is poorly served if you're a dead geek walking. Staying abreast of tech innovations will let you more easily see better solutions to tech issues as they arise. Reserve at least an hour a day to peruse IT news sites, gadget sites, and so forth. Don't get stuck in the hamster wheel of the day-to-day.

10. Make the business listen to you. Befriend the brain-sucking zombies. You've heard ad nauseam the need for technologists to understand the business. Well, the business needs to understand you, too. Make a point to engage with business staffers so that you can learn what's really important to them and they can learn what's really important to you. Plus, once you realize they're not (all) brain-sucking zombies, and they discover you're not Ted Kaczynski, you'll create the trust of a personal relationship that is critical during crunch times.

Microsoft Security Essentials

2009-09-01T09:50:00.002+02:00

For those who still want to download MSSE and are not from US, there are still possibilities.
Hier is one Softpedia MSSE, after download and installation, it should update/upgrade to actual 1.0.15xx version.

My experience so far is quite good. I'm not sure how good it really works, cause I didn't penetrate it so far.

Norway - Viking Laws

2009-08-31T10:01:00.003+02:00

As I was on holiday in Norway, and maybe also will write a blog entry for this, I found the viking laws and I think they are very useful in todays (work-)life:

The Viking laws are:

Be brave and aggressive

Be direct
Grab all opportunities
Use varying methods of attack
Be versatile and agile
Attack one target at a time
Don’t plan everything in detail
Use top quality weapons

Be prepared

Keep weapons in good condition
Keep in shape
Find good battle comrades
Agree on important points
Choose one chief

Be a good merchant

Find out what the market needs
Don’t promise what you can’t keep
Don’t demand overpayment
Arrange things so that you can return

Keep the camp in order

Keep things tidy and organised
Arrange enjoyable activities which strengthen the group
Make sure everybody does useful work
Consult all members of the group for advice

I will place them right next to my office desk.

beer garden season and women (german only)

2009-06-06T17:24:00.001+02:00

Die Freiluft Biergartensaison wird eröffnet!

Aus der Erlebniswelt eines Kellners:

Damentisch: 10 Damen

Herrentisch: 10 Herren

20:00 Uhr Damentisch

Kellner: Guten Abend die Damen, was darf es denn sein?

Frau 1: Oh, ein Glas Sekt.

Frau 2: Nee, wir warten noch auf die Anderen.

Frau 1: Also doch ein Glas Sekt.

Kellner: (geht)

20.03 Uhr Herrentisch

Kellner: Servus.

Mann 1: Servus.

Kellner: Und?

Mann 1: Zehn Bier.

Kellner: (bringt Bier)

Mann 1: Was krieg'ste denn?

Kellner: 18.

Mann 1: (gibt 20) Stimmt so.

Kellner: Danke.

20:10 Uhr Damentisch

Kellner: Haben die Damen etwas gefunden?

Frau 3: Haben Sie Cola light?

Kellner: Nein.

Frau 3: Warum nicht?

Kellner: Keine Ahnung, ich bin nur der Kellner.

Frau 3: Dann nehme ich eine Apfelschorle, aber mit wenig Apfelsaft.

Frau 1: Oh, die nehme ich auch, aber bei mir können Sie mehr Saft
reinmachen.

Kellner: Selbstverständlich.

Frau 5 zu Frau 2-4 und 9: Trinkt Ihr auch Sekt?

Frau 9: Ja.

Frau 2: Ja.

Frau 4: Nein, ich habe Migräne.

Frau 1: Dann nimm doch einen O-Saft.

Frau 9: Oh, ja ich will auch einen O-Saft.

Frau 4: Nee, ich nehme ein stilles Wasser.

Kellner: Haben wir leider nicht.

Frau 4: Warum nicht?

Kellner: Keine Ahnung, ich bin nur der Kellner.

Frau 4: Na gut dann nehme ich doch einen Sekt mit O-Saft.

Frau 5: Dann nehmen wir ne Flasche.

Kellner: Soll ich ihnen dann eine kleine Flasche O-Saft dazu bringen?

Frau 5: Warum?

Kellner: Weil wir keine Flasche fertig gemischten Sekt mit O-Saft haben.

Frau 5: Na dann lassen Sie den O-Saft weg.

Frau 9: Dann nehme ich aber noch ein Wasser dazu.

Frau 10: Ich auch.

Frau 7: Ich auch, oder? Sie haben wirklich kein stilles Wasser?

Kellner: Nein, nur stillen Sekt. Wir nennen das in der Fachsprache
Weißwein.

Frau 1-10: ???????

Kellner: (denkt: War doch klar, dass die das nicht raffen) Und die
anderen
Damen?

Frau 3: Einen Süßgespritzten.

Frau 6: Einen Sauergespritzten.

Frau 8: Eine Cola light.

Kellner: Wir haben leider keine Cola light.

Frau 8: Warum nicht?

Kellner: KEINE AHNUNG ICH BIN NUR DER KELLNER.

Frau 8: Dann nehme ich ein Radler mit wenig Bier.

Kellner: (geht und versucht sich den Scheiß zu merken)

20:18 Uhr Herrentisch

Mann 3: (brüllt durch den Saal) Mach noch 'ne Runde!

Kellner: Jo (geht, holt zehn Bier, stellt diese wortlos ab, während
"Mann 3"
20,- aufs Tablett legt).

20:25 Uhr Damentisch

Kellner: (bringt die Getränke) Sooo die Damen, wer hatte denn das
Radler?

Frau 1-10: Schnatter, Schnatter, Schnatter...

Kellner: WER HATTE DENN DAS RADLER?

Frau 1-10: ?????? (Vollkommen überrascht, dass ein Herr mit einem
Tablett
vor dem Tisch steht und

das Damenkollektiv ansieht).

Kellner: DAS RADLER.

Frau 7: Petra, hattest Du nicht das Radler?

Frau 8: Oh ja, mein Radler, hihihi!

Kellner: (stellt das Radler und die anderen Getränke auf dem Tisch ab
und
denkt: Sollen die das

Zeug doch selber verteilen).

Frau 3: Und wo ist meine Cola light?

Kellner: (atmet tief ein und wieder aus) Wir haben keins UND ICH WEISS
AUCH
NICHT WARUM.

Frau 3: Dann nehm ich...

Kellner: Sie haben schon gewählt und es ist auch schon da.

Frau 3: Oh.

Frau 8: Was macht das denn?

Kellner: Zusammen oder getrennt?

Frau 8: Nur das Radler.

Kellner: 1,80 bitte. (Die Dame wühlt in der Handtasche nach dem
Geldbeutel
und drückt dem

Kellner 2,- in die Hand. Der Kellner gibt ein 20 Cent Stück zurück,
worauf
die Dame ein 10

Cent Stück sucht um dieses dem Kellner als Trinkgeld zu überreichen).

Kellner: So, der Rest?

Frau 5: Ich zahle die Hälfte vom Sekt, ein Mineralwasser und den
Sauergespritzten.

Frau 2: Wieso die Hälfte, wir sind doch drei, die wo Sekt trinken!

Frau 5: Oh ja stimmt, dann zwei Drittel der Flasche, ein Mineralwasser
und
Süßgespritzten.

Frau 2: Dann zahle ich das letzte Drittel von dem Sekt.

Kellner: (rechnet angestrengt und versucht die Ruhe zu bewahren) Dann
bekomme ich 7,63 von

Ihnen und von Ihnen 4,33

Frau 2: Warum haben Sie denn so unrunde Preise? Das ist doch
unpraktisch.

Kellner: Das ist halt so bei einem Drittel von 13,-. Normalerweise
teilen
sich nicht drei Leute ein

Getränk.

Die restlichen Damen zahlen in ähnlicher Weise Ihre Getränke, lassen
sich
dabei das Rückgeld stets

geben und entscheiden sich vereinzelt zu einem Trinkgeld von bis zu 20
Cent.
Somit entsteht ein

Gesamttrinkgeld von 45 Cent.

20:25 Uhr Herrentisch

Mann 4: Mach ma' 10 Bier und zehn Schnaps und was Du trinkst.

Kellner: (Nickt und holt die Getränke) Kurze Zeit später stellt er zehn
Bier
und elf Schnaps ab. Mit

dem elften Schnaps stößt er mit der Runde an.

Mann 4: Was macht das?

Kellner: 45,50

Mann 4: (gibt einen 50,- Schein) Gib mir drei raus.

Kellner: (gibt 3,-) Dank Dir.

Der Abend geht in ähnlicher Weise bis in die frühen Morgenstunden
weiter.

Am Herrentisch werden insgesamt zehn Runden Bier und fünf Runden Schnaps
getrunken.

Die Aufzählung der am Damentisch getrunkenen Getränke entfällt aus zwei
Gründen:

1. Es würde den Rahmen dieser Email sprengen.

2. Der (männliche) Autor dieses Artikels würde beim Schreiben
Kopfschmerzen
bekommen.

My (NO) travel to Poland

2009-05-16T20:20:00.003+02:00

After Finland and meeting some ex-Erasmus students, I also wanted to meet some other people. So we decided to meet each other in Poland. There was not a long discussion about the location.

All together we would have been Bonzcek, Szimon, Chris, Michael, Arno, Gosia and I. First I wanted to go by train, because the flights were already too expensive on that short notice. But the day before departure I found a flight from LOT at the price 199€ two ways.

I bought it and was quite happy to fly 1,2 hours and not to drive 8h by train. Thursday was coming and after working (in Vienna headquarter) I headed home to get all my stuff and to pack. Finally I started my ride to Vienna Airport, and guess what, near Amstetten, my engine "exploded". Probably I had too less water or oil in it, whatever, it just stuck and stopped.

I had to call the car breakdown service. They would need 30mins to get to me and after that 1h to get my car back to my hometown. As I had no time left to get to the airport and also I needed to arrange me some ride (i need a car to get to work - 120km) I decided to use the rest of my "holidays" to look for an alternative.

I was really pissed and still I am, we waited a long time for this meeting, I'm really sorry guys, would love to meet you some day, BUT I will not give up !!!!
Miss you and hope we soon get another opportunity.

For now, I have no new car yet, my car is not repairable (3000€+), and I'm still looking, actually I have no idea what I want... that's the bad part of being single, you have to make your own decisions *g*

regards

Finland Lappeenranta Vappu Meeting

2009-05-16T10:04:00.011+02:00

Last but not least it is time again for a blogentry, I'm a bit lazy but I try to catch up a bit.

There was this idea of some Ex-Erasmus students to meet in Lappeenranta (Finland). First of all to meet each other and otherwise to celebrate vappu.

What is vappu? A question I heard often these days. Some say vappu is the nearest thing, that Finland have regarding the carneval. Some other say it is the Finnish version of the American Spring-Break parties, and there are others who say that it is just another day off. Whatever kind of definiton you are choosing, vappu is worth going and celebrating.

Paul, a German ex-Erasmus student, started the whole thing, and a lot of people thought that this is a great idea. In the end, we were just three guys, who really were ex-Erasmus students. Paul, Benjamin and me. Thats sad, but fun is all that matters and we had already some friends in Lappeenranta.

My flight went on 27.4 to Helsinki (169€ both ways) and from there I drove with the train to Lappeenranta (39€ one way). I didn't arrange any room with friends, so I booked myself a room in a hostel/camping-place. You know, I don't want to bother anyone, and sleeping on a friends floor is maybe not the best choice anyway. However, next time probably I will arrange something else, because the rooms are not really cheap. (Hostel 60€ per night incl. breakfast, Hotel 80€ per night ex breakfast) There would have been cheaper places, but the student houses are open starting from 1.5 and the Karelia Park hostel from June - August. It was holiday, and I'm not a student anymore, so why not spend some money.

When I started this trip, I thought, hey looking forward to see Finland in spring time. HAHA, guess what, spring has not arrived there yet. Maybe two or three weeks later, but at the time I was there, it was like this:

Everything grey, and yes, the fucking lake was still frozen !!!

What did I do?
I walked a lot ... The weather was, except one day, very nice and sunny. The warmest day was 17°C and the coldest (night) was 0°. Actually the 0° night was the vappu night ^^

On Tuesday I met with Mahesh in the city centre. Mahesh was one of the exchange students who settled in Lappeenranta. He has quite a success story to tell, he is running his own company now, and it seems that it is very successful. Informations on that you can find on his homepage http://www.redsolution.fi .We enjoyed the sun at the coffee house and talked for some hours. Good Luck to you and your company Mahesh!!
The funny thing when I sat there, Benjamin walked by (at this moment I didn't know that he is in Lappeenranta too), so quite funny *g*.
In the evening I met with Paul, who cycled the way from Helsinki to Lappenranta in two days, grazy guy. Even more grazy is, that he cycled back from Tallinn to Germany. First night he slept in my hostel room, because his sleeping strategy was not really well planned ;)

On wednesday, another day in the center, I did a lot of shopping, and again walking, sitting in the harbour, reading, enjoying myself and my free time. Actually I do not remember what I did the rest of the day *g*.

Thursday was the official start of vappu. At noon the students met at the city center to start vappu. Therefor they do that:

They put the student hats on the statue, just like in Helsinki, only a bit smaller.
After that they walk, in order (color of the faculty guilds) to the harbour, where the new students get there baptism.

For the baptism, the new students, in there overalls, have to slide into the lake. (remember, lake was still frozen *gg*). As you can imagine, it was cold. Here are some impressions:

A nice experience, .. and NO I didn't do it *g*

After that we spent some hours in the sun and having a beer.
In the evening there was a festival at the university. The bad (organizational) mistake was, that the entry fee was 20€ and that you can't bring your own drinks. As you can imagine, Finnish students weren't that happy about that, so inside there were 40 people and on the outside there were some hundreds ^^, so was I, together with Teemu and some Polish girls. Was a nice evening, even with 0°.

On Friday was the official vappu day (Mayday), where traditionally all Fins make picnics and barbecues with family and friends. At the harbour there was a market with stalls, an everywhere you can see the students making the picnics.

It was a very nice, sunny day, which I enjoyed a lot. Relaxing is always the best on holidays ;)

Saturday was already time to leave, so I went to the Railstation, back to Helsinki, there I spent some hours of shopping, and after that my flight brought me back to Munich.

New Years Eve 2009 - Linz 09

2009-01-14T21:05:00.002+01:00

Hei folks,
a bit late, but here's a short report from new years eve 2009.
We (Maxx, Dres and I) spent this new years eve in Linz.
The main reason was the opening of "Linz 2009 European Center of Culture".
The special event startet ten minutes after midnight, it was not a normal
firework, it was a "rocket symphonie".

It started a bit weird, I guess that is the art part *gg*, but I also have
to mention that wie stand on the Nibelunger bridge and therefore we
didn't see the groundfirework.

However, even with some weird parts of this symphonie, I mean the "singing",
the whole show in the end was quite spectacular. We made some videos and
photos, but I will post you here a video which I found on youtube, because
I think the quality is much better, so here is a video of the last 3 minutes
of the rocket symphonie.

Nice, of course to be there was much more fascinating.
There have been about 130000 people, live music everywhere,
mainly on the main square.
I want to present you one of the performers, because I think they are
some kind of special. They are called Attwanger and they sing in
Upper Austrian dialect and with drums and traditionell instruments.
It's quite a cool mix. I didn't find any good quality live-video,
so I give you only the sound with some pictures, found on youtube.
Have Fun!

Especially live, they are great !!

The evening was quite nice, even when it already ended at three in the morning. (not much alcohol, a new experience for us all *gg*)

regards
Harry

Two new free MMORPGs

2008-12-07T10:15:00.002+01:00

Hey Gamers and especially MMORPGamers.
There are two new MMORPGs which I have to mention here, because they seem to have a lot of potential.

The first one is called "Runes of Magic". The graphic looks very nice and the gameplay seems to be interesting. The classes are as usual Warrior, Scout, Rogue, Mage, Priest, Knight. The only available race is Humans. The game is free, also the playing and it is available in English AND in German too, that's a plus. The open beta is starting on 15.12.2008 !!

The second game is "Requiem - Bloody Mare". It is a horror MMORPG and this is quite a new topic. As far as I know the only or first MMORPG which claims the horror topic. I tested it and I have to say, the graphic is really fine, and the game seems to have good potential.
Four races, each race two joblines (magical, combat) and for each jobline two classes. In the end there are 16 classes. It is only available in English.

Here is a video to the game:

The game is starting with age 17, so nothing for kiddies.

Have Fun!

Christmas traditions Steyr PART 3 - Christmas Market

2008-12-05T20:52:00.007+01:00

Christmas market (Christkindlmarkt) is one of the most common and well known christmas traditions. It starts with the first advent weekend, sometimes even one weekend before.
They have a lot of stalls, starting with traditionell handicraft, christmas decoration, presents, sweets, eating and drinking.

Most popular drinks are Glühwein and Punsch. You have to drink it when you are in Austria during Winter/Christmas.

Steyr for example has one market in the town center, one in the city park, one in Garsten, and a lot more around Steyr.
You also find big christmas markets in Linz.

and a lot of other towns everywhere in Austria.

By the way, we already heard that Steyr is the Christkindl Town, but we have the Christkind also in person, here is the official Steyrer Christkindl:

We have a lot more to offer, but to tell everything would be to much for a blog, you will find information at Steyr Info and all over the internet. Have Fun!

Christmas traditions Steyr PART 2 - Christkind

2008-12-05T20:13:00.006+01:00

As I mentioned in Part 1, the gift bringer in the most European and Christian countries is the Christkind.
Steyr has a part of the city which is called Christkindl. It is a pilgram location with a "holy" wax figures, stories tell that it has healing power.
However, Christkindl has also a post office, where everybody (of course mostly children) can send there christmas wishes straight to the Christkind itself.

Here is a photo of the post office:

Steyr also has a Christmas museum, kind of "rollercoaster" with really icky stuff. Here is a short "promotion" video.

So if you like this kind of stuff, you should visit it ;) For children it is nice for sure, I'm personally not really interested in that aspect of christmas *gg*. More to come about christmas traditions in Part 3.

In castle Lamberg we also have a advent/christmas exhibition, here is a video for that:

Christmas traditions Steyr PART 1 - Perchten

2008-12-05T19:27:00.006+01:00

Steyr is a christmas town. Why? Because a place of pilgrimage next to Steyr is called Christkindl (Christkind). So we are the hometown of the Christkind in Austria. Therefore we celebrate christmas every year with a lot of traditionell celebrations.

One is called "Perchtenlauf".
We have Nikolaus (looks like Santa Claus, but is based on a real person called Nicolaus, he was a saint some hundred years ago). Nikolaus rewards well-behaved children, and the Krampus or Percht he comes for the not so well-behaved children ;)

Last weekend was this kind of Perchtenlauf in Steyr, here are some photos of this event (the photos are taken from e-steyr.com made by Peter Kainrath:

I heard, that there have been about 680 (!) different Perchten-masks, they came from all around Austria and even Germany. Quite scary, but the children love them, some are scared at the beginning, but learn fast that this are only masks and underneath are humans ;)
This is one tradition, more traditions in Part 2.

It's all about (MMORPG) games

2008-11-23T13:54:00.011+01:00

It's not a secret that I am a gamer. I like to play PC games quite for a long time now. Started back in the 80's with a really dumb console, then C64, Amiga, and so on until I ended up with PC-Games.

I played a lot of genres. In the beginning I have been more the Ego-Shooter type, for example Unreal Tournament (the first version). I played it for about 3-4 years quite intensively. Then some years ago I started to play a genre called MMORPG (Massive Multiplayer Online RolePlay Game). And since then I stuck in this genre ;) I'm not sure how long, but I guess for 7 years now.

