联合国秘书长科菲·安南2005年3月21日向联合国大会提交了联合国改革报告。在随后召开的新闻发布会上安南说支持日本成为常任理事国。简直是开玩笑嘛。
作为热血华人欢迎各位把这个网址发给您的朋友！亮出您的鲜明立场，签名反对！！http://kr.poptang.com/
jeudi, mars 31, 2005
Interesting opinion on the food and drug industry
As usual was watching TV during lunch, and happened to see this American program with a special guest talking about a book called 'The Natural Cures They Don't Want You To Know'. According to the TV program guest, the food and drug industry simply doesn't want ppl to be healthy because otherwise their profits would be severely affected. Take a simple example. We are always encouraged to 'eat right'. However, many food labelled 'Diet' nowadays actually contain ingredients that are added specifically to increase appetite, to make ppl hungier, and inevitably to make ppl fat. Why? The fatter one gets, the more he/she would eat, which means more profits for the food industry. As for the drug industry, the black scenes are even worse, according to the program guest. The American authority that regulates the drug industry explicitly states that 'Nothing can prevent, cure, or diagnose a disease unless it is a drug'. Along with this rule, they are classifying more and more illnesses as 'disease'. Even obesity is a disease. The result? More and more natural cures (non-drugs) are eliminated from ppl's knowledge. Manufactures of those natural cures cannot state that those things have curing effect to particular diseases because if they do, they are effectively selling drugs without a license, which is illegal. And a drug license can cost as much as hudrends of millions of dollars. In one word, more and more illnesses can be cured only by drugs, as ppl know, because they will never get to know about other natural cures. The direct consequence is higher demand for drugs, which again represents $$ to the drug industry.
Pretty insightful and interesting theories.
Pretty insightful and interesting theories.
SchemaSoft in news (probably for the last time)
Hoho, SchemaSoft being acquired by Apple has become head news.
Here's the actual link to the news page:
http://news.com.com/Apple+swallows+SchemaSoft/2100-1047_3-5630368.html
"Apple did not say how many of those employees would be retained nor say whether they would remain at the SchemaSoft's headquarters in Vancouver. "
---Of course they wouldn't mention anything about lay-off: They dismissed the whole QA team! And that's why I'm working remotely from home right now to finish off my work term! (Refer to my post on Mar 14 and Feb 24 for more info.)
According to the current situation, most likely they will retain the Vancouver office. It's located in Yaletown, man, such a nice place to work in.
Here's the actual link to the news page:
http://news.com.com/Apple+swallows+SchemaSoft/2100-1047_3-5630368.html
"Apple did not say how many of those employees would be retained nor say whether they would remain at the SchemaSoft's headquarters in Vancouver. "
---Of course they wouldn't mention anything about lay-off: They dismissed the whole QA team! And that's why I'm working remotely from home right now to finish off my work term! (Refer to my post on Mar 14 and Feb 24 for more info.)
According to the current situation, most likely they will retain the Vancouver office. It's located in Yaletown, man, such a nice place to work in.
mercredi, mars 30, 2005
Two more interviews
So tired... Today I went for two co-op interviews in a row, one with Research In Motion in the morning and the other one with ACL Services in the afternoon. The one with RIM is actually a telephone interview. So I went to sit in this super small room (or rather cell?) in the Science Co-op office and talked on the phone with two interviewers for about half an hour. These two guys from Waterloo (RIM is a Waterloo company) were really specific to technical questions, but I was pretty lucky that I got all the technical questions (mainly C++/Java) correct except one, which I really have no idea about. Overall this interview went pretty fine, and after going through all the previous interviews, I feel more comfortable to talk a lot during interview than before. As for the one with ACL Services, there are over ten other interview candidates competing for this position, and moreover, there's a second round next Monday! So I don't really put much expectation on it. When can I actually settle this sticky co-op thing??? This is already my 7th interview in this term. Damn... Utterly sick of going for any more interviews!!
