Month: January 2011
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Classic Electronics: Das Model – Kraftwerk (1981)
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OQIYEPe6DWY&w=510&h=316] Kraftwerk has to be one of my all-time favorite. This is one of the most melodic and widely sampled piece by Kraftwerk. They released a German and an English version, and it reached No.1 in the UK singles chart in February 1982. Coldplay sampled The Model’s melody, see you can hear it. [youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W0uqLM1uj_k&w=510&h=316] I…
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Classic Electronics: Force Majeure – Tangerine Dream (1979)
Tangerine Dream is one of the bands that shaped my taste in electronic music. Apparently, the key musicians still perform together but have changed their style over the years. Their first few albums in the early 70’s are somewhat unlistenable as they are mostly long pieces of electronic noises which sounded futuristic at the time.…
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Joylessness in bronze
Outside the Museum für Gestaltung in Zürich (Museum of Design, Ausstellungsstr. 60) is a fountain and around the perimeter of it are several bronze statues. All are all looking at the fountain either with deep thoughts, heavy emotions, or a headache. One has apparently gone mad (or at least I think he has) and is…
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Arrival of a New Rice Cooker
(I started writing this more than a year ago when I was stilling living in the US; left it as a draft all this time, but we are about to visit Asia, so I’d better post it before it gets really stale) To an Asian, an electric rice cooker is an essential home appliance that…
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Emmigrating to China
This is an old blogpost that was written before I left NY about Chinese language in US schools, but forgot about it until now. Well, I like the artwork too. Apparently, according to this Jan 2010 NY Times article: Foreign Languages Fade in Class — Except Chinese., many schools in New York gave up teaching…
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Cat & iPad
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EYyXRiziHL8&fs=1&hl=en_US&rel=0] I do not have a cat. Nor do I have a iPad. But this video shows the fun you (and your cat) may have when you put them together.