What do I like on playing MMORPGs, ... a lot, hell lot of REAL people in the game. You can join a guild and play with others. Not really the social isolation as many think that pc gamers have. I get to know a lot of people during the years, some come some go, but with a few the friendship lasts for many years now. Some I didn't even met in real life so far, but we chat a lot by instant messenger and phone. We talk about everything, like I do with my "real life" friend next door. The only difference, I can not say, come on let's go for a coffee or a beer ;) (theoretical we could, but just ingame ;)

It all started with DAoC (Dark Age of Camelot). This game infected me with the MMORPG virus hard. I played it for some years and reactivated it later on for some month again. It was and is still one of the very best game in MMORPG, even when it is outdated and the graphic is not up-to-date. I still think about reactivating it again for some month ;)

In the last years the genre exploded and hundreds of games flood the market. Some come and go, some exist rarely and some attained cult status. I guess one of the worldwide best known is WoW (World of Warcraft). No, I do not play it, I had played it, but only for a year.
One strategy for game developers is, that the game and the playing is for free. This market has grown exponentially in the last two years. (Yes, normally you buy the game with the first month included and then you pay every month about 10-13€)

I think I tried nearly every free MMORPG there is, but the satisfaction was never for long. I tried Fantasy, Science Fiction, Pirates, and so on...
Here some free MMORPGS which I think that they are not bad and maybe for people who want to test the genre without paying:

1. Perfect World
This one is quite nice. The graphic is high quality and the game itself is quite good. I didn't play it for a long time, but my impression was a good one. It's a classical Asian fantasy-MMORPG. It is free to download and free to play.
To get an impression, here is a video:

2. Exteel
Something totally different, a good start for Ego-Shooter type of player to enter the world of MMORPG. It is a Science-Fiction "Shooter" with Death-Match, Capture the flag and so on, all known by shooter games.

3. Rappelz
Another Fantasy-MMORPG which comes from Asia. Free to download free to play. Here's a ingame video.

4. Flyff
Ok, this one is weird. In the beginning I got shocked of all this kiddy stuff jumping around, I would have quit if not friend of mine wanted to play it. After some time it was not that bad as it seems on the beginning. It is also from Asia and it is, let's say, colorful *lol*. It is not a graphical high-end game, it's more kiddy comic style *g*. But see for yourself.

This is just a mix of free MMORPGS there are a lot lot lot more, just search for them in Google, or for the german speaking community here is a link to Onlinewelten Free-MMO.
Guildwars, Metin2, Shayia, and so on and on and on and on...

So lets now come to the MMORPGs where you have to pay for the game and for the playing. Actually, when you compare those games with free to play games, you will see, there is a difference.

1. Age of Conan
It had some difficulties when the game starts, a lot of bugs and not enough content. Therefore the game lost a lot of players. But Funcom worked a lot in the last few month, and I can say it was worth it. The game is the best in graphic (and will be even better when the DX10 update is released - soon), the music, the atmosphere, just cool. The game itself is a Fantasy-MMORPG which basis on the Conan stories. It is one of the games I'm playing at the moment. The price for the game is at the moment 29€ and the month cost between 11-13€ a month. For that money you get free updates and content and so on. It has a really innovativ combat system, just to mention that and it is for 18+ because of the sex, blood and violence ^^
Here's an impression:

2. Warhammer Online
Another game i play at the moment, or let's say i can't decide which of those two i should play, and at the moment i have not enough time anyway.
Warhammer is very similar to World of Warcraft, ... when it comes to the graphic. It is just not good, I mean the graphic, but the game itself is quite good and has also some innovative features. The PvP-system (Player versus Player) is at the moment the best there is on the market. (my opinion) No wonder, because the game was developed by the makers of DAoC.
Here is the impression:

Ok, what does the future bring:
MMORPGs to come are Stargate Worlds and some other I just don't remember right now.

So, this was a "short" inside few to MMORPGs. Of course there are a lot of games I haven't mentioned, like lord of the rings online, world of warcraft, tabula rasa and so on and on and on,
but this would become a neverending story. Another good site for that topic is mmosite, so feel free to inform yourself in more details.

Try MMORPGs, online gaming is the future, and it is really nice if you find friend to play with. It is just another hobby you can have. but of course never forget your real life !!

regards and game on!!

Merit Scholarship

2008-11-19T21:58:00.003+01:00

Finally I took the last chance to earn a merit scholarship.
I got the e-mail yesterday, that I was granted
the merit scholarship for the year 2007/08 -> 726,72€
The second student of my year who "won" the scholarship
is Sandra, gratulations!!

I am really happy about it and I want to thank everyone
of my university for there support and the nice five years of study.

hoooray !!!

Murphy's Law

2008-11-19T10:22:00.000+01:00

For those who don't know it,
one of my favourites, Murphy's Law.
And don't forget, Murphy was an optimist!

*No good deed goes unpunished.
*Leak proof seals - will.
*Self starters - will not.
*Interchangable parts - won't
*There is always one more bug.
*Nature is a mother.
*Don't mess with Mrs. Murphy
*90% of everything is crud.
*If you're feeling good, don't worry, you'll get over it.
*All warranties expire upon payment of invoice.
*Where you stand on an issue depends on where you sit.
*Never eat prunes when you are famished.
*Friends come and go, but enemies accumulate.
*If you try to please everybody, nobody will like it.
*A short cut is always the longest distance between 2 points.
*Anything that can go wrong will go wrong.
*You will always find something in the last place you look.
*The chance of a piece of bread falling with the buttered side down is directly proportional to the cost of the carpet.
*No matter how long or hard you shop for an item, after you've bought it, it will be on sale somewhere cheaper.
*No one's life, liberty, or property are safe while the legislature is in session.
*The other line always moves faster.
*In order to get a loan, you must first prove you don't need it.
*Anything you try to fix will take longer and cost more than you thought.
*If you fool around with a thing for very long you will screw it up.
*A $300.00 picture tube will protect a 10 cent fuse by blowing first.
*If it jams, force it. If it breaks, it needed replacing anyway.
*Any tool dropped while repairing a car will roll underneath to the exact center.
*The repairman will never have seen a model quite like yours before.
*When a broken appliance is demonstrated for the repairman, it will work perfectly.
*A pipe gives a wise man time to think and a fool something to stick in his mouth.
*Everybody should believe in something. I believe i'll have another drink.
*Build a system that even a fool can use, and only a fool will use it.
*Everyone has a scheme for getting rich that will not work.
*In any hierarchy, each individual rises to his own level of incompetence, and then remains there.
*You will remember that you forgot to take out the trash when the garbage truck is two doors away.
*The race is not always to the swift nor the battle to the strong, but that's the way to bet.
*There's never time to do it right, but there's always time to do it over.
*When in doubt, mumble, when in trouble, delegate.
*Anything good in life is either illegal, immoral or fattening.
*It is morally wrong to allow suckers to keep their money.
*A bird in hand is safer than one overhead.
*Murphy's golden rule: whoever has the gold makes the rules.
*Everything east of the San Andreas fault will eventually plunge into the Atlantic Ocean.
*Nature always sides with the hidden flaw.
*The light at the end of the tunnel is the headlamp of an oncomming train.
*Celibacy is not hereditary.
*Never sleep with anyone crazier than yourself.
*Beauty is only skin deep, ugly goes to the bone.
*To know yourself is the ultimate form of aggression, Freudian Psychology.
*Never play leapfrog with a unicorn.
*A smith & wesson beats four aces.
*If everything seems to be going well, you obviously don't know what the hell is going on.
*If more than one person is responsible for a miscalculation, no one will be at fault.
*In case of doubt, make it sound convincing.
*Never argue with a fool, people might not know the difference.

Career day at my university and my workplace

2008-11-13T21:11:00.007+01:00

Just started working, but already presenting my company at the career fair at my university. There have been about 90 companies. The run to our stall was quite good, thanks all my study colleauges and students from CMS and SEC for there interests.

Here some impressions, made with my phone, so don't expect high quality:

our stall:

me and my division leader

I also want to show you some pictures from my workplace and the view out of my office. It is quite nice, maybe nothing special for some of you, but working there is smooth.

the view from our social room, I also call it the "living-room"

and my desk (the one to the right) YES, it is clean, not like home ;)

Let me see your workplaces guys !!!!
More about to come, still have some news about the graduation ceremony (but the photos not digital yet), so open your eyes for new news ;)

regards

Security Competence Day

2008-11-13T20:44:00.005+01:00

Two weeks ago I had to hold a presentation about Business Continuity Management in my company for some customers. The whole afternoon was dedicated to Security and therefore I presented BCM. The feedback was good, as the buffet was ;)

Some Impressions:

Me in action:

The clients:

The presenters:

Dit it !!!

2008-09-28T21:58:00.000+02:00

Last Tuesday I had finally my diploma exam for the Master of Science. I was the last to go and in the end I did it sucessfully.

Official I can use my MSc. after the "Sponsion" at the end of october. So in the future it will be MSc. BSc. ;)

Thanks all for whishing me luck and the congratulations afterwards, your great !!

A day in Schönbrunn

2008-09-28T21:39:00.009+02:00

Last Saturday I took a break of my intensive learning for my diplom exam, to meet Esther and Robert in Vienna/Schönbrunn. Esther and Robert also attended an exchange semester in Finland.

It was very nice to see them and the trip through Schönbrunn was even better, even when the weather was bad. Some impressions of our day at Schönbrunn.

The castle:

In the cafeteria, when some guest left some cake or whatever to eat, the birds are quite fast to get it ;) It just took some seconds until the cake was gone and it seems that it tasted.

Esther and Robert

and again in the tropic house:

Some Animals, I have to mention that the zoo is really nice renovated and a must see !!

It took us some hours to walk through and we didn't even see everything. It was very very nice and thanks Robert and Esther for the day and hopefully we see us again soon.

Some Updates

2008-08-29T21:47:00.002+02:00

Hi guys!

It's again a long time since writing.
At the moment I do not have any internet during the week,
so this situation does not make it any easier.

But here's now the update:
The idea of moving to Zwettl
(in the beginning only during the workdays)
was never my favourite one.
So I tried to find another job next to
my current one. So finally I would have found
one in Linz (near my hometown).
But in the end, today I decided, after a long
discussion and a lot of thinking, that I will
stay in my current company and will not take the new job.

Why?
The main reason for this choice was my job
and the topic I'm working on. I always wanted to
work on Security-Management and Business Continuity Management
and at the Security Competence Center I am the one
who is responsible for this.
The risk to have to do a job I do not like,
in the other company was to high, and I was not willing
to take this risk.

So I have to find a way to put
the private issues in correct order, the
job things are already.
I know it will not be easy to find a new
personal environment, but now I am motivated to
try it. If it will work, the future will tell us.

So long!

My new job, my new town, my news

2008-08-09T22:21:00.008+02:00

So, finally I'm willing to write some news, sorry for the long break, can't promise a frequently update at the moment.

After some days relaxing in carinthia, including biking, hiking, farming mushrooms and so on, I started working on 1st of August.

Here is the proof for the mushrooms:

So, as I told you, I started working on 1st of August.
Therefore I have looked for a flat in Zwettl, my worktown. I found a place in a three-side farmhouse. The first look it was nice and I loved it. But after spending three days in it, the good mood changed into bad one. The rooms stank, a lot of different kind of insects where living in it and last but not least, I had no good internet connection. So all together, it was horrible and I really felt bad there. I even felt so bad, that I thought about quiting my job there and left the town behind to leave back to my hometown.

However, I left this flat after four days and quit the "contract". I fled into a private guest room, and I can tell you, this one is really nice and I love it. So everything is getting better since then. Most of the doubts are gone and now I can enjoy my job.

So, about my job. I started my job at Raiffeisen Informatik at the Security Competence Center in the CERT-Team. My job there is Security-Management. My job is to implement Security-Management with customers (risk management, business continuity management) and that is what I really like and enjoy. As far as I can say after one week, the job is perfect, the colleagues are nice, the company is ideal, .. the only thing I need know, is a flat and a social life in Zwettl.
At the moment the best thing is the job, I hope the social and the living part will be better soon.

Some pictures from my worktown and the surroundings:

Master Thesis finished

2008-07-19T19:04:00.002+02:00

Hei folks,

sorry that I didn`t write for such a long time,
but the main reason was my master thesis.
I spent the whole days for the last one, two month
to finish my master thesis just in time.

So finally I finished it on 17.7 and delivered it on 18.7,
the last possible day.
The title is "Process model for holistic implementation of business continuity management and risk management"
You will find it soon on my website.
At the moment I`m waiting for the ok,
because until then, it is not sure that the university will accept it.

I will write more soon, because soon my second life in Zwettl will start.

Short trip to Gmunden

2008-06-16T12:33:00.005+02:00

Actually we planned last Saturday to go to my future hometown Zwettl, to check some appartments and houses, but last minute we decided to make a short trip to Gmunden at the lake Traunsee.

It was very nice, we (Rainer, Birgit and me) enjoyed it a lot, even when the weather was not the best, here are some impressions of the beautiful lake and town:

I do not have more, sorry. But I guess it is enough to get a bit of an impression.
Greetings!!

My new PC

2008-06-16T11:48:00.008+02:00

After assembling a lot of PC's for my friends, I finally can effort me my own new PC. I wanted to buy it when I start working, but I can't wait any longer. So here is the configuration of my new masterpiece.

AMD Phenom X4 9850 4 * 2,50GHz Black Edition (~185€)
ASUS M3A32-MVP Deluxe 790FX (~137€)
4096 MB DDR2 RAM Corsair PC2-1066 Airflow (~99€)
GeCube Radeon HD3870 X2 X-Turbo Dual (~272€)
Seagate SATA II 320GB (~47€)

My friend Vik buys the same PC but also

LiteOn LH20A1S Sata DVD-Writer (~19€)
ASUS TA-883 Midi Case
550W Power supply

Thats it, I'm looking forward to it, should arrive on Wednesday.
For those people who ask, why I'm using AMD when Intel's performance is better (at the moment), I already described that issue here.

I decided to buy me a high-end graphic card this time. The HD3870 X2 is a dual GPU card with two HD3870 graphical processor units on it. It is nearly the same when you put two single HD3870 cards in the system and run them in crossfire mode. But the X2 performance should be a bit better, when all the reviews I read so far are true.

The graphic card looks like this:

I would say, it's a monster ;)
And for normal users or "sometimes" gamers it is too hardcore, the HD3870 will do it for those people. Martin for example is very happy with his card and he is playing a lot, also Assassines Creed, which is one of the newest games with high graphical performance needs.
I don't know why, but this time I want a "dual-GPU" card, because this is the age of multiprocessor PCs ;)

Of course you can wait until the new generation of graphic cards will appear. The release should be at the end of June or at the beginning of July. But as the past tells me, new cards are always more expensive for some month. And the dual GPU cards will be released later anyway. So maybe it is better to buy the actual cards, because they will get cheaper when the new generation is released. (ATI's new generation will be the 4800 family based on RV700 chipset)

And here is the motherboard:

As you can see, theoretically it is possible to put four graphic cards in it ;)
But be aware, if you put two cards of the above mentioned card HD3870 X2 in you PC, you already need a 700+W power supply ;) have fun !!

My new Job

2008-06-09T12:39:00.003+02:00

Finally I made my decision for my new job.

It took me a very long time and a lot of inner-family-and-friends discussion to finally decide. I have been to a lot of job interviews and I had some offers for a job, but finally I decided to become a Security Analyst at Raiffeisen Informatik (R-IT).

My main job area there will be Security Management, but with the chance to work in other security areas as well. It is the security competence center of R-IT.
One of the main decision points was the location, where this agency of R-IT is located. It is in the Waldviertler town Zwettl. It is a very small town with no big towns nearby. I always would like to live on the country side, but always with a big town in range ;)
However, I have been there meanwhile, and it made a really good impression. So now I am looking for a flat or house to rent and I will start in August.

Not only the town was a decision point, also a lot more things. The whole package has won in the end. I'm looking forward to start my job there and I hope I can integrate in the town community. I will keep you up to date.

Trip to carinthia

2008-06-09T12:23:00.006+02:00

Again I fled to carinthia to do some work for my master thesis.
Yes it is still not finished! unfortunately
As you have read before, the last weeks wasn't easy for me,
this is not an excuse, but it should explain my motivation
about the things which are really important in life.

However, I have been to carinthia for one week
and I found my love to make photographs again.
So I picked up my cam and made some nice macro-pictures.

What I like about macro-pictures is, that you have to enjoy the
small things, move around with an open eye and an open mind.

Here are some examples:

Maybe I will make photographing my new hobby, I just like it.

In Memoriam

2008-06-09T12:16:00.002+02:00

There is a sad reason why I didn't write for so long.

My beloved father died on 21st of May way too early in the age of 64.
Thank you father for all you have given me and all you have been,
I miss you a lot!

We have chosen this phrase:

"You can grieve for him and feel bad,
or you can think about the good times with
him and smile"

There is a reason why I have chosen this phrase,
you always should think about the good things you had
and not about the good things you will not have anymore.
Life goes on and you have to move on in your own life,
stay strong and always keep the person in your heart.

with love
your son

Yet another QuadCore

2008-05-15T11:21:00.004+02:00

Yesterday I assembled another QuadCore computer, this time it is the one from Andreas, a friend.

However, the components are nearly the same as last time, except CPU, power supply and harddisk + multi dvd burner:

AMD PHENOM 9600 4x2.3GHZ Black Edition AM2+boxed
Sapphire Radeon HD 3870 Single-Slot, 512MB GDDR4, 2x DVI, TV-out, PCIe 2.0
Gigabyte GA-MA790X-DS4, 790X
Seagate Barracuda 7200.11 500GB
Kingston KIT 2048MB DDR2 1066
Power supply 550W with 14cm fan
SAMSUNG SH-S203D SATA black bulk DVD Writer

This time the boot process and the setup were not the problem, the problem, in the end, was the DDR2 RAM. Seems that it is unstable with the full 1066MHz, after manually changing it to 800MHz it worked, before that it crashes all the time. We have to bring it back and get new one for those.

For more detailed information on some of this components, look down to the other assemble thread.

Not more news for now, ... before the assembling I was at another job interview, after the assembling I have been to a grillfest organized from our organisation HagenbergerCircle. And yes, I still write on my master thesis.

Regards

Rolands Wedding Eve Party

2008-05-04T09:42:00.000+02:00

Last Friday a friend of mine celebrated his wedding eve party. He was a bit afraid that we could do something bad to him, so he started the party at 1930 already in a public Pub ;).
Nobody has organized some fun stuff, not even Rolands "best man", except Maxx and me ;)
Maxx got a convict costume and I brought my task list for the future fiancé.
I also read a poem with 20 reasons why a beer is better than a wife *g*

However, here is the task list, I translated for you into English:

Get dressed properly -> convict costume (lesson learned: that's your future)
Find two girls who make you a nice make up (lesson learned: look in the mirror, No you don't have to do everything to look good)
Find 4 girls and get a signature on each butt cheek (lesson learned: be sure that no other girl is in your heart)
Get two bra's from girls (lesson learned: Look at it, the inner values are the important)
Carry a girl trough the pedestrian zone (lesson learned: Be strong in life and fight for your luck. Everything needs strength, but it is worth it)
Get 5 kisses from 5 different girls (lesson learned: You will be married soon, this is all you can get then)
Get 3 free drinks from 3 girls (lesson learned: Nothing solves itself, talk with each other.)
Get 2 pairs of socks from girls (lesson learned: Smell it, also other girls have mistakes)
Make holes in two beer cans and drink it (lesson learned: I hope you know what you give up)
Find a taxi driver who drives a round with you for free (lesson learned: Even hopeless situations can be solvable)
Get 10 lipstick kisses from 10 different girls (lessons learned: Not even 10 makes you a prince)
Find 3 pubs which play you one song (defined from the party) (lessons learned: Try to make your life more diversified.

Some tasks he fulfilled with ambition, so that we have to flex the rules ;)
In the end we had 4 bra's *gg*.

Of course text is not enough, therefore here some photos to the evening:

First of all, here is our convict:

The make up task and the kiss task, all in one ;)

The task with the socks, mhhhm tasty:

In the town we met a bunch of girls celebrating their wedding eve party, congratulations to Edith.
Nice caps with "Edith has found her G-Spot", that's the main reason for her wedding *ggg*.
Her task was to sell a lot of porn stuff, there we had this condom hat and a dildo-candle and so on ...

Fulfilling one of the tasks, signatures on the ass. Actually he needed 4, in the end there were about 12 and all with waterproofed Edding pencil.

Another task, the girls bra's, the first two we got too fast, so we changed it to four ;) thx to the girls.

The last task, the beer cans, after that we released him and he is free to marriage.

FREE at last !!!

