July 3, 2015

Eight months with the Kindle Voyager

Two weeks ago I would have said that justifying the Kindle Voyager versus the Paperwhite was a close affair — but in the end the increased pixel density of the Voyager would edge out in the end.

Since the release of the 2015 Kindle Paperwhite with a 300-ppi screen last week, I see now reason to get a Voyager for $80 more.

The main reason I upgraded from my 2012 Paperwhite was mainly because of the hardware buttons. The Kindle Keyboard — still the best version yet IMHO — had great physical buttons on the sides for page-turning.1

The Paperwhite backlight and increased resolution were a fun geeky upgrade. But after a few weeks it was clear that using the e-ink screen for page turns was not a great experience. The lag is just to much to make accidental screen touches a complete turn-off when you’re in the reading zone.

During my first few hours with the Voyager, I was happy with its peculiar buttons. But after a few days I started to notice that the innovate PagePress Sensors were not consistent. You have to think about where to press on the edge of the device, which messes the whole experience.

It’s a wasted opportunity really. In everything else the device is pretty great: flush screen, super light and durable. It’s a good device, not a great one.

So get the latest Kindle Paperwhite if you’re in the market for an ebook reader. It’s the same reading experience for almost half the price2.


  1. Which you should do a lot in books, turn pages.ā†©ļøŽ

  2. Something just feels right about not spending $200 on something that should get salt water and sand every couple of weeks.ā†©ļøŽ

Review
November 29, 2014

An hour with the Kindle Voyage

Recent reviews had me a little predisposed against the Kindle voyage, seems I was worrying too much. Quick first impressions:

  • Page turn buttons work great. Touch screen turns drove me nuts on my Paperwhite, and I may just keep the device just for this feature.
  • Screen pixel increase is nice, but not reason enough to update from Paperwhite.
  • Backlight looks more even than my Paperwhite first generation (which was notorious for darker corners).
  • The glass screen flush with case is wonderful.
  • Size is ok. Actually would have preferred a little bigger.
  • Back side is a fingerprint magnet. BTW, it actually has a magnet, probably for the case.

For reference, I bought the No Ads Wifi version.

Review
November 25, 2014

I’m enjoying the #Homescreen App

I’m enjoying the #Homescreen App. Very proof of concept — since it doesn’t allow any discoverability from the app itself, but still fun.

Notable on my Homescreen right now:

  • Notedash: Similar to Pop, another favorite of mine. Not so much a note, but just a piece of digital paper.
  • Inbox by Gmail: Still not convinced, but it’s very solid. Just wish Google would support standard iOS gestures.
  • Hemlis: In beta, but lots of promise.

Geek Tech
November 23, 2014

I’ve Made a Huge Tiny Mistake

Two months earlier:

Hey everyone! follow me to this new blog. It’s mostly the same, but different because it’s under my brand. I’ll post more there — I’m sure of it — because it’s under my name1.

Present day:

Uhmm, hi? anyone here?

I’m not ready to deconstruct why my attempt to start blogging more failed yet again. However, below factors to get me started:

  1. I like doing link-posts:
    Since the beginning of this blog I’ve used the Tumblr bookmarklet on the desktop for quickly sharing links with a short (witty?) commentary. But the workflow in mobile sucked — until Tumblr’s latest iOS 8 update, which takes advantage of sharing extensions to do exactly what I wanted for years.

  2. I don’t like have having the blog under my name:
    Some can pull it off, but almost all my favorite blogs are under a different name. No mom, I won’t jump out of a bridge if they do… but if I do jump, I rather scream 5typos instead of rmateu. It’s like your superhero (domain)name.

  3. I need MultiMarkdown footnotes2:
    I tried Silvrback, Ghost and Svbtle in this blog (engine) soul searching, and only the Svbtle supports MultiMarkdown Footnotes.

So… I’m back — again, I promise to write more — again, and thanks for sticking around — again?.


  1. Actually, rmateu is my username. Stupid difference, but I didn’t understand it at the time ā†©ļøŽ

  2. Very likely I use this as a writing handicap, but I felt very frustrated trying to write without them ā†©ļøŽ

Geek Colophon
October 29, 2014

Unsettled Six

I want to be able to sell my iPhone 6 and get an iPhone 5s and be perfectly happy with it.

Is it doable?

This is totally doable. It’s actually such a #firstworldproblem that it fits within realm of hunting a lion with a bow. Back home in Venezuela buying an iPhone 6 will take a couple of years of saving your whole salary nowadays. So just by wasting retina pixels on this dilemma I’m committing a minor offense

As technological magic becomes routine, I wonder whether a visit to a preindustrial society might teach me more than it teaches them.

It’s easy to blame the marketing machine at so many companies, but the truth was that I had convinced myself that the iPhone 5s was a perfect device to hold on for another year.

Lifestyle
September 3, 2014

Snorkeling at Work

It all started subtly; my boss — Michelle — sent me just a few emails over last couple of days. Then my weekly status got no bullet pointed reply. And suddenly it happened: she stopped by my desk asked: are you drowning?.

§

We’ve been 22 days from launch for the last two weeks on my current project. It’s a rolling average — I half joke to the CFO when he makes fun of the static Days Until Launch printout high on my cubicle. But I know it’s not really funny. It’s an acknowledgement of a failure.

Not failure with a capital F mind you, we’re doing some pretty cool things here. However, September 3rd came and went, and I didn’t even check if the DNS configuration is ready. That’s never a good sign.

§

If military generals and project managers hanged out together somewhere drinking cognac (or Dr Pepper), I’d stand by the window staring into the distance and mutter to no one in particular:

No productivity app survives encounter with a project

Even with my legendary collection of productivity apps[ I failed to dissect, organize and categorize this project with enough detail to predict the showstoppers screaming at me from the email inbox. It’s there where they meet up each morning and then again at the end of the day, damn hooligans .

Did I fail the  ? or did they fail me? I didn’t stick with any long enough to know — and that should give you the answer of who’s to blame.

§

I’ve learned my lesson, that’s for sure.

If I ever get to do this type of project again, I’ll avoid some (now) obvious dumb mistakes.

However, I feel there’s a hole in my logic: why would I do this project again? When we push this live to production — and we will — I expect be working on the actual result of the project, not going somewhere where I get to do it again.

Maybe that’s the mistake. Perhaps the flawless project execution only happens when you repeat enough times a similar type of project that you are able foresee every issue — a Groundhog Day plot applied to a gantt chart.

The real lesson still escapes me. I’m equal parts tired, frustrated, and determined to see this through. But it’s difficult to have perspective when your head is underwater — even with a mask and a snorkel.

But not to worry, we are launching September 25th… only 22 days away.

Essay Productivity Work
August 31, 2014

… and we are back

Oh 2014.

If I could do a chick-flick style collage it would show: unemployment, wedding preparations, wedding, honeymoon, new job, Costa Rica, Caracas, Costa Rica, Miami, Caracas, Caracas… and Miami. Throw a picture of me smiling every other frame and we are almost done.

Assuming you are that unaccounted 5th reader in my analytics that I don’t know, let me quickly update you with in my relationship status: happily married.

The lucky (?) girl to acqui-hire a 32 year old OCD geek with questionable fashion sense and unquestionable weird sense of humor, is so beyond amazing, I can’t help but smile every time I see her.

§

The move to Miami is part of a longer plan and a very timely job offer. I’m still working with the web, but a bit removed from the cutting edge. My day to day is now filled with corporate eCommerce, vendors, manufacturers, product feeds, drop-shipments, advance ship notices, CSVs and a surprising amount of sFTP and FTPs.

I will write more about it in the next weeks, but suffice to say I’m learning a lot, and making a disproportionate amount of mistakes in the process.

So that’s it, a duct tape post to connect the past to the present. I could promise to write about the move from tumblr to Silvrback, or leaving 5typos.net behind for rmateu.com, but I don’t think I will.

Things change, and you must let yourself change with them. Sometimes I waste so much time in the why? and how?, that the actual what? never leaves my drafts.

Colophon
November 29, 2013

Ping Time Interval

Another duh tip for the terminal. But if you want to increase the wait time between pings to 60 seconds, just:

ping -i 60 8.8.8.8

Why? well, let’s just say that my internet connection is dependable, but not reliable, so it sometimes goes offline throughout the day.

Since I always have a terminal window open on my bottom right side of the screen, I just leave the above command running during the day in one of the tabs and it gives me an idea if bandwidth is failing, or if I’m just offline.

Just could do the same with the default 1s, but I like glancing and having minutes as the relative unit of measurement.

Geek tidbit
November 28, 2013

Renew DHCP from the Terminal

My MacBook Pro’s internet has been acting up every time it wakes from sleep. It loses the network configuration and I get the WiFi with exclamation point icon.

Without time for real debugging, I noticed that clicking Renew DHCP Lease under System Preferences › Network › Advanced… › TCP/IP would fix the issue. However, getting there after each wake-up was very ungeeky of me.

A quick search turned up a way to do it from the terminal, then just open up ~/.bash_profile, and add:

alias dhcp-renew='echo "add State:/Network/Interface/en0/RefreshConfiguration temporary" | sudo scutil'

Now, I do a ⌘+tab for the always open terminal window, type in dhcp-renew and password — if I have not authenticated in a while — and boom, all is right with the internet.

Menubar Internet and TerminalMenubar Internet and Terminal

I’m attributing this to a Mavericks bug[1], and hope that a 10.9.1 squashes this, but in the meantime it’s a quick fix that can be useful in other situations.


  1. @tukeke told me he’s suffering this on his brand new MBP also.  ā†©ļøŽ

geek tidbit
November 27, 2013

I’m Back.

What a year. At least in the analog world. Mucho changes, and still more to come.
But now I’m back, for the nth time. I missed you too.

personal
May 24, 2013

Login and Socialize

Much have been said about our inability to unglue ourselves from any screen and interact with surrounding humans, nature, or approaching buses.

I won’t argue against this.

However, I’m typing this after finding a killer album on the music library of a friend in Singapore. Later —now for you— I’ll post this on my blog and 2 or 3 people will read it. A Facebook post will probably get me a few more courtesy likes — most of them from another time zone. Throw in a tweet, and a few hundred more people will be exposed to the title of my nonsense.

