Dropbox

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Dropbox!Meer en meer gebruiken we de computer alleen om een verbinding te leggen met het internet. Mail checken, bankzaken regelen, betalingen, bellen, videobellen, eventjes iets opzoeken, muziek beluisteren, films kijken, series downloaden, een boek lezen, een recept nakijken.

Wat nog ontbrak voor mij was een harde schijf die ik overal kan gebruiken. Ik stuurde wel eens bestanden naar mijn eigen email, zodat ik ze altijd bij de hand had, maar het kan toch gemakkelijker. Met Dropbox kan je gratis een harddiskje van 2GB maken, die je vanaf een willekeurige plek kan benaderen. Zelfs vanaf je smartphone!.

En extra leuk is dat je met allerlei zaken extra diskruimte kan verdienen. De tutorial doorlopen is goed voor 250MB extra. Zorgen dat iemand anders zich aanmeld via een referentie zorgt er ook voor dat de nieuwe persoon en ikzelf 250MB erbij krijgen. Erg goed bedacht.

A letter to Ingvar Kamprad

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Bendigo - chiringito!The situation with our ‘neighbors‘ is still the same and has not improved. Myself and my pregnant wife are getting more and more annoyed by the situation and by the lack of action undertaken by the parties involved.

It was my idea to send a letter to the owner of the property where the homeless were staying but it proved difficult to find the address of the world richest person, Ingvar. I did found out he had a foundation called INGKA that is under his supervision and that controls all administrative affairs of IKEA. A foundation that is actually located in the Netherlands. To this foundation I sent the following letter.

Dear Ingvar Kamprad or representative,

Although you will surely not know me, I would like to introduce myself shortly and address an issue that effects us both. My name is Adrie Berg, and I live in Las Palmas. Although I never had the pleasure of meeting you, we are in fact neighbors. I live next door to your property in the ‘Lope de Vega’ street. We have in fact been neighbors for the last 3 years that I live in Las Palmas even though no-one lived on your property during that time.

The view of my window is over your backyard and the small path you take to enter the backyard. The access to your garden is blocked by a big iron garden door. Sadly, the last few month my home is troubled by some homeless people that have taken refuge in your backyard. These homeless are demanding that we are quiet from around 7 o’clock at night because they leave the house around 6:30 in the morning. As a result my wife is uncomfortable in using the balcony of our own home.

We have talked to the police, but they will not act until the homeless person inflicts physical harm. We have also contacted the agency whose phone number appears on the building, but they don’t really seem to care about the situation.

My wife is pregnant and this raises concern and we would like to address this situation. My suggestion is that you either fix and sell the property which is in a beautiful area, or assign someone to take care of the property. If you want I can take care of this task, but you will need to provide me with some way to enforce my power over the property to remove the homeless, and make the property livable.

Please inform me that you will take appropriate steps the resolve this situation and feel free to contact me with any doubts or questions you might have.

Kind regards,
Adrie Berg

The question is whether this letter will ever be seen by the right person. I have my doubts and suspect it will end up unread in the trash but it doesn’t hurt to try.

Nesting urge

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Birds nest!Things are going quite well with little Pek and also his mother and father are doing well. Recently however Ana developed a strange treat. Nesting urge! I’m not sure how it started or where it came from, but I have a strong suspicion that it is related to some pregnancy hormone. Ana has a strong need to buy, improve, clean, paint and renew. More specifically, Ana want me to do all these things. This is how I ended up constructing an IKEA-box for our little baby 6 months early. Still waiting for me are a children’s cupboard and a special table to change babies.

Nesting urge
A strange behavior that becomes obvious because a pregnant woman starts to spend much more time with things like cleaning and re arranging. Usually this behavior start during the third trimester of the pregnancy

According to experts the behavior is intended to handle the stress that is sensed in relation to the upcoming birth of the child, or a way to prepare for the birth. The behavior is aimed specifically to the desire to control the situation. The behavior comforts and introduces a sensation of easy and trust to the mother.

Our landlord also got to experience the new Ana mentality. The balcony needed to be renovated and we needed a new postbox and the buzzer to open the gate also needed to be fixed. Some friends have already been convinced to help paint the entire house. In addition we are spending some afternoons looking for different apartments, because who knows… maybe we’ll be better off somewhere else.

The strange things is that I as a future father don’t notice any urges. Even more so, I try to calm Ana down and put a brake on all her desires. My first comment was that breathing fumes from cleaning products, IKEA furniture and paint is not the most healthy occupation for a pregnant mother. It is also very curious to be painting the home we currently rent and at the same time invest time and effort in looking for another place to stay.

