All posts by chivacongelado
Physical vs personal distance
One of those things that always make me wonder is how in this day and age, we can work very closely with people we don’t meet in real life. We can learn to know them, and share a lot of experiences together without being in the same place or knowing how they look. Then, when we finally meet them, we realise we already knew them.
Recommended book: The Muslim discovery of Europe
I’ve always been interested in finding out “the other side of the story”. That was one of my main incentives in learning foreign languages, and the reason why I usually scan international newspapers. As a recent project put me in constant contact with Turkey, I was able to pick up this book at Istanbul airport and was able to read it through. While this blog gives a longer review of the book than I’d be willing to write here, the most interesting bit of the whole book was that for the peoples comprising Medieval Islam, Europe was an uninteresting barbaric fringe following an antiquated superseded religion, and so approached their contact with Europeans from a stand of perceived moral superiority. Not unlike the way Europeans viewed the peoples of the New World in the 1500’s.
The book then gives a summary of how those attitudes changed with the faster European development of the Renaissance to a situation where while European technical, scientific & military expertise was sought after, cultural contact was still avoided. 300 years later, the situation is starting to change as can be seen in the TED talk below:
Disclaimer: I know Turkey is in general much less traditionalist than other Muslim countries. It is generally agreed that the push West was started by Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, which was not covered in this book.
Cómo vivir en Finlandia durante el invierno y disfrutarlo
Cuando escuchan que vivo en Finlandia, mucha gente me pregunta cómo es vivir acá en invierno, especialmente cuando puedes llegar a experimentar diferencias térmicas como la de abajo:
En realidad, yo pienso que no es tan difícil como parece. Al contrario de lo que pudiera pensarse, no me la paso añorando las playas de México todo el invierno ni mucho menos (obviamente no le voy a decir que no cuando se me presenta la oportunidad de ir, claro). Como donde crecí la nieve es algo que sólo se encuentra en las cimas de los volcanes, cada que llegan las nevadas lo disfruto enormidad y me preparo para los deportes y actividades de invierno: esquí de fondo (en tierra o sobre el mar congelado), esquí alpino (en Laponia o en Savo), patinaje sobre hielo o deslizamiento en trineo. Intentaría el hockey sobre hielo, pero la verdad es que el único deporte con bastones para el que no soy tan malo es el golf. Con probar salibandy tuve suficiente.
Otra cuestión es obviamente la ropa. Acá tienen un dicho con el que estoy completamente de acuerdo:
No hay mal clima, hay mala ropa
Uno tiene que saber vestirse de acuerdo al clima y también tener en cuenta el factor viento (-17 °C con viento fuerte te puede llegar a dar una sensación térmica de -40°C). Se dice que el 30% del calor corporal se escapa por la cabeza, así que el uso de gorro de lana o sombrero es recomendable. Además, necesitas guantes, bufanda, ropa interior larga, un buen abrigo o rompevientos y saber vestirte en capas: una capa gruesa no te protege tanto como varias capas delgadas, ya que lo que calienta es el aire atrapado entre cada una. En lo más frío del invierno puedo llegar a usar hasta 5 capas de ropa entre camiseta, camiseta larga, camisa, suéter, saco y abrigo. Sudaderas de microfibra o de plano suéteres de lana pueden ser útiles. Algunas personas también usan orejeras de lana o piel. Aún así, salir a la calle en invierno no está peleado con la moda o el estilo propio: no es necesario pensar que te vas a ver como muñeco de Michelin 8 meses al año. Contra lo que pudiera pensarse, en diez inviernos sólo he tenido que usar pasamontañas una vez y hubiera podido sobrevivir sin él.
No uso botas de invierno a menos que realmente haga mucho frío o me vaya a ir a hacer senderismo, pero unas buenas plantillas de lana y calcetines largos de lana o seda pueden hacerte el paro, aún con zapatos o tenis normales. Lo único que sí hay que tener en cuenta es la suela, ya que la nieve o el hielo favorecen las suelas de hule o plástico de buen agarre. Caminar al trabajo en invierno en zapatos de suela de cuero es intento de suicidio.
Lo más importante es escuchar a tu cuerpo y recordar que es un mecanismo maravilloso. Si estás aquí un rato podrás notar que te acostumbras al frío, y cuando en primavera el mercurio vaya de subida te va a empezar a dar calor a cero grados. Recuerdo que en mi primer año aquí sentía que se me caían las orejas con los primeros vientos de Octubre aunque apenas era otoño, ahora a menos que estemos abajo de -15°C no las uso o empiezo a sudar como si tuviera la cabeza en un horno.