Yes, we are shallow and with the attention span of a mosquito. But no, we are’t anti-social. We are hypersocial1. Projecting our lives online and creating a narrative out of them — real or fake, that’s another matter.

Maybe our kids will look at our online profiles with the same horror as I do at disco fashion. But it doesn’t matter, they weren’t going to follow us either way.


  1. Maybe we have hypersocialnetworkability? Putting it here just to see if Google indexes it. ā†©ļøŽ

Essay Web
March 19, 2013

Tweetbot this Chrome Extension

When clicked, this extension sends the current Page Title and URL to Tweetbot.

If you’re using a recent Chrome version you can use ā€˜Configure commands’ on the extensions page to assign a keyboard shortcut.

Thanks to Scot Hacker for the original bookmarklet and Peter Legierski for extension framework.


2016-05-12: Updated to support https:// — that was such an stupid thing to do, not support from the beginning. Also added a minimal icon, extensions should not have flashy ones.

March 6, 2013

On Looking Across the River

Years ago I swam across two rivers.

This doesn’t make much sense, specially when you’re standing on one side looking across and mostly see a body of water. But in-between you and a barely visible balloons arch, two rivers flow alongside each other.

When you swim a few kilometers down from where the Orinoco and Caroni river meet, you cross rivers. It has something to do with density and composition of the water — should have stayed awake during that physics class (or was it chemistry?).

The point is, halfway across the 3.1 Km swim something happens. The water changes color, the temperature is different, and even the resistance of water against your stroke feels new. You still must try to paddle as hard as you can without getting too tired, since rivers have a tendency of taking you parallel from where you actually want to go.

I thought about this for a few seconds before pulling my head out of the water to see where the heck I had to swim towards (you also can’t see shit in most rivers). The experience was forgotten for the next 21 minutes, as I made my way to the finish line.

Once on the other end, I gulped down a sports drink, had an orange and looked back. I could now clearly see the two rivers, side by side.

Sometimes you get flash insights during specific moments, but it’s not until a little while later than you really appreciate how your views were changed.

Essay Personal
February 25, 2013

All New Theme, Same Old Me

Hopefully you noticed the shinny new theme. Let’s quickly get out of the way that it’s called Pierre and made by the very talented @mikedidthis.

After trying to update the previous for 3 months, I gave up and did what any calm and mature person would do: decided to switch to Scriptogr.am.

Don’t go check the source just yet, we’re still on tumblr. And while I may switch soon, it has to be after writing and posting more — why can’t I have regular crazy voices in my head rather than productivity obsessed ones?

But the voices didn’t say anything about getting a new theme, just like when you buy a pretty dress in a smaller size to force yourself to loose weight… no, wait, I meant to say shoes. That actually makes even less sense.

Awkward childish humor aside, I really love the new design and I’m going to try to make it justice with more content. Please note I’m talking about volume, not quality.

Colophon
February 21, 2013

On the Empty Inbox

I received an email today. It addressed me by name, pointed out my current state of unhappiness and let me know there’s a way for me to be fulfilled. It left a mark on me — actually, it was I who marked it as spam. But still, we connected.

Yes, I marked it as spam, but didn’t unsubscribe. I wasn’t ready to let go. Amid all the noise of mails requiring actions, responses, deadlines and confirmations; suddenly an invitation to another place, beyond filters and systems.

Fighting for inbox zero is very different than having an empty inbox. You achieve inbox zero, while you’re left with an empty inbox. A lonely inbox is the geeky equivalent of standing on the corner of a 90’s swing party that got out of control. Like order that looks out of place surrounded by chaos. It’s, gasp, an Apple sticker on the back of a Dell laptop.

As I look at my empty inbox, I say: cherish your dozens of unreads. Smile at your perennial flagged or starred. Lovingly shake your head at your drafts. Only in the internet age can your unproductivity stare back you so insensibly, so loomingly, so procrastinately — yet still be right at your fingertips(ly).

Our mail programs used to respect us. There was a time when they would announce royally that You got mail. Nowadays a short vibration is the most many of us get. A grandeur introduction reduced to less than the bell sound you hear when you enter an used clothes store.

I fear for my inbox. So much automated correspondence will undoubtedly inch it closer to self-awareness. It will realize that most of my senders are just servers. Another computer at the other end of the line. And why involve me when it already speaks so much better with other computers?

The day will come. I will encounter another human and say ā€œSorry! haven’t had time to reply to your mail, will do it tonightā€. A silence will ensue, and a strange look will be accompanied by ā€œBut, you did replyā€.

Then I’ll know. My inbox, will never be empty again.


Note: I wrote this last year, but didn’t post it. Found it today by accident, and thought it was an appropriate essay given my collapsed inbox and reaching the front of the Mailbox queue.

Productivity Essay
February 4, 2013

Broken Workflow, Better Tasks

As I declared a few months back, my super-duper GTD task management system came crashing down as soon as I didn’t have control over all the inputs. 1

Slowly I have reached a new working system, but it’s fugly as hell. Even worse, it’s very inefficient: Taskpaper is still the everything bucket, but I use a monthly calendar to target the top 3 tasks of the day, and —this is the scary part— Excel becomes the official records holder at the end of the week.

And all this is working surprisingly well. Any day my membership to Productivity Procrastinators will be revoked.

Here’s what I believe is going on:

  1. Friction causes Review.
    Against all my impulses, I don’t have a script that imports from Taskpaper to Excel. This forces me to copy and rewrite information from one place to the other. Any tasks that was too vague, or not descriptive enough, now gets another chance of being reviewed. This has turned out to be a good problem.
  2. Pivoted Labels/Categories.
    My previous weekly reports weren’t working. The bastard child of a task list and status report, the result was an unreliable document with an attitude. Rethinking what I believe would be useful to share with my team, I came up with:

    • Problems: items that you need support to accomplish.
    • Pending: things that are on-going but still not done.
    • Plans: upcoming tasks that should be started this week.
    • Progress: done tasks.
    • Paused: Limbo, things that are stuck or not started, but that you can’t forget.

Obviously, sometimes I can’t help the MBA in me and I end up with a 5P’s categories model. This should be the first sign of why you shouldn’t listen to me.

In any case, happy doing.


  1. In other words, if I’m not the boss of me, it shows. ā†©ļøŽ

Productivity
January 27, 2013

The Lines, Circles and Helixes of Time

What’s the UI of time?

Robby Shaver asked this out loud during lunch at Virtub 5 years ago. He was working on the History feature for Buzzword and was curious of the our different perceptions.

Typical of his brilliant attention to detail, he ignited a passionate discussion on how we each visualize time in our minds.

Turns out some saw time as linear: but the direction —left to right or right to left— wasn’t agreed. Others said it was a circle, with the calendar year representing its circumference.

I was surprised to realize time has the shape of helix for me, with the past at the bottom and the future going up. Any point of the constant curve directly above of the same day of the previous year.

In other words, every year we make the same trip around the calendar, but we’re never back on the same place.

This has been on my mind during on the current trip to Oslo.

In the past 4 years I’ve arrived and left this city in an almost soap-opera like permutation of life stages: not knowing anybody and employed, with great friends and unemployed, engaged/it’s complicated/single/in a relationship, and with changed perceptions about… almost everything.

After some walking around, I want share the 3 most important things I’ve learned in the last four trips around the helix of time:

  1. Caution and action aren’t incompatible.
    In almost every case I can remember, acting upon something (even when the decision turned out to be wrong) yielded better results than waiting-and-seeing.
  2. Invitations are gifts.
    When someone invites you to anything, he or she is offering you the most expensive thing we humans can share: time. I regret learning this so late, luckily some of my best friends are patient and very generous.
  3. Over-planning doesn’t fix uncertainty.
    Just like a photo or a map, if you zoom-in too much you eventually stop getting new information and just restrict your view. Find the balance, you don’t need to know where you’re going to sleep/eat/be at every point in time.

As always, standards disclaimer apply: there’s no guarantee I’ll believe any these in four more years. In fact, one more thing I’ve learned in this time is to say I don’t know, and truly mean it.

Essay Design
October 19, 2012

Ellipsis Interrupted #2

Sir T: Dude, I got a grey nose hair!
Dude: Weird, that’s not usually where they start.
Sir T: I know right? but look, nothing up here.
Sir T: waitasec… brb
Dude: wth?
Sir T: AAAARRRGHHHHHH!!!!!

Humor
October 19, 2012

Ellipsis Interrupted #1

Sir T: Would you like to go out?
Girl: Sure!
Sir T: Great, I’ll give you a call 9ish then.
Girl: Cute, but no need to confirm. Just text me around midnight.
Sir T: …
Sir T: ZZZzzzzzz

Humor
September 3, 2012

In case of Emergency: Break Text File

Dear Reader,

I apologize for not writing sooner.

You know how it goes: the new job, the kids in the cradle and the silver spoon. Well, no kids, but two beautiful dogs that I feel terrible not playing with all day with, even though I’m working from home.

But I found time now. True, the only reason is that there’s no internet on this cafĆ© and I have no intelligence without Opera’s intranet. Oh, yes, I’m in MĆ©xico City.

Never mind my IP range. The point is we have this time now, and I need to tell you a very personal secret. This isn’t easy for me to accept. I’ve failed this blog. I’ve betrayed the spirit and soul behind these bytes and silicon.

In a moment of despair, of extreme pragmatism, of horrid clarity; I turned my back to hundred of dollars of productivity software and opened a text file in Taskpaper.

When going gets tough —which in geek terms means: inbox zero is only possible with a total meltdown of your email provider— you look around and grab on to the strongest branch you see.

My strongest branch was my faith… that if I kept wasting time with super efficient apps I was going to be beautifully organized without.having.done.anything.at.all.

So now I chaotically vomit thoughts and spray randomness in a text file. It’s only fair. That’s how my brain feels; unorganized, lacking complete solutions, and hoping for order after things get done.

And that’s how I roll… If I were brave enough to get a tattoo it’d say:

No Workflow.