New PC for Martin

2008-04-30T22:17:00.007+02:00

Last week a friend decided that he wants a new PC. Therefor I looked up a possible configuration and sent him details.
He liked it, so he ordered it and finally last weekend I assembled it.
The Thing cost 496€ and its components are:

AMD Phenom X4 9550 Sockel-AM2+ boxed, 4x 2.20GHz
Sapphire Radeon HD 3870 Single-Slot, 512MB GDDR4, 2x DVI, TV-out, PCIe 2.0
Gigabyte GA-MA790X-DS4, 790X
Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 250GB 16MB
Kingston KIT 2048MB DDR2 1066
Power supply 500W

The components are not the most expensive one, but also not the cheapest one. That was one of the challenges. Some will ask, why AMD? The answer is simple. First of all, AMD Quadcore is a real Quadcore, not like Intels 2 * 2 Core. If you want details on that, Google it or visit Parallel Computing at LUT *g*.

But I'm a nice guy, so here are some infos in form of pictures,
first the picture of the real Quadcore of AMD:

And here is the Intel "Quadcore":

Do you see the difference?
Correct! In Intels Quadcore 2 cores always share one Level 2 Cache. And thats why it is not a real Quadcore, it is a 2 * 2 Core.

I know that AMD is at the moment 10% slower than compareable Intels, but I trust in AMD to solve this with a bios update.
Another advantage is the new platform. It supports PCI-e 2.0 and Hyperthreading 3 and it is the only platform which does at the moment.
So, why did I choose ATI card? AMD == ATI, so ATI is best supported on that platform, including Crossfire.

You don't know what Crossfire is, crossfire is the "same" as Nvidias SLI, you can combine the graphical power of two or even four graphic cards, here some pictures for a better understanding:

I wanted to build the components in the old case, but unfortunately the old PC was a microATX board, so was the case. So we used one of the older cases he got. Normally there are not really problems in putting together components, but there have been some in this example.

First the PC booted and the XP Setup started, but I had no Sata driver disk, so I had to start again with the driver floppy. But from there on, it didn't boot anymore, always stopped at startup. So I tried a lot of stuff including a bios update. It worked again and the Setup started, but only until "Windows checks the hardware configuration ....". I again tried some configuration in the bios and in the end it worked.

We installed all the necessary software and very important for Martin, his racing games. The graphic was awesome, it really makes hell lot of difference to before. In the end all took us from lunch at 13 until 23 in the evening....... nice waste of time ;)
I want a QUADCORE TOOOOOOO !!!!! ;(

Security Forum

2008-04-30T21:27:00.004+02:00

Every year, the Hagenberger Circle hosts the Security Forum. I'm a member of this organization and therefor I was there too, of course.

This year I was a bit late, because I thought it will be on the next day *gg*. But finally I arrived, ready for the lunch break. I met a lot of nice people and I talked a lot. Actually I liked those conversations more than the presentations. This year the mix of the presentations was not that good. Too much management presentation, but not security management, I mean business economics. (my opinion)
And I think the topics have been too shallow. That was also some feedback I got from some other visitors. But next year it will get better, that's for sure.

However, I visited the OSSTMM and the Business Malware presentation. In the first presentation the time was way too short to get an impression. The presenter always said how important Security Performance Indicators are, but unfortunately he never showed how this indicator looks like. So there where more questions marks afterwards than before. The Malware presentation from Kaspersky was interesting, but one of those presentation with to much economics in it.

To get an impression how this years Security Forum looked like, here some photos:

You can find more pictures and the presentations on the Homepage of the SecurityForum.

Work - Life Balance

2008-04-30T21:20:00.003+02:00

Hei folks,

sorry that I didn't write for so long, but I'm kind of busy right now and when I have free time, I'm not always motivated to write ;).
However, today I have some posts for you.

Some days ago I updated my CV and therefor I needed a better photo. Before that I used a private photo from the Koli trip in Finland.
Ok, so I put on my business suit and made a photo. As result from the photo shooting, there was also a funny photo, which I call "Work - Life Balance". You wanna know why, take a look on your own...

In my opinion, it is art *ggg*

Discovery Career Fair

2008-04-10T12:26:00.004+02:00

After two years I visited yesterday again the career fair discover at the Johannes Kepler University in Linz.
I went there with Hannes, who joined me. He was a bit uncertain if it will make sense. In the end he was convinced.

We visited nearly every stall at this fair and asked "it security jobs available??". *gg* Some said things like "it-security is in our firm not a topic"..... no comment from me ;)

But mostly the reaction was very friendly and nice, even with no actual open vacancy they gave us addresses and contacts to ask for it.

Some other seemed very interested, because they have jobs in that area. Names like Accenture, Deloitte, KPMG, Ernst and Young, PricewaterHouseCoopers and other big players in the consulting and auditing area do have positions in some kind of the it-security area. But also "normal" industrial firms do have positions or think about positions, so keep your eyes open.

In the end I can say that it was worth it, we left with good contacts and some nice presents ;)

News from my flatmate

2008-04-06T13:03:00.003+02:00

As I mentioned earlier in a blog entry, I have a new flatmate *g*
However, living with me must be very satisfying, because my new flatmate seems to enjoy it a lot.

Here is how "she" looks like after the last couple of days:

Nice isn't it? It's not even finished yet. Damn, living with me must be a pleasure *ggg*

My private Shelter

2008-04-06T12:46:00.005+02:00

Last week I tried to focus more on my master thesis. At home it is quite hard, because there is always some kind of distraction. So on Sunday (30.3) I decided to "flee" to the families garden cottage in Carinthia. It was that immediate, because I wanted to finish the In- Outputs chapter for Risk Management until Friday.

On Monday I left at 9 in the morning and arrived between 12 and 13. I was the first this year, so we (my uncle and I) had to bring it out of hibernation. The main thing was to turn on the water. As usual not everything went fine, so we had to repair the angle valve. But finally it worked and in the late evening on Monday I already started to write.

It was sunny every day. I really like it to have my breakfast on the terrace in the sunny morning and every morning it was like that:

I spent nearly every day with writing. I left only for lunch and one time for shopping and one time just to cruise. For shopping I went to the Atrio Shopping centre.
And my cruise took place around the Millstätter lake. Where I took this picture:

On Thursday I finished my work and went home in the late afternoon. I have no Internet in the cottage and no printer, that was the main reason. I would have stayed longer. I sent the document on Friday between 12 and 13 and I hope my adviser was still at work, if not I would be displeased.

It's quite funny how much I can work on my thesis without all of those interruptions. So I will look for a location not that far away here, but maybe I will go again to our cottage, just to be more productive.

Alumni Party

2008-04-06T12:34:00.003+02:00

On Friday (28.03) we had our yearly alumni party. This year again Michi organized it. It was again a very nice evening, even when a lot of people left quite early.

There were about 70 alumni from "Computer and Media Security (CMS)" and "Secure Information Systems (SEC)". At the beginning we saw a presentation about news from our University and our organization, the HagenbergerKreis (Hagenberg Circle).

Nothing really new for me, because I'm still in Action. Yet so far I'm "just" an alumni for CMS and not for SEC. The only really interesting news came from Robert, our boss of those two degree programs. He was not allowed to say much, so I have just a clue what it can be. If it is like I think, it will become big ;)

After the presentation we had a buffet. And spent the rest of the evening with celebrating and talking. I like to see, because it is really interesting, what the other alumni become, in the economy. Such an event is always good for networking, especially at the moment.

For me this evening ended at 5 o'clock in the morning.

Michi can handle the organization of the party, but unfortunately he can't handle his camera *gg*. He made a lot of photos, but the memory card was broken and even recovery didn't help. So there are no photos at the moment, sorry.

ENISA published BCM Method and BSI also its

2008-03-28T13:59:00.003+01:00

Not everybody knew that ENISA was working on this for quite some time now. However, they published there "Business and IT continuity: Overview and implementation principles" report in February.

I read it and I can say it is quite good. It has for example a useful mapping between the ENISA model and other established BCM-standards. Like the BS25999, which I'm working on in my thesis. However, I will not tell you everything, because if your interested in details, you should read my master-thesis "Process model to implement Risk Management and Business Continuity Management organization wide". I'm working on it, so be patient.

Have fun reading the report, if you need more, ENISA still has other reports to read.

Also the German BSI was working on there catalog number four, which cares about the continuity topic. They published a draft version of 100-4. I also checked this one, but not in detail, so I will not give you a comment about it at the moment.

Some News

2008-03-28T13:32:00.004+01:00

Hei my friends!

It's been a long time since I wrote my last blog entry. Sorry for that. But there is not that much to tell at the moment. I guess you don't wanna hear about my master-thesis anymore, so I start with some other news.

News Nr. 1. - my new flatmate

Yes, I have a new flatmate. *gg* No not that kind of flatmate. It's a new plant *gg*. I got it from the easter bunny. So have a look, it is the one on the left side, at the moment it gets its blossom. Looking forward to that, should be really nice.

Actually, the one in the middle is the part I could save from one of my Finland-Plants. They died on the way back to Austria in the car, because of the cold. But fortunately one had a little sapling I could use to plant it. I'm proud of it *gg*

News Nr. 2. - job interviews

At the moment there is not much to tell about jobs. I have some job application out, of course not only one. I guess every company knows that a candidate does not only have one application a time. However, some get positive answers, some got negative answers, some got so far no answers.

My study colleagues aren't in that hurry to get a job. Some have one or more applications running, other's don't have any so far. The reason why I have already some applications out is simple. Because there are some jobs, I would really like to work in, therefore I sent my applications now, because I don't know, if this kind of jobs are on the market in six month.

Whatever, some are perfect for me, and I hope I get a chance to show that I'm the best to have for the job ;)

News Nr. 3 - car needed money

Blablub.... I had to repair my car, because I wouldn't have got the "test badge". In the garage it would have cost 1600€ (!). So I had to do it on my own. Of course not me, but a friend of mine did it for me. In the end it cost 480€, I guess that is cheaper ^^

Ok, I would say that's it for the moment. Tonight we have Alumni-Meeting, looking forward to it.

Paintball and other kind of painful things

2008-03-17T10:49:00.002+01:00

Hey my friends!

Last Saturday some friends and I where playing some Paintball at this field.
It's a really nice field in an old four-edge-farmhouse. They will expand it soon with the inner side of the farmhouse and one part to simulate house-fights.
We were 11 people, some I didn't know, but in war there are no friends anyway ;)

The field has everything you need, from a tunneling-system to a tower, everything there. Our opponents were some kind of campers, so they always hide behind the wall and wait for the others to come. I didn't care, so maybe that was the reason that we lost most of the time. It was really funny and it didn't hurt that much (except next day, but this was the "sport" not the bullets).

Ok, what other painful things.... hmmmm
Actually I over reacted, maybe my master-thesis could be a painful thing *gg*. Or let's say Latex is a painful thing, it will not do what I want it to do. I work now for days to get the document in the shape I want it, but it won't work. Hopefully it will work soon, because I'm already one step behind.

Last Friday there was also open doors day at my university. It was also a nice day, because I like to show people around and the things we do. Most of the time I spent in the biometrics lab, where I showed people how to use iris scan, fingerprint scan and face scan devices. The funny part at the face scan was, we used some pictures of celebrities to compare with our users. The result was sometimes really funny, for example a couple, both compared with Paris Hilton, ... the guy was more Paris Hilton than his girlfriend *ggg*
My result, I do not really look like George Clooney, neither Bill Gates..... ;( *g*

Yeah, I had also a job interview on Friday. But more on that in another entry.

Doors open Day at my University

2008-03-12T11:28:00.004+01:00

Hi all,

this Friday 14.3 is doors open day at my university - University of Applied Sciences Upper Austria and of course especially at my Campus Hagenberg.
I will be there starting at 10 until the end. You can find me in the Biometrics lab.
More information:
On my university (english)
Doors open day (german only ;( click on the campuses to get detailed information about the program)

PS.: I also have a job-interview on Friday, but later on more on that.

Exhibitions and job interviews

2008-03-08T12:47:00.005+01:00

This week is fully planned. Not only because of my master thesis, but also because of the additional program.

First of all there are a lot of exhibitions this week, which are quite interesting. The first one I visited yesterday, was the "B.e.s.t" exhibition. It's about continuing education, work and studying. Maybe you ask yourself why I have been there when I'm nearly finished with studying.

Actually I wanted to inform myself about possibilities to join a phd-program. Therefore I visited a lot of universities, Austrian but also universities from abroad. I wanted to know something about making a phd next to a job or how it works if you do it full-time. As expected, the Austrian universitites are still a bit snobbish when it comes to students from universities of applied sciences (Fachhochschulen). Except the Johannes Kepler university in Linz. The people from the technical university of Vienna, who I spoke to, were friendly at the beginning, but when I asked how difficult it will be for Applied Sciences students, there was this acknowledgeable change in the face and she said, maaah you have to do a lot lot lot of additional courses to get even a chance to be affiliate at the phd program.
I can only say, wake up girl!! I studied 5 years (not 4 as some still believe). I have no problem to make the one or other additional course, but lot lot lot to get a chance, hahaha.
The girl at the JKU stall was quite more relaxed. She said that probably will be some additional courses, but that it is possible to do it next to the phd program. I know that there is still a problem to get a free place, because universities prefer there own students, but they should think if a healthy mix of university and applied science students wouldn't be better. However, thanks to JKU to be not that small-minded as other Austrian universities.

Actually, at the moment I haven't really decided if I start working or continue studying. But at the moment working is the favorite choice, because there are some nice job offers available.

Which brings me to the next point, the job interview. Of course I send my resume to more than one job, but I guess every human resource person will know that. However, yesterday I had my first job interview. In my opinion it wasn't that bad, but the problem is you never know what the other side thinks. People who know me know that I'm a truthful person, so maybe some other people can't handle that fact. For example, I mentioned clearly that a job as programmer is not what I will do in the future.

The company makes a very nice impression and the job sounded also very interesting. Of course it is in my field IT-Security and as far as I can see right now, it will be cover the whole field. I hope I made a good impression and get an invitation to the next round of interviews.

For the other jobs I didn't get an answer yet, but I will inform you when I get one.

Let's get back to the exhibitions. We also planned to drive to the Cebit exhibition. But the schedule was changed to 23o'clock yesterday and that would have been to much stress for us, because we already were tired. So we cancelled that one, but instead we will go to the energy saving exhibition in Wels tomorrow. We have been there also last year and it was really interesting. This year I want to find out what my "dream"-house would cost, *lol*, I'm looking forward to this shock.

Storm over Europe

2008-03-04T21:19:00.004+01:00

I guess a lot of people recognized the storm we had a few days ago.
Also Austria had some places which were hit hard.
But I guess one of the most famous scenes is the one you can see on the following video. It is about a airplane who tried to land at an airport and was hit by a blast, but just look for yourself. It happened in Germany.

I guess they were quite lucky ;)
Good luck also to all people who experienced damages or worse losses, keep your head up.

Nightwish concert videos

2008-03-03T19:55:00.004+01:00

Finally kampfjogurt published his videos, the quality is the best to find at the moment, so enjoy the three nightwish videos from the concert in Vienna:

Amaranth

Everdream

Bye Bye Beautiful

Nightwish Concert

2008-03-01T13:22:00.009+01:00

After skipping the concert in Helsinki, what I regret later on, I finally made it to a Nightwish concert.

First of all, why did I regret skipping the concert in Helsinki? Because I would have loved to see Indica ;( But at that time I didn't know that Indica is not the support band for the European tour.

However, on 28.2 I have been to the concert in Vienna (Gasometer). The supporting Band was Pain. Fortunately the band was not a "Pain in the ass". They are a Swedish metal band and they were quite good. To get an impression, here is a video of one of their song at the concert (thx to kampfjogurt who made this video):

That was actually the last song before the Nightwish show. I can not say a lot about the show, only that it really was great. I had my concerns about Anette (the new singer), because I loved Tarja's voice, but Anette is a very nice (and good looking) woman. She is Swedish, but actually in my opinion she looks perfectly Finnish.

There are yet not really good videos available, but I'm sure there will be some soon. Therefore I give you some impressions with some photos. Unfortunately Günther forgot his camera (bravo günther!) and mine was too big, so I searched for pictures and found a good source in the German Nightwish Fanclub homepage, where raven_arkadon put some really nice pictures.

Here are some impressions:

Thanks for the nice photos, you can find the rest of the gallery in the above mentioned link.

It was a great evening and I enjoyed it a lot !!!

Finland : Austria -> 1:0

2008-02-26T11:02:00.006+01:00

No this is not about the world cup in ski-flying. Actually Austria won gold and silver in the single competition and gold in the team competition.

It is about the people
Last Friday I went out with some friends. On this evening I drank not even one gram of alcohol. Why? because I don't want to. The evening was very funny. But why 1:0 for Finland?

Later this evening we have been to the newly renovated Segafredo in Steyr. This was one of my most famous pub some years ago. It was newly renovated, so I wanted to see how it looks like. Nothing really special, but ok.

As the evening went on, I had time to "monitor" the behaviour of the people there. It is always different to have a not drunken view *g*. A lot of young people have been there, good looking, but fancy.

Remember Finland, have you ever ever see or here a Fin gripe about the look of others, or the clothe of others and so on ? Think about it, .. I haven't. Because nobody cares how people look like, and if they do care, than they don't show or say it. Because there is some respect and privacy.

In Austria and especially I recognized it again on this evening, people here care,.. more than they should. This kind of arrogance is so pathetic. The Segafredo always was a place to attract those kind of people, who think they are better than others. Is it really necessary for Austrians (especially the youth) to run down other people, just to feel better? This competition between people, not only at work but also in the private life. It is normal for central Europe. Especially in Northern countries, but also southern countries, it is different.

I think the problem already starts in school (learned from the parents), where 7 year olds complain about the cloth of other 7 year olds. Because some don't wear any popular brand, or maybe they do not have a playstation or own tv or own computer at home. In my opinion school uniforms would make a lot of things easier for some children. Or when 19 years old complain about 45 years old people coming to a disco. (What the hell are those "old" people doing here ?!)

Ok, one more examples. When a car is driving on the road and a faster one is coming from behind and on the other lane is a car driving in the opposite direction. Finland: both, the one on my lane and the one on the opposite lane would drive as right as possible to make space for the faster car. Austria: both, the one on my lane and the one on the opposite lane would drive as far in the middle as possible, and think "you are not overtaking me, no your not, ...."

In Ireland the 18year old goes to the same pub and has fun as his 60+ year old grandfather. In Finland, how often did we see naked guys running around *g*, did someone complain or run them down? So what's so special about central European people, ... I don't know and I hope I can fight those behaviours and not become (again) one of those kind of people. Give some more respect!

What do you think about this?

Workshop Resume

2008-02-26T10:28:00.002+01:00

I'm back for some days and I now want to give you a short feedback.
The workshop about Business Continuity Management was quite ok. The most interesting part was the practical part in the second half of the day.

Nevertheless it was hard for me to stay awake, not because the topics were boring, but after 8h overnight train and nearly no sleep, sticky air, ... *yaaaawn*

However, even if the topics were quite interesting, the workshop was not worthy the effort. First of all the wasted time in the train and secondly the money of course. 14h ours train (linz - frankfurt and back) 39€ + 39€, local trains (st. valentin - linz and back, frankfurt - darmstadt and back) 4,10€ + 4,10€ + 6,75€ + 6,75€, a room for one night 70€, tramway 1,45€ + 1,45€ and the workshop itself 35€ (student price).

I recommend doing it another way, for example booking a cheap flight as early as possible. (when I tried to book flight also would have cost 250€)

About the content:
The first speaker was from the BSI UK. This is the organization which created the BCM-standard BS25999. The topic should have been BS25999-2:Specification .. . But unfortunately it was mostly about part one of the standard, not part two. So nothing new for me in that case. But afterwards I asked the speaker some questions, so it was a bit helpful at all.

The second topic was "the concrete procedure in a BCM project". I disagreed a lot with the speaker. He has a lot of experience in the field of Disaster Recovery, but his mapping from "there way to implement BCM" to the 25999 standard was ... hmm... let's say, not how I understand it. One example, he always talked about assets and continuity of this assets. But in BCM normally you always talk about (business) processes and the continuity of those.

After a short coffee break the chairman and professor of the TU Darmstadt talked about how to measure efficiency of BCM. This topic was quite interesting, even if I do not need it for my master thesis. It was a mathematical approach how to calculate an efficiency value. You can calculate a result without even testing the BCM approach . It was very theoretical, but something different and interesting.

After lunch there was a presentation about a doctoral thesis. It was ok, but not very exciting. Would be nice to read the whole dissertation, because in such a "short" presentation it is only possible to get an idea of the content.

