Omnia Mutantur

Can any Spanish speaker explain the mathematics of this La Nación article?

Un total de 257 personas murieron violentamente entre enero y marzo anteriores, de acuerdo con registros de la Cruz Roja.

La mayoría de los fallecimientos ocurrieron durante accidentes de tránsito, especialmente choques (el 34 por ciento).

Este cuerpo de socorro también atendió durante este primer trimestre del presente año 24 asesinatos, casi todos con armas de fuego (el 26 por ciento de los casos).

So we have 257 violent deaths, of which 34% belong to traffic accidents. Then they say we had 24 murders, which accounts to 26% – but 24 is only 9% of 257. They could mean that 26% of people were murdered with firearms, but they said that almost all cases were firearms. Or maybe they actually mean that 34% was the number of collisions resulting in deaths. Then there’s 8 people who drowned, for 3%, leaving 37% of violent deaths unaccounted under miscellany.

Way to give out useless information.

Ricardo Costa Rica, News and politics

Oh boy, Amnet really outshone itself this time.

We want to cancel our account, so Vero called them and asked for the form we’re supposed to fill. What they sent us was a Word document with an embedded image, which was actually a scan of someone else’s cancellation letter. This included their customer’s ID number, his address in La Uruca and his scanned signature.

I think we’re doing the cancellation in person. Maybe that way they won’t have it scanned, ready to send to someone else.

Ricardo Costa Rica privacy

It’s half-surprising that you can still find useful stuff on Slashdot before places like Reddit. The latest surprise find is an article describing how Microsoft is screwing the pooch on Iceland, which is of course the best thing to do for your business in a country with a dying economy.

The short version is that Microsoft Certified Partners buy software contracts from Microsoft, and then resell them to their clients. With the capital of Iceland now being 5 cents, a lot of companies who bought these contracts have gone bankrupt, and of course aren’t making their yearly payments to Microsoft anymore (kind of difficult when you’re dead). The MCPs who sold them the contracts are then on the hook for the money.

“Aha!” says the suit from Redmond. “You made a contract with us, and another with them. Their inability to uphold their end of the contract does not invalidate your commitment to us.”

This is what I’ve heard from pals in the industry. Pals who’re being screwed over right now. In short, the MCP’s have to pay the licensing fees for the bankrupted companies.

The sheer shock of having to do so is starting to hit the Icelandic economy, hard. Already battered by the collapse of almost all privately held financial institutions and the subsequent bust of nearly fifteen hundred companies, Iceland’s MCP’s are next.

And then,

But the backlash effect has been astounding. Several of Iceland’s largest MCP’s are now fighting for survival in a sea already at significant turmoil due to the economic depression. Shit had already hit the fan, but now they’re being skull-fucked by Microsoft to boot.

And what would you do? Well. My sources tell me a lot is afoot. Several MCP’s are bailing out, switching over to Free Software and restructuring their business model. Keep the revenue inside Iceland, sell better technical services for less money and yet double their revenue. “Why didn’t we do this earlier?”

Why indeed.

That’s just beautiful. I bet this is making all sorts of people eager to sign up as an MCP.

The original article is occasionally returning a 500, but Google has it cached. It’s very colorful.

Ricardo Science and Technology crisis, freesoftware, Microsoft, Science and Technology

Now that I’m back home, I’m catching up with the hundreds of photos I shot but didn’t edit or upload, so I likely will be posting

Below are the graves of the Brothers Grimm, which I saw on a detour to Schöneberg. There seemed to be papers at the ground, children’s notes held down by stones. Not sure if that was a particular school trip or some sort of tradition I’m unaware of.

Ricardo Books, music and film, Travel Berlin

More than jetlagged I feel caffeine-lagged. I got used to drinking more grüner tee in Berlin to keep warm, plus kept sampling the capuccinos at places where I stopped in the afternoons. Now that I’m back on a lower dosage, my body is kind of resenting it.

I brought back some rooibos that I found at an organic supermarket, but given its lack of caffeine, I’ll wait until I’ve re-balanced my caffeine intake to try it.

