ArthurRE: What is the most risque food you have ever eaten?
Get your vomit bags out… i’m kind of experimental when it comes to eating. Usually it works out just fine.
[li]Snails (drenched in garlic, quite nice really),
[li]Testicles of course,
[li]One-inch-long-ungutted-completely-intact-baby-birds-on-a-skewer,
[li]Raw oysters (their sexual connotation definately comes from the taste… i won’t go into details, but YES),
[li]Cow’s heart,
[li]Various kinds of intestines-and-blood-pies (Black Pudding, Blutwurst, Balkenbrij, Haggis)
[li]A sheep’s head including the eyes,
[li]Pickled-and-yellied brain of pork
[li]Semi-cooked brain of cow
Just don’t give me a cheese sandwich, please! Apart from melted cheese on a pizza or tosti/croque monsieur, i find the stuff absolutely repulsive.
ArthurRE: lonely planet
I seem to remember sheeps testicals at some stage was on the menu…
They don’t taste that bad, actually. Taste-wise it’s somewhere in between hardboiled eggs (of course!) and liver, and texture-like they are somewhere between potato and (again) hardboiled egg. Definately better then Polish cow-intestines soup (Flaki) or any kind of cheese ;D
A friend of mine recently arrived back from working in a
university in china and unfortuntely he was given extra work
when he arrived due to a problem with another lecturer not
turning up as he wanted to spend some time traveling. With
this lack of time in mind he did not like it much because he
found those people he was working with lacked a sense of
humour. I mention the circumstances as he didn’t get much
time out of the capital due to the extra work he had to do
and this will have influenced the types of people he spent
his time with but he said they all took everything very
seriously which drove him nuts.
Beijing? So much fun! The people are very kind and direct, yet somewhat reserved (i know those two don’t really match, but somehow they manage). And you score massive points if you join the Chinese Huddle – no queing there 😀
ArthurRE: lonely planet
I seem to remember sheeps testicals at some stage was on the menu…
They don’t taste that bad, actually. Taste-wise it’s somewhere in between hardboiled eggs (of course!) and liver, and texture-like they are somewhere between potato and (again) hardboiled egg. Definately better then Polish cow-intestines soup (Flaki) or any kind of cheese ;D
A friend of mine recently arrived back from working in a
university in china and unfortuntely he was given extra work
when he arrived due to a problem with another lecturer not
turning up as he wanted to spend some time traveling. With
this lack of time in mind he did not like it much because he
found those people he was working with lacked a sense of
humour. I mention the circumstances as he didn’t get much
time out of the capital due to the extra work he had to do
and this will have influenced the types of people he spent
his time with but he said they all took everything very
seriously which drove him nuts.
Beijing? So much fun! The people are very kind and direct, yet somewhat reserved (i know those two don’t really match, but somehow they manage). And you score massive points if you join the Chinese Huddle – no queing there 😀
ArthurRE: lonely planet
Mixtec,
Have you travelled around a bit? My personal experiences are that usually a tongue-in-cheek attitude and don’t-take-it-all-too-serious are the perfect way to avoid cultural problems during travelling. I found it a lot better to behave a little in the “Ian Wright”-way rather than just some superficial oh-i-am-so-interested-and-touched-by-your-culture-waaaaaw-amaaaazing-ooooh attitude. With the latter you aren’t likely to make any decent contact with the locals anyway since you’ll be looking in awe at everything they consider part of normal, boring, everyday life.
Even more so, if you act a bit silly, the embarrasment when you make a stupid cultural mistake is all on you. Try behaving like a perfectly serious traveller and then blow your nose in a Turkish long-distance bus, or do it when you goof around a bit. Chances are you’ll get a lot more positive response in the latter case.
ArthurRE: lonely planet
Mixtec,
Have you travelled around a bit? My personal experiences are that usually a tongue-in-cheek attitude and don’t-take-it-all-too-serious are the perfect way to avoid cultural problems during travelling. I found it a lot better to behave a little in the “Ian Wright”-way rather than just some superficial oh-i-am-so-interested-and-touched-by-your-culture-waaaaaw-amaaaazing-ooooh attitude. With the latter you aren’t likely to make any decent contact with the locals anyway since you’ll be looking in awe at everything they consider part of normal, boring, everyday life.