Then there was a presentation about the human factor in BCM,.... sorry can't tell you anything, I was too much concentrating of not falling asleep. (not the presentation, the followings of the train trip ^^)

The last two presentations were about practical implementations at Siemens and BMW. Those were also very nice and useful to get an inside view to a practical implementation.

Workshop and other stuff

2008-02-20T14:08:00.004+01:00

Until yesterday I was still correcting my expose, my content and my project report. (for the third time(!)) Hopefully this time it is good enough for my adviser.

Today I will travel to a workshop in Germany by train (2220). The workshop is hold by the Cast-Forum at the Fraunhofer institute in Darmstadt. The topic is "Enterprise Security Management" and has its focus on Business Continuity Management. So it should be perfect for my master thesis. I will travel 8h there and 7h back. The funny thing is, the workshop only lasts from 10-17 o'clock. I will stay one night in Darmstadt and when I'm back I will give you a report.
Fortunately I got this special tickets (Sparschiene), where I have to pay only 39€ from Linz to Frankfurt. (normally ~109€)

Today I sent my resume with all additional documents to a company to apply for a job. The job is called Technical Security Analyst and the description of it sounds very promising. So I thought, why shouldn't I try. It is only in a small town, but the company is very good. It is the biggest in its market (in Austria) and it also has settlements all over central and eastern Europe. I will keep you up- to date

Now I should excessively start with my master thesis, because the first milestone (chapter 1-4) is on 29.2. Phhhuuuuu!!

Presentation for PCClub and new technical stuff

2008-02-09T13:05:00.000+01:00

First of all, last Wednesday we did a presentation (in the name of our organization Hagenberger Kreis) for the PC-Club in my hometown. It was the second presentation about IT-Security. This time we had the topic Backup. First I was afraid that the topic is too small and we can not fill the planned 1-1,5h. But as it is, when it comes to presentations, in the end it took 2,5h.

First we presented basics like medias, where and what to backup and so on. Also we explained in details what is and how works incremental, differential and full-backup.
At the end we presented two tools to backup.

The first one was the Vista integrated backup and restore center. For (semi-)professionals I would recommend not to use it. Because it has some really weird things implemented. First of all it is not possible to choose a backup strategy. (increment, differential, full) Vista makes first a full backup and afterwards only incremental backups all the time. So it is not possible to make a full backup every Sunday and in between incremental.

But the weirdest thing is, that you can't really choose a directory or file to backup. Because the only choice you have is to choose a partition or disk and afterwards choose which kind of file types you want to backup. That it definitely strange !!! You don't believe me? Have a look!

Weird!!
However, the restore function has the possibility to restore only one file or a directory. (why not the backup function !!!??)

The second tool was one of my favourite -> Cobian Backup.
It is freeware and it is really good. It has everything you need, except backup on DVD. You can find it here Cobian Backup.
The feature list is really very nice and the upcoming version, which should be published soon, has even more features. But read the feature list on your own, I give you just some key words: FTP, encryption, compression, password, timestamps, files/directories/partitions/disks, and so on and on and on.....

Ok, let's move on to the new technical stuff.
Truecrypt released a new version. Version 5 brings some new stuff, but the most important thing is the pre-boot encryption.
Finally a free software encryption tool has a pre-boot feature. This means that you have to enter a pass phrase at the boot process and if someone steals your PC or hard disk, he can't do anything with it, because it is encrypted. Very nice!!
I will do it as soon as possible, but first I will do a backup of my important data, because there is always a small risk with this kind of software. In the worst case, you can't access the PC on your own *gg*. But it should work, I will give you some Input as soon as I know.

Vista User Account Control issue:
When I put my PC into my domain and "transfered" my local user to a domain user account, I had a problem with the UAC. Everytime it asked me to enter my Admin and password. Not like before just to click at continue, this time I really have to type it all the time.
I lived some time with this issue, until I solved it yesterday. I played with the user accounts and recognized, that my domain user is not in the list of the local users. So I made a new user. There you can say that this user is part of a domain. After I did that, everything worked find as before.

Clinton vs Obama

2008-02-05T12:48:00.000+01:00

I guess a lot of non-Americans out there watch sometimes the news about the "fight" Clinton vs Obama. Maybe because it's just funny how stupid sometimes US-Americans can be. I mean, come on, in which country can a men become president with having not the most votes ?! That's the American kind of democracy. (Ok, Austrians can be also stupid sometimes, especially when it comes to elections *gg*)

However, I think it is very important who becomes the next president, because the one they have at the moment is just embarrassing.

So, today is the "Super Tuesday" and US citizens can vote who of those two should be the presidential candidate. I think it is not easy anyway, but anything will be better than it is now. On one side is Hillary. A strong woman, who has the knowledge and the experience. On the other side there is Obama, "young" and dynamic, maybe the knowledge, but experience?? Difficult.

So we will see soon, how USA will decide. In the meanwhile you can spend your time with one product of the election campaign, the video "Yes we can", which is based on a speech of Obama, which includes a lot of supporting Hollywood stars. (I hope for them, the never will regret their choice, but it is the same for all supporting stars, also those supporting other candidates. (As far as I remember, some supported the actual president ^^)

Hmmm, by the way.... Yes we can is a good slogan, you can use it everywhere. For example conquering Irak....Yes we can!!! Yes we can!!! I hope they will not use it that way ;)

Some facts and your turn to vote:
Eco-Research US-Election monitor
Let the show begin!

There it is...

2008-02-04T23:53:00.000+01:00

It's again a long time since my last entry. January is over, so is the real stress. Now it should be easier to find time to write some entries. So what did i do the last few days.

As I already mentioned most of the time in January did I spend on my pre-master thesis project. In the end I had 24 pages and it should be ok. But of course I did also other things.

One time I have been at a presentation from Ted Humphrey about ISO27001.
About Ted Humphrey:

"Ted Humphreys (FBCS CITP, CISM) is Director of XiSEC Consultants Ltd a UK company providing Information Security Management consultancy services around the world. He has been an expert in the field of information security and risk management for more than 27 years. ...He was the editor of BS 7799 Part 1:1999, ISO/IEC 17799:2000 and the 1999 and 2002 editions of BS 7799 Part 2 the ISMS standard. ..."

The presentation was very nice and the really good part for me was, that he confirmed indirectly, that my topic of the master thesis is well chosen, because it will be a relevant topic in the future. Good for me, hopefully!! :)

Some days after I visited a "Security projects fair" at our university. It was the first time, that every class from our security studies (computer and media security bachelor and secure information systems master) presented its semester projects. Before that we always presented only to the students of the same class and get the grade for that. Now it is possible for each year to see, what the other years have done.

I must say this idea is really good and the fair was very interesting. Some really good projects have been presented. One group programed a software which does load balancing with virtual machines without any interrupten (it is available open source on sourceforge, but did forget the URL). Another nice project implemented secure services over a mobile network. For example ordering a credit card per mobile and you can pay one minute after the order with your credit card on the phone. And a lot more interesting projects. Nice !

Ok, what else.

Last week there was my last exam (hopefully) in my study career. It was the cryptography2-applications exam. It was a bit more than expected, but it should be ok. Before that we presented our project. So finally I have all the time for my master thesis.

Ah, we also got the grade for Parallel Computing. I only reached a 4 (out of 5). It's not so bad, but 5 would be better *gg*.

Ok, the last thing for today. We have a presentation about Backups in my home town at the PCClub. We (Georg and me) do this for our organisation Hagenberger Kreis. I will give you a summary afterwards.

So much for today.... see ya!

How is it going?!

2008-01-20T12:24:00.000+01:00

That is a question I hear a lot in the last few days. Thanks, I'm doing fine. Even when I have hell lot of work to do and Finland still is in my mind.

How is it going?
That what I ask you now. How are you doing? Tell me.

Some also asked me if the blog ends now, after my study abroad. I have this blog since 1,5 year now. My study abroad was just a part of it and the blog will therefore not end !!! The frequent of posting entries will be a bit bigger, so I recommend you using RSS-Feed. And yes, the blog continues in English.

Would be nice if some of my friends out there continue reading and sharing there thoughts with me.

So what I'm doing right now. As I already mentioned, I have a lot of work to do. First of all I have to finish my work for the project, which I have to finish in one week. I also have an exam at the end of this month.

But work for the university is not all. I have to visit a lot of friends since my return, ok maybe that is not work,... but it is time. (well spent)
I also have to support a lot of friends and relatives with their PCs and Internet. That is work!! Believe me!! Questions like "How do I make uppercase letters" are common. And last but not least, yesterday I had to renew my parents aquarium, because the old one was leaking.....

I hope you all doing fine, let me know!

Conclusion about my study abroad

2008-01-13T10:38:00.000+01:00

It’s time to write my conclusion about my study abroad in Lappeenranta and Joensuu (EILC). It is quite difficult, because I’m still thinking a lot about this time and I’m not really finished with it. However, I will give you a short conclusion.
I will start from the beginning.

First of all, if you have the possibility to go by car, you should do it. If you don’t like too much driving, you can choose car train and ferry as we did.

Secondly, if you have the opportunity to attend the EILC (Erasmus Intensive Language Course), you should definitely do it !! The time during EILC was one of the best during the whole study abroad program. Why? Not difficult, first of all it was in the summer, so you can enjoy the warm weather and the lake, sitting on the beach, parties at the beach and so on. You can meet a lot of nice people before starting the real Erasmus semester. Joensuu is a nice city and in my opinion a good place to study. Don’t worry about learning the Finnish language, everybody is able to pass.

Let’s move on to Lappeenranta. Lappeenranta is called the summer town. There is a reason for that, in autumn and winter there is not really much activity there. With activity I mean public events. September is the last month where some events take place. During the autumn and winter month it is just another Finnish town, but I think there are not much towns in the east, southern and middle Finland area where this is different. Only towns with special skiing areas can offer more.
Nevertheless, Lappeenranta is in my opinion a nice town. It would be no problem to survive there longer than one semester.

Ok, maybe I should say something about Finland itself. Finland is a very
nice country. If you have no problem with short winter days and long summer days, then you can go there. The country side is very nice, the nature is beautiful, even when they don’t really have mountains there. You can do every kind of sports activity during the whole year. Nearly everybody speaks perfect English, so surviving is not a big problem, and if you stay more then one semester you should learn Finnish. I think if you really want to learn it, it is possible. I will not mention all the good and bad things and the little things that make Finland the country it is, because it would be a never-ending blog entry.

Finland is a good country for living and in many ways quite similar to Austria. Some things are better, some things are worse. If you want to know details, you can ask me personally, because writing everything down is just too much at the moment. Maybe I will make a separate blog entry with some examples.
Must do activities are: Lapland (National Park), St. Petersburg, National Parks in common, Helsinki, Savonlinna, Great Lake Saimaa (boat, swimming, grill, ...), maybe Rovaniemi (Santa Claus, Martiini), Tallinn by ferry, if you have time and money maybe Stockholm by ferry. (and so on)

In some ways living in Finland can be very expensive. But I guess it is also possible to find cheaper places. For example in Helsinki a 74m² apartment costs about 900€. As far as I know, Fins don’t really earn more money than we do in Austria. For my room in a shared apartment I paid in Joensuu 160€ (3 persons apartment) and in Lappeenranta 290€ (2 persons apartment). The one in Joensuu was quite fucked, but the one in Lappeenranta was brand new renovated and it was the biggest room. Smaller rooms are available from 230€. A meal in a restaurant can start at 16€ all included, but it is also possible to eat for 5€.

Shopping is not really different to Austria. Some stuff is cheaper, some stuff is more expensive. I never checked the prices one on one, but I didn’t really realize a big difference. Of course alcohol is a lot more expensive, but that is Finland. For 0,5l can of beer, you pay in the best case 0,99 cent. For the cheapest 0,33 l beer can you pay 0,66 cent. The bottle of wine is available from 5€. Austrian Stroh Rum 0,5l costs 15€. One big advantage by going by car, is of course that you can bring a lot of stuff with you ;)

Now to the most important part of Erasmus or study abroad, the people. First of all, whatever you think you know about different countries, the chance to change this opinion is very high. I would say I changed my mind mostly about Poland and France. Austrians experience with polish people is mostly not a good one and therefore there are a lot of stereotypes. The people I met in Joensuu and Lappeenranta truly proofed this stereotypes wrong and I’m really glad about that. Also my meaning and another stereotype about French people was changed. Yes, they do speak English ;)

There will always be people who want to stay in groups of there own, I mean with people from the same language. I think this is a really big mistake and I’m glad that I found a lot of people who tried to make friends from other countries. Every country had this kind of groups, I will order them from beginning with the worst: China, Spain, Germany and France. Those were the biggest parts of the people, that’s why it was easy to recognize. I met some Chinese people, they are nice and polite, but when it comes to party or do some activities they always stick with Chinese.

Of course not all people of the named countries only stick in there language groups, but a big part of them did. Ok, maybe if there would have been 20 Austrians, it would be more difficult for me to stay in foreign language groups.

I give you some examples of Countries I met: China, Japan, Nepal, India, Chile, Nigeria, Canada, England, Spain, France, Belgium, Netherlands, Greece, Austria, Germany, Czech, Slovakia, Poland, Italy, Hungary, Estonia, Lithuania, Russia, Finland. I think a very nice collection (I hope I didn’t forget any).

I hope I can stay in contact with a lot of people. I know it will be difficult, but nowadays with Skype, MSN, ICQ and E-Mail it should be not that big problem. Just let’s talk some times and maybe meet again in the near future.

Ok, I forgot to mention one group of people, the Fins. The easiest way to know Finnish people is of course your tutor and people of the same lecture. Any other way to get to know Fins is a bit more difficult. I have to say, that my focus was more on the Exchange students, because it is hard enough to get to know a lot of them in just one semester. Would I have stayed more than one semester, I would have focused more on knowing Fins. Because first of all it needs time to get in contact with them and it is mostly your turn to do it. Fins are great people and if the know you and you earned there trust, you find the true Fins then. Because Fins are not that silent as everybody thinks, yes maybe in the beginning. Unfortunately I don’t know much of them, but those I know I enjoy there company.

I guess this was enough to read for this time, maybe I will drop another thought on my study abroad later.

Thanks to all the people who made my study abroad probably one of the best times in my life. I already miss you and I hope I will see some of you soon. Thanks also to Finland and the Fins, kiitos paljon!

New Year's eve in Helsinki and the way back

2008-01-07T19:40:00.000+01:00

Hei my friends, it took me a bit longer than expected, but now I try to write the missing blog entries. For the summary about my study abroad in Finland you have to wait one more entry.

Ok, first I will tell you something about the New Years Eve in Helsinki. My friends (Maxx, Roland) and I, Roman and his friends Thomas and Martin, we went on 31st to Helsinki to celebrate New Years Eve.

After checking in at the Hotel (Arthur) near the center, we relaxed first to have enough power for the rest of the night. After lunch we went at 2030 to the senators square to check the place because the main event was there. At this time there were not even one person there, so we went to the center to go to a pub and drink some. We stayed there for nearly 3 hours and played also some card game.

Afterwards we went back to the place, and we were not alone, thousands of Fins joined us and when we arrived at the square some thousands of people were there. I would guess that there were more then 10000 people.

There was some live music and show and at midnight after the countdown the firework show started. It was very nice in my opinion, the only strange thing was, that there was not even one stall where you can buy alcoholic drinks. Every Fin knew that and brought own drinks, we didn't ;(

We made a lot of nice photos and a lot of even nicer videos, but I haven't got them yet. I will publish them when I have them.

After the show we went back to a beer bar where we celebrate again new years eve at 100, the new years eve from Austria ;)
The night ended at the entrance of a nightclub, where the entry fee would have been 7€ even when it was only possible to buy drinks for half an hour more, lol.

UPDATE: Late, but I didn't forget, the videos from New Year in Helsinki (sorry no time and no motivation to mix it with music):

The countdown and firework:

After the countdown second part of the firework:

The days after we spent with a lot of shopping, I spent hell lot of money on souvenirs.
At the 2nd of January we went back. First with the ferry from Helsinki to Travemünde (Germany), which took 27hours and was a "ride on the wild side", because the sea was quite rough. We arrived on 3rd of January at 20 o'clock and had to stay there until the next day, because the car trains leave at 1930 from Hamburg Altona. We stayed at a private room and went to Hamburg on the next day to do some final shopping. At 1930 we left with the car train and arrived on 5.1 at 900 o'clock in Vienna. After breakfast in the Pertl's residence (thanks a lot) I drove home. I arrived, ... maybe more with the body than with the mind (at the moment).

It is over ;(

2007-12-30T21:51:00.000+01:00

The captain leaves the sinking ship as last. Ok, maybe I'm not the captain, but in the end I also have to leave Lappeenranta for good.

Tomorrow on 31st of December I will go to Helsinki to celebrate the New year there with my friends and also Roman has some friends there who are joining us.

I don't know if and when I have a possibility to write the next entry, so in the worst case I can write it on 5.1, because then I'm back in Austria. On 2.1 we will go by ferry to Travemünde, which we will reach on 3.1 and on 4.1 we will go by train to Vienna.

I will not write my Finland summary now, so be patient. I really need time to write one and I'm not ready at the moment to accept that I have to leave.

See you soon, and if there is no possibility to write an entry before,
HAPPY NEW YEAR 2008 !!!!

Austrians and Gigglin

2007-12-29T16:20:00.000+01:00

A new wave of Austrian friends (Maxx, Roli) arrived at 27.12. I fetched them from the airport in Helsinki. The rest of the first day we spent with changing news from home, initial shopping and a welcome beer.

Next "morning" we went to the city center to do the sightseeing program, as usual, and go for coffee and shopping. Actually the original plan was to go to Savonlinna to make a tour through the castle. The bad thing is, that it is closed from 15 - 31.12.

Maxx and Roland at the harbor:

And relaxing at the fortress cafeteria:

Of course if it comes to the night program, on Fridays, guess what, Gigglin Marlin *gg*
We missed the bus at 23, even with spontaneous sporting afford by me, we missed it :)
(Perkele !!)

Ok, back to the flat and taking the next bus. Finally we arrive in Gigglin and the party started. It was really funny and we enjoyed it a lot. Drinking and a lot of dancing and even more fun.

more impressions ? :) ( the time on the photos is Austrian time, so one hour more to calculate)

We met a lot of nice girls and we left the Gigglin after it closed, but finished the night in my flat with some breakfast at 530. And yes, we slept long ;)

One last photo, because I like it a lot, Maxx coming straight from hell *g*:

The rest of the photos is in my Webalbum.

Christmas Eve

2007-12-25T15:02:00.000+01:00

Finally Christmas eve arrived and we spent it with a lot of cooking and baking. I already mentioned the menu plans before, so I will show you here how it looked like in the end ;)

I already started my preparations in the morning, because the dough for the Apfelstrudel has to be made earlier to rest a bit. After that Martin and I cooked the potatoes and eggs for the (Slovakian) potato salad.

At 1330 we started cooking and begin with cutting all the ingredients for the onion soup and the potato salad. No, nobody was hurt in the end. The onion soup was Romans responsibility. After finishing the soup we put it in the oven to bake it with bread and cheese and in the end the first meal of the day looked like this:

Meanwhile Martin was already finishing his (Slovakian) potato salad.

We made "Wiener Schnitzel" to the salad. The strange thing when it comes to breadcrumbs in Finland is, that they don't have them the way we do at home. The breadcrumbs here are flavored, so you have to choose between breadcrumbs for meat or for sweets.

We were already nearly full after the soup, but of course we also had to eat the main meal. And it was also very delicious, like the soup.

As dessert I planned a Apfelstrudel. Directly after lunch I started to make it. After putting the ingredients for the first of two Apfelstrudels on the dough, Roman read what was written on the description for the breadcrumbs, which should be for sweets. One of the ingredients in the breadcrumbs was Paprika !! LOOoOOL
Ok, a bit nervous now, because I already put it in, I just put more cinnamon and sugar on it :) In the end there was no difference and it was very good.

The skin was a bit too crusty, because I left it too long in the oven, but for next time I know a trick to solve this problem.

So we were finally finished with all the eating, we made a small break and after this break I started to bake some cookies for the party in the evening.

First of all I wanted to bake some "Vanillekipferl" (vanilla rolls) and secondly I baked some "Nußhäufchen" (nut something).