FREN 111 Summer Session
The night class section of FREN 111 summer term is still full... almost crying liao... So I decided to take a chance by talking to the prof teaching that section directly. She's a very kind-looking granny. Female version of Santa Clause, to be specific. :) She talked slowly and softly, really nice. There she told me that actually a lot of ppl had registered the course just as insurance cos they were not sure if they could pass the course this term. Oh, well... Beginners' French courses are not that hard at all, aren't they? But anyways, I have to wait till the last week of April to see whether there would be any ppl dropping the course or not. My fate is still in the hands of others. Sighz...
mardi, mars 29, 2005
TTC and RSVP
Just came back from my French 102 class, and today actually learned something: another interesting interpretation of 'TTC'. In a French store or restaurant, TTC doesn't really mean Table Tennis Club (which I'm so used to and so familiar with), but 'toutes taxes compris' (All Taxes Included). It's probably a nice word to see (to my wallet, at least).
And on the way back just now, I was thinking about this 'RSVP'. It's such a common word that I always take it for granted, but have never thought about what it stands for. So far, the interpretation I think that makes most sense is 'registre s'il vous plait' (register please), but the verb for register in French is actually 'enregistrer', so I'm still not very sure...
And on the way back just now, I was thinking about this 'RSVP'. It's such a common word that I always take it for granted, but have never thought about what it stands for. So far, the interpretation I think that makes most sense is 'registre s'il vous plait' (register please), but the verb for register in French is actually 'enregistrer', so I'm still not very sure...
lundi, mars 28, 2005
Fort Langley Trip
I didnt' want to stay at home for the Easter weekend, so I looked through the Vancouver travel guide and found this small town called Fort Langley. Oh well, it's a national historic site, so there we go. I went with Eddy since he would always be interested in going somewhere outside the City of Vancouver, haha. The bus trip is pretty long, two hours plus. I better write down the bus numbers and stuff, in case I'll go there again next time. Bus 41 from UBC to Joyce Station, and then Skytrain to Surrey Central Station, then Bus 502 to Langley Centre, finally C62 to 96 Ave & Glover Rd.
Fort Langley is such a small town that basically all the shops are located along the single street, Glover Rd. And from where I got off the bus to the bridge over the Fraser River, it's probably less than 500 metres. At the other side of the river, it's simply forest. It's said that the aboriginal ppl are still living there. So cool.
Amon the shops, most of them are gift shops, and the rest are restaurants as I can remember. They've got pretty cool stuff in the gift shops (definitely not key chains or mugs that I always see along Robson St). I bought two pretty weird collectors' spoons and a 1918 one-cent coin. The coin is amazingly much larger than what we have nowadays, and the material is also apparently better.
The main attraction of the small town is of course the 'Fort'. It's preserved as National Historic Site, so we had to pay for entrance fees, sighz... Actually we almost missed the 'Fort' because the entrance of the site is built like a museum which I'm not so interested in. It was until I took the picture at the flag pole that I realized that there's a 'Fort' behind the 'museum'.
The Fort is kinda cool, enclosed by wooden barricks. There are several buildings inside, all of which are made of wood. The explanation I heard is that metal was very expensive stuff back then and had to be shipped from England (Gosh!). So they wouldn't use metal unless absolutely necessary. Then there's this Big House. The British proclaimed British Columbia a British colony in the house pretty much in a rush because there was rumour of possible American take-over. Consequently, Fort Langley became the birth place of British Columbia. The narator girl told us that this Big House was kind of a men's club. Only men with social status high enough could stay there. But from the interior decoration and furniture in there, I'd say that the living standard was still far inferior to that I saw in a castle in Victoria.
The reason why I have been using quotation marks around the word Fort all the time is that I hardly saw any weapons there. The only one I saw was a small cannon exhibited in one of the houses. This fort probably had little millitary significance but merely a trade post (local business office in modern terms).