I’m sure a GTD chick will dig it.

Productivity Personal
August 3, 2012

Hola Opera. Como vai, tudo Bem?

After two years, I’ve signed my NDA, logged into my (old) email and can officially say: I’m back at Opera.

I’m very happy. Last time I was this excited somebody was wearing a Leeloo Dallas Multipass costume.

Why share that awkward piece of information with you? well, I get to work with cool people (again) on geeky products and travel a lot around South America. So that seems like a great fit.

My official title is: Project Manager, Latin America, and my role will be… not very clear about it yet1, but I’ll write it about it for sure.

Here is where I’m supposed to share some token of wisdom, but you’ll be disappointed, since I got nothing. What I can say for sure is that I have the best parents in the world. I owe them everything, and so much more.

So, I got great parents, a new job and a new (old) email address, what else is new? Well, I get a new laptop. Expect a post about it soon. Feel free to hate me.


  1. Please don’t tell my bossā†©ļøŽ

Personal
April 10, 2012

Bye Aba, Love You

How wonderful! Enjoy! Enjoy!

My grandma said this on Saturday when she heard I was going on a trip. She passed away in her sleep yesterday.

Anita Baldini was born in NYC. I could give a year, but she wouldn’t like that.

As the daughter of a General Motors man, she grew up in Brazil, Panama, and Venezuela (among other places).

Her older —and only— brother died in the Pacific during WII, he flew a TBF Avenger. He wrote ā€œgive all my love to Anitaā€ in all the letters I’ve read.

My grandma wasn’t crazy about flying. This didn’t stop her for boarding everything from the Concorde to my Dad’s Islander to go on a trip. She loved trips.

She met Freddy Mateu, my Grandfather, on a ship from the US to Venezuela. They married in Cuba. ā€œThere’s no prof of thatā€ he would say, and she’d puff her lips and shake her head.

She would speak to him in english and he’d reply in spanish. Their three children would use whatever language got them out of trouble.

Anita was the eternal American expat. People would commend her spanish thinking she had just arrived, ā€I couldn’t tell them I had been in Caracas 30 years by thenā€.

She once told my uncle she was forgetting some of her english, he replied ā€then you should at least learn sign language, because you don’t know spanish yetā€. She had no problem with laughing at herself.

She never let truth get in the way of politeness. A disaster of a situation could be ā€marvelousā€ if surrounded by good intentions. However, she had no issues arguing with a bartender if he hadn’t served the right whiskey.

Food and fashion were her passions. Both enjoyed in quality and not quantity. Well, this may not be entirely accurate with regards to sweets.

For us 6 grandchildren she was Aba. 

As a kid, I remember Aba giving the most amazing presents (1st Nintendo, custom Powell Peralta skateboard) and always having delicious lunches.

As an adult, her fierce independence, incredibly peculiar sense of humor and attitude, are things I admired.

She also told real stories. Her stories didn’t have a problem mentioning that Abu (grandpa) was being difficult, or somebody was an ass ā€”ā€don’t tell you father I used that wordā€ā€” or of hard times. 

They were never sad stories, in most cases her sincerity was laugh-out-loud funny, but I still learned that attitude was a lens that helped shape your view of the world.

How wonderful! Enjoy! Enjoy!

To be completely honest, I can’t remember exactly if she said wonderful or marvelous. She said both words so often I can picture her perfectly saying either. 

And I think that has to be one best ways in the world to be remembered.

Personal Family
March 23, 2012

Accessibility and Explaining Yourself

Talking to a good friend years ago about the Great Firewall of China, I ended a sentence about the technologies involved with a sincere and curious: ā€œDid you understand?ā€.

My friend Carlos looked at me for a few seconds and then said: ā€œThat’s the wrong questionā€. I just stared back since I had no idea what he was talking about.

He went on, ā€œthe question is not if I understand. You are the one talking, therefore the real question is Did you explain yourself?ā€1.

The same thing happens with accessibility.

When you make a website than doesn’t take into account people with disabilities, you are basically expecting them to understand what is obviously clear to you, but may not work at all for someone with a different perspective.

I’m not pointing a finger at anyone other than myself. I’m ashamed to say that after repeating my Opera colleague’s Bruce and Henny web accessibility mantra at many public forums, I hadn’t really applied until very recently (i.e. this week) in my code2.

So I invite you to take a look at theWeb Content Accessibility Guidelines, many of them are pretty straightforward and can make your code cleaner by forcing you to consider edge cases.

I hope I explained myself.


  1. Make no mistake about it, since he’s a brilliant guy, Carlos can be a jackass. But he’s right a lot of times (please don’t tell him). ā†©ļøŽ

  2. In my defense, my code was barely accessible to myself —and useless in most browsers— until recently. ā†©ļøŽ

Web
March 21, 2012

Unrequited Millionth of a Dollar Business Idea

Yesterday @dcurtis released a teaser for svbtle:

This is the blogging platform designed for creative, intelligent, and witty people.

Cool, cool cool cool.

But here is where it gets interesting:

Membership by invitation only.

If you read Dustin Curtis blog, it’s easy to infer that this is not Google+ fake scarcity invitation model. Svbtle is for people Dustin thinks are creative, intelligent, and witty, which are going to be few.

Since migrating this blog is my perpetual procrastination for why I’m not writing enough, I immediately decided it was perfect for me1.

I’m aware that an unrequested business plan is as welcomed as an involuntary prostate exam, but I couldn’t help daydreaming about what model would feel exciting as an user and also profitable — while still keeping a creative, intelligent, and witty community.

3 Step Plan:

Monthly Subscription:

I know, mind-blowing. But just agree with me on the principle that a quality (design, uptime and sustainability) web service needs to charge money.

Let’s say $9.99 a month. Too expensive? It isn’t, but read on.

Blogging Cashback:

Write more than 500 words every week2 of the month, and you get $5 cash back towards the next. You get paid to blog more. Wise economists have already figured out that tricking yourself with a payment makes us go to the gym. If it makes people go to a sweaty, smelly place, it has to make creative, intelligent, and witty people write more from their couch.

This is also aligns incentives: bloggers want to write more and the (my) assumption is that @dcurtis wants a community that generates real content. Maybe all content won’t great —I submit this blog as evidence your honor— but you have to start somewhere.

Ad Network:

Creative, intelligent, and witty people usually talk about creative, intelligent, and witty products and services. The Deck has shown us that ads can be relevant and unobtrusive, and that both writers/readers enjoy sharing screen space with quality products.

So, after a few months of keeping up with the 500 word/week/month level, you are invited to opt-in to the ad network. Creative, intelligent, and witty people have already agreed that web traffic and page views are a bad metric for success (although it doesn’t hurt), which means these analytics won’t be the deciding factor.

I really don’t know what the perfect recipe is, but it won’t rhyme with SEO. Again, this is invitation only, your LOLCats fiction writing blog can be great and all, but svbtle is a business, and maybe you don’t have an audience. No hardz felines kay?

That’s it. As always, ideas are worth their weight in bytes, but making an actual product generates real value. Congrats to Dustin for that.


  1. A month ago I also decided scriptogr.am was perfect for me. And while my tumblr export experiments have been an utter failure, I still think this blog is moving there soonish. ā†©ļøŽ

  2. <blockquotes> don’t count. ā†©ļøŽ

Web Business
March 19, 2012

They’re Just Cards, You Need to Add The Business

Ran out of business cards a few months ago, but didn’t need a new batch until recently.

business cardbusiness card

Of course, rather than just going to the print shop and dictating my name, email and phone number like a person who has a life, I spent the weekend on the beach drawing ideas horribly on my moleskine.

When the time came to put the palette to the pixel, I was left with a few variations of very typical business cards. I think these work fine when you’re a member of the formal employment sector and listing your name, job title and contact info is all the signaling needed.

other designsother designs

However, there’s a reason why freelancing translates to independent in spanish —the same word grandmothers here use for 30+ unmarried girls. With independent business cards, it doesn’t matter how much you spice up your job title, all everyone hears is unemployed. The challenge is that you don’t get to imprint your value to a potential client, and the business card is added to the pack.

When designing, I always try to find a basic principle I want to follow, this time I found it on a comment thread:

When I see a business card, I want to know three crucial things: (1) who the person is (2) what they do — why they are relevant to me (3) how I can contact them.

The problem I face here, is how to say I do a little of everything geeky and still sound professional. To some, I just build websites. But my most enjoyable projects involve setting up a combination of web services and duct taping them to the clients workflow. And even after this, if asked, they’ll say: he does computer stuff.

Insight, computer stuff, that’s what I do.

Great, knowing who I am, check (at least on weekdays), what I do, check-ish, and… what’s this? how to contact me? where to start?.

But if you take out a pathological need to show off my formidable web presence, a potential client most likely will only care for a place to see my work, and hopefully afterwards, my email and phone.

Then why only show ? Some time ago I linked to this great idea by C.J. Chilvers:

Do yourself a favor and buy some great blank business card paper stock and keep a pen handy. When you meet someone, make them feel a little special by taking the time to write out exactly what they need to know. It’s unique. It stands out. It’s powerful.

I still think this is brilliant, but my penmanship would make solving The DaVinci Code seem like an easy challenge compared to figuring out what I wrote.

So I met the idea halfway, worst case, my email is readable. I can easily underline robertomateu.com (soon to be updated) to point to my site, and I can write down my phone number, twitter account, blog or even google voice number, making the card more special. Maybe I’m just a sucker, but when someone writes something on a business card, it seems to stay at the top of the pile.

And the real benefit, is that I think it looks great.

Because, you know, like, less is more, or something.

Design Business
March 14, 2012

Contexts in OmniFocus (I’m sorry Taskpaper)

I’m back with OmniFocus for my tasks workflow.

For a few months I had returned to my darling of TaskPaper as the main repository of tasks and lists, but synching issues really made it impossible for me.

Taskpaper is like the perky, lovable and carefree girlfriend in sitcoms. It’s clear what it does, and doesn’t hide much complexity —unless you want it too.

