I feel the Christmas spirit already

and it is different than the "Romanian Christmas spirit"...everything is so nicely decorated...there are lights everywhere in the city (white ones, not very coloured like we have them home)...shops have changed their displays...and we went to a Christmas market. Yulin played the drums and some other instruments that I don't know how to call:) in an orchestra...I saw her performing for the first time.Big event!!!! there were lots of people in the street and carols, hot drinks everywhere...very nice! I am looking forward for the Christmas market in Goteborg (Dorinda, Yulin, Viviane, Janine and me). We are gonna drive in the morning and be back in time for the Christmas party in Akademien. We were told not to miss it, coz it's really good and since Swedes don't lie...

Lots of things going...

Last Wednesday Movember was fun...I will upload some photos later:) coz they will say more than I can describe. On Thursay I've been with Jan (my next door neighbour and one of my friends here) to Karlssons (Soprano Night with the Business students) - it was nice. On Friday me and Yulin had a very short trip to Huskvarna. Good things to see there: poneys on the street, houses built on high hills and that's about it...Then we returned to our favorite place:Jönköping and went for Fika at Larssons'(Yulin's contact family). This was the best part of our day...We drank glögg (hot wine with almonds and raisins and some other secret stuff) and we aet pepparkakor and Rosa's favorite sandwiches. Yulin played the piano for us, then we looked at some family photo album. The bonds in their family are very close. Rosa and Sven are grand-grand parents and they are very active and full of life. When I am with them I don't feel they are just some old people. They are very open and nice to us. I am glad I met them and get the chance to see a Swedish family. I can't wait for our next Fika.
Friday night....Bongo Bar...weird...Erik went to Australia.
Then Saturday Ceyhun's friends arrived from Istanbul so we had to give them a warm welcome party in Centrum Bar...which was better then other times, but still not interested in the "meat market"(this is how some ppl call Centrum).
Sunday deserves a special post...Later...now I have to go pay the internet and do some stuff

Wheee

Finished my first shit...Maybe I got to excited by the idea and I hurried the process a bit...but this is the result...Only showed it to two of my neighbours and they think I am on serious drugs and they suggested I should find other activities, like cleaning their rooms and stuff like this...not interested...I am in scrapbooking mood now! Don't care how long is gonna last. I enjoy it for now! Back to my Intercultural Communication essay...and then pre-party in Vilhelmsro and at 8 in Akademien to watch the guys getting rid of their ugly beirds for Movember (raising money for the prostate cancer in the campus area). We paid them to do this for a double purpose, right? Tonight they will look better for sure! Can't wait to see Mattias without the facial hair!!!!

Scrapbooking...my first try today

Scrapbooking will help me tell stories about me and what is happening to me in a visual an tactile way...I hope my skills will help me create almost the "stories" that I have in mind...like I imagine them...I will let you know soon if my creative mood is any good for my new activity. As predictable, my first work of art is going to be PINK!

I need more light...

It definitely gets dark too early here...today I had a project meeting with Linda from Australia, one of the coolest persons around. We will write an essay about Miscommunication in the intercultural context. So, we will do some research and then gather and make a very good work and get an A. After the meeting I went with Yulin to Nyfiket for fika (coffee break). Having fika is a very common activity here and Swedes drink big quantities of coffee. It was our first Fika in this place and we liked it. Its costumers are mostly "artists"...friendly people and not very expensive. I like having fika and I think from now on I will go in a new place every other time...They opened some new places in town the other days. So, we have alternatives