Ricardo Health, Travel caffeine, coffee, rooibos, tea

There were so many activities going on all the time in Berlin, that inevitably I was going to miss some of them by only a few days. There was a showing of Don Giovanni that started in mid-march, plus an opera season starting on February 28 with (I believe) The Marriage of Figaro; and just at the end of March, a musical by Eric Woolfson (co-founder of The Alan Parsons Project) on Edgar Allan Poe.

Berlin is very much alive.

Ricardo Books, music and film, Travel Berlin, music, opera

Ricardo Random funny stuff, Travel Berlin, easilyamused

A woman stopped me today on the street, asking for directions in German. I understood where she wanted to go, so I helped her in English. She spoke good English herself, and since we were both going in the same direction, we strolled for a bit talking about the city. Turns out she’s been here 9 years, but is originally from Guatemala.

I love this town and will be sad to leave it.

Ricardo Travel Berlin, Travel

Since Berliner Republik is kind of high end, even if cheap by european standards, I’d like to list a few examples of really cheap, really good places to eat around town.

At Dada Falafel you can get the best falafel im brot (pide bread) ever for 3 euros. Add 2.5 euros more and you get eastern tea with cinnamon and cardamomo and dessert.

At Maximilian’s in Rosenthaler Platz you can get some very good dönner for 2 euros, and a dürum dönner – which he prepares by wrapping it in Turkish pizza instead of taboon bread – for 2.5 euros. They have falafel, but it’s warmed over and can’t hold a candle to either Dada Falafel’s – stick to their dönner.

Not too far is 5 Flavor, an excellent chinese restaurant. At lunch time you can get one of their many dishes accompanied by either hot-sour soup or a spring roll for 5 euros. I got some very spicy Kung Fu Beef with rice and the hot-sour soup – both were excellent.

Really close too is St. Oberholz, a very chic café with free wireless where 5.5 euros will buy you a cappuccino and one of their very large bowls of soup. If you’re still hungry, a few more euros will get you one of their fine prosciutto sandwiches.

Near the Heinrich-Heine Strasse subway station there’s another middle eastern place. They have a good dönner for 2.5 euros, and some decent falafel which they’ll prepare on the spot.

The café at the Bode Museum has some excellent pastries, even if their coffees are a bit on the expensive side. Still, you can easily get away with a cappuccino and some delicious Mozart Cake for about 7 euros.

There are also many oriental food stalls for eating on the go, for instance a vietnamese place right outside Friedrichstrasse Station, where you can get a box of noodles with vegetables for about 2 euros. This will only be a snack, but it’ll hold you until you find a nice dönner place.

On sundays you can gorge yourself at one of the many brunches around town, which will range from 10 to 15 euros for all you can eat of exquisite food. And of course on any random day you’ll find sausage stands, hot dog vendors and pretzels all over the place, ranging from about 75 cents to 1.5 euros.

This probably paints a better picture of what I mean when I say eating out here is cheap. It’s really, really cheap.

Ricardo Restaurants and bars, Travel Berlin, food

After tasting Berlin’s smorgasboard of Croatian, Chinese, Thai, Italian, Japanese, Indian, Turkish, Russian, Vietnamese and Indian food, I realized I hadn’t had nearly enough German cuisine. I ended up at Berliner Republik, which had been recommended by someone here. They have an interesting system where the beer prices go up and down like a stock market, depending on demand, and every so often the market crashes and prices reset.

I asked the waitress to recommend something to me, and she brought this monstrosity.

There’s sour cabbage on the other side of it, and mashed sweet potatoes as well. It was such a hun thing to serve that they probably expected me to clean my teeth with the bone.

Dessert was very good, some sort of sweet flan with sour grapes and apple slices.

I had two beers (including a rice beer that had a vanilla twang to it), a cappuccino that was a pretty much an espresso with foam on it, the dessert and the huge pork leg. Ended up paying 25 Euros, including their outrageous VAT.

Don’t let anyone tell you that eating out in Berlin is expensive.

Ricardo Restaurants and bars, Travel Berlin, food, Travel