Paint can!
Ana agreed in park with my comments which resulted in the deal that Ana will go shopping with friends next weekend. I will be accompanied by some other friends to paint the apartment.

Posted in Pek

Our neighbor, the richest man in the world

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Ikeahouse - From the street!
The building next to us is inhabited by two homeless persons. We usually have no problems, but recently this changed. The homeless felt that some of our friends were bothering them by smoking/talking on the balcony. The homeless told our friends to be quiet (“Shut up!”), so he could go to sleep at 6 o’clock at night in the garden of our neighbors. Unfortunately he met the wrong person, a friend with a very strong character and she started a discussion with the homeless.

Ikeahouse - The bedroom!
‘We live here and we pay rent. You don’t live where you are staying now’, was the core of her argument. The homeless quickly replied that Las Palmas was a small city and that he would me meeting us in the street.

The shouting escalated and the police was called. But they didn’t do anything. First someone had to be injured. Then our friend called the broker that was trying to sell the house (unsuccessfully because the house has been for sale at least the four years that we live next door). The broker told us the price was 1.400.000 euros. 1 million for the property, and 400.000 to make the property habitable. ‘Well, that’s just fine. We would love to have a look’, was her reply. What followed were the details. The house has a special status (Werelderfgoedlijst) and should remain mostly unchanged and the house owner is … Ingvar Kamprad!
Dagobert Duck! or Ingvar Kamprad?!
You are probably wondering who is Ingvar Kamprad, well, this is the person who in 2004 was the richest man in the world, and in 2007 one of the 5 richest persons! He has an estimated wealth between 33 and 51 billion dollars. Not bad at all.

Ikea!Our neighbor Ingvar is amongst other things the owner of the IKEA. Coincidentally our house is filled with his products. Tuesday we’ve got an appointment to visit the house. Although we are very curious to see how this works out, we await the result. Probably the homeless will (at least temporarily) be asked to look for another place to stay.

It is strange that for almost 3 years we have been living next door to the richest man in the world, without ever meeting him. It’s even stranger that the house of the richest man in the world is inhabited by people who have nothing.

Update: the story continues.

Toch leuk, statistieken

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Twee gezegden zijn vandaag van toepassing.

‘In het land der blinden is eenoog koning’ en ‘Een plaatje zegt meer dan 1000 woorden’. Om te begrijpen waar dit op slaat moet je onderstaand plaatje maar eens bestuderen.


In vergelijking met die spanjaarden heb ik als nederlander toch een goede 2 cm meer. Uiteraard is dit slechts een klein onderdeel van een overzicht van alle landen.

Android update March

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Time to introduce the entire cast of the game.

Cats and Dogs, Boys and Girls.
Cat!Dog!Boy!Girl!

There are still quite a lot of details to work out, but things are progressing. Maybe in a few months there will be a big announcement. One detail more that I will reveal in this post is the name of the game. The name will be quite simple: ‘Cats and Dogs‘.

Koffie bloem

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Koffie bloem!
Mijn koffie plant zit inmiddels vol met knopjes. Hopelijk heb ik over een tijdje dus een flinke verzameling overheerlijke koffiebonen. Hiermee kan ik dan mijn koffieritueel perfectioneren. Eerst de bonen drogen. Hierna de bonen branden, daarna malen, en dan… genieten!

Carnival 2011 – The Indian party

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On the Monday after Carnival (this year on the 7th of March) there is a very typical celebration in Las Palmas. The party of the Indians. During this party everyone is dressed in white and the crowd slowly moves through the main street ‘Triana’ starting in the ‘San Telmo’ square towards the ‘Plaza de la Rana’ square. There is always some Canarian band playing and everyone tries to keep close to the music. At the same time everyone is throwing powder in the air. The distance is only about 1 kilometer but the crowd needs a few hours to reach the end point.

The main street can be recognized from a very big distance because an enormous white cloud is hanging above it. The cloud exists out of the power that is being strayed into the air by the attendants. Once you enter the street everything is white. The ground, the air, your glasses, your clothes, everything. In the street the only thing you do is follow the partying crowd and follow the music, stopping a lot of times to spray powder into the air.

This is one of the most original parties in Las Palmas, and you could even compare it to queens day in Holland, with the only difference that everything is white instead of orange, and of course it is a much smaller scale.
Carnival 2011 - Powder party!

A new life

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A new life is about to begin. Figuratively for Ana and myself and literally for the future addition to our family. Of course we are very happy. The doctor has told us that there is a high probability that we will need to use blue paint for the baby’s room.

5 weeks:
Pek 5 weeks 		7 weeks:
Pek 7 weeks
11 weeks:
Pek 11 weeks 		12 weeks: (this morning)
Pek 12 weeks
Posted in Pek