Overall, I would rate this place 4 Star for a one-day trip.
Fort Langley is such a small town that basically all the shops are located along the single street, Glover Rd. And from where I got off the bus to the bridge over the Fraser River, it's probably less than 500 metres. At the other side of the river, it's simply forest. It's said that the aboriginal ppl are still living there. So cool.
Amon the shops, most of them are gift shops, and the rest are restaurants as I can remember. They've got pretty cool stuff in the gift shops (definitely not key chains or mugs that I always see along Robson St). I bought two pretty weird collectors' spoons and a 1918 one-cent coin. The coin is amazingly much larger than what we have nowadays, and the material is also apparently better.
The main attraction of the small town is of course the 'Fort'. It's preserved as National Historic Site, so we had to pay for entrance fees, sighz... Actually we almost missed the 'Fort' because the entrance of the site is built like a museum which I'm not so interested in. It was until I took the picture at the flag pole that I realized that there's a 'Fort' behind the 'museum'.
The Fort is kinda cool, enclosed by wooden barricks. There are several buildings inside, all of which are made of wood. The explanation I heard is that metal was very expensive stuff back then and had to be shipped from England (Gosh!). So they wouldn't use metal unless absolutely necessary. Then there's this Big House. The British proclaimed British Columbia a British colony in the house pretty much in a rush because there was rumour of possible American take-over. Consequently, Fort Langley became the birth place of British Columbia. The narator girl told us that this Big House was kind of a men's club. Only men with social status high enough could stay there. But from the interior decoration and furniture in there, I'd say that the living standard was still far inferior to that I saw in a castle in Victoria.
The reason why I have been using quotation marks around the word Fort all the time is that I hardly saw any weapons there. The only one I saw was a small cannon exhibited in one of the houses. This fort probably had little millitary significance but merely a trade post (local business office in modern terms).
Overall, I would rate this place 4 Star for a one-day trip.
mercredi, mars 23, 2005
dimanche, mars 20, 2005
Rainbow over UBC!
Photo courtesy of Jingjing
Can't imagine that! After a whole day of rain, a big ranbow appeared over the campus. This is the first time that I actually witnessed a real rainbow. No kidding... It's really an amazing phonomenon with a lot of Physics involved. But it's pity that I've almost forgot them all.
lundi, mars 14, 2005
My Home Office
My Home Office: I have been officially asked to leave my office and to work from home from now on because I am not an Apple employee and my presence in the office would apparently pose 'security concern'. Well, not bad actually. They are still gonna pay me the same amount of salary, and I don't have to travel any more. Moreover, my supervisor is also gonna work from home with me, so I feel pretty 'balanced' in that sense. The only big problem is that my table is even more crowded! The PC that I brought back from the office is a monster (in terms of volume, not speed, unfortunately).
jeudi, mars 03, 2005
Interview @ HSBC
This is how I appreciated the importance of this interview: I took one day off just for this interview. The position is Java Dev, and requires 'strong knowledge' in J2EE. But none of the courses I have taken actually taught me anything about J2EE, so I had to 'cram' for it. Within half a day, I went through most of the J2EE features! (well, of course without plunging myself into the tons of pages of coding.) As for the interview itself, how should I comment about it... It appeared to be fine. There was no 'dead silence', and I don't think I made any blunt mistake, but somehow I feel kinda weird. First of all it is the dress code. I thought the dress code in HSBC should be pretty formal, and I really dressed up in the safest way: tie, long-sleeve shirt, long pants, and suit. But the guy who interviewed me actually had casual wear. wtf... And during the interview, I always had the feeling that he thought I'm too junior for the position, and he kept giving me that cunning simile which made me a little bit nervous. The interview turned out to be fairly short, much shorter than scheduled. Maybe the guy had lost interests already. Anyways, it's over now, and I don't really expect much from this interview (but how much I did!). Damn, when can I settle this co-op thing?!
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