Even more so, if you act a bit silly, the embarrasment when you make a stupid cultural mistake is all on you. Try behaving like a perfectly serious traveller and then blow your nose in a Turkish long-distance bus, or do it when you goof around a bit. Chances are you’ll get a lot more positive response in the latter case.
ArthurRE: War or no war?
Are we waiting for the evidence? Or rather just on the end of the Hadj…
ArthurRE: War or no war?
Are we waiting for the evidence? Or rather just on the end of the Hadj…
ArthurRE: Shuttle lost (blows up?) on re-entry
A very sad day for manned space travel. It proves that even fairly old technology like the Orbiter still has it’s risks. The pilot of the shuttle was a former USN EA-6B driver by the way.
As for the Shuttle count, this leaves only three operational ones remaining:
STA-095 Shuttle Avionics Integration Laboratory, bldg 16, JSC
MPTA-098 part of Shuttle-C mockup at Langley (different from OV-098)
OV-098 * Pathfinder (MSFC mockup, * = honorary number)
OV-099 Challenger (formerly STA-099), delivered 1981 – destr. Jan 28th, 1986
OV-101 Enterprise – landing test vehicle only, OV-designation out of sequence. Now with the Smithsonian institute
OV-102 Columbia, delivered 1982 – destr. Feb 1st, 2003
OV-103 Discovery, delivered 1983
OV-104 Atlantis, delivered 1985
OV-105 Endeavour, delivered 1991 (to replace Challenger).
MPTA = Main Propulsion Test Article
OV = Orbiter Vehicle
STA = Structural Test Airframe
It remains to be seen if NASA is willing to spend money on yet a new Shuttle (like the Endeavour), or if they just continue using the remaining three. There has been talk during the 1980s of bringing the Enterprise to full Orbiter Vehicle status, but this was not deemed necessary.
ArthurRE: Shuttle lost (blows up?) on re-entry
A very sad day for manned space travel. It proves that even fairly old technology like the Orbiter still has it’s risks. The pilot of the shuttle was a former USN EA-6B driver by the way.
As for the Shuttle count, this leaves only three operational ones remaining:
STA-095 Shuttle Avionics Integration Laboratory, bldg 16, JSC
MPTA-098 part of Shuttle-C mockup at Langley (different from OV-098)
OV-098 * Pathfinder (MSFC mockup, * = honorary number)
OV-099 Challenger (formerly STA-099), delivered 1981 – destr. Jan 28th, 1986
OV-101 Enterprise – landing test vehicle only, OV-designation out of sequence. Now with the Smithsonian institute
OV-102 Columbia, delivered 1982 – destr. Feb 1st, 2003
OV-103 Discovery, delivered 1983
OV-104 Atlantis, delivered 1985
OV-105 Endeavour, delivered 1991 (to replace Challenger).
MPTA = Main Propulsion Test Article
OV = Orbiter Vehicle
STA = Structural Test Airframe
It remains to be seen if NASA is willing to spend money on yet a new Shuttle (like the Endeavour), or if they just continue using the remaining three. There has been talk during the 1980s of bringing the Enterprise to full Orbiter Vehicle status, but this was not deemed necessary.
ArthurRE: lonely planet TV
Agree with you Garry – the episodes hosted by Ian Wright are definately worth looking. I also like the ones with Justine Shapiro, she doesn’t have the sense of irony as Wright (nor does she visit the cool places Wright does) but she also appears to look a little beyond than the first-hand superficial features of a country. Something which i can’t say about that blonde chick who always gives me the impression to be a perfectly off-rippable dumb tourist:
“You! Shtraf! 10.000 dollars!”
“Okay.”
