Originally called Ozakajō, this is one of Japan’s most famous castles, it played a major role in the unification of Japan during the sixteenth century of the Azuchi-Momoyama period. Osaka Castle is situated on a plot of land roughly one kilometer square. It is built on two raised platforms of landfill supported by sheer walls of cut rock, using a technique called Burdock piling, each overlooking… Continue reading...

Saleem writes about the measures the South Korean government have set for the national exams:
“Yesterday was a holiday here b/c 3rd grade high school students took the university entrance exam all across the country.
Get this – during the Korean listening and English listening portions of the exam (which all happened at the same time in the whole country), planes were not allowed to fly in or out of… Continue reading... | 4 Comments

Japan:

1. Small coke is actually a small coke
2. Grannies play Mario Kart and are actually good at it.
3. Where are the garbage cans? Am I supposed to hold my trash all day?

Koreans love online gaming, example: This is a “PC room”, where one can play multiplayer computer games online. PC rooms like this are extremely popular among South-Koreans, ever since Starcraft came out in 1997. You have a room like this every block! Interesting because the computer and broadband penetration is quite high in Korea. But many young people are going to these rooms to play LAN-based multiplayer games with others… Continue reading... | 5 Comments

South Korea’s military says it is preparing for the possibility that North Korea may try to provoke a naval skirmish along their disputed sea border. (december 2008, voanews.com) While things look calm for an expat, South and North Korea are officially still at war, because of that military service is compulsory for men. One of my Korean friends served at the Demilitarized Zone… Continue reading... | 3 Comments

Seoul is a magnificent city; it’s the worlds second largest metropol but the actual commercial and financial center is about the same size of Berlin’s. To give you an idea – I took some pictures around Seoul over the past few weeks, click on them for a high resolution copy. (CC)
Taken from the WTC building. Check the little cars in the picture… Continue reading... | 3 Comments

My girlfriend and college friends (Michiel, Mathijs and Joery) are giving Twitter a trial… on my recommendation! It made me wonder whether Twitter is useful or not. I realized that Twitter DOES deliver me value, but it also takes a LOT of time to grow and maintain! For the ones who do not know where I am talking about: Twitter is a web service that allows you to share moments with your friends. Generally spoken: Sharing moments creates closer bonds and with Twitter its possible, even when you are busy working, traveling or at the bar. That way, Twitter connects you to your friends, wherever they are…… Continue reading... | 4 Comments

About a million presentations are going on right now, but 50% of them are unbearable! Chances are you know what sucks and what doesn’t – I’d like to share three tips that I found very useful in becoming a professional speaker, perhaps it helps you!… Continue reading... | 2 Comments

I came across a news article about a project that just dazzled me. What can a country do that has little land but a lot of mouths to feed? Right, you can import! But what do you do as a logistics company when your turnover is decreasing because commodity prices are rising? Exactly: You lease your own land and grow and ship the crops yourself!… Continue reading... | 1 Comment

The thermometer slowly declined down to zero degrees over the last week. We headed up to the roof to see the sunset in the clean frosty sky, I realized that this was not the first time we were going up for a view.… Continue reading... | 1 Comment