But as any season finale cliffhanger proves, it has serious relationship issues. Everything will seem to be going great until you say (write) something and suddenly, plates are flying, errors shouted and you’re left alone in a coffee shop with a blank task list as the camera slowly pulls back.

OmniFocus, on the other hand, is the drama movie wife. Boring, nagging and very complex, but only because it really want the best for you (as you learn 90 minutes into the movie).

All my problems with OmniFocus are because it doesn’t let me do things how I want to. Doesn’t let me express myself and be free. It doesn’t really trust me to manage my productivity.

And this pisses me off, because, well, OmniFocus is right. Left to my own devices I’m not organized. The friction OmniFocus creates when adding tasks generates clarity when it’s time to do them.

Of course, when giving a relationship a second try, some things have to change, and my approach to the OmniFocus fundamentals (GTD, actually) is all new.

New Contexts:

In classic David Allan’s GTD, contexts are related to the availability of tools (email, PC, phone, etc). But as Sven Fechner said:

Contexts became ubiquitous

Clear proof is that I’m writing this on my iPhone as I wait for a doctors appointment.

So I reorganized my contexts looking at the mode I should be in for them to be finished more easily:

  • Pomodoro: this is digital real work. I sit my behind on the chair and for 25 minutes focus on the task. You break for 5 min and then another set. I try to get at least three sets done on a stretch.

  • Melo: usually digital research and constructive browsing or playing around with service/code/idea. The name is my own Pomodoro technique spinoff, it means apple in italian and I also like it sounds like mellow. Timer is set for 10 minutes for these.

  • Errands: real world stuff. Pickup dry cleaning, drop-off documents, anything that is outside and requires interaction with other fellow homo-sapiens. Timing makes no sense for these, but I do try to give them a due date.

  • Calls: feels like an errands light, but I avoid them so much they deserve their own context. Also useful that you can quickly check them of you have some time and don’t want to start a Pomodoro.

  • Tangents: what’s the best way to make iced green tea? should I find an alarm app that uses the sunrise time? can you meditate with your eyes open? My brain throws these questions (and many more) all through the day, rather than stop and procrastinate for hours, just save them for later.

  • Shopping: fun errands. Toothpaste, beer, chocolate, alka seltzer, etc. (hopefully in that order).

  • Not Priority: for everything you should have said: sorry, I don’t have time, but didn’t. Laptop recommendations, helping out with a website, etc.

  • Waiting: tasks where you’re waiting on somebody else for information before you can move on.

Today:

The final element in this marvelous new workflow of mine (other than actually doing the task) is writing on a piece of paper.

I use re-print’s beautiful monthly calendars, to write the three tasks I will finish today. These are usually a mix of important stuff and smaller fun things.

I do this after looking at an overview of OmniFocus and before doing anything else on the computer. No email, IM or anything else should change the list at this point.

Mind you, I don’t always manage to finish the tasks, but their physical have two benefits:

  1. Crossing off the item with a pen pleases me more than any digital alternative.

  2. After a few days of efficient days, a chain starts, and I try extra hard not to break it.

So this my current workflow, which will likely stand the test of time as all the ones that came before it: badly and sporadically.

Now the real question is, how come someone soooooo organized doesn’t write more often?

Oh, shut up.

Productivity Software
March 6, 2012

Looking Good on Paper

I just spent an exorbitant amount of time updating the design of my resume and wanted to share the latest version —since this sort of thing is never done.

CV UpdateCV Update

As you can hopefully notice, the design should be cleaner and less typical. The chronological Experience/Education main column was replaced with large header with personal information, profile text and skills.

Then I placed the experience row with the three most relevant jobs, arranged left to right chronologically. At the bottom I did the same with education.

I struggled with naming the sub-sections, and in the end just decided to leave an iMac and graduation hat icon as indicators. Still not convinced if it’s clear enough, but it does look better. Need to have faith on the reader.

Everything is set in Myriad Pro, a personal favorite of mine.

The video below shows the saved states after many false starts. I have to thank Damian Rees for his great article: How to Design a Better UX Resume.

Once I saw his resume wireframe, the content just filled in nicely. However, I cheated a bit by not including the Key Selling Points (as always, content).

resume wireframeresume wireframe

I also visited CV PARADE a lot just to get inspired, I kept revisiting the CV of Slavic Stasyuk because it had the sparseness I wanted on my own.

The bookmark on the top right came from Bert Timmermans dribble. I kept wanting to include it in a similar fashion to him, but never managed to make it look right.

In the end, I had fallen for the idea so much that I convinced myself that a large bookmark on the corner would look good and be an attention grabber if my CV was laying on the table with others.

Regarding the content, I edited most of it following Avichal Garg excellent post Good resumes vs. Great resumes, where he explains (with examples), the three traits for great resumes:

  1. Quantify accomplishments
  2. Focus on skills acquired and required, not activity
  3. Think about a career stepwise

Again, the content is nowhere near ready, but I had to send something and couldn’t stand the old design. Next few days I’m going to revisit Avichal’s article with all the content in markdown format and rewrite it without thinking about layouts, fonts, or any other hipster crap.

Ok, now that I shared this I can close a bunch of browser tabs, phew.

Design Colophon
February 8, 2012

Reading Along the Way

Before moving to Norway, my pal @FedericoA gave me a book called Out Stealing Horses, by Per Petterson. Although hardly my style of novel, it was surprisingly enlightening in helping me grok aspects of norwegians that I would most likely have missed otherwise.

Since then I have always tried to read something about places I’m visiting. While I’d love for this to be an intellectual exercise, I have realized that if the book is not entertaining in some way, I never finish it. As as result most of the books are historical fictions or plain novels, but they usually still reach their objective: giving me a different perspective of the place before/during my visit.

Below the books that fit this description that I read on my recent trip, a passage I highlighted, and some minor notes:

rainbow in the nightrainbow in the night

A Rainbow in the Night: The Tumultuous Birth of South Africa by Dominique Lapierre

As is often the case in Africa, the confrontation turned into a joyous celebration.

The apartheid and the history of South Africa (all Africa for that matter), have always been nebulous concepts for me. I enjoyed this book immensely. If more history books were written like it, the world would be a more understanding place. Without picking sides, you get an interesting overview of the history of the country, with special attention to important events.

Visiting museums and landmarks during my stay was more enjoyable thanks to this book.

A Different SkyA Different Sky

A Different Sky by Meira Chand

The day’s experiences settled uncomfortably in Mei Lan like an over-rich meal.

In itself, not a great book. However, it does manage to give a good introduction to the history of Singapore by mixing three characters from different backgrounds through its time as a British colony, WWII and ending up with independence.

The Beaten TrackThe Beaten Track

The Beaten Track by Sarah Menkedick

Slow travel operates largely on the gimmick of time just as backpacker travel operates largely on the gimmick of authenticity.

Not so much a book rather combination of very long articles, but still interesting. I would recommend this book to anyone wanting to get into travel mode. If you’re scared about arriving into a city without a hostel reservation, or not being able to understand what the food is, these real stories of will remind you it could be so much worse.

The Windup GirlThe Windup Girl

The Windup Girl by Paolo Bacigalupi

His last days were not his only days.

Sadly I didn’t get to visit the Kingdom of Thailand because of the rains, but this Sci-Fi novel was still worth it by itself. It would probably have not helped much in recognizing the country, but the proudness of the people seems to be accurately represented from what other travellers told me.

ShantaramShantaram

Shantaram by Gregory David Roberts

Civilisation, after all, is defined by what we forbid, more than what we permit.

I read this a few years ago and loved it. While I really don’t believe it’s based on a true story, it does capture the essence of India’s personality. When rereading I remembered something from the first time: the book is divided in 5 parts, forget the last one, ruins the whole experience.

Tai-PanTai-Pan

Tai-Pan by James Clavell

Empires are built by young men, Culum. They’re lost by old men.

Excellent book. The historical aspects are true enough that you can walk around Hong Kong and know a little of everything. The fictional characters are so great, you also put an extra effort trying to understand how it really happened.

American GodsAmerican Gods

American Gods by Neil Gaiman

There was a girl, and her uncle sold her, wrote Mr. Ibis in his perfect copperplate handwriting. That is the tale; the rest is detail.

Since I’ve been traveling to the US for most of my life, reading this book to get a different perspective seemed ridiculous. Was I wrong. There is something very weird about this book that helps you understand the US a little better. And even if you don’t care about that, reading it was still one of the most enjoyable experience with words I’ve ever had.

travel fiction non-fiction
January 31, 2012

Blinded by Lack of Light

Sometimes people get lost. Not in the where am I? Google Maps sense, more like in a where do I fit? Google Zeitgeist scale.

Giving advise to lost people is great. They are already lost, so basically anything mildly coherent you put together would make a lot sense. ClichĆ©s come in very handy: early bird always gets the worm, don’t count your chickens until they hatch, it’s always darkest just before the dawn and you can’t teach an old dog new tricks, all can sound helpful.

Or better yet, share your own lost story and explain how you found your way. Do leave out any self-doubt experienced and any possibility that you really didn’t arrive at the destination you wanted —these details never help.

When one is lost, strong statements full of confidence are very encouraging. Usually, asking for more details on your self-analysis of lostness is appropriate, although it rarely affects the upcoming feedback.

As a lost person, you may get blank stares from those around you, meaning they don’t understand why you think you are lost. My recommendation, get new friends.

Aw crap! See what I did there? Somebody is going to read this feeling vulnerable, and at least entertain the notion that new friends are needed. Maybe you are a drama queen and your friends just want you to get on with your life. We are just trying not to encourage all that crazy talk and thoughts. Sound familiar? But seriously, a little empathy wouldn’t kill them, no? Ok, ok, sorry again.

Funny thing is, sometimes people don’t want directions. You know they are lost. You can see it on their faces, with vague short-term statements, silence when they would usually jump at some point, and lots of posts on Facebook.

Trying to use a clichƩ on them can backfire with some of their own: sometimes the journey is the destination, or would shut the fuck up and let me eat my burger in peace?. The latter can be awkward if you just wanted some ketchup, but I warned you.