Eric,
From what my friends told me, security in RoK wasn’t as much of an issue as they had thought. They were seen plenty of times, including by Korean military personell, but they seemed to understand what they were doing. I have to say they did hold up to some basic courtesy standards: not parking your car in front of a crashgate, no obvious infrastructure photography… (one of the guys was also on one of my under-arrest Russia-trips, and also did spot some aircraft in Iran, Pakistan, Syria and Taliban-ruled Afghanistan) nevertheless, they compared it to a country like Taiwan where planespotting is not really banned. Sometimes they’ll ask you what you’re doing and occasionally you’re followed, but that’s it. The only jumpy guards they’ve met were the Americans though. I do hope that the tensions settle down a bit before the next batch of spotters is going (they are also a bit more persuasive…).
ArthurRE: lonely planet TV
Agree with you Garry – the episodes hosted by Ian Wright are definately worth looking. I also like the ones with Justine Shapiro, she doesn’t have the sense of irony as Wright (nor does she visit the cool places Wright does) but she also appears to look a little beyond than the first-hand superficial features of a country. Something which i can’t say about that blonde chick who always gives me the impression to be a perfectly off-rippable dumb tourist:
“You! Shtraf! 10.000 dollars!”
“Okay.”
Eric,
From what my friends told me, security in RoK wasn’t as much of an issue as they had thought. They were seen plenty of times, including by Korean military personell, but they seemed to understand what they were doing. I have to say they did hold up to some basic courtesy standards: not parking your car in front of a crashgate, no obvious infrastructure photography… (one of the guys was also on one of my under-arrest Russia-trips, and also did spot some aircraft in Iran, Pakistan, Syria and Taliban-ruled Afghanistan) nevertheless, they compared it to a country like Taiwan where planespotting is not really banned. Sometimes they’ll ask you what you’re doing and occasionally you’re followed, but that’s it. The only jumpy guards they’ve met were the Americans though. I do hope that the tensions settle down a bit before the next batch of spotters is going (they are also a bit more persuasive…).
ArthurRE: lonely planet
They’re good. Unfortunately, the bulk of the backpackers are hardly more curious and tended to do some research themselves (Thailand, India…) so they’ll stick to the LP to the letter. Which is kind of ironic, yet can get very annoying. You don’t want to see signs of disbelief when you’re telling about a site not mentioned in LP… Their quality has given them an almost mythical status, and some people do treat it as a bible. Unfortunately.
But they are excellent country-guides, i immediately admit. And a lot of them make fun reading too when you’d otherwise be booooored in a train/bus/hotel… Good thing is that they are almost as useful as a local version of the yellow pages (now THOSE are useful. Does anyone have a link to the South Korean yellowpages, btw? It’s to help a few friends finding a car rental without paying Hertz or Avis-prices).
ArthurRE: lonely planet
They’re good. Unfortunately, the bulk of the backpackers are hardly more curious and tended to do some research themselves (Thailand, India…) so they’ll stick to the LP to the letter. Which is kind of ironic, yet can get very annoying. You don’t want to see signs of disbelief when you’re telling about a site not mentioned in LP… Their quality has given them an almost mythical status, and some people do treat it as a bible. Unfortunately.
But they are excellent country-guides, i immediately admit. And a lot of them make fun reading too when you’d otherwise be booooored in a train/bus/hotel… Good thing is that they are almost as useful as a local version of the yellow pages (now THOSE are useful. Does anyone have a link to the South Korean yellowpages, btw? It’s to help a few friends finding a car rental without paying Hertz or Avis-prices).
ArthurRE: Iraq to head UN Conference on Disarmament
Yes! Let’s attack the foul dictatorships of all countries starting with an I! Ireland and Iceland beware!
And when the world is done, we’ll see the inspectors move into Indiana and Iowa to prove their WMD production capabilities…
ArthurRE: Iraq to head UN Conference on Disarmament
Yes! Let’s attack the foul dictatorships of all countries starting with an I! Ireland and Iceland beware!
And when the world is done, we’ll see the inspectors move into Indiana and Iowa to prove their WMD production capabilities…
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