Vilhelmsro - the place to be

My view

After

Before

Locuiesc din august in Jönköping, orasul de care m-am atasat foarte mult. E un oras mic situat in jurul unui lac -Vättern, al doilea ca marime in Suedia. E mare si frumos si cateodata cu valuri. De la mine de pe geam il vad...asta in zilele cand e ceata si cand sunt acasa inainte de trei dupa-masa:) Zona orasului in care stau se numeste Vihelmsro si e o zona foarte linistita...prea linistita pentru o casa de studenti. Vecinii nostri sunt foarte batrani si mai avem in preajma lost of house for disabled people. Oricum daca busurile ar circula mai des aici ar fi perfect. Casa nu arata ca si caminurile noastre deloc...Am aproximativ 80 de vecini...Ii cunosc pe cei mai multi dintre ei, cu exceptia unor asiatici care nu socializeaza cu noi...no offence...Impart bucataria si baia de pe coridor cu inca 8 colegi, dar nu e stresant deloc. Ce facem aici cand nu suntem la scoala sau in club?Foarte multe chestii: lots of movies nights, gatim impreuna (best dinner Singaporean food - Yulin and coque-au-vin - Thomas), pre-parties and after-parties intotdeauna, zile de nastere, poker night, cereals breakfast party, taco night, batai cu zapada mai nou, decorating the common room cu cele mai ciudate chestii, project meetings and some other unexpected events. Petrecerile spontane sunt la ordinea zilei...dar e ok ca tinem cont cand se studiaza si cand nu. Pana acum nu m-a deranjat nici un chef. Dar in fiecare zi I get distracted de cate ceva sau cineva si asa ca studiul e mai ok la biblioteca...acolo you get distracted only my hot Swedish guys:))joking!!! Experimentez interculturalitatea in fiecare zi...sper sa nu creeze dependenta.:) Nu am aplicat pentru locul asta, dar am fost sa vizitez celalte doua case de studenti si nu cred ca mi-ar fi placut mai mult altundeva. Locuiesc cu people from Turkey, Slovenia, UK, Rusia, Polonia, USA, Canada, Germany, Japan, Singapore, Finlanda, Australia, Belgia, Elvetia and no Swedes. O sa imi lipseasca locul asta...

Pentru fetele mele preferate

Dragele mele Cari, Paula si Ade, cred ca ati fost de multe ori dezamagite de blogul meu...sorry for that...I will keep you updated from now on...ma gandesc mult la voi!!!abia astept sa povestim! vreau detalii despre noile voastre activitati. sper ca la scoala nu va stresati prea tare!si mai sper ca veniti la banchet! facem impreuna cu Jurna?oricum ne petrecem noi impreuna...Swedish style:))Sper sa ne vedem before Christmas...nu stiu exact cand plec!M-am atasat mult de locul asta si de oamenii de aici. Mi-am facut cativa prieteni faini. Orasul e frumos si la scoala imi place...azi am avut ultimul examen si dup-aia voi mai avea numai proiecte si prezentari pentru Intercultural Communication and I will start also working for my Degree Paper. sounds like fun! Sper sa imi gasesc o tema faina, oricum imi place domeniul comunicarii interculturale, so I will be fine! I miss studying and doing some PR stuff. Found some good books here. Probabil ca le voi xeroxa pe cateva, daca nu apuca sa le termin. Biblioteca de aici e amazingggggg...deci chiar iti vine sa stai sa citesti. E un mediu perfect! I love it! Cred ca nu e nevoie sa explic lipsa mea in lumea blogurilor....anyway I am back with more energy than ever! Sper sa ma cititi pentru ca sigur voi fi mai activa...there were too many things happening asa ca nu stiam despre care sa mai scriu;) enough of an explanation?maybe not...I'll be back...Love ya!!!

my first "snowkid" in Sweden

I woke up this moring at 7.30 to revise for my Mass Media Studies exam after 3 hours and a half of sleep and lots of Coke...but it wasn't as bad as I expected....the view outside was amazing...all white! So, I was actually in the mood for the lousy exam, which by the way went well...After the exam I went to eat Libanese Food in a place near school with my favorite Turkish classmates: Alihan and Emir.:) The big event of the is that me and Yulin made a
snowkid...her first! This is why we decided to make a small one...actually, too lazy. Now it's already dark for a while...the snow brings a bit of brightness, which is good and I decide it's for me to share my "intercultural adventure" with you! it's great!!!!

