Doing laundry in Denmark

As it is a problem for everyone who stays at a hotel for a long period of time, I had to find a way to do my laundry. With my client's help, I was able to find this laundry room in Valby.


The first challenge was to figure out how to pay. Everything was written in Danish. I had to guess based on some numbers I saw. It turned out, 1) you insert coins into the machine on the left, and 2) choose the washing machine, then you will see that the balance goes down by 25 DKK (per wash).



And, I looked at the washing machine but nothing was happening. Thank God. This gentleman was kind enough to explain that I had to push the red button on the washing machine by kindly pushing the button for me ( I had no idea what he was saying. It turns out not everyone in Denmark speaks English.. duh.. right? but it is amazing to see how many people here speak very fluent English! )




Now, what are theses? The spin cycle in the washing machine does not seem long enough and clothes are acutally pretty wet. For 2DKK, you can put your clothes into one of these things and spin your clothes more. I actually saw the big difference after using one of these.



Using the dryer was a bit tricky. For some reasons, it kept stopping after running for 10 minutes. I couldn't figure out why. I just had to push the button every 10 minutes again and again.



The place charges 3DKK for 3 minutes - basically 1DKK for every minute. I had to run it for 45 minutes.

In the end, I spent about 50DKK for using two washing machines + 2DKK for the spinner + 45 DKK for the dryer. 100DKK is about USD18. Man, I can't believe how expensive things are around here.

Osterport, Denmark

CHO_4989
Originally uploaded by calking97

I was able to see the train track from the hotel room (Comfort Hotel Osterport).

Frankfurt!

CHO_5509
Originally uploaded by calking97

The scariest thing is when the pilot throttles the engine to bring the plane back up while it is trying to land. Well, at least I got to take some pics of Frankfurt while we are making a loop.

Stack your tabs vertically on Firefox

This is a very useful Firefox Add-on: http://piro.sakura.ne.jp/xul/_treestyletab.html.en

The add-on allows you to stack your tabs vertically (instead of laying
them horizontally like a tool-bar). What makes it more useful is that
it maintains the tree structure for tabs. For example, if iGoogle
created a new tab when you clicked on a link on its page, it shows
that the tab has been spawned by iGoogle.

The add-on also allows you to collapse the tree view if you wish to see only the parent pages.

Google is pretty scary..

Gmail is asking if I am considering toastmasters. Toastmasters is a non profit organization helping one another developing public speaking and leadership skills.

I've had some email traffic regarding toastmasters and it is asking me if I want to consider visiting www.SpeakingWithoutFear.com. By looking at the URL, I can pretty much assume that the web site maybe offers a manual or some training materials for improving public speaking skills.

How much scarier is this AI going to get? I wouldn't be shocked even if someday an actual person shows up on a pop-up window and talk to you about something that they want to sell.

People apply for the company, not for the job

In United States, at least for engineering jobs, most people apply for the job. It is also employer's vested interest to hire the right person for the job. Matching the skill set with the right project is very important for both parties.

In Korea, it seems that we have a completely different culture. Most new hires don't even know which team they will work for until the day that they get assigned to a team. What's more shocking is that they don't even know to which location they will be asked ( in this case, told) to relocate until spending a significant amount of time for the company orientation program. Orientation programs are different for different companies but they usually require new hires to spend more than one week at a training center without going home.

The fact is that people in Korea apply for the company, not for the job. This is a very interesting concept (this is more true for the big companies). For a lot of people, the name value of their employers is more important than the kind of work they will be doing for them (this is also true when it comes to choosing the university) Most people here will probably choose the company with a big name than a small company even if the small company is willing you pay a bit more and willing to let you work on a project that would excite you.

The implication here is that it is very difficult for a team to ask for a new help whose skill sets match the needs. Since the HR folks without sufficient engineering background make hiring decisions based on some test scores (yes, many big companies have their own entrance exams) and appropriate them to teams, the vicious circle is inevitable. For example, it is not uncommon to see guys with electrical engineering backgrounds with maybe one semester introductory programming course assigned to a software development team.

In conclusion, you shouldn't be surprised even if your HR person can't provide you with the job description when you apply for a job in Korea. The chances are your HR person probably don't even know, because they will have to figure out which team you will be assigned to first.

Google did it again! - April Fool's Prank

Despite the skepticism that Google might not do the april fool's prank this year, Google definitely did not disappoint us this year either. This is a brilliant prank - I managed to get some of my friends totally falling for this. Thanks to Google for allowing me to have this fun!

see for yourself! - http://www.google.com/intl/en/landing/chrome/cadie/

Google provides the pdf file for the glasses layout and even lets you download Google Chrome with 3D - try it yourself

Google also did not leave out those users with other locales. Since I can only understand Korean other than English, I can only talk about the korean one though..

If you type '끝말잇기' (keut-mal-it-gi), Google tells you you can play the game. The rule of this game is that a player takes the last syllable of the opponent and use it for the next word. If you can't come up with the next word, you lose.

Next to the panda, it says, it wants to start with '대한민국' (dae-han-min-gook) which means Korea in Korean. Since the word ends with 'gook', I typed the next work '국가' (gook-ga) which means the nation.

Then Google continues to play the game. When Google fails to come up with the next word, it tells you that you are a good player :)