Me rolling the vanilla rolls:

So at the end when we were nearly finished, it looked like this:

Yeah, I know, we are damn good ;)

So finally the Christmas party took place at Evi's flat. There have been surprisingly less people, so that we have to start with 6 people, but later on fortunately we were 10 people. Actually I thought that all the Chinese will come, but they did their own party with only Chinese people allowed ;(

Nevertheless, it was a very nice evening even when we were a bit tired sometimes because of that much work, but my conclusion is, that it was a good Christmas evening worth to spend. Luca also brought some self made Tiramisu and Jose brought some Finnish pulla both have been also very delicious .

The party ended at 230. Thanks all for coming and sharing Christmas with me/us.

All the photos are online in my Web album as usual, have fun!!

Christmas plans

2007-12-23T22:58:00.000+01:00

After another good bye evening yesterday, we planned our Christmas day/evening.
The actual plan is, that we (Martin, Roman, Jose and I) will start cooking at 13o'clock at my place. We bought everything today at Prisma, which took us about 2h15.

Our Christmas lunch will be:

onion soup (with bread and cheese baked)
wiener schnitzel with potato salad
apfelstrudel

We never made this things on our own, so I think it will be a very interesting experience *gg*.

Afterwards we will bake some cookies for the Christmas party, which should take place at Evi's place. Wish us luck with the cookies also *g*
There should be a lot people there, hopefully!

For all my people at home and friends all over the country:

Frohe Weihnachten !!
Merry Christmas !!!
Hyvää joulua !!

Enjoy the day and enjoy the life ;) (even when I'm not near :)

Bad start in a weekend

2007-12-22T15:11:00.000+01:00

Staying longer in Finland than it would be necessary is normally a good thing. The bad thing is, that you are the last man standing and that you have to manage a lot of good bye's.

After a heavily celebrated Farewell Party in Gigglin Marlin the first huge wave left on Thursday, continued yesterday when I brought Chris and Arno to the train station and still continued today when more then 10 people left Lappeenranta for good.

Before Gigglin we met at Chris and Martin's place to talk and make a pre-farewell-party, nice as usual. Where we also continued to decorate their Christmas tree.

Let me give you some impressions from the last Gigglin Marlin (you will find more photos online soon):

On Friday some of us met for the last time in the nice cafeteria at the fortress. At the start we planned four persons and in the end we were about 14. It was also very nice last "Kaffeeklatsch".

It was "funny" to see how all people especially the girls tried to not cry at the train station. I think if they would play "Time to say good bye" through the speakers everyone would let it go ;)
Ok, maybe even I would loose that fight then *g*

I am sad, but I know that I can and will stay in contact and hopefully some day we meet again, somewhere in the world.
So for all that already left and of course for my dearest friends, thanks for everything it was an honor to meet you and share an Erasmus semester with you.

Good Bye's and the last Uni stuff

2007-12-19T19:04:00.000+01:00

The last few days the first people already left Lappeenranta to go back to their home countries. In the next few days a lot more people are following and also leaving Lappeenranta for good.

This means, beginning with Saturday we are all alone ;(
Ok, not so alone, because there are still people left, but not much and nearly all people I hung around have left then. Therefore today will be the last real party in Gigglin Marlin, maybe a smaller one also on Friday.

The stuff for the university is nearly done. There is still the documentation for project02 in parallel computing to write, a paper for Finish-German Tandem and last but not least the Finnish For Foreigners exam on Friday. But I think that I maybe will not make the exam, I'm thinking about it. Because I have a lot more points that I need for Erasmus so it would be not necessary and I could focus on the other stuff including my project work for my home university. But I will decide on a short term, so we will see. (needed ECTS 15 - at the moment I have 19 without FFF2 exam)

I already mentioned my project for the home university, where still a lot of work is to do. I will focus on that for the rest of the time I stay here or at least until my next visitors come from Austria on 27.12.

Nothing more to say for today, this will maybe change after the party tonight and the farewell evening with our Tutor Tuija tomorrow.

Nähdään!

A week in the cottage and around Finland

2007-12-16T17:20:00.000+01:00

I haven't written for quite some time now, but there is a good reason for that behavior. I had some visitors from Austria, what I already mentioned in the blog entry before. I will describe you the week and apologize before hand, if it is a lot to read ;)

Before I started my week with my friends, I had to finish the Parallel Computing Take Home exam first. We got it on Tuesday and I nearly spent 10 hours a day from Wednesday to Saturday to finish it as early as possible.

Day 1 - Helsinki / Arrival
Günther, Silvia and Claudia arrived last Saturday the 8.12, but I couldn't join so early because I had to finish my exam as I already mentioned.
So on Sunday at 830 in the morning, I drove to Helsinki to meet them. It took some time to find the hotel, because nobody told me that there are 1000000 hotels called Scandic something *g*. And it became more difficult, because Günther described me the way from their point of view when the arrived with the taxi. Unfortunately the taxi drove in the other direction *ggg*.
In the end I found it and I finally can greet my first Austrian visitors.

On the first day we walked around Helsinki to see some sights and enjoy the town. We were really lucky, because all days before it always rained the whole day, but on this day and the whole week we always had nice weather and even sunshine. You don't believe it, here is a picture (the rest of the pictures is already online):

We visited a lot of places and in the evening it was time to board the ferry to Tallinn. We decided to go to Tallinn with the last Ferry at 21:45 and stay the night on board in a cabin. The funny thing is, that it would have cost 218€ all together with 2 cabins + 4 persons to Tallinn and only 4 persons back, BUT with 2 cabins + 4 persons to Tallinn and 1 cabin + 4 persons back it cost us 66€ all together, LOOL. Don't ask me how this is possible, but it is!!
We had a rough sea and that's why Günther was most of the time of the cruise on the "sun"-deck to get fresh air and not vomiting. *gg*

Day 2 - Tallinn
At 7 in the morning we left the ferry to walk to the historic center of Tallinn, which is also on the UNESCO heritage list for it's historical value.
I can understand why it is on this list, it is a really nice town.
When we start walking through the center it was still dark and we got impressions like it would be already night. During I checked a picture I made the minute before and I saw some smoke in it. I asked my friends, who the hell blew smoke in my view.... actually nobody was smoking. In the end I recognized that something in the inside of my camera burned down, because I also had to reset it and initialized it again. The funny part is, it is still working. Here is the picture with the smoke:

We moved on to the center where we found a really cute cafeteria at the marketplace. It calls itself "Tallinn's best cafe" and I would believe it, it was really very nice with a lot of delicious cakes.
After again walking around, because still nothing has opened so far, we visited the christmas market, which is also situated on the marketplace. Of course I bought some presents for my parents. The market was nice, but Estonian didn't bargain, that was the bad part.
Of course we saw a lot of sights again, here we are on the "top" of Tallinn with probably the best view over the old town:

After lunch and again a lot of shopping and sightseeing, we went to our ferry with which we left Tallinn at 1645 to go back to Helsinki. We were very tired so we slept a bit in the cabin.

Back in Helsinki we drove up north to Lappeenranta directly to our cottage.

We rented a cottage near Lappeenranta (14km) in Mehrenlehti. It cost us 450€ from Monday to Sunday, not much for 4 persons in my opinion. The cottage and the sauna was already heated up when we arrive at 2345. The owners showed us everything and after that, Günther and I decided to have our first sauna turn at 2 in the morning. It was great, I don't know why I haven't visit Sauna earlier *gg*, yes, it was my first time in 4 month.

Day 3 - The cottage
In the morning we had the first chance to see our cottage at daylight and also the nice scenery, which welcomes us with mythic fog all over the lake. But have a look on your own:

The cottage (left), with sauna (middle) and grilling place (right):

The lake:

We went to Lappeenranta city center to do some walking, talking and shopping. But resting for the rest of the day.

On this day I brought my Take home exam to my professor, where he can have a look and tell me if a passed or not. The first thing he said was something like "..dare you, you wrote so much.." hahaha,.... yes, I had like 17 pages for 4 questions and for the first one 5 and the second one 4 pages. In the end I passed, thank god ;) But I didn't get the points so far, because he said he had to read it carefully, because I took a very different approach than anybody else. ;)

Day 4 - Lappeenranta
The plan was to see the sights of Lappeenranta. It has not much sights, so we weren't in a hurry *gg*. The morning started even better than the morning before, sunshine :)
You don't believe it, look at this picture I made in the harbor of Lappeenranta:

Ok, sunshine doesn't mean that it is warm *gg*. However, we spent a nice day walking through Lappeenranta. We visited the old cafe at the fortress of Lappeenranta, wow they had delicious cakes *gg*

We also visited the oldest orthodox church in Finland, which was the first time opened since I'm here to visit it. Ok, maybe we should have ask the group inside if they paid for the tour *g*

In the evening we went to the christmas party at Gigglin Marlin (after sauna), which was organized by the student union. A very funny night with a special appearance from a girls dance group. You maybe can guess why I really liked it *g*

Day 5 - Long sleep and Ylämaa

After a long night, we had a longer sleep, ok for some it wasn't even long enough *g*.
The program for this day was a visit in Ylämaa. It is a small town with a big mining history. Because in Ylämaa there is a rich deposit of spectrolite and other stones.

The first impression was not very good, because everything was closed and the "town" was extremely small. After some time and questions we head back to the "stone city" and fortunately the before closed shop was open now. I bought me a ring for my thumb and the others also bought some stuff. The ring is made from bloodstone. It breaks very easy, as Günther recognized after 3 minutes. He unpacked the ring, dropped it, broken *ggg*, not even once weared *gg*. But the lady behind the desk was nice enough to give him a new one for free.

After some shopping and grilling in the evening we went to bed.

Day 6 - Very long sleep and shopping
Nothing special on day number 5, just more sleep and relaxing and do some shopping in the center of Lappeenranta.

Day 7 - Imatra and Ruokolahti
We went to Imatra to see the rapid canyon. Afterwards we went to the church hill in Ruokolahti, just to visit the wooden bell tower and the church there. Which looks like that (bell tower)

After the usual sightseeing we went back to the cottage to spend the last evening there. We also walked on the frozen lake.

Today I brought them back to Helsinki Airport, where they left at 16 o'clock.
Thank you three for the visit, it was really a very nice week with you and I enjoyed it a lot.

A lot of photos of this week are online in my gallery.

Holiday, Friends and take home exam

2007-12-07T22:45:00.000+01:00

Terve!
Let's start with the heavy part of the topic, the take home exam.
At the moment it seems that I'm quite good in time. I worked the last days nearly around the clock to finish it as soon as possible. There is just one task I haven't done yet, the others should be solved or fine. My plan is to be finished tomorrow night, that I can start with my holiday.

And there is the second and third topic of my title. On Saturday my friends Günther, Silvia and Claudia arrive in Helsinki and on Sunday I will join them in Helsinki to spend a whole week with them. It is my first visit from Austria and I'm really looking forward to it.

I will give you a list of what we have planned:

Sunday night, going with the ferry to Tallinn
Monday, spending the day in Tallinn and going back in the late afternoon
Arriving in Lappeenranta where we rent a very nice cottage on the saimaa lake
On Tuesday we will have a look at Lappeenranta, and I also have to bring my take home exam on that day to university.
The rest of the week we will visit: Savonlina, Mikkeli, Ruokolahti, Imatra, Ylämaa

As you can see, a lot to do for one week.
I'm very happy and looking forward to this week, hopefully everything is fine and we can enjoy a week with friends.

Nuku hyvin ja hyvää viikonlopua!

Take home exam and other stuff

2007-12-05T17:27:00.001+01:00

Moi out there!
I haven't written for days and the main reason for that is, that I have a lot of work to do for the university. I have to mention this sometimes, so that you don't think I'm doing nothing ;)

On Monday we finished our project 01 for Parallel Computing, which was a program including PVM functions. The main job of the program was the multiplication of matrices. So the master process sends the values to the slaves, they calculate it and send the result back. (short version of the function) Of course we also had to write a documentation for it.

Today I had my final presentation in "Presenting in English". It was about traveling in Europe and I in my opinion my partner Mikko and I did quite well. The final task will be an analysis of our own presentation.

Ok, and last but not least we got our take home exam in Parallel Computing yesterday. Yes you read correctly, it is a exam which you can take home and fill it at home. Of course it is more difficult then a normal exam and believe me it takes a looooot of time. I hope I can finish it soon enough, because on Sunday I will meet Günther, Silvia and Claudia in Helsinki to spend the week with them. That means that two of my days for the exam are lost, therefore I have to do it faster, that means.. At the moment I do nothing else, except writing this blog entry, which by the way is part of my small break.

We had to send our pre-master project report for our home university yesterday. There is not really much movement in the project, mostly because there is just no time at the moment. But as far as I know, I am not the only one who has a slow start. I have to invest the whole January for it to catch up and of course the next semester for my master thesis. First of all I have to read a lot, I mean A LOT and that actually takes time. So, hopefully after the take home exam and my "holiday" week with my friends from Austria, I will find the time to really start through. There is "only" Finnish for Foreigners exam left on 21.12 and the second project for Parallel Computing until 23.12.

moi moi

Facebook Security Issues

2007-12-01T23:13:00.000+01:00

Facebook is a broadly used and well known community site and I know that a lot of you people outside are using it. I am also a user and therefore I have some suggestions for you to make it more secure.

Lately Facebook made some bad news with tracking the surfing behavior of its users, even when you are not on Facebook.
Nate Weiner made a very nice blog entry, which describes the whole issue in detail. If your are interested in reading it, you will find this blog entry here.

To secure yourself it is not necessary to read the whole article, because I will give you a shortcut what to do right now.

First of all, to use this security tools, you have to use Firefox, because the following tool is a plug-in for it.
Install the BlockSite add-on / plugin
After restarting Firefox, which is necessary to activate it
Open the options of the add-on, you can find it in the list of add-ons
There you enter this URL to block: http://www.facebook.com/beacon/*
Confirm it with ok and be safe

For those people who are not so familiar with Security and FireFox plug-ins, I also would recommend you the following plug-ins, which I'm using and also suggested by the Network Security Blogwriter Martin McKeay:

NoScript

which is very good, it protects you from any kind of scripts and ads. It blocks them in default, and you can temporarily or permanent allow sites and scripts. Very useful!

GreaseMonkey

is for using user scripts, I would suggest it only for advanced users. It is used to activate some userscripts, for more information you should read the description. As I said, maybe better for advanced users.

CustomizeGoogle

also suggested by McKeay, and honestly I didn't know it before, but will also use it, sounds very nice.

I'm using some more add-ons, but they are not all just for security.
Use Firefox and use the add-ons from above and you will be much more safer !!

Middle of the Weekend Report

2007-12-01T21:33:00.000+01:00

Why do I again report in the middle of the weekend? Easy, because I think nothing more interesting will happen, because today I'm just relaxing.

On Friday we went again to the swim hall, this time Martin and Florian joined us, before that I met with my Finnish partner to finalize our presentation. It will be held on Wednesday. In the evening there would have been the birthday party of Iris (Happy Birthday again!). Why "would have been"? Because I thought, having a Glühwein party before, would be a nice idea. Actually it was a nice idea, but it ended too late for me to join the birthday party, because they already left to the nightclub.

As I already mentioned, Roman, Martin, Florian, I and later on Martti had a Glühwein party and played some cards (president and asshole). Not much of them drank the alcohol, therefore Roman and I had to finish it. This was also the reason why Roman didn't join me when I went to the nightclub to meet the others ;)

Arrived in the nightclub at midnight, the rest of the birthday party was a bit drunken. Ok, let's say they were near the coma ?! ;) I will not comment the condition and behavior of some of those girls, I will just say "some girls shouldn't drink that much".

However, I joined the group with the guys from Nepal, Japanese, India,... . It was nice and I enjoyed to ask the Japanese guy some questions about Japan, which are reeeealy very important.... ok, for me *g*. You can maybe imagine ;) I hope I didn't bother him too much. By the way, Japanese names are sometimes not that easy to remember :)

After nightclubbing, I went home. When I walked to my place, I saw that there is still a party going on at Chris place. So I went there and joined them. Some of them were also a bit drunk, but the behavior is much more nicer and funnier then from some other people I already mentioned. For example running some rounds naked in the public *gg*
We also played some Rugby, or let's say just throw some rugby ball. After the final snowball fight I went to my room, kind of watched a movie and fell asleep.

The rest of the weekend I will relax and do some stuff for the university. There is still some stuff to do, because this week I have my final presentation in "Presenting in English" and I have to finish the document for Parallel Computing Project 1.
But the really worse thing is coming Tuesday or Wednesday, then we get our "Take Home" exam in Parallel Computing, for which we have one week time to finish. Don't think that this will be an easy task. More on this later.

Hyvää viikonlopua !!

A new grade and new Vocabulary

2007-11-29T09:50:00.000+01:00

Yesterday we got the second grade for this semester. It is the grade for Mobility Management, what is worth 4 ECTS. You can remember?! The lecture with the project where we have to use this damn network simulator and the always the "same tone" voice of the lecturer, which is a kind of hypnosis to fall a sleep.
However, the content was quite interesting and I finally got my first 5 grade in LUT. Nooo, don't worry, 5 in Finland is not the same like in Austria *gg*. Actually last time when i described the grade scale it was not exactly correct, therefor I will explain it again.

5 excellent ?
4 very good 1 in Austria
3 good 2 in Austria
2 satisfactory 3 in Austria
1 passed 4 in Austria
0 failed 5 in Austria

ok, that's how I would translate it. We will see if our University also see it this way, I have to ask.

There is nothing else to report at the moment, this week I have again some work to do, like Parallel Computing Projects, Presentation for Presenting in English and some other stuff.

Vocabulary of the day - Wednesday and Thursday this time adjectives:

hoikka - slim, thin - schlank, dünn
laiha - skinny, thin - mager, dünn
lihava - thick - dick
pitkä - tall, long - groß, lang
lyhyt - short - kurz, klein

sievä - pretty, cute - hübsch, niedlich
nätti - pretty, cute
komea - handsome - gut aussehend, attraktiv
laiska - lazy - faul
iloinen - happy, glad - glücklich

Something to think about

2007-11-27T09:03:00.000+01:00

Two days ago I read an article. In this article the author mentioned, that the British government warns the youth to put too much private information on social network sites like facebook.

In a survey the found out that a lot of people put their private pictures (parties and so on) on this sites. They also warn them, that a lot of companies look through the internet for information about a person before the hiring and that some didn't get a good job or have no chance for a career because the company found a "bad" picture in the internet.

This is maybe possible. I also have a lot of pictures in the internet and some of them are surely not bootlicking. If a company decides to not give me a job, because they found a bad photo of me in the Internet (with bad I mean a photo from a party for example, dancing on the table or whatever...), is it really that bad? I mean, of course it is not very funny if I do not get the job because of that.

BUT, ask yourself. Do you really wanna work in a company which makes their opinion about a person on a lousy picture of you. Where skill doesn't matter, but one picture ruins everything? Ok, a picture of you killing someone, or being part of a Nazi group may be considered as good evidence, but a picture of you drunken at a party ?!
This is what you are and if you really have to change that all for being part of a company, it is your choice.
Maybe it will become more important if you are really in a high position like CEO, Politician or whatever you define as a high position, but to get a job?
I even would accept when I get the job and they ask me afterwards, if it is ok for me to remove the pictures, because it maybe doesn't look that good. I would accept that, I would delete them.
But before hand, just to avoid being kicked out before I'm in?!

Think about it and tell me what you think.

I also started a poll on that question, let's see how it will end.

To not make a own entry, I will put the vocabulary of the day here:

puhdistaa - to clean - reinigen, säubern
pestä - to wash - waschen
siivota - to clean up - aufräumen
levätä - to rest - rasten, ausruhen
levähtää - to make a rest - sich ausrasten

btw. Date, Sunrise and Sunset and Daylight :

Nov 28, 2007

8:44 AM

3:06 PM

6h 22m 24s

Vocabulary of the day - Friday and Monday

2007-11-26T19:54:00.000+01:00

Hello again, friends of the Finnish language. As you already recognized, there were no vocables on Friday. It was because of our spontaneous trip to Joensuu. However, of course I have them here and will write it right now:

Vocabulary of the day - Friday:

lainata - to lend, borrow - ausleihen, borgen
maksa - to pay, cost - zahlen, kostet
sovittaa - to try (on) - probieren, anprobieren
kuvato - to describe - beschreiben
varata - to book, reserve - buchen, reservieren

Vocabulary of the day - Monday:

ottaa - to take - nehmen
kuunnella - to listen to - zuhören, anhören
häiritä - to disturb - stören
opetella - to learn - lernen
opettaa - to teach - lehren

There is nothing else to tell for today. Pidä hauskaa !!