I will like the technological accessories

Why do we use technology for? Fun, entertainment, everybody else does, it is like a dare to know how to use it, we really need it? No matter which is the answer we all want to make our lives easier and save our time. I personally would really like to have a cool accessory, looking like a bracelet with a touch screen which could help me do all the housework, or at least the cooking part. This would be great. (If I would work in a company creating this accessories I would make discounts for students for sure, so that they can dedicate more time having fun and studying). This bracelet will be linked to the household items. It will like a new fashionable universal remote, with reminders and also voice warnings. And maybe we could also use it to open the garage door, the mailbox and everywhere inside the house area. Of course, it will have an attractive design, available even with Swarovski crystals and different colors. When I used to be little I imagined that in the future we would have robots doing the work for us, but now I think robots are out of date and not cool. They would be more difficult to control and would use more space than the bracelets. I think they will attract both men and women. Some people like accessories very much so for them is an extra reason to be more “trendy” and for those who dislike being accessorized they would just be the gadgets they must have to save time and energy. I don’t know how my future laptop will look like, but I’m sure it is going to be less heavy than the one I have. I think many technological “toys” will change because people like to show their creativity in this field, which I see as being a good thing. If it is more fun and not very difficult to use the new gadgets I believe these changes are positive. And I think people will get more and more used with adopting technology and not being scared of it. I hope I’m going to have a good time discovering the new creations and not spend too much time reading their user’s manuals.

The Semantic Web - revolution of new possibilities

I had problems searching things one the World Wide Web many times. And sometimes I wondered why isn´t the computer smarter or why isn´t there any program that I can use that helps me find the information I need easier. We have these kind of problems because the words we use as hints for our searches don´t have a semantic content to our computers. Computers are not reliable when it comes to meanings.
The Semantic Web would definitely make our searches easier to get. The main characteristic of the World Wide Web it´s is universality and the links are its´ elements. Non-discrimination should also be one of its´ characteristics. Its´aim is the human consumption in the first place and secondly it is a source of databases, programs and sensor output.
For a Semantic Web to work we need the access to structured collections of information and some inference rules that they can use. There is a common knowledge representation system but it needs to work using some rules and codes and even then there are still going to be unanswerable questions. But this doesn´t scare the Semantic Web researchers. What makes the SW different is providing a language that expresses both data and rules and that allows knowledge-representations to be imported on the Web.
Sometimes we don´t get the right meanings of what the others are trying to say. This is why the SW need ontologies, understood as documents that define the relations among terms. These can solve confusions by providing equivalence relations. They also help manipulating the information.
What SW promotes is synergy, accuracy of web searches, flexibility, less time wasted, reliability. The main idea which can make it work is reducing information to get closer to what we are looking for.
Developing a SW is important because it may assist the evolution of human knowledge as a whole, using a unifying language. I hope we will have such a web really soon!

The Long Tail - article by Chris Anderson

Consumers’ tastes and behaviors can surprise the marketers anytime. This happens especially when both parts realize that consumers’ tastes are not the mainstream trends. But which exactly are these trends? What the author is trying to emphasize is that some of the potential good works (movies, books…) are not widely spread because there is no certainty that they will have consumers and from this the producers bigger budgets. When the risk of not having readers, viewers, spectators exists those who want to make money are very careful.
What it is strange is the need we sometimes have to access something different than the mainstream. Anyway, hit-driven economics could not deal with everyone’s tastes. This is why there was a need for a different kind of business: Long Tail.
A long tail business works by some rules: Make everything available (mainstream and non-mainstream products), Cut the price in half. Now lower it (Prices should be according to the effort and the money invested in the process of making products available, because we all like to make a good business and some of us spend a lot of time looking for a cheaper and qualitative opition), Help me find it (suggesting what else we could listen, customizing our options). These rules follow a certain logic which should be the logic of any entertainment business.
Another problem discussed in the article, which is, was and it is going tp be actual for a long time is related to our choice when it comes to music. Do we buy the original CDs´, the pirated ones, buy songs online or we download it for free? In this, the retail music suffers the biggest loses because now there are lots of networks which provide us music for free. I think everyone downloaded music or movies illegally at least once from one of these kind of networks and had the experience of low quality, being something else than what they were looking for, no sound, taking ages or other disadvantages like this. So, when it comes to this it is our choice how much money, time or patience we want to invest.