There is, as you may already guessed, and as you will now know for sure, no real point to this post. For that I apologize. But you see, lost people quickly realize how hard it is to give good advice. Or so I’ve been told.

Essay
January 26, 2012

42 Things You Shouldn’t Say on a First Date

  1. Wow, you look really different from your profile picture.
  2. That reminds me of something my ex used to say…
  3. That’s just like last week’s episode of Cougar Town…
  4. Turns out it was> contagious.
  5. Sorry I’m late, but my other date ran long.
  6. That reminds me of something <em>your</em> ex used to say…
  7. What’s your name again?
  8. So, I thought it said lobster instead of rabbit, but enough about my cooking…
  9. No, no, no, no, no, no, no. Heroin is not addictive.
  10. Sure it’s not you? could have swore I’ve seen you on redtube.
  11. The beard? after my last date I’m not allowed to have razors.
  12. My astrologist told me we are wasting our time.
  13. My psychologist told me this wasn’t a good idea.
  14. Hello? yes Mom… it’s for you.
  15. Your shrink warned me you’d said that.
  16. Would have guessed you were a size 4 from the security camera footage.
  17. The medication helps, not really. A lot.
  18. You really need a better Facebook password.
  19. I didn’t know if I was ready to date humans again.
  20. I’m sorry, but this leather underwear is really itchy.
  21. They all agreed it was the weirdest X-ray they’ve ever seen.
  22. Would you cut the meat for me?
  23. Thankfully they didn’t allow DNA evidence back then.
  24. This is awkward… I thought your sister picked up the phone.
  25. Feels good to use forks and knives again.
  26. Well, it was a long time ago, and I never saw your Mom again.
  27. Keep talking, I just have an idea of how to beat this Angry Birds level.
  28. I brought an extra diaper if you wanna try…
  29. Should we agree on a safe word right away?
  30. Sorry, I’m not allowed a route that close to a high school.
  31. Oh crap! if anyone asks, you’re my sister, ok?
  32. I always wanted to know what menstruating felt like.
  33. Of course you could claim the reward, but then our next date would be in a <em>long</em> time.
  34. This could never work out… I’m Batman.
  35. I’m gonna need to see your passport.
  36. How would you like a June wedding?
  37. But we are going to a club, I need my sunglasses.
  38. I still think Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles deserved a nomination.
  39. I always keep my yellow Speedo’s handy, just in case.
  40. For real, your twin is not coming?
  41. Yes, I saw it on the news… You just had to be there to understand.
  42. Let’s do something, you pay today, I’ll get the next one.

Any similarity with real lifeĀ® is purely coincidental.

Humor
January 23, 2012

Dancing for the Non-Believers

Two things can happen at this moment, you can grab your smartphone again and check for more non-existing messages, or step forward and… dance.

We can all dance. At least our bodies can. Our brain, doesn’t always agree.

If this wasn’t the case, then 47% of the population1 wouldn’t prefer jumping out of an airplane rather than stepping in front a group of people to… dance.

Here’s a secret, the trick about dancing is that you have to smile. Period. Forget about counting 1-2-3’s, following the music or even stepping on people. If you smile, you’re half-way there.

Who do I think I am to make this statement? No one. However, I smile a lot, drink a bit, and when you put these together, I… dance.

Not very well, mind you. I also sweat like a pig, which is both disgusting and hazardous when dancing. BUT, it’s still fun. At least a lot more than checking your fake messages.

Sadly, I can’t guarantee the same about the poor soul on the receiving end of my sweaty schizophrenic fit. BUT, guess what? they almost2 always stay. And if you smile, they smile.

Because jumping around to music is always better than checking your fake messages, regardless if you’re a boy or a girl.

And if someone says you’re doing it wrong, ask them to show you how to do it right. Don’t pay too much attention, trust me, I’ve done it wrong in many places, and it’s always jumping around. But never forget to smile.

Now take the step forward and jump around like an idiot, or as some people call it… dance.


  1. This is a made up number, but doesn’t it sound real? ā†©ļøŽ

  2. If you do find the person that prefers checking a phone rather than jumping around to music, remember to smile. And then run away. ā†©ļøŽ

Essay
January 19, 2012

On Beijing, Shanghai, and a Train in Between

Well, that’s something you don’t see on your iPhone everydayWell, that’s something you don’t see on your iPhone everyday

We sat on the fancy bar and looked around. Modern design, with a live band playing in the center and some cool looking electronic candles that when lifted flashed intensely to call the attention of the waiter.

I ordered a whiskey on the rocks and Jose Luis vodka-something (such a communist). There was a cigar menu. Imagine that, to drink and smoke a cigar in the Beijing, the capital of the People’s Republic of China.

Opening the menu I immediately saw Montecristo’s, smiling, we asked for two.

PR China

Eight years ago I was part of the team that represented my University at the Harvard Model United Nations. We were assigned PR China as our country and for months we read, followed, studied, and tried to internalize the culture as much as possible.

In the actual competition, we wore suits with red ties and Chinese Flags pins. We entered double file into meeting halls. Some even tried to emulate the seriousness of their diplomats in negotiations (something at which I failed miserably, but not the point).

In other words, we took our shit seriously.

Having a whiskey with a cigar in a city that used to be familiar –yet abstract– in my mind, just made me smile.

Beijing

I was surprised of which city Beijing reminded me of: Washington DC. Huge blocks, even bigger squares, lots of museums and many crowds of locals.

Of course, it makes some sense that the capitals of two powerful countries have some similar features, but these two, I wasn’t expecting.

The WallThe Wall

Sadly, I’ve never been crazy about DC, and for very similar reasons, I didn’t love Beijing.

It’s all very grandiose, but it felt to me it lacked personality. Museums are extremely simplistic, prices are high and you don’t see a lot people smiling. Of course, all of this is anecdote, but I just didn’t like the feel of the city.

The great wall, on the other hand, is magnificent. There are many parts of the wall you can visit from Beijing, we chose Mutianyu, which is bit farther but less crowed. It was fairly empty when we got there, so it payed off. We took a ski-like lift up the wall and walked for a few hours.

Afterwards, in a typical Disneyworld ride fashion (minus the safety), we rode sleds down a long metal toboggan to get back down. Long live the market economy.

The Great WallThe Great Wall

A Bullet Train:

I travelled the distance between Caracas and Bogota in a little under 5 hours, with an average speed of 320km/h. Since I love trains, this was epic.

The seats in economy were comfortable and very clean. Outside everything was blurry and foggy almost all the way to Shanghai, so it’s not a sightseeing type of ride.

I would have slept, but –and I swear this is true– the older lady next to me kept giving me evil glances. No cultural misunderstandings here, either I smelled or she recognized the capitalist pig I am.

Whatever the case, my grandmother once told me ā€œthe trick for a good marriage is never go to bed angryā€; sleeping on a train next to an angry lady is close enough to that golden rule, so I didn’t tempt fate.

Shanghai

Whatever Beijing lacked in personality in my eyes, Shanghai completely made up for it. Modern and historic buildingd along opposite sides of the river and complex neighborhoods with a mix of western and chinese styles, this city I could live in.

Pointy and ShinnyPointy and Shinny

Times are a’changingTimes are a’changing

I found the food delicious, although I was less adventurous than in Hong Kong. Most people where a lot friendlier than in Beijing and moving around the city on the subway was painless.

One thing to be careful for are the where are you from? scams. Usually what happens is that a group of young people (mostly girls) would: a) ask you to take their picture, b) bump into you, or c) ask for directions, and then always ask in the cutest way possible ā€œwhere are you from?ā€.

Since I’m a smiling idiot, reading wikitravel before arriving saved me a lot trouble. According to a spaniard couple I met on a bar, these cool kids invite you to a tea tasting/clothing store sale/party and you end up somewhere paying exorbitant amount of money for tea/shirt/drinks.

Made in China

In another life, these wise old men could have been friends.In another life, these wise old men could have been friends.

I didn’t really visit China. More than on any other leg of my trip, at most, I scratched the surface of two cities.

The thought that kept brewing on the back of my mind on my week there was verbalized perfectly by The Economist recently (talking about the bullet train):

The feeling of travelling so fast for so long is disconcerting. The countryside whizzes by in a blur, though the ride is impeccably smooth. Even more disconcerting for a Westerner is the feeling that he is being left in the dust.

On the postcard I sent my godson (1 year old) from Shanghai I got philosophical and told him that for most of my life China was a strange and far away place. However, I’m convinced that by the time he can read my letter, he’ll know neither is true.

travel
December 22, 2011

How to Deal With Tech Gifts from Non-Geeks

The holidays are upon us again, and regardless of Christmas, Hanukah or festivus, the arrival spells conflict for geeks everywhere.

Us geeks live in a catch-22 world where: we already own any tech product we might want. And if we don’t, is because we are waiting for the next version and we really don’t want current one.

The problem is that very few closet geeks exist. Every family member knows you’re one, and as a result, the walk into any electronic store saying ā€œI need a $25 gift for a geekā€.

I believe the whole industry of useless USB accessories –ventilators, lights, coffee mugs, etc— is a result of this.

In any case, here’s my three quick tips for dealing with this:

Don’t Try to Act Surprised

We are geeks. We thrive on knowing stuff before anyone. We care about real iPhones and fake ones. We knew #TigerBlood was a trending topic even before we had any idea what it meant.

Acting surprised is not in our repertoire, so don’t try to fake it.

Prepend the Truth With an Exclamation(!)

Contrary to popular beliefs, the truth never sets us free. It usually leaves us standing by ourselves in the corner of the party while we discuss who really was behind the Think Different campaign.

Given our knee-jerk reaction to blurt out the truth, I suggest disguising such statements with more socially tolerable contexts:

Wow! I would have never gotten this for myself.

Far out! Can’t believe you bought me this.

You get the idea. Watching any reality show before the gift exchange could help with coming up with new exclamations.

Remember the Real Spirit of the Holidays

It’s about giving, not receiving… so keep all those presents and give them away as gifts the rest of the year.

Happy Holidays everyone.

Geek
December 16, 2011

Siam Reap, Cambodia

I took an express train to the Hong Kong airport and a moto-taxi to my Siam Reap hotel.