Joensuu Trip - Team Vessapaperi Reunion

2007-11-25T14:42:00.000+01:00

On Friday I didn't went to Finnish for Foreigners, because it was to hard to get up and it would had started at 830,... I decided to sleep a bit longer and make something else useful.
During the morning I talked with Dimitris and Zdenek when they have time for us. They had time this weekend, so I decided spontaneously that we (Roman and I) go to Joensuu for the weekend, to reunite team vessapaperi for the last time in Finland.

As Roman is not the spontaneous guy he was not really happy about changing all his plans on a short term, but I knew that he will also join, so I made the decision for us *gg*

We left Lappeenranta about 1430 and had a 3 hours drive to Joensuu, where I slept at Dimitris place and Roman at Zdenek's place. First of all, thanks guys for your hospitality, kiitos paljon!!! (Also thanks to Dimitris Flatmate Tobias)

We arranged a party at Dimitris place to celebrate the reunion. I can not much say about this party, the only thing I can say "it was hell of fun" *gg*. We wasted a lot lot of alcohol, including my two liters Schnapps which I brought with me. Some more people joined Magda, James, Ula, Björn and so on.... Thanks to all of those people, it was hell of fun !!

We also went to another party in the house, it was kind of a costume party. It was ok, but not that fun. We made on this evening with my camera 172 photos, so you can imagen how much stupid photos there are, lol, and on the next day after checking those pictures, a lot of funny stuff appears.

On Saturday we (Roman, Zdenek, I and the hangover) went to the center to eat. On the afternoon the rest and I went for a coffee and in the evening we decided to spend it comfortable like watching a movie and being lazy. Before that we also visited Tobias, not Dimitris Flatmate, another Tobias from EILC. There would have been a small party at Gosias place, but I really needed no more alcohol on this weekend. Sorry for not coming to Gosia, Emily and Kuba, but gladly we met in St. Petersburg before.

After breakfast we left today. Thanks to all for this nice weekend, I hope we will meet in the near future again and I hope we will stay in contact. THANKS !!!
For all those people who I didn't meet and greet, sorry !! Special sorry to Veera, the hangover was just too bad and on the day before nobody went to the center ;(

Ps: I'm thinking about, not publishing the photos... some are just too bad *gg*, and at the moment I'm just too lazy to separate them.

UPDATE: photos are now online, I hope I removed the worst and only the most harmless are online.... if you find one, which is not, tell me, I will remove it!

Vocabulary of the day - Thursday

2007-11-22T21:45:00.000+01:00

Hello fans of the Finnish - language *gg*, because I think nobody else will read my "Vocabulary of the day" blog entries ;)

However, who thinks that I already know all the vocabulary of the days before is wrong *g*, it needs time :)

I don't wanna waste your time, so here are the five vocables:

tajuta - to understand - verstehen
voida - to can - können
palella - to freeze - frieren
kääntää - to turn, translate - umdrehen, übersetzen
hakea - to fetch, get - abholen, holen

There is not much more to say for today.
I'm still looking for an accommodation for Günther, Silvia and Claudia who are coming on 9th of December. So if you have any suggestions, write me.
Roman and I also are nearly finished with our challenge for Parallel Computing seminar.

Nähdään ja nuku hyvin!

Finnish Tandem Dinner - Finns cooking

2007-11-21T20:31:00.000+01:00

After swimming on afternoon, it was time for another evening with our Finnish-German Tandem group. This time it was time for the Finns to cook something for us. I can say it was very good. They cooked "Aidin hyvät lihapallot", what translated means "mothers best meatballs".

Which looked like this:

Niko and Nikita in action:

I was the whole time so f****** tired, that I sometimes nearly felt asleep, all because of the swimming *gg*.

However, they also made some dessert:

Kiitos paljon! for this very nice evening, sorry that I was soooo tired ;) Good that I didn't felt asleep, because they would have painted my face *g*.

At the end of course, the vocabulary of the day:

pudota - to fall - stürzen, fallen
keittää - to cook - kochen
vihata - to hate - hassen
kysyä - to ask - fragen
vastata - to answer - antworten

Nähdään ja nuku hyvin !

Vocabulary of the day - Tuesday

2007-11-20T19:18:00.000+01:00

I will continue posting my Vocabulary of the day, I hope it doesn't bother you ;)
I also decided to write the German translation too.

For today I will continue with some verbs:

pitää - to keep (pidä hauskaa! -- have/keep fun !) - haben, behalten (pidä hauskaa! -- Hab Spaß!)
tehdä - to do/to make - tun, machen
jättää - to leave something somewhere /allow - etwas wo lassen, erlauben
tuoda - to bring - bringen
käydä - to visit - besuchen

Pidä hauskaa !!

Swimming and Vocabulary of the day

2007-11-19T16:14:00.000+01:00

Today Roman and I finally were swimming in one of the two swim halls in Lappeenranta.
(Lappeenrannan Uimahalli)
We talked about this since a very long time and today we went there. It was very nice, even when the swim hall is not that big. The main pool is 25m with 6 lanes. However, it was good to make some activity and hopefully we will continue it.

Another thing I want to start today and hopefully also continue, is the "vocabulary of the day". I want to choose five different Finnish vocables each day, which I want to learn. At the beginning I will start with verbs.
So here are the first five vocables for today - Monday:

antaa - to give - geben
kirjoittaa - to write - schreiben
uida - to swim - schwimmen
esittää - to present - präsentieren
ohjelmoida - to programm - programmieren

Weekend report

2007-11-17T14:48:00.000+01:00

Ok, the weekend is not over but I just have time to write something. The whole week was quite stressing, first we (Roman and I) had to finish our Seminar work in Parallel Computing, including a 20 minutes presentation, until Tuesday. Then I had to make my Mobility Management project. Where we had to "code" a scenario into NetworkSimulator2-Mobiwan and writing a documentation for it.

So yesterday we had finally the Parallel Computing presentation and I think it was good. Our challenge is "Differences in application development using BOINC and PVM". We have one week to write a document for this challenge.

At last I finished my Mobility Management project yesterday at 1930 o'clock and sent both, the project code and the documentary to the lecturer. The documentation still got 13 pages, so quite more then I originally expected. By the way, the NS2 program just sucks !!!! It cost me a lot of nerves. It really was just a pain in the ass. (figure is the ns topology)

Of course after so much work, I earned a nice evening with some friends and a good party. Fortunately Inga made her birthday party yesterday. (She had birthday on Wednesday, happy birthday, again...) I went to her place where Esther and Iris and a lot of other people already partied (Robert, Ayu, Andrea and many more). I came too late because before that I was at Chris and Martins place to drink some Glühwein and Nussschnaps. Finally Austrian culture found its way to Finland.

After some time and some drinking and some really funny happenings, we went to the nightclub Gigglin Marlin. It was a very nice and funny evening/night. Thanks for that!! There are some good pics, but I will get them soonest tomorrow.

Update: The first wave of pictures, those from Inga are in my gallery online.

Finnish Tandem Dinner

2007-11-14T20:26:00.001+01:00

Today evening we had our "Finnish/German Tandem"-Dinner. We were in Lemi, which is situated about 25 km from Lappeenranta, a very very small village. Nevertheless we have been there for Dinner, we ate lamb. And it was delicious.

We had to sing a Finnish Christmas song, which actually is a song for children ;). But ok, our Finnish is like that from children *g*
We talked a lot, of course in German, but we also asked some things to refresh our Finnish.
It was a nice place there, the atmosphere was like a "Almhütte" in Austria, even when it is 2000m less high ;)

We had some funny discussions about the German language ;) The evening was nice and some more pictures are in my gallery. Now I really have to do my project stuff, grrrr, so see you!

Birthday and Study abroad fair

2007-11-14T15:48:00.000+01:00

Last Friday was the birthday party of Anna (Spain) and Vanessa (France) in the basement at Teknoligianpuistonkatu.

Before we went there, Roman and I made us some original Austrian Glühwein. Therefore i bought red wine and Stroh rum. Meanwhile we found out that they also have some kind of Glühwein here in Finland, it is called Glögi. You just have to be careful when you buy some, because some are without alcohol, some with 4.7% and I think there should be some with more alcohol.

After that I went to Esther&Iris place, where I didn't spend much time, because some already wanted to go to the birthday party, what we finally did.
It was very nice and a lot of people were there.
But that was not all for the evening, with the bus at midnight we went to the nightclub "Gigglin Marlin", where we spent the rest of the night 'til 4. There I also met our Finnish teacher Elina, who talked of course in Finnish to me *gg*, I think I wasn't that bad, I understood it mostly, hopefully.... she didn't correct me, so ;)

I have much to do, so there was nothing else until yesterday.
There we had the "study abroad fair" day at the university, where we presented our university and of course our country. The bad thing was, we had to share our stand with the germans, urgs! ;). The polish stand cheated, because they had a handful attractive girls there, so the had of course the most visitors ;)
Ok, i visited them too, but just because I'm interested... *gg* of course in Poland, what do you think :)

The Fins were quite uninterested, not much came to see the stands anyway.

But it was nice, I like this kind of thing. We had some nice posters from Austria and some other useless stuff. Thanks to Austria tourism, who send us some material and gave us a free account to download high quality pictures from there online gallery. Thanks!

More photos in my online gallery. From all other stands, and the best stand France *gg*. They had the biggest stand, but no people to present (out of 20) and no material, lol.

Kurzeinführung in Finnish local cases

2007-11-10T12:06:00.001+01:00

This blog entry is for my german speaking friends at home, so it will be in german.

Also, wieder einmal ein Eintrag auf Deutsch.
Möcht heute mal eine kurze Einleitung in "Local Cases" (lol, mir fallt der deutsche Begriff dazu net ein) in der Finischen Sprache geben. Was auch soviel heißt wie, ... in Finisch kann ich inzwischen schon mehr Grammatik als in Deutsch ;) (aja, und in Finisch kann ich eigentlich nix *g*)

Es geht also darum:
Wo? Woher? Wohin?
Missä? Mistä? Mihin?

Unterschieden werden generell mal zwei Arten von Orten. "Geschlossene" Orte und Offene Orte. Bei einem geschlossenen Ort ist man "drin", geht "hinein" oder geht "hinaus".
Bei offenen Orten ist man "drauf", geht "rauf" oder geht "runter"

Als erstes Beispiel werd ich mal Städtenamen verwenden.

Man hat zum Beispiel die Stadt Lappeenranta. (ist als geschlossener Ort zu bezeichnen, aber VORSICHT, in Finnland ist nicht jede Stadt als geschlossener Ort zu sehen. Warum? Das wissen die Finnen selber nicht)

Nun fragt man Wo bist du? Woher kommst du? und Wohin gehst du?

In Lappeenranta. Von Lappeenranta. Nach Lappeenranta.
Das wären mal die kurz gehaltenen Antworten auf Deutsch.

Finnen benützen diese Form des Ausdruckes nicht, die hängen einfach eine passende Endung an das Wort und schon heißt es was anderes. Die Endungen für geschlossene Orte in der Reihenfolge passend zu den Fragewörtern sind: -ssa/ssä -sta/stä -Vn/-hVn/-seen

Missä? ---> Lappeenrannassa (nt wird zu nn wegen kpt-change, andere grammatikregel)
Mistä? ---> Lappeenrannasta (wieder nt zu nn wegen kpt-change)
Mihin? ---> Lappeenrantaan (hier kein kpt-change, weil Mihin immer strong grade verlangt)

Es bedarf also nur Lappeenrannassa, um auszudrücken, dass man in Lappeenranta ist.

Es gibt jetzt noch die offenen Plätze. Zum Beispiel ein Martkplatz. (tori) Die Endungen für offene Orte in der Reihenfolge passend zu den Fragewörtern sind: -lla/llä -lta/ltä -lle
Missä? ---> Torilla (auf dem Marktplatz)
Mistä? ---> Torilta (vom Marktplatz)
Mihin? ---> Torille (zum Marktplatz)

Ok, das war mal zum aufwärmen. Da ihr jetzt Spezialisten seits, werd ich euch folgende Aufgabe stellen: (matkusta = reisen, Itävalta= Österreich, lentokone= Flugzeug)
Minä matkustan Itävallaan lentokonella. (heißt?)

Ich reise nach Österreich mit dem Flugzeug.

Haha, ich weiß, fieees dass ich jetzt auch noch das Flugzeug ins Spiel gebracht hab. Aber Fahrzeuge werden in der Regel auch als "Plätze" beschrieben. Wichtig ist hier nur der Unterschied: Jemand ist im Flugzeug (lentokonessa), oder jemand kommt mit dem Flugzeug (lentokonella).

Also würd ich zum Beispiel fragen:
Miten menet yliopistoon? (Wie "gehst" du zur Universität)
Minä menen bussilla. (Ich fahre mit dem Bus)

Missä Harald on? (Wo ist Harald?)
Harald on bussista. (Harald ist im Bus)

Am Schluß geb ich euch jetzt noch eine kleine Reiseroute, die ihr versuchen könnts zu übersetzen. Vorsicht! ein paar kleine Gemeinheiten sind eingebaut:

Minä olen Suomessa. Minä matkustan venäjälle bussilla. Sitten lennän islantiin. Menen islannissa autolla. Matkustan laivalla irlantiin, siellä käyn galwayssa. Sen Jälkeen lennän puolaan. Lopuski matkustan puolasta junalla suomeen.

Viel Spaß beim übersetzen, verzeiht mir bitte falls ich selber einen Fehler gemacht hab, bin ja auch nur ein Mensch ;)
Übrigens: Sonnenaufgang ist jetzt um 7:57 und Sonnenuntergang um 15:44. Pro Tag verlieren wir in etwa 6 Minuten Tageslicht. (Vergleich Linz 7:02 und Untergang 16:31 und. ca 3-4 Minuten pro Tag)

Snow and Schnaps

2007-11-07T13:53:00.000+01:00

It is snowing and finally we also had some snow on the ground. It is not that much at the moment, but enough to cover the nature in a shade of winter. It is nice and I like it. I also tried to drive today and it was ok, but not because of the Finnish Snow cleaning troop. I haven't seen even one car and the streets are not cleaned at all. No salt no pebble; maybe they wait 'til it is one meter or more, I don't know. In Austria they start to put salt on the street before it starts snowing. (picture entrance hall of the university, stolen from Paul's Blog, thanks ;) )

Nevertheless, the snow came to the right moment, because I got again a package from home. It includes four liters of real Austrian Schnaps (nuts, plum, pear, blackberry). Thanks to Max for that nice package. (Where's the Stroh Rum ?? ;) )

It was not the first package I got, I also got one from my parents with a lot of useful stuff inside. Of course a lot of chocolate, but I donate the most of it to other people, because it was just too much. But one other important thing in that package was the "Glühfix" ingredients for real Austrian Glühwein. Thx Mom and Dad!!

So I have now Schnaps and Glühwein, and the winter can come !!!! (As it already does)

St. Petersburg - Photos online

2007-11-06T18:16:00.001+01:00

All together we have about ~1000 photos, so I decided NOT to give all of those in my online gallery. Instead i made a collection of about "only" ~300 photos which I put in my Webalbum.

This photos includes: The Russian Evening, Catherine Palace, Neva River night boat trip, St. Isaacs Cathedral, Cathedral of the Spilled blood, State Hermitage Museum and some others.

Some are a bit too dark, and maybe some are not sharp enough, sorry for that, but I think you will get a good impression of St. Petersburg.

Enjoy them !!!

St. Petersburg – Day 4 - the last day

2007-11-06T10:39:00.000+01:00

Wake up time was at 830 o’clock. After a nice breakfast I bought me the last Souvenirs in the hotel and I also sent some postcards to Austria. (breakfast photo is from another day)

After packing my stuff, including a hotel towel (oops *g*), I went down to check-out. Nearly all were already in the bus and the other busses have already left, we still waited for four people. Two Polish guys (Bonzcek and Szimon) and two German guys were still missing. Bonczek and Szimon came after a couple of minutes, but the others didn’t, because they felt asleep again *gg*. So Robert woke them up, they hadn’t even packed their stuff so far. I think we left half an hour too late.

The next stop was at a huge supermarket in Vyborg, where we bought food and alcohol for taking home. I bought me a bottle of Vodka with two glasses and 48 0.5 litre cans of Russian beer and last but not least a carton of cigarettes. Of course this was not for me; I just took it to sell it in Finland for hopefully a good price. Whoever wants some Marlboro lights, make me an offer between 2 and 3 Euros per package.

After passing the first Russian checkpoint we came again to the border house. It was really bad, because we had three other busses before us. It took hell lot of time to pass all the checkpoints and the border, I think this time we had been checked four times.

In the No-Man’s land between the borders we had the last change to buy some stuff in a duty-free shop. They also had Finnish beer there and it cost half of the price in Finland. At the Finnish border we waited again ‘til it was our turn. Normally the Finnish border patrol check all the luggage for too much alcohol and cigarettes, but in our case they didn’t even check one bag. That’s why we were quite fast through the check.

At 19 o’clock we arrived in Lappeenranta where I have to remove a lot of frost from the glass of my car. After heading home I spent some time on my computer, but I felt asleep quite soon.

As resume I want to say:
St. Petersburg is a very beautiful town for sightseeing and clubbing. It is surely not the cheapest place in Russia, but in comparison to other countries, like Finland, it is still quite cheap. The trip was very well organized and the stuff was nice. The hotel also was nice and the people from three different universities also did their best to make this weekend to one of the best weekends in this semester. Thanks a lot!

Money I spent in 4 days:
159€ for the trip including the hotel (double room)
45€ for the Visa
82€ for the optional program (20€ Russian dinner, 20€ Catherine palace, 15€ River and canal cruise, 7€ State Hermitage, 7€ St. Isaacs, 7€ Cathedral of the Resurrection, 6€ photo admissions)
200€ for the rest, like souvenirs, clubbing, eating, alcohol, metro, and so on...

St. Petersburg – Day 3

2007-11-05T21:49:00.000+01:00

Day number three again started at 8 o’clock. In the original schedule there would have been a bus sight-seeing tour through St. Petersburg. We (Hannes, Robert, Pia, Ayu, Iris, Esther, Felix and I) decided not to go on the bus but go on our own, because bus driving inside of the down is very annoying thing.

So we went to the metro station next to our hotel. We already heard that metro stations in St. Petersburg are very deep, but wow, this was really deep. I didn’t take time, but I think it took us some minutes with the escalator. They stations are that deep because the Neva River is very deep, and of course the metro is going under the river.

We drove to St. Peter and Pauls fortress to walk through it on our own. There again is a very nice cathredral. As I already mentioned before this was the very first building in St. Petersburg.

More information about the fortress and the included cathedral:

• St. Peter and Pauls fortress in English
• St. Peter und Paul Festung in Deutsch

Afterwards we walked to our next target, the St. Isaac’s Cathedral. On the way there we passed dozens, even hundreds of police and military men. Later we heard that they have to guard a demonstration of the communists. On the way we also passed a very nice ship which was nearly new, but build like ships from the 17th century. When I took a closer look I recognized that it was some kind of wellness and fitness area. Wow, really a good location, it looked great, but I think you have to have a lot of money to be member of that club.

It was a nice walk, but in the end we had to hurry a bit, because we wanted to join the bus group at the Cathedral for the guided tour. In the cathedral you have to pay again an extra fee of 50 Rubels to get the admission to take photos.

I will not say much about this cathedral, because the description would be always the same, because all the buildings where really amazing and impressive. Just take a look on your own in my photo gallery, as soon as the photos are online.

More information about St. Isaacs Cathedral:

• St. Isaacs Cathedral in English
• St. Isaacs Kathedrale in Deutsch

After we had lunch (170 Rubel = ~4,80€) we went to the State Hermitage Museum which is really close to the cathedral. A really huge building and it is one of the biggest museums in the world. There we are, jumping around again, with Hermitage in the background. Again a fee was necessary to take pictures, it was 100 Rubel, actually I was the only dumb who paid, because everybody else just took pictures without paying.

They have a lot, lot, lot, ... paintings from artists like Renoir, Leonardo da Vinci, Rembrandt, and so on.. . For me there were too much paintings *gg*, so my main interests were the building itself and sculptures and so on.. . Unfortunately, the main topic of the guided tour was the paintings, arg!! It was a bit surprising that the security measures for the paintings weren’t that obvious. If you want to ruin one, it would be no problem I think, quite strange if you look at the value of such a painting.

