Bring on the Night

Fourth in the series of “What we did in Norway on our vacation pictures”.

What’s a vacation in Norway without a trip to Hardangervidda?

We couldn’t resist going there even though it proved pointless 2 years ago. The snow and water rendered a walk impossible. Fortunately we stroke luck this year, and found both Hardangervidda and the weather perfect for a stroll.

Both Kojak and I have aggravating injuries making long walks, if not impossible, then a risky business. Kojak’s knee is loose and ready to snap into a lock every second. It’s been that way many years after a sports injury. I have a loose knee and a loose/hurting ankle from sports and a violent theft (a whole other story). Also C is not that big on long walks. In her mind she is ready, but not when the going gets tough ;-)

So we settled on the sane, but a bit boring trip of lunch in the open and a 1 hour walk afterwards. Not at all comparable to insane the 4½ hour walk in nowhere land Kojak and I took about 6 years ago, but still sufficient to feel like we’ve been there again. Continue Reading »

Tags: hardangervidda, norway, pictures, vacation

Just found a picture at The Opposite End of China, that reminded me of exactly how the chicken feet I ate back in China looked. Nails and everything.

Fancy a bite anyone?

Tags: China, food

Added a few pictures from our Norway trip to my photoblog – Bring on the Photos (inventive name, right?)

Check em out here:

Bring on the Photos

Tags: eos 400d, photoblog, pictures

Ok – I may not be an expert when it comes to Chinese games. Some would say that I’m an amateur, while most would say that I’m a complete ignorant. Regrettably I have to agree with the latter.

Even so, no one could predict what it really meant when C said the following yesterday 1 hour before dinner: “Would you mind if somechinesegirlsname came over and play mah-jong?”. Thoughtful of C to ask, but of course it would be ok.

What I should have done, was to put on my babelfish/oracle bones hat. A famous hat able that translates sentences spoken by Chinese to one understood by non-Chinese. The hat would have told me this: “Would you mind if somechinesegirlsname, her friend and his father came over and play mah-jong?”.

Of course I wouldn’t mind, but had I known that 3 Chinese (hereof 2 new to our home and one of those just landed in Denmark the day before for the first time in his life) came by, I would have used more than just 15 minutes to clean our apartment.

C told me the full story as we ate dinner. My reaction was something like: “What? How many did you say?”. In C’s defence she has a stupid husband and she responded with: “Of course there’ll be 3 coming over. Mah-jong needs 4 people to be played *sigh*”. Lesson learned and on with the cleaning, as C finished her dinner. Continue Reading »

Tags: china vs denmark, chinese, mah-jong

Finally got around to doing what Ryan has been to busy to do: I adjusted the China Blog Ring gadget that was in my sidebar, so it fits WP themes with narrow sidebar margins.

This is what I’m talking about:

Old look

New look

Actually I’m pretty happy with the result. Not only do it now fit my sidebar, but the colors also match my theme.

Actually this post is only made to taunt Ryan a bit by trackbacking the good news to him. From what I can see he is more than busy enough doing other projects atm ;-)

Tags: blogging, China, China Blog Ring

Third in the series of “What we did in Norway on our vacation pictures”.

One of our trips to see stuff went to a huge Glacier called Folgefonni. Also called Folgefonn, Folgefonna and probably other resourceful names. Not sure why the Norwegians didn’t settle on one and kept it, but that’s a whole other story. Back to the glacier.

Folgefonni is situated in on top of a mountain range in about +1500m above sea level. It sports a summer ski resort. The road to the resort is erhm interesting to drive on to put it moderate. It’s narrow, curvy and very steep. You need good nerves to take the trip.

As usually C fell asleep 45 minutes before we arrived. The same time it takes to drive the last nerviest stretch. After we arrived I woke her up. As expected she looked a bit puzzled to see snow close and people skiing. At least we didn’t have to hear her complain about her ears as we climbed the mountain. That’s normally something that bugs her a lot during flying and changing altitude fast. Then of course she didn’t see the beautiful scenery or the dangerous road there. Continue Reading »

Tags: norway, pictures, vacation

Second in the series of “What we did in Norway on our vacation pictures”.