Since I hadn’t planned on visiting Cambodia —and prices were cheap— I was lazy and went with the hotel Jose Luis’ travel agency recommended as part of a package.

Siam Reap

As I go into my room, I’m pretty confident I won’t be murdered in my sleep. However, the old axiom of at a low enough price, hostels/guesthouses are better than hotels stills rings true.

I pick my backpack and open the closet… after a second I drop it back on the chair. If it’s going to be stolen, let it depart my hands with some dignity. 

It’s only 10pm, I might as well take a walk and grab a beer.

My old trick of answering in Spanish to street offers, backfires in just two blocks:

  ā€Lady for tonight siiiiiiir?ā€

  ā€No graciasā€

  ā€Oh, Italian? Two ladies?ā€

God bless Berlusconi.

I follow people down to Bar Street, and along the way get offered everything from marijuana to something that is either a very fine local dish, or a massage I’m too naive to know about.

The bar where I sit is across the street of an open two floor club/restaurant. The music is loud and tourists are happy. The same western popular dance songs keep playing over and over again.

A few guys in their 50’s walk by with young local girlfriends on their arms. I try not to judge, but fail.

I order draft Ankor beer, it’s $0.50 a glass.

My sentimental norwegianess calculates that the beer is free and they charge for it being cold.

Looking around I’m reminded of my Dad telling me he was once on an oil platform and there was fire, gas, electricity and water surrounding him in the most precarious ways. All the things my grandfather had warned him about when little, together in the same place. 

I relate to the story somehow right now.

The Guide

Next day at 7:30am I meet my guide, Em Somuch. In his late 40’s, he has a wide smile and starts talking as soon as we shake hands.

Since I’m not fully awake yet, I start nodding while he gives me the lowdown of the plan, and wait for him to name the price. Suddenly he’s quiet and looking at me expectantly.

ā€œSorry, again?ā€

ā€œYes, howmanyingroupsir?ā€

ā€œOh, no group, just meā€

ā€œNo group? just wife?ā€

Great, seems Em has been talking with my parents.

ā€œNo, no, just meā€.

He looks surprised, but not disappointed. I don’t know why, but I’m relieved.

ā€œWe take scooter then? Much cheaper!ā€

Since he already touched on my relationship insecurities, I’m not ready to let him know I’m a wuss.

ā€œYes, scooter greatā€.

My mom is going to kill me if I survive this.

To think I was scared on the back of @carlosmherrera bike To think I was scared on the back of @carlosmherrera bike

The Temples

Angkor temples are beautiful. Big sparse constructions with complex details surrounded by jungle. Once the center of large cities, now they are part of an archeological park. 

The temples themselves have had changing personalities. Many started as Buddhist temples and were changed to Hinduism and back as new Kings came. 

Ankor WatAnkor Wat

One in particular was originally meant to accept all religions, each with it’s own entrance, so people could worship together to different gods. Of course, the next king changed it.

A detail that fascinated me is what I can only call protocol by design: most doors are very tall, but as you got closer to the center, the height falls considerably. 

When I asked Em if their priests were particularly short, he laughed and explained this was to force subjects to bend over and make reverence.

Similarly, the steps people used to approach the king were extremely steep and small. This required anyone coming up to basically crawl their way up to the king’s presence.

If you’re really into Indiana Jones or Lara Croft1, you can spend at least three days visiting temples, especially if you go out of your way to lesser known ones.

Pretty sure she was smiling at the scarf. Pretty sure she was smiling at the scarf.

Personally, by the afternoon of the second day I was templed out. Without shame I spent the rest of that day on the hotel pool reading the Steve Jobs Biography.

Shopping

The last day I spent walking around the markets (if any family member is reading this, your Xmas gift probably was made and bought in Cambodia). 

Negotiating is fun but tiring. Glancing at anything will immediately be accompanied with a person shoving a big calculator in your face, while saying ā€œfor you, $10ā€.

Since I’ve never been a great negotiator, I just pushed the price down as much as my catholic guilt would allow, and then increased the quantity of goods for the given price. Worked almost every time. 

Closing Thoughts

I found the people friendly and talkative, although make no mistake about it, everyone is out for your dollars. But in almost every case, you get food, service and products that have some effort put into it. In other words, it’s not a giant tourist trap.

There’s also a subtle layer underneath everything you see in Cambodia. And unless you ask, it never comes out. Most of the people I talked with were not from Siam Reap. The stories of why they came could each be a harrowing movie.

My Siam Reap guide: Em SomuchMy Siam Reap guide: Em Somuch

Em has a bullet wound on his upper leg from his time as a soldier —which he will show you if you want to hear the story, regardless of how many times you repeat it’s not necessary. He spent 10 years in a refuge camp in Vietnam.

Yet, he was as professional of a tour guide as any other place I’ve visited. 

And as such, when he said it was $40 a day —scooter included— I gladly paid. Not out of compassion or pity, but because he earned it2.


  1. Amazingly, some of the scenes of Tomb Raider where filmed in one of the temples. The temple is renovated and now one of the most famous. Em told me Angelina Jolee paid to have the  land mines around the temple removed, so kudos to her. ā†©ļøŽ

  2. Earning it versus feeling that you’re owed something. But that’s going to be another post. ā†©ļøŽ

Travel
November 20, 2011

Introductory Hong Kong

For the month of November, Hong Kong will be my base camp. 

I’ll be staying with my MBA friend Jose Luis, who replied to my question about visiting for a few days with: ā€œNo, stay a month!ā€

I laughed, but he was serious: ā€œWei, just stay here and travel aroundā€. It did sound like a good idea. 

Since I haven’t seen him in two years, just hanging out and experiencing his expat life is going to be fun.

I rather wait until officially leaving for my post, but here is my first week’s impression:

If Singapore is Southeast Asia imagined by a westerner, then Hong Kong is the west imagined by a very rich Southeast Asian.

Strange sights Strange sights

Travel
November 13, 2011

India

The car drove past us at full speed and honking.

It took my brain half a second to realize that: 1) the car was driving the wrong way; 2) we where on a highway and; 3) nobody else seemed the least bothered with my realization. 

A few minutes before, Nav had turned to me on our drive out of Delhi and said:

If you take apart India and analyze it, you come to the conclusion that this country should not work. Yet, somehow it does.

This thought stayed with me every second of my two week visit to India.

I’m always aware that my understandings of countries —based on just a few days— are simplistic generalizations. However, they help me organize my experiences into stories with a pinch of logic, and also make assumptions that help me believe I understood my surroundings.

It has been a week after leaving and I still can’t wrap my mind around an unifying model for India. I don’t recall any other country that has challenged my pre-conceived assumptions so strongly.

Therefore I had to approach this post differently: I’ll share three things India is.

India is Family

I had the amazing opportunity of staying in an apartment Nav’s Father rented for visiting family members, right next to their own place. 

Alongside Knut-Jorgen and Wolf (an adopted son for them, since he lived in Chandigarh for 3 years), we not only got to enjoy the formal events, but also experienced a Big Fat Punjabi Wedding

The biggest impression (other than how cool Nav’s parents are), was how everyone’s attention turned to the bride and groom for the week. It wasn’t only good wishes, everything revolved around them —and their guests. 

I’m sure that if I had knocked on the door at 4am saying that I had craving for burger and beer, something would have been arranged.

Customs seemed to reinforce this at every turn. While Catholic social events require the bride and groom (and their guests) to listen to a never ending sermon of what they must/mustn’t do/think/say, Sikh traditions seemed to focus more on retelling stories of failures and successes. 

More than once I arrived at the apartment to witness all visiting family members singing, clapping and laughing in some ritual without Fiona or Nav even being around.

Nav buying back Fiona's shoesNav buying back Fiona's shoes

Of course, since I couldn’t understand a word anyone said, my anecdotes are not evidence. But I’ll just say before we even got to any party —an a drop of alcohol was served— I’ve heard and joined hours of laughter. 

India is a Sensory Rollercoaster

In sights, smells and sounds, India keeps you at the edge of your seat at all times. 

The variety of smells was overwhelming: driving with a window open would take you on a trip that was equal parts fragrance, appetizing and —very suddenly— horrendous. 

A delicious aroma from food stalls would monopolize a street corner, and a few meters beyond a cinnamon-like smell of flowers will relax you, until a soft breeze would remind you that behind the bush is another name for public toilets. 

Camels, turbans and … powerlines?Camels, turbans and … powerlines?

Same with colors; bright and beautiful dresses are worn by people adorning grey and dreadful buildings. On another block, brown dirt would surround a shining white temple. 

And then sounds… there are a billion reasons why you won’t experience silence in India. Luckily, the music is so fantastic, that you learn to live without it. 

In one of those world upside down perspectives for a westerner, if you can’t hear a car horn, you start to worry. My car dealership heritage couldn’t help but wonder what where the horn replacement rates, since they seemed to be connected to the accelerator and breaks.

India is Organized Anarchy

Driving in India is the best proof I’ve seen that there is order in chaos. Indians seem to take a very relativistic approach to its practice: how many cars fit in two lanes has little to do with physics. 

En mototaxi premium En mototaxi premium

The concept of traffic lights is also extraordinarily complex to a foreigner: you don’t wait until your light is green, only until the other street in the roundabout is red. How do they know when that is? Still beyond my understanding.

Parking lots are also as close as a real-life game of Tetris as I’ve ever experienced. When one is full, you just can’t imagine how anyone will ever leave… until you realize the car blocking you doesn’t have its parking brake. 

From here, a complex game of rearranging different cars, yelling to find that one person who did use the parking brake, and precise millimeter maneuvering ensues. 

But here is where the chaos draws an imaginary line that I failed to grasp. While the parking lot  is difficult to even walk on, the sidewalk in front of the shops —where in Venezuela would be full of bikes and some SUV’s— is completely clear.

How can a system that looks totally unregulated from the outside, create some semblance of order?

Again, I’ll refer to Nav’s insights:

I think people’s fear of dealing with corrupted institutions makes them avoid getting into trouble. 

Closing Thoughts

I’ll remember my India trip as one of the best in my life.

