…in Autumn and loves pictures from country side and not of these every-time-shot (but lovely!) Tuscany villages and towns: Here thy are: It was in October 2008 when we came back from Naxos/Greece on our trip »Round Europe 2008« and crossed Italy from Bari to Riviera.

Technorati Tags: Fotos, Italien, Kultur & Gesellschaft, Kykladen, Reise, RundEuropa2008, Tourismus, travel

…young adults and it’s going like lightning. Banal?

Yes shure, yea, it’s just like that. Nevertheless I saw just that clearly today, when our friend from Lithuania sent to me the Link to the photo site of her sister.

That she likes to take photos she not only told me in Vilnius last year but also proved that immediately. An incredible sure instinct for objects, arrangements, light, motion. Rasa and her »little sister« Ieva just had bought a new CANON 450D for her in the morning

and instantly she came with a real barrage fire of photos without any delay. So, this was just a year ago.

No doubt: Rasa is a talent

Just have a look. I wouldn’t be surprised at all if there would be a lot more in the future. And also in a wider area. Lithuania and Photography in any case is an extra chapter. And Rasa got just seventeen some days before…

Technorati Tags: Fotografie, Kultur & Gesellschaft, Litauen, Photo, Photographie

Sometimes it happens on Skype. Our friend from Lithuania sent me tv news video from Lithuania. There was a section where he talks about his job:

.

If you need his help, Have a look!

And if you are hungry: Try these »Zeppelinas«!

Technorati Tags: Litauen

… is ready for download here.

Technorati Tags: Photo, RundEuropa2008, Tourismus, travel

…because it’s almost gone. Nevertheless again a lot of things were happening, bad and nice. Elizabeth tried to put them together in her Annual Letter. And she strongly hopes that she did not forget too many events of importance…

So for me there is nothing left to do but to put her letter to the internet for download and to wish you all peaceful and contemplative holidays and for the New Year all the best, particularly peace and health. I don’t think it will become an easy year.

Some word about the letter: It is very long this time, 18 pages in German. It’s my job to do the translation for you and I am not ready early enough

So please excuse me for that. I put the first part of three to the internet for download. And I hope and I promise to supply you with the rest soon. And one more thing: Do not care about mistakes in translation, there was not enough time to read it thoroughly…

We hope you like it!.

Greeting from the cold Isla bonita (14°C in the morning)

Lis and Reinard

Links:

• Annual Letter, Part 1 (english)
• Jahresbrief 2008 (deutsch)

Technorati Tags: Kunst & Kultur, LaPalma, travel, RundEuropa2008

Hi, friends!

Everybody who is interested: Just have a look at our actual photos and some more here. This is actually an experimental place

La Palma, the Isla Bonita, from outside…

More to come!

Technorati Tags: Fotos, LaPalma, Photos

To all our friends out there who did not receive our letter by e-mail. And of course to all who are interested

As long as a year is eventful you are living. We are going to finish such a year, with traveling, parties and – a move of a very special kind. As last year we are again sitting on La Palma but this time not only for a visit…

We assimilate and it is not so difficult to do so.

Lis again finished an Annual Letter for all of us. I finished english translation tonight and I hope there arfe not too many errors…

Special Thanks to those who were helping us on our way through their country this year, specially in Albania, Croatia, Czech Republic, Greece, Lithuania, Latvia, Ukraine…

We wish You all peaceful holidays, muse and recollection and a peaceful Happy New Year 2008.

Links:

Annual Letter 2007, PDF (5.9 MB)

• english
• deutsch

Technorati Tags: alltägliches, LaPalma, Lesen, Reise

…but it will not happen that German will become the EU standard language as I was just informed by a friend by e-mail – really too bad. The following compromise can be said to look pretty but…

The European Commission has just announced an agreement whereby English will be the official language of the European Union rather than German, which was the other possibility.

As part of the negotiations, the British Government conceded that English spelling had some room for improvement and has accepted a 5- year phase-in plan that would become known as “Euro-English”.

In the first year, “s” will replace the soft “c”. Sertainly, this will make the sivil servants jump with joy.

The hard “c” will be dropped in favour of “k”. This should klear up konfusion, and keyboards kan have one less letter.

There will be growing publik enthusiasm in the sekond year when the troublesome “ph” will be replaced with “f”. This will make words like fotograf 20% shorter.

In the 3rd year, publik akseptanse of the new spelling kan be expekted to reach the stage where more komplikated changes are possible.

Governments will enkourage the removal of double letters which have always ben a deterent to akurate speling.

Also, al wil agre that the horibl mes of the silent “e” in the languag is disgrasful and it should go away.

By the 4th yer people wil be reseptiv to steps such as replasing “th” with “z” and “w” with “v”.

During ze fifz yer, ze unesesary “o” kan be dropd from vords kontaining “ou” and after ziz fifz yer, ve vil hav a reil sensibl riten styl.

Zer vil be no mor trubl or difikultis and evrivun vil find it ezi tu understand ech oza. Ze drem of a united urop vil finali kum tru.

Und efter ze fifz yer, ve vil al be speking German like zey vunted in ze forst plas.

If zis mad you smil, pleas pas on to oza pepl.

Technorati Tags: Europa, europe, language

Links:

• free-burma.org

There seems no solution tree days after the elections which took place last sunday: Both sides represent nealy the same amount of about 45%. My question to our friend in Ukraine was if he knows about fakes and corruption in conjuntion with the elections. This morning I got this mail:

Hello,

Yes, I think results were faked. More or less in different regions. As usual, results were coming slower from eastern parts that from western. We have seen the same during president elections and the delay was corrections (faking) in favour of Yanukovich. I think today we can see the exactly same scheme. Also, faking is being conducted in favour of socialistic party. Meanwhile the party doen’t have enough votes to be in the parliament. There are some places where the results for this party is 100 times higher than in the places just around it. It cannot be so, I think. It’s very hard to believe.

The socialistic party has betrayed their voters by joining the coalition of Yanukovich. It is known that earlier they supported Orange revolutuion & democratic pro-western forces. Thus, this time they didn’t get even 3% of votes. But as for me, they are trying to fake their results now do get back again to add some figures to party of Yanukovich to form a majority.

We’re all waiting for complete results and hope that out hope is not going to die again

Links:

• Press Release OSCE