Como dicen por ahí: Si te llueven limones, haz limonada.
Libro recomendado: Cartas Finlandesas
Si eres hispanoparlante y vives (o planeas vivir) en Finlandia, este libro es absolutamente imperdible. Escrito hace 110 años por el entonces cónsul de España en Helsinki cuando Finlandia era un Gran Ducado dependiente del zar de Rusia y la población de clase alta era mayoritariamente de habla sueca, este libro es un retrato veraz, ácido a veces y sumamente divertido en ocasiones sobre cómo vivían, comían, hablaban (o no), se relacionaban y morían los finlandeses de aquel entonces.
Aunque en algunas cosas el país ha cambiado sustancialmente, el carácter sigue siendo fundamentalmente el mismo.
Chivacongelado.com search keyword visualisation
Found this at Ian’s blog and just couldn’t resist. It’s a very interesting way to see which keywords bring people to this small corner of the net.
The rules of cricket
You have two sides, one out in the field and one in. Each man that’s in the side that’s in goes out, and when he’s out he comes in and the next man goes in until he’s out. When they are all out, the side that’s out comes in and the side thats been in goes out and tries to get those coming in, out. Sometimes you get men still in and not out. When a man goes out to go in, the men who are out try to get him out, and when he is out he goes in and the next man in goes out and goes in. There are two men called umpires who stay out all the time and they decide when the men who are in are out. When both sides have been in and all the men have out, and both sides have been out twice after all the men have been in, including those who are not out, that is the end of the game!
Recommended movie: Okuribito
This is probably the best movie I’ve seen all year, and certainly one whose American trailer doesn’t do any justice to. The most endearing, human (& humane) way of portraying death as a part of life I have seen in a movie screen. No wonder it won the Oscar last year.
If you find it somewhere (I stumbled on it on Canal +) watch it. Absolutely unforgettable.
Recommended movie: My sister’s keeper
15 years ago this movie would have been a sci-fi piece. Now it’s “just” a contemporary drama with great acting and a very interesting plot.
TEDx Helsinki v3
I was very lucky to get a ticket to the 3rd version of TEDx Helsinki, the locally-organised TED mirror event. You can find a small summary of the talks below.
- Theme of the day: Doing out of the box.
- Jody Turner Opportunity: Developed world vs Developing world means industrialised and ready versus human touch and in progress. Your passion is the most valuable thing you’ve got. There’s no ownership in innovation. Empowerment. The change generation is all of us.
- Kaikki muuttuu paremmaksi (It all gets better, in Finnish) video premiere
- Janne Gallen-Kallela-Siren: visual literacy, more than just normal literacy. Think more in images and symbols, less in letters & numbers. More creative, less engineering.
- Matti Posio: Future of Finnish culture. Culture is threatened by new culture. Media endangered by social media, if they don’t know how to use it unlike CNN. Finns believe in authority somewhat, Americans not really, which influences the way they approach media.
- Puppetry of the penis (NSFW).
- David Wolfe: The fruit tree planting foundation. Chocolate history. Chocolate for health.
- Alf Rehn: Love and raw materials. Passion for doing, extreme production. What can chefs teach of management: Linking strategy, esthetics, passion and implementation & Organized caos.
- Mikko Hyppönen: Internet. Evolution leads us to Facebook =) . What threatens the net? Web crime.
- Hannu Lauerma: Psicopathy. Antisocial personality disorder. Nervous system doesn’t react to stress like majority of people. Feelings missing. Can develop with lack of physical contact when young. Lack of empathy. Leading to crimes against humanity.
- Itay Talgam Conductor video first, then live talk.
- Video of 3 year old jonathan conducting beethoven 5th. How to do the same but different? Leaders are afraid of being ignored. Making people get out of their comfort zone. Build order and then destroy it. Empowering instead of command and control. Create metaphors and bring people into them. Customising message to relationship. Authenticity matters. Leadership is suspension of disbelief. Do it all wrong, but still get it right (think out of the box).
- Stefan Bremer and violinist Teemu Kupiainen remember photographer Jouko Lehtola, showing his photographs to Johann Sebastian Bach “Chaconne”.