Joining the Jet-Set

On Wednesday, I was told that I got the go-ahead to take a business trip to London for Meetings on Friday (2 days later). I was very cool with that and quite excited – mostly for the fact that I might have the opportunity to unthaw from BRR-lin’s freezing temperatures (17 days with no sun and counting). Special thanks to Niall who was able to take the dog for a couple days, and on less than 2 days notice. The trip was literally a “jet set” type trip – taxi -> airport -> Taxi -> Office and reverse. Other than being up since 4am and not getting home until midnight (bed around 2am), the trip was, I think quite successful. Essentially, I had alot of input into the “coming features” and hopefully brought up a ton of things that weren’t thought of to make sure we were covered.

Richmond Bridge over Thames

Otherwise? The office in London sits on the Thames, and our conference room faced the river (above) and a bridge near Richmond going over it. It was above freezing with a bit of rain. Everyone else thought it was cold (It was ~43 F) but me? Coming from 12 F Berlin – well, it was quite Balmy. I immediately stripped down to the t-shirt turtleneck and enjoyed the warmth and the sun for the morning…. When lunch came, I took a few snapshots of the River and the office (game room chairs below), and wished I could have stayed longer.

Chair ballBaseball Chair

When I left, I had an interesting discussion with the taxi driver on the way back to the airport who had asked about the day. Essentially I mentioned it was too short of a trip, but I suppose “Life is what you make of it” which turned into a discussion of how you can accomplish almost anything if you just have the drive and determination and know where to look to make opportunites happen. He dropped me off at the airport – and when I opened the door to go inside the terminal — this is the sign that greeted me. Karma telling me something? I don’t know – but I just thought it was cool how fate / karma really reinforced the conversation.

The World IS Full of Opportunities... Don't be blind to them.

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Prints for Haiti

I’ve been watching what’s going on in Haiti after the earthquakes for the last few days and while I don’t have much of money myself (I could only afford a $50 donation), I have decided to participate in a little different way – which is also being promoted through Flickr, and I hope this will encourage a few more donations to help those in need.

What am I doing? I’ve entered several of my photographs up for bid in the Flickr Charity Print Auctions group at:

www.flickr.com/groups/charityprintauctions/

for the Haiti Earthquake Appeal. A few Examples:

1) Wieseckes Mill Brandenburg Germany (edited)

2) Prepositions in an Urban Jungle

3)

4)Oberbaumbrücke Sunset

5) TV Tower, Reichstag, Brandenburg Gate

6) St. Marienkirche, Alexanderplatz

    Here’s how it works.

To bid, you need to comment below the image on Flickr (or email me) with the amount that you would like to bid. When the auction closes, the person that has bid the most, wins the print.

The prints that are for auction may vary in size (as set by the photographer), but I’m offering most at 20 x 30 CM (7.9 x 11.8 inches) with a thin white border around it so it’s suitable for Framing. They will be printed by Snapfish on high gloss finished paper and promptly delivered to you.

This Auction will finish on Sunday, 24th January 2010 at midnight CET (Central European Time).

The winning bidder has to pay their winning amount to Doctors Without Borders (Medecins sans frontieres):

doctorswithoutborders.org/

When you do this, you MUST make a screen grab of the donation confirmation page to send to the photographer. This is the only way the photographer knows that you have paid and can arrange for the print to be sent to you.

The photographer accepts that they will pay the costs of production of the print and the postage to the winning bidder.

Not interested in the Prints you see above? Please check out my “best of” sets; and/or My flickr photostream – and see if there’s something you’d like in return for your donation!

www.flickr.com/photos/phoenixesrose/collections/721576054…

If you are more interested in something else (cards, postcards, or heck, even some German chocolate) for your donation, I may be willing to make arrangements!

Together, we CAN make a DIFFERENCE!

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Chickens At the Airport – What?!?

This week I had to go to the airport to meet up with a friend. They’ve redone their announcements since the attempted Christmas “underwear” bomber, and it made us both crack up laughing – apparently we have a new animal at the airport.

In a German airport, of course, you expect the original announcement to be in German. However, they also do the ‘courtesy’ of translating it to English so we can better understand what they’re saying. In this case, it’s been read by the same female individual, with a horrible accent and even worse grammar – to the point that it left me wondering about why they don’t hire a native English speaker to CORRECT and READ the announcement.

The announcement is effectively:

“Now securitee gedelines state that bags cannet be left alone. Please do not accept propertee of the other people. Parking is not allowed in front of the chicken areas….”

Um… CHICKEN AREAS? Really? Where exactly are these Chicken Areas? I think maybe they mean CHECK IN areas but…

Even better is the fact that bags cannot be left alone. I think they want to say that bags should not be left unattended, – but then again, maybe the bags get lonely….

Also, I shouldn’t accept items from unknown persons- now really, how do I not accept items from unknown persons – especially since they’re the ones generally SELLING items in the stores – does that mean I can’t take anything with me? Wouldn’t the airlines love it then.. no baggage…

Otherwise, they’ve also changed the announcements on the trains. Yes, I get that English is confusing, and that it’s difficult, and that these are relatively new (they’ve just added the English at the most touristy spots in the last year) . Again, why not hire someone to correct this? (If you’re going to do it, do it properly!)

The Announcement (Again, a literal translation of German):

“now arriving at station (name). Please leave the train to the left / right”.

I always want to ask ‘you want me to leave the train to the left of what – the kitchen counter? the street?’ Is it so someone can find it later?

I mean – I know that they are saying that I should EXIT through the Left/right doors, or maybe that I should exit on to the left platform, but either way, it’s still not correct the way they’ve stated it, and leaves me feeling a bit …

Lost in Translation.

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