Romania´s day in Jönköping

The presentation of our country was very good. We (Andra, Cristi, Mihai, Laurentiu and me) managed to show people that we have a beautiful country with lots of places worth visiting. We also offered people some traditional food, but only some dishes that are not so complicated to cook. The complicated ones are also a reason why people should visit our country. We also told people the real story of Dracula (who is just a character created by Bram Stoker, who was inspired by the name of Vlad The Impaler - also called Draculea, one of the voievods of the sixteenth century) and that they don´t need to wear garlic in their pokets when they come to Romania. It was fun! Here you can see some photos from the event http://www.flickr.com/gp/11293052@N04/36Yr9j

It´s weekend

Today I finished recording for the 50th time my presentation for my Tehnological Autobiography. (Chris, thanks for you help).What a relieve. I had school every day this week and I think is was the most busy week of all the weeks spent in Jönköping. I´m a bit tired, but I´m still going out tonight at Akademien for tacos and probably also in a club because today it is Tukka´s (Finland) and Mattew´s (Belgium) birthday (they live with me in Vilhelmsro). This weekend I have to study for my Swedish exam and I have to continue reading ``The Inmates are Running the Asylum`` and I definitely have to clean up my room.

"Triumph of the Nerds" - my reflections

“PC”, “IBM”, “Intel”, “Bill Gates”, “Compaq”, “Microsoft”, "Adobe", "Internet" are words used by everyone on every day’s life and known by very many people. Now we can take advantage of the multiple uses of personal computers, but I don’t think most of us know the story behind this great gadgets. Honestly, I was never interested how the process of creating the PC developed, but many times I thought the some computer freaks did a good job.
Let’s make computers for fun!
I think the story of the computer nerds is really interesting and it is worth watching it. As it is important to know about the history of your country, about important moments of the World’s history I believe it is important to know about the PC’s history because it has become a very important part of our life.
I see these computer nerds (people who use a computer in order to use a computer; for their own fun) like good examples of dedication. They are dedicated when it comes to their goal, they work together, they put together every effort, sharing everything so that they succeed faster in creating the “toys” they want. The fact that they had this communities was really good because it was easier for them to communicate and maybe this is the one of the reasons which contributed to the fact that we have PCs’ today. The spirit they had, sometimes influenced by the hippie movement also helped them to succeed. As Bill Gates said they made “works of love”. They were determined to create de personal computers because they wanted to have fun. It is interesting to see that they didn’t do it for the money they could get out of it. These “leaders of a revolution” did an extraordinary thing and made the world better.
Let’s make computers for money!
Although now we all now the computers are a very well developed business, I thing it is important to know which are the roots of the business (the common effort of the young nerd, as their hobby). I believe that the “suits” appear in this computer field is not a bad thing because the nerds needed some guidance. And I see the business peoples’ involvement in this as an accelerator for what we have today in the computers’ field.
One interesting aspect of the computer business is that buying a piece of the computer later is less expensive and does more. This is why they have to be sold quick to avoid to lower prices.
Another thing that makes this business a good one is that every day some parts of your computer can be updated and this means of course more money. When I bought my first computer I knew that there is going to be a moment when I would have to invest for better uses and more applications which work faster.

The reaction of the media is also presented in the movie and the main idea of all the articles is that computers are the future. They really are the present and the future. I’m really curious what kind of laptop I will use in ten years.