One painting was really interesting, it should be the most controversial painting in hermitage, because it's kind of funny, it is called "The punishment of a Hunter". On the surroundings you can see what hunters do to animals, and in the middle is the revenge of the animals.

My feet hurt like hell after the tour. We went for a coffee and after that we dropped the Ballet fans at the Mikhailovsky Theatre. No, I did not go to the Ballet.

More information about the State Hermitage Museum:

At 23 o’clock it was again time to go to the nightclub. This time it was the Havana Club and we all went there by metro. This club has three dance floors. The first one was part of the Karaoke bar, the second one was for dance music and the third one was for techno music. We spent some time in each of the areas. They also had some show program, like all the clubs.

It started with a chest measurement contest for the girls. So in the end there were three girls on the stage with the biggest breasts. Unfortunately just one of those girls has also a nice face and body *gg*. They had now to dance a bit, and after that it was time to get rid of the shirts and of the bra. Unfortunately, the good looking girl decided not to take of the shirt, so we were forced to look at those ugly girls dancing barely naked, arg! Believe me, I do not want to see this again, that’s why I fled as soon as possible.

I really wanted to visit a real Russian striptease bar, but no one wanted to follow me, except Pia. Again at 3 o’clock we left the bar and took again a Lada Taxi, which cost this time 200 Rubels.

One more day to come.

St. Petersburg – Day 2

2007-11-05T20:50:00.000+01:00

Before I describe this day, I will give you some input about St. Petersburg:

Area: 1439 km²
Inhabitants: 4.580.620 (2006)
27^th May 1703 the town was founded and the first building of the town, the St. Peter and Pauls fortress was build from “Peter the Great”. He travelled a lot through Europe, studied in the Netherlands and spent some time in Britain. He wanted to build another, better Amsterdam. That’s why St. Petersburg has a lot of water channels. In the history of architecture in St. Petersburg there has always been European influence, because they invited a lot of European architects to build their castles, cathedrals and so on.

Find more information about St. Petersburg in the following links:

Our day started at 8 o’clock. We had our breakfast and after that at 930 o’clock the next optional trip was scheduled. It was the guided tour to and through the Catherine palace. First of all, I was not very lucky, because I forgot my jacket in my room and there was no time left to fetch it. I was forced to spent nearly the whole day with my t-shirt and believe me, it was fucking cold. Fortunatly we spent a lot of the time on the inside.

Catherine palace was originally built from Peter the Great for his wife Katherine. Every following generation extended the building a bit with its own influence in architecture and design. This building is really very impressive as you can see on my pictures in my gallery. The tour was very interesting, even when the guide uses always the same expressions when it comes to Russian people or buildings, words like stunning, handsome, extremely beautiful and marvellous and so on... (Btw she used it all three days long) I just asked myself, where did they lose all this marvellous and stunning genes. (I make an exception for the Russian girls).

After the guided tour we could walk around on our own. Pia, Hannes, Iris and I took this chance to get in the park of the castle. There we took some funny photos, but also some nice photos from the park area. The reaction of the Russian people, when they saw me running around in a t-shirt was really funny ;) (There is also a jumping photo of me, believe it or not, but the girls will need some time to send me their photos, hurry up girls !!)

Find more information about Catherine Palace, Catherine the Great and Peter the Great:

After Catherine palace we went to the “Cathedral of the Resurrection of Christ” (in German: Christi-Auferstehungs Kirche) but mostly it is called the “Cathedral on the spilled blood” (in German: Blutkirche). This was the place where Alexander II of Russia was mortally wounded. They built this Russian Orthodox church at this place. From the outside it is already again very impressive and on the inside even more. I can’t describe all the details; see it on your own in my gallery. (For photos you have to pay additionally 50 rubels ~1,5€.

More information on the cathedral:

There was also a big souvenir marketplace nearby, so we went after lunch to this market to get some souvenirs. When Russian see tourists, they always start with extremely high prices. For example, I wanted to buy me a “Flachmann” and the seller started with 1000 Rubels (~30€). Even in Austria you will never pay this. That’s why you have always to bargain for a good price. In the end I paid 1000 Rubels for two. (In my opinion, it would have been possible to bargain even a lower price) On that day I bought nothing else.

After that we went back to the Hotel to prepare ourselves (for example getting a jacket) for the night cruise on the Neva River. (Another optional program)
We already had an idea of how great St. Petersburg is at night, but it was even better. Under the influence of Russian Champagne and Russian Vodka, the lights of the buildings along the river were even more intensive. I really loved that trip and in my opinion, if I have to decide which the best part of the weekend was, it would have been this boat trip. (Sorry no good photo at the moment, I will wait for the girls before I post one)

It was Friday night, so after the boat trip we were dropped at the next nightclub. Let’s say only those people who were interested in spending the night in the nightclub. So I left the bus ;) and went to the nightclub Revolution. The entry fee was about 250 Rubels (~7,5€). In every nightclub they have some kind of face control, that doesn’t mean that you have to look good, but if you are already too drunk, you will not be allowed to enter. The beer cost 90 Rubels (~2,7€). We met a nice couple from Austria at the bar (where else ;) ) from Pichl bei Wels. What is located really near to my hometown. The club has two different dance floors and a chill-out zone. It was a good evening, at 3 o’clock we went home, and that for we took the first time a “Lada-Taxi”.

So, what is a Lada-Taxi? In St. Petersburg everybody can effort a Taxi license, because it doesn’t cost much, so they main idea was, hey why shouldn’t everyone be able to play taxi. Therefore you just hold your hand with the thumb to the floor straight, and someone will stop to bring you where ever you want. At the beginning we were sceptic about this, but in the end it was an experience and really funny. It will not even take a minute ‘til someone stops. First you have to make clear where you want to go, then you ask for the price and of course bargain again. Take only taxis where only one person is inside, that’s the main rule, you shouldn’t take the “official” taxis. On this evening we paid 150 Rubels for the whole car (~4,5€). By the way, if you are afraid of St. Petersburg, you should be more afraid of the traffic then of the people, because the traffic is really really crazy !!

That was the second day, another day to come.

St. Petersburg – Day 1

2007-11-05T14:49:00.000+01:00

Hello my friends, as you can see, I’m back from Russia. I will write one blog entry for each day of the trip, because if i put everything in one entry, it will be just too much to read at once.

Day 1:

The departure of the bus was planned for 10:30 at the university. I stood up at 8 o’clock to have no stress in the morning. I packed my stuff already on the evening before, so there should have been enough time to take a relaxing shower and so on. As you maybe can already imagine, things sometimes come other then they are planned.

I went to the shower in my shorts, no T-shirt needed. So I close the door of my room and in the same second, oooh shit, I forgot my key again (!) in my room so I was locked out for the third time in this semester. I had only my shorts and no T-shirt. Gladly I had my jacket, so I put my jacket on and walked in my shorts to the elders flat. (Because my phone was also in the room)

I rang the doorbell for about 10 minutes, nobody answered. I went to Bonczek and Martin’s place to ask for a phone to call the house elder, but he wasn’t reachable. Slowly I became a bit nervous. The next thing I tried is to call the LOAS office. Fortunately they already were at work. The woman sent me the key service. Normally you pay 4€ to the house elder if he opens the door and 15€ for the key service. After opening my door I asked the worker how much it is and he answered “nothing, it is service”, wooow, great, thanks a lot.

After that I finished my things and left with the car to the university. Roman wasn’t on that trip because he met with some friends in London. The bus trip started about 1040, because Andresz was a bit late. We shared our bus with some students from Jyväskylä university.

Until the border there was nothing special happening, we got some introduction for the border and for some other useful stuff. The Finnish border was quite fast. As you maybe already guessed, the Russian border wasn’t fast at all. You have to pass the first checkpoint, where they enter the bus and check the passports and the visa in it. After that you come to the real border. There you have to leave the bus and enter the building, where they again check the passport and the immigration paper. (Yes, you have to fill out an extra immigration paper) This check took a bit longer. After that we were ready to leave for St. Petersburg, but of course not before we passed another checkpoint where again somebody entered the bus and checked the passports and stamps again.

We arrived at the hotel about 17 o’clock and we checked in for our rooms. My roommate was Hannes, and our room had a real good view to the backyard of the hotel *g*, nevertheless the room itself was nice.

In the evening the first optional event took place, the “Russian evening” with some traditional food and of course a lot of vodka. After some introduction in “How to drink vodka” we ate a really good soup and some other stuff which I don’t remember the names. After a lot of vodka there was some live music and interaction with the guests (dancing, aso..), it was quite funny, but the last 15 minutes was just getting boring, maybe not enough vodka at all.

Everyone was quite tired, so we decided not to go to the nightclubs in the first night. I went to the hotel bar to drink a beer with James and his friend. After some talking I wanted to go to my room. On the way there I heard some noise out of one room. Some familiar voices, so I knocked on the door. It was the Polish party were I would have been invited earlier, but I didn’t know where it took place, lucky boy. I joined this party, where some of my friends from Joensuu also were guests. At about 3 in the morning I went to bed.

The first day was over, and a lot more to come.

Birthday party and first grade in LUT

2007-10-31T20:51:00.000+01:00

First of all, happy birthday Esther !!
Thanks for the birthday party, it was a nice and comfortable evening. The topics we discussed were thrilling and funny like always. I don't really know why we always end talking about dirty stuff, weird *gg*
I hope you enjoy my self-made deep frozen cake ;)
We also tried some "glögi", which is the Finnish kind of "Glühwein/Punsch". It's very sweet and has not much alcohol, that's why you have to put some vodka in it.

HA, i got my first grade here in LUT. We got our grades in Finnish for Foreigners today. I have a 4 !! In Austria i would be a bit disappointed about that, but here in Finland it is the second best grade, so in an Austrian context it is 2. Actually I'm not very happy with it, because i wanted a 5, but it is ok, i made some stupid mistakes so i have to be punished. ;(

Weekend report and upcoming Trip

2007-10-29T20:54:00.000+01:00

Another weekend is over and for those who don't know, we are in Finland now since 3 months and we will stay 2 months more. We didn't really celebrate the half-time so far, but i tried to combine the birthday party form Michael (Poland) last Friday with my half-time anniversary. I know that it is already more then half, but hei, there is always a reason to celebrate.

As i already mentioned there was a birthday party on Friday. Fortunately it was in our home area Karankokatu in a common room. This rooms are for rent. They include a kitchen and couches, tables and so on... It was the first time that someone rented the common room here, as far as i know, because Karankokatu is the only student home where you have to pay to rent the common room. (10€)

There where about 40 people, so you can imagine that the party was really good, i enjoyed it a lot. A lot of those 40 people went also to the nightclub or city center, but other ones, including me stood in the common room and partied on. So in the end we were about 15 people left and the party ended for me at 330. Normally the common rooms have to close at midnight, but who cares ;), one reason why the house elder was invited *gg*

On Saturday i stood up at noon, and the first thing i had to do, was getting rid of Jehovas Witnesses. I didn't know that the have them here, but as you see, they have, and they are the same annoying as they are in Austria.
The rest of the day i spent with doing nothing. Ok, not the whole day. At the evening i read a bit out of BS25999 for my pre-master project.

On Sunday i spent some time with reading about BOINC, which is our topic in Parallel Computing. I didn't really start writing so far, but i have to get some input first. Roman already started to write, but he is a bit party lazy the last days/weeks, so he has nothing else to do *gg*.
I also thought he got maybe a bit depressed, but he looks ok, but i will watch you Roman ;)
I will do more this week, because we have to finish the Seminar-work until 9.11.

What else is new? Easy, new lectures started today. I now attend "Presenting in English", "Finnish for Foreigners 2" and the ongoing lecture "Parallel Computing". As you can see, i do more then I had originally planned, I don't really now why, but hei! it's just for fun!!!

This Thursday I will go to St. Petersburg. This trip is organized by the Student-Union and a Travel agency. I'm really looking forward to this trip, i waited a long time to do this !!! And another great thing is, that my friends, or let's say some of my friends, from Joensuu are on this trip as well. GREAT!!!
So you will hear nothing from me beginning with Thursday to Sunday. I will make a report as soon as I'm back from St. Petersburg.

It's decided

2007-10-25T22:15:00.000+02:00

Today we made the final decision. Roman and I will stay in Finland until 2.1.2008. As you can see, we will spend Christmas here and the new year in Helsinki. The main reason is of course, that some of our friends will come to stay with us in the new years night. My friends will arrive at 27.12 and Roman's will arrive at 31.12.

Everyone who wants to join us during the Christmas holidays, contact me, would be nice.

Sorry to my parents and relatives for not being at home for Christmas. There will hopefully a lot of other upcoming Christmas evenings which we can spend together, i think it will be a boring Christmas evening here, but we will handle it.

Exam week

2007-10-24T17:54:00.000+02:00

This week is exam week. As I already mentioned in the entry before, the week were i have to study. I'm not really amused about this, but as you see, even in study abroad sometimes it is necessary to learn and work. (unfortunately)

However, today we had our first exam in Mobility Management. It was the first time that i had an exam together with a lot of students from different lectures. There wasn't only the Mobility Management exam, also six or seven others. So all together there were about 286 students.

You have to look at the table which color your exam has, and sit afterwards to a correct desk/exam. You are not allowed to bring anything except something to write. If there are other exceptions like dictionary, they are announced separately. In our case there was no exception. After the exam you have to show your student card or ID and subscribe.

One nice thing here in this university is, that you have the possibility to check all the exams from the years before online. So you get on one side a clue how the teacher used to ask, and for the lazy guys you also can guess which questions are coming. I don't trust teachers when it comes to exams, so i learned like i always do. But two days ago, we decided to check the old exams, to try one or two to check our knowledge so far. The bad thing was, the lecture is the first time in English, so we didn't find the exam on the first try. But after some translation we found it. Of course exams were in Finnish, thanks to one of my Tandem partners (Niko) this was not really a problem.

And guess what, the exam today was not really a big difference to those which are already published. ;)
So i started to write, and write and write.... After 45 minutes, i was at question 3 of 5, three people left with their MM exam. I just thought, what the fuck, i write like hell and they are already finished? But after some discussion with Flo it seems that they just don't know something and therefore left. (of course we discussed after the exam *gg*)

Normally there would be three hours time (!!!) for this exam. In a Hagenberger way we were finished after ~1,5h and left simultaneously. So in my opinion it should be ok, hope the lecturer also decides this way.

The next exam is on Friday, it is Finnish for Foreigners 1. I started studying yesterday and will continue tomorrow, maybe a bit today evening, i will see.

Short sign of life

2007-10-23T21:30:00.000+02:00

Moi ja anteeksi!

Sorry for posting this entry so late, but there are some good reasons which i will explain later.
Before that let's have a look what I did on my weekend.
At Friday evening i was invited at Esther and Iris place, because there should be a party. So I went there with the bus and entered the flat.... ööhm, party!? *gg* there were 4 persons sitting, I thought about 10 people *gg*.
Nevertheless it was getting better and better. There were Esther, Iris, Doris (friend of Esther, from Austria but actually in Rovaniemi), two Finnish guys (sry, forgot the names already) and I.
We had a lot of fun, i just say "voi" (butter),.... it's an insider joke, so don't try to understand it.

After that party we went to the Diva (nightclub). Actually i do not like the Diva very much, but on that evening it was very funny. Of course it depended on the people in that case. On one dance floor in the Diva there was a Live Rap-Concert with a lot of different Finnish rappers. I don't like Rap music, but with the Finnish language it sound not that bad, quite funny.
But mostly we spent our time in the chilling area, where Esther and Iris practicing their kind of integrating in Finland, no it's not speaking or learning Finnish, and no it's not traveling around, there motivation is, .. get a Finnish boy and do some practical work, ok!? *gg* I would like this kind of practice with a Finnish girl, but the girls are not so easy like the Finnish boys *g*. However, it was a good night and we left the Diva about 315 with the taxi. (I will put a photo here, as soon as Iris or Esther are willing to send me one or more)

On Saturday the girls decided to eat at a Greek restaurant in the center, I was invited so joined them. The first surprise for me was in the bus. Five girls ... and me?! (Inga, Andrea, Iris, Esther and Doris) Ok, normally i have no problem with that *gg*, but i wished there was some male support when one of the girls started to talk about "Gute Zeiten, schlechte Zeiten" (german soap opera on TV). *gg*

So we arrived at the center and walked to the Greek Restaurant which is located next to the Canibalis (Metal bar). But we didn't enter, because the prices were to high for some girls. (average 16€, in my opinion, not that expensive for Finland). So we went to a Pizza/Kepab restaurant on the opposite side of the road. There they had Kepab lunch for 5€ and pizza for 7€, and wow it was a lot to eat. A really huge pizza, and the "Rula Kepab" (Dürüm) where minimum 2times bigger then in Austria. It was really good, even when the waiter wasn't that happy about working.
After that we went to the coffee house and drink some coffee. We went back by foot, it really was necessary after eating so much. We talked a lot about everything including Finland. More about my opinion on Finland later on. When we reached my home place, Esther asked me where I have my rucksack ..... OK !!! So, getting my keys for my car, driving back and fetch my rucksack from the coffee house. In Finland it is not really a problem forgetting or loosing some stuff. Finnish people are very honest. Chris for example lost his wallet with all the cards and money in it and it was no problem to get it back on the same day, even with all the money in it.

Ok, so why did it take me so long to post some new news. That's easy to explain. Because this week is exam week. In my case that means that i have two exams. Tomorrow i have my exam in Mobility Management, what is quite a lot stuff to learn, and on Friday i will have my exam in Finnish for Foreigners 1. Believe it or not, I have also to learn for FFF1, even after the EILC course. Some things are not that easy to remember after two month and there is also some new stuff which i didn't have in the EILC course, but there is also some stuff we had in EILC but we didn't have it in FFF1. That was one reason why i took FFF1 even after the EILC, because you can never know which kind of teaching the teacher in Lappeenranta is using.

So, as you can see, i have to learn, or probably i should learn, but not this evening *g*, i have to catch up with Prison Break S03E05 ;) Those who know, will understand me.

Kiitos, nuku hyvin! moi moi ja nähdään !

Tandem Afternoon - Topic: German/Austrian Cooking

2007-10-18T12:00:00.000+02:00

Hyvää päivä!

Yesterday we had our second meeting with our "Finnish-German Tandem". Paul and I decided to cook some German and Austrian specialties. Paul made some "Reibekuchen" and I made "Apfelmus" and "Salzburger Nockerl".

Recipe for Reibekuchen

5 lbs white potatoes

4 medium yellow onions

4 eggs

1 Tbsp salt, or to taste

sunflower oil or other neutral oil for frying

Coarsely grate potatoes and onions (a food processor saves a great deal of time).

Salt the potato mixture to taste.

Drain salted grated potatoes and onions in a sieve or colander, trying to reserve as much potato starch as possible. Discard liquid.

Mix in eggs.

Pour in just enough oil to cover the bottom of a nonstick frying pan.

Place the pan over medium-high heat. When the oil is hot, drop heaping tablespoonfuls of the potato mixture into the pan and flatten.

Cook until golden-brown, approximately 3 minutes, depending on the stove. Flip and cook until the other side is also browned and crisp.

Drain on a paper towel covered plate and keep warm in the oven.

Replenish oil and repeat until all the batter is gone. Avoid using any liquid that accumulates in the bottom of the bowl.

Serve with applesauce, sour cream, or smoked salmon.

Applesauce recipe:

Apples (how much you want or need)
Cinnamon and sugar

1. peel the apples and cut them into four pieces, remove the core.
2. put some water and the apple pieces into a pan and cook them 'till they are soft.
3. crunch them
4. put cinnamon and sugar to the crunched apples and mix it.
Decide yourself how much you wanna put in, start with less and put more if needed.

Salzburger Nockerln:

There are a lot of different recipes for those, i put you one for example.

5 eggs
½ cup milk
3 tablespoons sugar
2 tablespoons flour
1 tablespoon Butter
Vanilla aroma
grated skin of ½ lemon
less than a pinch of salt
icing sugar

Preheat oven to 245°C or 470°F.

Divide the eggs into yolks and whites and beat the egg whites with salt and little sugar for one minute. Add rest of sugar and beat egg whites until stiff.