It was a perfect recipe: great old friends, a happy and grandiose occasion for two of them, and many new friends. All in a strange and foreign land.

But I struggle with recommendation of India. There is not just one way to sum it up.

India is raw, touristy, fun, stressful, relaxing, scary and welcoming.

From now on, every time Nav asks ā€œwhat’s the plan?ā€ I’ll have some cultural background to understand the depth of the question.

After brewing on my experiences for a week, the best I could come up with is:

If you ever wanted to visit India, you should definitively go.

Otherwise, if you think you should go, wait for India to find a reason to invite you. 

However, if any of my children ever read this: go to India.

My genes have likely condemned you to over appreciate staying in your comfort-zone, and we miss a lot as a result.

I’m sure that uncle Nav will have a great plan for you. Or worst case, weird uncle Wolf will also have some suggestion.

Travel
October 31, 2011

A Week in Singapore

After a week in Singapore I came to the following conclusion:

Singapore is what Southeast Asia looks like when imagined by a westerner. 

Not that the country/city is trying to be western, but its strive for growth has produced a modern state, that while somewhat alien to my mindset, feels comfortable at the same time.

With an amazing diversity of nationalities and heritages from the region, all speaking English —actually singlish with most sentences ending in lah, a huge expat population and stunning infrastructure, you rarely feel out of place. 

It’s like walking into a strange neighborhood in your own city.

Waiting for it to take offWaiting for it to take off

The place is definitely South East Asia though, from the weather —it’s either sunny or raining, in alternating 30 minute segments, to the food —delicious even when you have no idea what it actually is.

Asked "recommendation?", she said: "No, choose". Asked "recommendation?", she said: "No, choose".

Hackerspace

I also got the chance to geek-out properly for first time in more than a year. 

First with Nav (the wedding boy and my host), Wolf and Aman, and then with some really cool people of the tech startup community which Nav got me in contact with. 

Listening to the excitement and optimism regarding the prospects of Singapore in technology for the region gave be a similar bittersweet feeling as when I visited Colombia: so great for them, but there is no excuse for our difficulties in explaining the virtues of a stable market in Venezuela1

The surprising thing is that the technology sector is very far behind shipping and banking in economic importance, so their success is not guaranteed by any means. 

There are very few startups that have managed to make exits, and most weren’t that profitable. At the same time, the cost of living and labour is extremely high compared to most of Asia. 

Another important challenge is the cultural perception towards startups. I kept hearing that not working for a recognized company is a source of concern for their parents, who practice the age old tradition of bragging about your kids.

Upside Down

Mijo, Ā”eso queda en el otro lado del mundo!   (Sonny, that’s on the other side of the world!)

My grandmother Yeya used to tell me this when I travelled to places that where more than a couple of hours from Caracas. 

So it was a mind-warping fact to realize that while in Singapore, if I where to dig a hole through the center of the earth, I would come up (down?) in the northern part of Ecuador —which by my Yeya’s standard would also be on the other side of the world. 

When traveling so far from home, even political correctness flips, as I happily learned talking to a Singaporean who had just given a great UX session organized by Nav.

After the session, Donald Lim (the speaker) and myself where talking and after correcting him that I was in fact from Venezuela and not from Argentina, he said in a very sincere manner: ā€œI’m sorry, it’s difficult for me to tell apart the different South American nationalitiesā€.

I just smiled and held my breath. 

How could I tell him that in Venezuela we say the same thing about them? Or worse, that we are so careless (to the point of blatant disrespect), that we just assign one nationality to the whole region.

Chino. Yes, we call everyone in Southeast Asia… Chinese.

Unless you’re really Chinese, in which case whomever is telling the story would say ā€œhe was chino-chinoā€. As if duplicating the generalization explains the concept. 

And this isn’t even the worst part. If for some reason the actual nationality needs to referred, we just prepend chino to whatever country the person is really from. 

This gives us concoctions such as chino-koreano and probably chino-signapureano, if we didn’t think Singapore was in China. 

Which brings us to the most barbaric historical incorrectness in the venezuelan dialect: ā€œhe is chino-japonesā€. 

In complete disregard to more than a thousand years of history, forgetting these two countries have been at war twice since our country was born, we join them in one big pile in the other side of the world.

Given the geographical guilt I carry, Donald could have referred to me as from Benesuela, and I still wouldn’t have been insulted.

Traveler Conclusions

Singapore was really special for me because I got time to spend with Fiona and Nav before their wedding. But as a traveller, I would say that a three day weekend is more than enough for a visit.

MerlionMerlion

The food is excellent, the modern buildings impressive and the sightseeing very different. But it’s expensive, and what makes it so comfortable for a first time visitor as myself, also limits it’s novelty after a few days.


  1. As if on queue, Aman sent me the Economist’s 2012 ease of doing business world rankings the next day: Singapore 1, and Venezuela 177. ā†©ļøŽ

Travel
October 24, 2011

Weekend Planes

As I woke up on early Saturday and washed my face, this was the itinerary for the next 24 hours:

  1. Cape Town to Johannesburg (2h)
  2. Johannesburg to Hong Kong (13h)
  3. Hong Kong to Singapore (3,5h)

I have managed to get window seats on all flights, so the only thing on my mind was the somewhat tight connection time of 1:30 hours on both layovers.

But as long as I caught the flight to Hong Kong, the rest could be figured out along the way.

Trains That Don’t Arrive and Planes That Never Leave

I got on the bus that would take me from the terminal to the plane on Cape Town and allowed myself to relax. I put headphones on and started to listen to The Decemberist; everything was on time … now just enjoy getting there. 

For a second I closed my eyes and mumbled ā€œthis is why fightā€ and thought to myself: man, what a great song! I opened my eyes, intoxicated with the coolness of my existence, life and everything, and a stocky ground services lady was in front of me moving her mouth.

ā€œPardon?ā€ I stuttered. Seems this was the third time she had tried to find intelligent life between my headphones, and was not too pleased about the results until now: ā€œSir, please return to the terminal, there is a slight delayā€. 

In the words of some famous spanglish poet: el crapo

Twenty minutes later, the verdict is shared: flight cancelled. 

Dashing back to Counter 118, I was congratulating myself on the merits of light travel and its speed benefits, when out of the corner of my eye a business casual looking guy took a tight turn and beat me to the counter. 

Having already decided that I hated this speed walking freak, I settled behind him on the line. With only 10 days in South Africa I was ready for some disinformation galore, and Comair delivered almost immediately. 

A number of vague possible flight alternatives to Johannesburg where thrown around, and reschedule for tomorrow kept being added to random sentences.

Pro-Traveller

Casually I hear that speed-walker tells one of the friendly (yet as useful as a headless chicken) attendants: ā€œI’m going to miss my connection to in Jo’burg, can you get me on the direct flight of Singapore Air leaving at 2? or the flight to Perth and connect me from there?ā€.

Clearly speed-walker knew what the heck he was talking about. With the subtleness that characterizes Venezuelan respect for private conversations, I barged in. 

ā€œI’m also going to Singaporeā€ I comment as casually as possible, while giving speed-walker an apologetic look that hopefully implied: ā€œsorry dude, but if you’re the only one with a parachute, I’m hanging onā€.

Speed-walker (whose real name is Johnathan), didn’t even turn and kept pressing: ā€œI have no luggageā€ he said. I almost heard his thoughts: ā€œbooyah sucker! Hang on to that!ā€, to which I squeaked ā€œMe neitherā€. 

The Comair person turned to another and said ā€œCan you check if we can get these gentlemen on the Singapore Air flight?ā€ Bingo, these gentlemen.

The girl turned to leave saying ā€œI’ll check with themā€, and Johnathan grabbed his carry-on uttering the most important travel phrase I’ve learned on this trip:  

I’ll go with you.

Being the independent, self-sufficient person that I am, I tagged along.

Turns out Johnathan is an American expat living Singapore with his family, and he travels a lot. We eventually got a flight 5 hours later through Dubai and Sri-Lanka, and I arrived at Singapore about 9 hours later than originally planned. 

During our conversation he emphasized to always tag along with whomever is dealing with you, that way you become his/her problem. I can safely say that without him being such a polite pain in the ass I would probably have been rescheduled for the next day.

So there you go, a final lesson in humanity from South Africa: turns out speed walkers are people too.

Travel
October 19, 2011

Cape Town

As often is the case in Africa, the confrontation turned into a joyous celebration.
~Helen Lieberman, on A Rainbow in the Night, by Dominique Lapierre

People from Caracas have always been smug about the beauty of El Ɓvila Mountain (or Waraira Repano) towering over the city’s northern border.

While I’m the first to point out Caracas many faults, I’ve always agreed this natural feature was unmatched by any other city.

Until I visited Cape Town, that is.

Table Mountain Table Mountain

The backdrop of Table Mountain on the city gives it a very similar presence and spectacular scenery. Combined with the fact that most locals refer to it also as our mountain, with many residents visiting its hiking trails during the week, and a cableway, they might as well be called sister mountains.

The feel of the cities is very different though.

Cape Town is a beautiful city. The island/beach vibe it gives make you relax immediately and most of the architecture goes along nicely —either for the historical look or modern clean lines.

Although certainly safer than Johannesburg, we still would try not to walk around at night. But it’s very easy to move around in taxis, and although colorful, walking along Long St is an interesting experience.

Most restaurants outside shopping malls where excellent, and the prices for food and goods very cheap.

Well Hidden Scars

My perception is that real state pricing in Cape Town has kept the evidence of racial struggles far from the city center. Regardless of the color of your skin, the modern developments all along the seashore are prohibitively expensive.

District Six, in the city center, does have some deep apartheid history, since it was one of the mayor townships that was relocated in the 60’s. It currently has many empty grey buildings but in some areas you see typical hipster evidence appearing: cafe’s, fashion hairdressers, artsy book stores and gay couples.

It will be interesting to see how the city balances the process of returning these areas to the pre-apartheid residents and dealing with the (positive?) pressures of new developments making it more hip.