Here’s a bunch of scenery pictures. Most of them taken directly from the porch of the rented house. So the motive is often the same, but the light and weather isn’t. It makes a bit of a difference, right?

Continue Reading »

Tags: norway, pictures, vacation

First in the series of “What we did in Norway on our vacation pictures”.

If you have been in Norway (and by that I look away from those who’ve only been shopping in the bigger cities) you’d know that driving can be hazardous. It’s hard to capture precisely how tiny, curvy and slant some of the roads are, because when you drive on those, there’s rarely a safe spot to stop and photograph.

Anyway, here are some pictures from our trip to, from and in Norway:

C posing in front of the ferry taking us from Hirtshals, Denmark to Kristiansand, Norway

Tried to capture a road that took us down from the Hovden area highlands to Haukeli. Tour de France anyone? Continue Reading »

Tags: norway, pictures, vacation

As a few people may have noticed, I haven’ been active the last week. Well except the last entry, that was scheduled ;-)

C and I was on vacation in Norway with a friend, and just came back yesterday. Hope to post some pictures later.

Tags: silence

As earlier written, I bought a few shiny things for C when she graduated from Danish Language School. Since we are not made of money with only one average income, it didn’t end up with a giant rock, but I still like the outcome:

Yes, her name starts with a C

Hanging stuff

Tags: gifts, jewellery

So C has vacation atm. Her exam is over, and she is waiting to start her new vacation job. So how does she spend her time?

Well, she’s not a lazy woman, so she keeps the place clean and does not insist that I help as usually. I like it. It won’t kill all the daylight hours, so she decided it was time for a reward after the last half year of studying (and she deserved it if any). So she started her computer and loaded her Chinese video-streaming software (probably including worms, Trojans and other goodies) and started watching Chinese series.

Streaming works extremely well. Even though it mostly only streams a 20-60Kb/s, its still decent quality. I don’t get those series, but on the other hand, C doesn’t get why I like playing computer games. So it’s a tie.

Here’s a picture of the hardcore watcher:

C can sit like this for more than 8 hours daily. Some times she even did about 16! As long as she’s having fun and enjoying her vacation, I don’t care. Soon she will be busy with work and later school, so now’s the time to let loose.

Tags: China, series, streaming

I am of course! Well, would love to write that I’m a bloody sensation, but that would be a big lie. So instead I have to write about the sensation that I feel, now that I got a new lens for my Canon EOS 400 camera.

I purchased a used Canon 28-135mm IS lens as replacement and upgrade to my DSLR camera. So now I have a bit more zoom range and Image Stabilization too. So far it’s a good trade, even though I lost 10mm (18-28mm) for close-ups in the upgrade. Haven’t found it a problem so far though. The old lens (18-55 non-IS) is not worth selling and will act as backup.

Hopefully the new gear will help me on my quest to become a real amateur photographer, and not just a wannabee.

Tags: 28-135mm, eos 400d

So, when you have nothing to say, what do you do? Talk about the weather of course.

A few weeks ago we had exceptionally good weather. 24-28c degrees and lots of sun. I miss it.

It’s now June. It’s supposed to be summer or at least early summer here in Denmark. Right now it doesn’t feel that way. It’s windy and shifting between sun and rain. It sucks.

On my way to work I had to pedal to get down-hill. Yes – down-hill! My route to work starts with one of Aalborg’s most hated hills. Fortunately we live on top, so it’s normally an easy 2 minute start of the daily bike ride. Yesterday some ferries to Norway and Sweden were cancelled due to the hard wind. One of those was the one we will be using when we go to Norway on our vacation. But that’s far in the horizon, so hopefully the wind will take off before that.

Only positive thing is that the changing weather opts for some beautiful weather phenomena like this rainbow that I shot from our balcony the other day. Actually there were two, if you look close. Continue Reading »

Tags: pictures, weather

It’s not that nothing is happening. I’m just a lazy ass updating here.

Actually a pretty big thing happened. C graduated from Danish school. That’s extremely good news as this gives her the right to go to “normal” Danish schools for an education. YEAAAAH!

What I find the best part is that C managed to pull some very nice grades too. Considering that she went to level 3, which is the highest level possible, AND got good grades is not a small thing. Her classmates were mostly at university level with many years of studying behind them. They also spoke good English. An obvious benefit when you have to look-up words in your dictionary. It also helps you get the meaning fast in some cases due to Danish-English word similarity.