Put the egg yolks into a mixing bowl and add ¼ of the stiffly beaten egg whites. With a whisk mix this quite well. Add rest of egg whites, sieved flour, Vanilla and lemon skin and carefully mix this, fold it in more than mixing it.

You need a heat proofed dish in which you put in the butter and milk and let this come to a boil. Spoon 3 or 4 big dumplings onto the hot milk-butter and put it into the oven.

Bake until golden brown, this takes not more than five minutes. Sprinkle with icing sugar and serve immediately.

Ok, some of you maybe already have experienced the difficulty of Salzburger Nockerl ;)
I never did it before, so i was not expecting anything *gg*. At the end it didn't look like Salzburger Nockerl, but it was ok to eat ;)
I will give it another try soon.

The Reibekuchen and the Apfelmus was very good and only Niko and Paul had some accident with the muller (?), they needed some plaster to stop the bleeding *gg*. I think they just did it, so that i have to do all the washing afterwards, grrr.

At the end all of us were leaving with a full stomack. We are looking forward to our Finnish cooking evening, hopefully i will stay alive :)

The days before there was nothing special to report, just trying to do some useful stuff for the university, more or less with success.
I've also learned the Finnish expression for "2 left handed", but i don't remember, i will post it later.

Update: I have now the Finnish phrase, it is "peukalo keskellä kämmentä". In English it means something like "thumb in the middle of the hand" and in German as whole sentence it is "Jemand hat einen Daumen in der Mitte der Handfläche". *gg*

Nähdään !

Tandem Afternoon

2007-10-13T21:32:00.000+02:00

Today we (Paul, Niko, Nikita and I) had our first arrangement for our "Finnish/German- Tandem". For today we decided to play some bowling

Ok, I'm actually not that good in bowling, that's why I will not place the photo of the result here ;) I think Paul will post the second result in his blog, because he have won :)

After that, we went for coffee and doughnuts, where I ate a Vaahtilasiirupi (mapple syrup) doughnut. It was very delicious. Paul ate some lakritsi (liquorice) doughnut, würg !!!

The Finnish/German - Tandem is on one side for the Finnish students who want to improve their German and for German speaking students who want to improve their Finnish.
So we did of course some German talking, because Niko and Nikita speak already perfectly German.
Paul's and my Finnish is not good, so there is no thinking about a communication, but we have the opportunity to ask for some vocabulary and such stuff, that's what we did. For example the first word i needed today, because of my bad bowling was "perkele". This means devil/satan, but also damn/damned. I will need more of those ;)

Next week we will cook something typical German and Austrian and the Finnish guys will cook something typical Finnish, I'm looking forward to it.

At the evening is the semi-final game of the rugby world-championship, i wish my French friends good luck!! But I will do nothing today, just a lazy evening watching some tv-series.

And again happy birthday to Marie, who celebrated her birthday yesterday. It was a nice party, thanks for that.

The first snow !!

2007-10-10T11:27:00.000+02:00

After sunshine, rain, sunshine, rain (no not different days, all today)... i didn't believe my eyes, the first snow is falling *ggggg*. Of course you don't believe me, that's why i made this:

I was chatting with Martin and simultaneously we both wrote snow!! snow!! :) 1 minute later Chris wrote Snow!! *gg*
However, it was just for a couple of minutes, so no reason to panic ;)

Update: 20 minutes later, sunshine again *g*, quite weird!

Lapland - Urho Kekkonen National Park

2007-10-09T17:41:00.000+02:00

There was a good reason why there was no sign of life from me the last few days. The reason was Lapland. But here is the whole story.

1. Departure Day
After a lot of discussion and planning we finally decided to go by car to Lapland. We were seven people, so we needed two cars. First of all my car and as second car we rented one. On 4.10 after the lectures and lunch, we started our journey to Lapland. It took us about 9 hours to drive ~800km to Rovaniemi, were we spent our first night. Normally the cheapest Hostel in Rovaniemi cost about 25€ per person, fortunately I found a camping place near Rovaniemi with nice cabins. We got one 4 person and one 2 person cabin and paid for all together 70€. (Normal price 60-68€ for the 4 person cabin) 10€ per person is not much, that's why we decided to sleep the last night also in this place, but more about this later.

2. Day 1 at Urho Kekkonen National Park
The original plan was to stay in a cottage outside of the National Park and make daytrips to the inside. Like some other plans before, this plan also was wrapped around. BUT, like all the other wraparounds, the new plan was much better, even when i was very skeptic about it.
We or let's say the bigger part of the group wanted to go directly into the park to the first reachable free cottage. (There are several free cottages inside the park)

It was already 2 o'clock pm when this decision was made. So we drove to one of the National Park entrances, the one at Kilopää. We parked our cars there and only put the most important stuff in our rucksacks. 15 km was the distance from this entrance to the first free cottage. I'm not a "professional" hiker, that's why I thought we will never make it 'till it's getting dark, because it was already nearly 4 when we left. But, fortunately we really made it in time. I think it took us about 3,5 h to get there.
I was forced to use the nature toilette, because in our hurry I can't visit a real toilette before we left the entrance *ggg*

200m after entering the National Park we took the wrong way, that was not a good start, but fortunately this happened only once :)

This was the first impression we got there:

First of all, before you expect too much colors, the "ruska" time in Lapland (ruska == autumn colors) was already over, 2-3 weeks earlier would be the best time.

On the way to the cottage i tried to get some impressions of the nature, but we were "running" so fast, that it was nearly impossible *g*. But the landscape was very nice, even without the autumn colors. For example we have crossed some "rivers":

And finally reached our cottage (this photo was from another day):

We were quite tired. So we eat and marked our territory and went to bed early.

3. Day 2 at Urho Kekkonen National Park

On day number two we decided to make a roundtrip to a hill to get an overview. Everybody knows that the hills in Finland are not very high, but the climate make those hills and the area look like at 2000m in Austria.

The trail was very nice and the whole distance was about 16km for this round. Here is a photo of me at the top of the hill, with a very nice surround view.

As you can see, the weather god was very nice to us. The temperatures weren't that cold. I think the coldest night was about -1° and the highest day temperature was about 6°. (Btw. the weatherforecast for 10.10 says snow for Lapland in this area ;) )

This part of the park is in the wilderness area, this means no marked trails there. Hannes was very good equipped with a map and a gps, so we were never really worried about that ;)
After lunch at the mountain we walked through the bog on the back of the mountain down hill through a very nice landscape, where we found our first reindeer corpse.
We walked a long a very beautiful river valley 'till we got to a fireplace at a very nice lake. We all enjoyed this trail very much. Some of the group decided then to walk some more kilometers, Roman and I decided to walk home and prepare the ovens and the fireplace for the barbecue in the evening.

The river valley:

As I already mentioned, on this evening we made a barbecue with sausages at the fireplace. Mhhhmmm!!!!

4. Day 3 at Urho Kekkonen National Park

On the last day we had to go back to the entrance at Kilopää. The main plan was to go another route back to get some more impressions of the National Park. The route would be about 20km. So we left the cottage to walk this route. Unfortunately decided Roman after 20 meters to slip and fall into the river during the crossing. So he was totally wet and pissed off. (understandable)
However, he decided to walk back the way we came on the first day and not this route, because the other is shorter (15km).
I got no good feeling to let someone walk alone this path, so I decided to go with him, while the others stuck to the original plan. In the end I think It was a good decision, because 20km could be quite hard to walk. We reached the car about 1,5h before the others, so we went to Saarenkylä for shopping and were reunited with the others after that.

About 6 o'clock pm we went back to Rovaniemi to our cabins.

5. Rovaniemi - Arctic Circle

On the very last day we wanted to see some sights in Rovaniemi and wanted to visit the Arctic Circle with the Santa Claus Village. We started the cars about 9 and wanted to leave the camping area, when this strange noise came from the front of my car. I stopped to check what is was. It was my V-belt, some parts of it were already ripped off ;(

I phoned ARBÖ in Austria, because i have this special insurance for holidays. The arranged a tow-car, which took 2 hours. The woman at the camping place was very nice and she invited us meanwhile for a coffee in the main house. The others were meanwhile in the center to see some sights. The tow-car brought me to a repair station. I waited 10 minutes, because they had lunch time, then they started immediately to repair my car. The repair took about 12 minutes and cost 58€ for the v-belt and 11€ for the working time. It was really very fast and I was really happy about that. So there was time to go to the arctic circle, where i got me my certificate for passing the arctic circle and of course a obligatory "kissing the arctic circle" picture:

I also visited the Santa Claus main post office. There you can buy postcards and put them in a special mailbox. They deliver this postcards exactly to christmas time with a special stamp on it. It would also be possible that Santa Claus sends some greetings, but this fat, white bearded, red clothed old man want 7,80€ for that, .... no thank you ;)
A lot of souvenirs there, so if you wanna loose a lot of money, this would be a good place for it.

Finally we started our way home to Lappeenranta. It took us about 9 hours again and we arrived about 1130 pm. Unfortunately I overlooked a 80 km/h limit, so I will get a fee for that ;(

It is impossible to tell all things that happened on that trip, so please forgive me that I will not mention everything here, this would need a lot of time to read and write and hell lot of space ;)

However, the trip was very very very nice. Thanks to all participants, you all were great and it was really fun and a wonderful, unforgettable trip.

Of course there are a lot, lot, lot of photos in my gallery (And still more to come, so look out for them). I also got a lot of videos, but I will not publish them in the internet at the moment, because it would took to much space (~1,5 GB).

Studies or Parties

2007-10-03T09:04:00.000+02:00

Some people always ask me if I'm here in Finland only for parties. Come on, do you really think so? No, it is not true. Of course I also have more or less to study.

For example this week on Monday we had 6h Parallel Computing, with ring-, mesh,- hypercube calculations, yesterday Tuesday we had 6h Parallel Computing (again) including a 15 minutes quiz and algorithms for Parallel Computing, afterwards 2h of Parallel Computing exercises (!!).

As you see, sometimes it can be quite challenging.

Parallel Computing is the most intensive course this semester. But I also have Mobility Management, mostly 2h on Tuesday and 2h on Thursday. The good thing is, I already know Mobile IPv4 because of a seminar work in Austria. So I understand the meaning and problems of Mobile IP. The IPv6 part is new for me including the security part, but the attacks are quite common, so nothing exciting for us. Bad luck that we miss two or even three lectures because of Parallel Computing.

I also have of course some Finnish lessons. Normally about 3h a week. Sometimes more, sometimes less. I will not mention the rest I have, because it's just for Fun and not really for study.

My pre-master thesis project should also be managed, but I didn't start so far. It could be that I will start it in November.

Don't say that I'm only here for parties anymore !!!!!

End of the weekend

2007-09-30T20:37:00.000+02:00

Another weekend is over and it was nice. Yesterday evening (Saturday) I was invited to a birthday party from Szimon, one of the polish guys. We were about 12 people. Some from China, Poland, France, Russia and me ;)
There was a lot to eat, because the Polish guys and the Chinese girls cooked some and baked some cake, it was very good. Not so good was the Polish Vodka ;)
I was forced to drink it !! And not only once *g*

We discussed a lot about the different cultures with the Chinese girls. The party ended sometimes in the morning, I don't remember but I think about 3. However, the Chinese girls, who were guests at this party, cleaned the kitchen, because they said it is normal in China. I tried to convince them to visit me, because my kitchen need a cleaning, but they were smart enough to say no *gg*

Today's evening we spent on the beach nearby to make a barbecue. It was really nice, we were about 20 people. Some of them weren't that satisfied so they left very early. However, after some more left, we were still 7 and the fire was under control again *g* (because Antoine also left *gggg*)

We will play some cards now, because i heard that the quiz tomorrow in Parallel Computing is moved to Tuesday, hurray.

Middle of the Weekend Posting

2007-09-29T18:29:00.000+02:00

The weekend is not finished yet, but I want to write some stuff down. Yesterday we were invited at Chris and Martins place to party and eat. The good thing was, there was Pizza, so that was ok. But Chris and Antoine tried to cook a special geek meal. It was rice, rice, onions, maggi cube, water, coke(!), ham !? Ok, that sounds crazy, i normally love rice, but i didn't try that one.... disgusting, sorry *gg* The recipe was from a French TV show, where they cook meals for geeks.

However, of course we drank a lot and joined afterwards the party in the neighbor flat, where the Spanish started their own party. After that we went to the center to go to the nightclub (gigglin marlin). Bad luck that Antoine and Paco weren't allowed to go in, so we decided to go to Diva. And again, it sucked hard. 5€ entry for nothing.

We took the 215 bus home. Again the pre-party was the best part of the evening.

Today on Saturday there was so much sunshine, that we decided to do some outdoor activity. We went to the center to meet some people and to buy some stuff for the barbecue tomorrow. Unfortunately when we came out of the shop, the sun was gone ;(

But Martin, Chris and I planned to walk, so we did. We drove by car to the beginning of the Saimaa channel and walked around in the area. It was nice and I made some photos of the autumn impressions there. You can find it, like always, in my public gallery.

Here are some examples:

Trip to Kotka and Valkmusa National Park

2007-09-25T20:06:00.000+02:00

Today we (Roman, Martin, Paul, Flo and I) decided spontaneously to stock up on the beautiful weather. So we had to decide between the seaside at Kotka including the Valkmusa National Park and the Repovesi National Park. The Repovesi National Park seemed to be nicer, but you will need a whole day to see it all. Finally we decided to go to Kotka and the Valkmusa National Park (about 107km from Lappeenranta).

Kotka is a middle sized city which has a huge harbor because of the geological circumstances. On one side the river and on the other side the Baltic sea. In Kotka we first visited the Maretarium, which is an aquarium presenting the underwater world of Finland. We paid 6,50 € entrance (student price). First we thought that the time (we arrived about 1515) was not enough, because the Maretarium has opened till 1700. But in the end they say that a round take 1h15. And it is true, it take not much longer, including watching a 10 minutes movie. (What we actually did)
It was nice and i would recommend a visit there. They also have a nice shop, I think my friend Rainer could spend a lot of money there. A lot of fish related stuff ;)

Paul and I also did some art in the childrens section ;) Guess which fish was mine *gg*

Afterwards we visited a small park in the town, which also was nice. We then tried to find the "famous" water rapids on the river. There should be three of them. First of all we tried it from the wrong side, so we have to park the car and try to reach it by foot. We came to the river, but it was not the right place. However, we determined to forget the "rapids" and go to the Valkmusa National Park.

First we thought we were on the wrong road, because there is not even one sign which points to the park. But in the end we found it. It is a very small National Park, but in my opinion it worth a visit.

The area is mostly a bog. And they made this wooden trails through the park. It was beautiful to walk there, because the ongoing sunset highlighted the autumn colors perfectly.

As you can see, it was very nice !!
More photos of our trip can you find in MY GALLERY!!

UPDATE: I added the 10 minutes movie from Maretarium, about the Baltic Sea.
Thanks to Flo *gg*

Weekend report

2007-09-23T21:27:00.000+02:00

I kept my promise, so i didn't drink any alcohol and i was in no bar or nightclub this weekend. Just enjoying the weekend. On Saturday we met in my flat and played some card games. First we (Paul, Martin, Martti, 2 Polish guys sry. forgot the names, Perrine and I) played Wizard and afterwards we played "President or Asshole", till 3 in the morning. It was a nice and relaxing evening.

On Sunday I was also very lazy, except that i cleaned my room and a part of the flat. Afterwards i cleaned my PC ;) put Vista 64bit on it and tested some Host Intrusion Prevention programs. On the evening Flo and I were refreshing our Finnish.

Nothing special at all.

Nähdään, hyvää yötä!! nuku hyvin!! mukavaa unta!
(See you, good night, sleep tight, nice dreams)

Begin of autumn party

2007-09-21T13:31:00.000+02:00

Yeah i know, yet another party *gg*

Yesterday was the "Begin of autumn"-Party in the "Gigglin Marlin" nightclub. The ticket cost 5€, but even with ticket there was a very long queue at the entrance.
Nevertheless, we got in and had a lot of fun. The beer cost 1€ on that evening (till 1 o'clock). The pint beer costs ~4,25€ normally.

Some people were already soo drunk before they arrived there. My greetings to Michael ;)
Even with a little pre-party in my place, I wasn't :). But of course this doesn't mean that I wasn't drunk at the end of the party. I think everyone was ;)

However, I will take a timeout this weekend, because I don't need a party and alcohol every day *g*

Another thing what happened to me yesterday.... I forgot my key in my room and the door was closed. I knew it will happen, but not so fast ;(
The house elder, who has a master key, was not available. So when I came back at ~4 o'clock I followed Roman to his flat, and slept their on the floor. It was not very comfortable and it was damn cold. But better then sleeping outside :) Thx Roman.

Today we only had "Finnish for Foreigners" lecture. So nothing new to tell about my studies.

Presenting my home town Steyr

2007-09-20T17:48:00.001+02:00

After the Global Village evening and some discussions about Austria, I know that a lot of people only know Vienna or Salzburg. But that's not all Austria can offer. For example my home town is one of the most beautiful cities in Austria.

That's why I have to introduce it to you, right now!

First of all some pictures from the old town:

Much more photos can you find here.
And useful information here:

Ok, what else to say, I think that is enough, because everything what you want to know, you will find it in on of those links above. If you have questions or wanna hear more, just drop me a message.

Photo update

2007-09-20T14:17:00.000+02:00

The photo albums "Visitors from Joensuu" and "Global Village evening" are now online.
You will find them here.

Global Village

2007-09-19T21:42:00.000+02:00

The world is a global village.

Today's evening we had the global village evening. Every country, or let's say some countries presented their self with some traditional food to taste.

Of course, Roman and I decided to do some Austrian cooking *gg*
Believe it or not, it was delicious.
We made some "Kaiserschmarrn" !! Thx to my mother for the recipe.
In my opinion it was good, because we made two full pans and at the end it was empty at all. So, for the people who are interested the recipe:

1 portion

300g flour
300ml milk
3 eggs (only the yolk, take the albumen by side)
2 tea spoon of sugar
1 tea spoon of salt
1 tea spoon of vanilla sugar
optional some rum
optional raisin

mix it all together, take the albumen and ok sorry i don't know the english name for it, make it "stabel" with a mixer.

Put 1 tea spoon sugar in it,
afterwards put it in the dough.

Bake it, make two times quarters an turn them around, rip it, make smaller pieces, if they are already getting brown, put some crystal sugar on it. If you don't know how to do it, I'm your men.

As side dish you take some apple puree or plum puree.

It was a shame that the Austrian girls didn't cook anything, only Roman and I did the cooking ;(

Ok, after that we presented it on a table at the student house, like a lot of other countries too. It was great, there was Spain, Belgium, Austria, China, Japan, France, Russia, Finland, Germany ....
Our stall:

It was very delicious, every country had really good food !!!!
And I very like the Chinese and Japanese food and drinks !!!, THANKS

Japanese had some Sake (sry I don't know the exact spelling). You have to put some Wasabi on your hand, lick the Wasabi and drink the Sake. GREAT!!

The Chinese food was excellent. Everyone who knows me, know that I love Chinese food. I did some arrangement to get some Chinese cooking lessons, looking forward do it !!!

Of course we also did a lot of drinking. For example a drinking game. Unfortunately we lost in the semi final, because the Italian guy was finished, but didn't put his glas on the head ;( so in the final the Spain won against the Nepal-Indian team.

The photos and some videos of the drinking contest of this evening will be online soon !!

Whatever, it was very nice and the evening now continues at Martin's place, where we drink some, Prost!!! See ya !! Nähdään !!!

PS.: Sorry to my Finnish Tandem partners that I didn't make it on time, anteeksi anteeksi !!

Finnish Tandem

2007-09-18T19:57:00.000+02:00

Ok, before you think I ride a new bike, or even worst, your thinking about some dirty stuff, stop it! It's neither.

The Tandem course is a lecture at the university, which get together German-speaking students with Finnish students. So the Finnish students can improve their German and on the other hand the German speaking can improve their Finnish.

My partners are Nikita and Niko, two Finnish guys. They already speaking perfect German, because Niko was already one year in Graz/Austria and Nikita was one year in Stuttgart/Germany. So, I am the leak of communication *gg*
The funny thing is, I'm so used to speak in English, that today, when I should speak German, I always fell back to English again *gg*

However, the next days and weeks, we will undertake some activities to get to know the language and the culture of the countries. I'm looking forward to it !!