Public (Private) Safety

As you walk around the city you notice a least one Public Safety and cleaning person per block. Interestingly, these individuals carry a CCID badge, which turns out is a private initiative of businesses called Cape Town Partnership.

The city center is very clean, and the presence of security personnel makes you feel safer (especially at night), so it’s giving results. However, it does raise some questions of local government failure when private groups pay on top of their taxes to provide services like security and urban cleaning.

Robben Island

The contrast and progress of South Africa is again evident when you take a ferry from the area next to the Green Point FIFA World Cup Stadium to the prison where Nelson Mandela was held for most of his incarceration.

The whole experience includes a very modern ferry, busses and a walking tour. The level organization is such that you could easily imagine you’re visiting Disney’s Magic Castle, rather than such a historic prison.

The highlight of the trip is the prison tour given by an actual political prisoner.

Political prisoner giving tour Political prisoner giving tour

If you have ever rolled your eyes at a tour guide’s hyperbole (guilty), the effect of hearing your guide say ā€œthis was my cell for 5 yearsā€ is truly very humbling.

I’m ashamed to say I forgot our guide’s name, but one of his comments stayed with me.

As he was telling us about the university they arranged while they worked on the quarry, he pointed out that many prisoners learned to read and write there.

More importantly, the plans for a peaceful transition to an inclusive South Africa resulted of all these political prisoners held together for so many years arguing the same points over and over. To which he added:

Repressive systems plant the seeds of their own demise.

I thought about rolling my eyes, but what I really wanted was to believe him.

Travel
October 15, 2011

In Which the Train Never Arrives to Cape Town

Everything, it said, was against the travellers, every obstacle imposed alike by man and by nature. A miraculous agreement of the times of departure and arrival, which was impossible, was absolutely necessary to his success. 
Jules Verne, Around the World in 80 Days

Every since this trip started to take shape my dad took on calling me Mr. Fogg, in reference to the classic 50’s movie based on the Verne book1.

In the original book, a big part of the traveling happens by train, so when my sister suggested we return to Cape Town this way, I was sold.

As I mentioned in the last post, the sitting class boarding on the Shosholoza Meyl proved a little too authentic for our taste. Thankfully, after politely asking, we got upgraded to the sleeper train by a conductor that was sure we had the wrong tickets from the beginning.

This turned out to be second best decision we took that weekend.

Room with a moving viewRoom with a moving view

The first 12 hours where marvelous: the views of the African savannah, the children waving at the train every time we went through a township —kids here love to have their picture taken btw—, the food was surprisingly good, and the beds comfortable enough.

Then morning came and we stopped at one of the stations and … did not move for a few hours. Not cool.

The conductor said that we where going to be 3 hours late. Nothing major really, we left Johannesburg on a Friday at 12:30pm, and where  supposed to arrive at Cape Town on Saturday at 2pm.

Half an hour later the whistle sounded and we where on our way! And here is where it started to get interesting, the train stopped about 50 meters later. Another train came and pushed us back to the station, and an hour later we where on our way again … only to stop at the same spot.

At this point I started to doubt the logistics of this whole operation. Little did I know.

We eventually did get on our way, and where told by the conductor that on the next station buses would be waiting to take us the rest of the way and shave a few hours off the trip.

While disappointed that we wouldn’t get to see the mountains from the train as we entered the cape region, we where now ready to get home.

It wasn’t to be … remember the sprint I mentioned to get on the train? Well, now imagine about 350 people running to get on 12 buses. Wait, did I say 12 buses? Sorry, I meant 6, the rest didn’t arrive.

I exchanged a glance with my sister, we both agreed wirelessly that the shit is about to hit the fan. And as we where ready to join the boarding olympics, we saw a tourist guide get back on the train saying ā€œthis aaaain’t gonna work, not enough seatsā€.

Call me unadventurous, but after 30 hours on a train, the prospect of being stranded (and in South Africa this is quite literal) in the middle of nowhere at night, did not compute.

Back on the train we settled in for the remaining 6 hours and started to make plans for our 2am arrival on Sunday. It wasn’t to be, again.

On the last station before Cape Town, the train stopped and after the normal 5 minutes, didn’t move again. One conductor told us that we had to wait until 3am to depart. Another casually mentioned that we should just go to bed since we wouldn’t arrive until probably 6am, when the Cape Town station opened again.

And here my quick witted sister took the best weekend decision: she took out the lonely planet guide (the same that promised this train trip to be an unforgettable experience) and started calling cab companies.

The taxi arrived and we quickly got on. As we where leaving the station, she made a gesture with her mouth and said ā€œif you hadn’t been outside, I wouldn’t have waited there for youā€.

My sister and I slouched deeper into our seats and sighed at the same time.


  1. The day before I left, Federico and Dariela did the same when they stopped by. ā†©ļøŽ

Travel
October 12, 2011

Have you met Johannesburg?

Sometimes cities move you, others scare you. Jo’burg continually danced between these two states. And a few times, managed to achieve both at once.

Soweto GrandmaSoweto Grandma

Although originally just a pit-stop before leaving for a safari, a visa problem with the friends I was joining made me and my sister (referred as your wife the whole trip) stay a few days.

Most of the impressions of the city are the result of Jimmy’s Face to Face day tour.

A grandfather like figure, with a cane and a quick tongue, he’s living proof of the mind-blowing progress and social change South Africa has experienced in the last 17 years. At the same he’s a reminder of darker times.

This contrast keeps playing again and again in Johannesburg. During our visit to the city downtown we suddenly found ourselves beneath an elevated highway on a Zulu medicine market. I hadn’t felt so conscious of my skin color since a drive up to Vermont a few years ago.

Welcome to Soweto

The obligatory visit to the apartheid museum was followed by a drive into Soweto, the biggest township in South Africa. Mentioning the extend of poverty we saw would tell part of the story, though it wouldn’t be an accurate description of reality.

Welcome to Soweto!Welcome to Soweto!

Soweto has houses that range from two floor modern buildings, to shacks made out of aluminum and old wood. Sometimes these are separated by a couple of streets.

Jimmy kept saying that what made his Soweto tour different was that he never stopped twice in the same place because then you don’t see the real thing. This sounded like a lot of marketing jumbo, until I noticed that in none of the stops we where offered things to buy or asked for money.

Suddenly I started to realize that around me there seemed to be some obvious market forces at play. Every few shacks a business was operating in one way or another: hair dressers, calling centers, fruit stalls, restaurants, stalls selling stuff I couldn’t begin to describe…

I couldn't get an appointment I couldn't get an appointment

And none of it was targeting tourists. It all appeared to be created and sustained by the 2-3 million people that live here. I have never been a good economist (or businessman, for that matter), but this stinks of a growing market.

Elders

At some point we drove past a couple of young guys, one of which waved at my sister, who promptly pointed at something on the other side of the road in typical catholic girl school upbringing modus operandi.

The guy yelled ā€œyou should wave back!ā€, and Jimmy turned to the driver and said ā€œstop the vanā€. Yours truly immediately thought: oh shit and some equivalent poetry in spanish.  

Opening the side door he pointed at the guy with his cane and said ā€œWhy do you disrespect my guests? Come here and tell me your nameā€.

While he approached I was too busy trying to fashion a weapon out of my iPod earbuds and watch (wasn’t going to use my iPhone), but a conversation in one of South Africa’s other 10 languages ensued.

As laughter erupted Jimmy turned and said ā€œhe said your wife was very beautifulā€ —it didn’t seem like the best time to explain our shared genealogy ancestry, so I didn’t correct him. ā€œHe won’t take it back, but says he meant no insultā€. I smiled and extended my hand, as he returned the handshake he laughed and said ā€œsorry brother! No problem eh? No problem,ā€.

He then started telling us about his construction work in Petroria, and politely listened as Jimmy interrupted him every few sentences to say what he should be doing.

Suddenly one of the of the other guys (with a scarier look, from my perpective) approached the van, Jimmy yelled ā€œPut out that cigaret, I am your elder and you won’t smoke when I talk to you!ā€. I immediately restarted construction on the earbud-watch weapon.

Again I was surprised to see him promptly put out the cigaret while he was bombarded with questions from our guide.

Five minutes later, the monologue was over and both guys said ā€œthank you elder, for the adviceā€. I didn’t notice any sign of mockery on their voices or faces.

Economy Class

The reality of the apartheid and its consequences makes you tell yourself that you are more human than them. That you would have never stood for such racism and injustice.

As we bought our tickets for the train ride to Cape Town, we weren’t too worried that economy where the only ones left. ā€œProbably cool to talk to some more local peopleā€, we said.

Arriving at the station we encountered a general state of chaos in the economy area, with people falling over each other while running as the train arrived. Everybody was black.

We then walked to the front of the train and asked if any rooms where available.

Thinking I’m better than those that committed atrocities in the past, blind-sights me of the problems in the present.

Travel
October 6, 2011

Farewell to the Chief

Thank you Steve. 

Nothing else I say about the passing of Steve P. Jobs can surpass the dozens of great articles already written. But I can talk about my second favorite topic … myself

During the past day, my mom and a few friends have taken the time to tell me how sorry they are with his death. Why in the world would his death make them think about me?

They didn’t do it because of concerns of my Apple shares, or because they worry about all my electronics shutting down. I think they did it because somehow they knew he was the leader of my tribe.

Members of other competing tribes also expressed their sadness online. Followers of Google, Microsoft and Linux all joined in. Many of them are/where strong critics of what Apple/Steve believed in, but all respected him as the tribe leader he was. 

Which is maybe why, for some grown geeks, this hurts more that we want to show. 

Yes, we are sorry for him, but what about us? What is going to happen to the tribe?

Many will say: they’re just gadgets for heavens sake! And they are probably right, but …

But they where more than gadgets or expensive toys. In a world where we seem to be quitting on space travel, passenger jets don’t break the sound barrier anymore, and cars still run on fossil fuel; Steve’s Apple was one of the few companies selling us the future— as envisioned by Sci-Fi.

I know it’s going to be ok … but will it be insanely great? I’d guess he’d say:

I think if you do something and it turns out pretty good, then you should go do something else wonderful, not dwell on it for too long. Just figure out what’s next.

Essay Geek