Another aspect which I find interesting to follow in this movie is the need of the people involved in the computer business to improve the computers. They wanted them to be faster, easier to use, more fun, more user friendly, having killer applications. Almost all the time there was a need for the next level. Which is going to be the next level of the computer technology we use today? I can't wait to find out!

We interact with computers every day, even if sometimes we don't realise. They became part of our lives. Even when we use the credit cards to pay, we use computers. Most of us would not imagine their lives without Internet. So, using the computers makes us feel integrated in the society, an active part of it and a participant in our societies.

Cateva ganduri din prima luna petrecuta in Suedia

Mi-am dorit de cand eram mica sa ajung in Suedia. Visul meu s-a implinit in luna august. Am ajuns in Jönköping foarte de dimineata si am cautat Universitatea. In drumul spre scoala am vazut lacul Vättern. Pe malul lacului era foarte multa lume pentru ca era soare si aici oamenii sunt foarte bucurosi cand e insorit. Si eu ma bucur foarte mult de astfel de zile pentru ca ploua foarte des, dar nimeni nu se uita ciudat daca ai noroi pe pantofi:) In campus sunt patru scoli, biblioteca(imensa si unde gasesti si carti foarte noi si carti foarte vechi) si Studenternas Hus(locul unde se organizeaza evenimente culturale, unde poti bea ceva si manca, unde e magazinul cu obiecte cu logo-ul scolii, carti second hand si cateva calculatoare). Imi place foarte mult zona facultatii. Eu merg la School of Communication and Education, care e cea mai frumoasa;). Orasul e mic, dar destul de activ. Sunt foarte multi exchange students, ceea ce e bine pentru ca suntem ca o comunitate aici. Studentii suedezi sunt prietenosi, dar dupa cateva beri si cum la scoala nu beau, desi in barul scolii se vinde si bere. Sunt si unii care sunt interesati de noi, dar destul de putini. Eu ma integrez mai usor pentru ca toti cred ca sunt suedeza, dar simt ca au anumite retineri cand vad ca nu vorbesc suedeza.
Casa in care stau e ok. Locuiesc numai cu exchange students intr-o zona mai retrasa a orasului, unde busul vine o data la 30 de minute, dar e frumos. Avem vedere spre lac, un common room mare si mult chef de petrecere. Mi se pare ciudat sa locuiesc aici, alaturi de inca aproximativ alti 50 de tineri, dar imi place mult.
Pana luni am avut numai curs de suedeza, dar acum am inceput un curs care are o mai mare legatura cu comunicarea, pentru ca sunt mici sansele sa folosesc suedeza in comunicare. Deja avem teme, doua carti de citit ,de vizionat filme si multe teme de reflectie. Profii sunt tineri si ne trateaza bine.
Aici sunt foarte multe evenimente in fiecare saptamana. Se organizeaza petreceri tematice "Toga party", "White Party", "Pool Party"- the best party I've ever been to, "Beach Party" si altele. La Studendernas Hus in fiecare saptamana e o competitie, o expozitie sau prezentari de diferite feluri. Marti, 2 Octombrie, va fi prezentare Romaniei, am emotii, dar sunt sigur ca ne vom descurca. Suntem 4 studenti si speram sa reusim sa convingem macar cativa oameni ca Romania nu e chiar asa "fucked up" cum cred ei.
Am foarte multe de spus, dar cred ca post-ul e deja prea lung. Imi continui povestea mai tarziu.

My first post on my brand new blog

I´m in my Communication Technology class right now, my first course in Jönköping University, except for Swedish Language, Culture and Society. I hope it is going to be fun...My first assignment is already something that I would never expect to have to do at school. So, I already have this dare which is to create my techno autobiography. Some ideas already came to my mind and I think it is going to be interesting. I hope my imagination will help me doing a good job. I will let you know how my work developes.