C never went to high school or university. The English she understands is what I could teach her through webcam and a few weeks of private tutoring in Harbin. Basically she would have to start from scratch if she wants to learn English in the future. So when she learn Danish, she use her Danish-Chinese dictionary 99,9% of the time. The English-Chinese dictionary only act as backup whenever I’m around to help her explain the meaning. You try looking-up a Danish word in the Danish-English dictionary, and then afterwards the English-Chinese and see how long that’s fun? Let me enlighten you: Its not, and you don’t. Continue Reading »

Tags: danish, Exam, integration

As threatened I made a photoblog. Pictures only, with room to comment.

Hopefully my new gadget (EOS 400D), will help me take some more artsy pictures. That is exactly what I will use the photoblog for. Not “everyday”, “watch my life”, “look I can push the button”, “I’ve been here”, “..and that was a good vacation” etc. pictures. Those will be confined to my gallery on this blog.

The new photoblog can be found here: www.joecool.dk/photos

Now the final task will be to get some talent. Meanwhile I direct you to ChinaMash, who got it happening.

Tags: eos 400d, pictures

Today we went to my parents for some barbecue.

On our way home we waited for the train. I, being a gadget geek, did my thing and shot some pictures.

C, being a rabbit freak, spent the waiting by collecting some dandelion leaves for her rabbits.

Are women from Venus and men from Mars. Are Women from heaven and men from hell? Will man and woman ever meet?

Tags: eos 400d, pictures

So after reading up on the net, I have decided yet another attempt to minimize auth plugins when people comment.

I really hate the idea of us (I had to write the annoying codes too, you know?) having to do extra work to comment on an article, but came up short every time I tried to find replacements. Recaptcha has worked pretty well together with Akismet. If I only enabled one of then, it just didn’t do it.

This time I will keep Akismet, but give et a few new “silent” sidekicks in for of Spam Karma 2 and Bad Behaviour. Hopefully it helps, and should be completely invisible to the commenter. I’ll cross my fingers.

Tags: akismet, bad behaviour, protection, spam, spam karma 2

Haven’t had enough time or proper opportunities to play around with my new EOS 400D. No doubt that it’s way better than my “old” pocket digital cam (Sony W80), but on the other hand, you need the right subjects and scenes to make full use of it.

Saturday C and I went downtown to watch the annual carnival in Aalborg. Should be basis for a few good pictures. The weather was good, and it was a perfect day to be a drunken carnival’er or watch them as they paraded through the city.

Unfortunately it was hard to get a good spot, so I really didn’t get as many as I would like to. Also there were loads of people, and C was waiting for her paparazzi husband, so I only got a handful and had no time to play around on camera settings.

After shooting some pics, we met some friends and grabbed some lunch. Then back to find a bus, only to discover my wallet missing. Back to the restaurant, where C found it on the floor. Phew. Continue Reading »

Tags: carnival, eos 400d, pictures

Things are a bit hectic round there lately.

Not that its an excuse for lack of writing, but may have a bit to do with it.

It’s a important time for C at the moment, since she is close to finishing her final Danish class. Last Tuesday she did the writing 4-5 hour exam. Haven’t heard the results from the school yet, but we’re crossing our fingers. Within 3 weeks she has to do an oral test too, and if she passes both, she is done with studying obligatory Danish classes.

Guess you can figure out that she have been doing nothing much but study the last month or so. Harder than usually, which is quite a bit.

After school she got a job working in a nursing home for the summer. The spot look nice and the colleagues seemed friendly, so she really looks forward to that.

Then in August, she’s back on the school bench to get an official education within the same area. We cross our fingers that she likes it, but otherwise, there are other options. For a foreigner in Denmark the pickings are slim, unless you speak flawless Danish or have a high education (or both). Continue Reading »

Tags: integration, life, school, vacation

Seems that the quake does wonders for the Chinese spindoctors (or lack of same) these days.

There haven’t been much Olympic Games/China bashing going on in the press, as the quake in Sichuan have claimed all headlines. Think it was a much needed breather anyway. I wonder if it can hold until this summer?

Tags: China, earth quake, olympic