lox.Journal

lox.Stuff

test test [No comments] test test [No comments] tete tetters [No comments] r rerere [No comments] test [No comments] Tales from a lost PDA - Bokki [Tuesday 30th June 2009] Japan, I should know something about this place, but apparently also Mr.X have been there and witnessed something that is surely quite.... funny! -- I was at a meeting today with the Italian Chamber of Commerce in Japan, nothing to get excited about, as usually the meetings are boring and do little for the company I work for. But, nevertheless, institutions need to be revered sometimes and here I am. It was here that I witnessed to a quite funny scene. An Italian guy next to me got introduced to some important Japanese managers, and more or less the scene was like this: The two parties face each other and the usual bowing begins, the Japanese senior manager in front of the other "lesser beings" that work at the company. The personal secretary of the top manager guy stands in between the Italian guy and his boss, slightly on the side not to impair direct contact. With a swift movement the personal secretary, a 40 year old Japanese man, presents to his god-on-earth boss the mandatory business card that is necessary in any proper Japanese presentation. The Italian guy must have studied something before and quickly extract his Louis Vitton card holder and draws the key to personal relationships in Japan. The Japanese guy goes first, bowing slightly, "Buongiorno sono Fumio Tanaka" (good morning I am Fumio Tanaka) in a quite staggering Italian, but showing that he learned two words in the car before arriving to the venue. The managers behind him look chuffed at the deep knowledge of Italian language that the master-of-our-universe is dishing out to the poor gaijin. The Italian guy now bows gives the card to Tanaka san and here the act is unveiled... "Hajimemashite, BOCCHI desu!", all accents wrong, but even the counterpart wasn't all that perfect with the Italian that he tried... Oh and strangely when he was saying that everyone was very silent. Well here I have to stop for a second to describe the scene and then I will say what "REALLY" happened for the Italian guy and the Japanese one. The top manager immediately takes the card and turns around to stare at the secretary, almost incinerating him with a stare. The secretary guy is frozen with the expression of someone that was just bitten in the balls by a rabid dog. The other managers look at each other as if they are about to be run over by a train, mouth open, going quite pale. The Italian guy looks around and cannot clearly understand what just happened, everyone is infact frozen with terror. Maybe an earthquake just happened? Quickly the head of the chamber of commerce steps in and diverts the attention clearing the party, leaving the Japanese delegation to their terror, taking Mr.Bocchi to another place to talk about that project that was so important. Well here goes the explanation... In Japanese when you introduce one to the other you can say "XXX desu" (pron. DES), which is a very basic form to say "I am XXX". This form also is used to explain a certain state, for example I can say "Samui desu" which means "I am cold". Here is the catch... The poor Italian guy has a very normal surname, Bocchi (pron. BOKKI), but that has a meaning in Japanese... BOKKI means HARD-ON. So he just said "I have an HARD-ON" instead of introducing himself... Or better he introduced himself fine, but he probably didn't know about the hidden meaning of it's surname... So replay the scene... Mr.Superpresident of a multinational that makes as much as the GDP of Bangladesh goes "I am Mr.Tanaka" - smile - card is given - "And I am HORNY!" - other card is given with satisfied smile... :D I couldn't stop laughing... You've got to love Japan! -- Check out the older Chapters in the Tales from a Lost PDA series: I - The Lesser Damage II - Good Times III - We Need to be a Team IV - Sledgehammer V - Tonight? [2 comments] SHUT THAT ARSEFUCKEDMOUTH!! [Sunday 28th June 2009] Though the unwritten laws of well behaving are prohibiting me from killing this flat faced Chinese individual that is gobbing SHITE like if it was the last meal of his life, the same laws do not prevent me from venting my mounting rage and hatred over the net. I really do not understand why in Asia there is this problem with eating a LITTLE LESS THAN YOUR MOUTH CAN TAKE, thus avoiding to emit noises and more than everything avoiding to spit bits and pieces of your meal all over the place. When I am tired and nervous like today (1 hour sleep last night), I really cannot take it, I guess that if I had a gun I could commit something regretful. So good stuff I do not have a gun :D NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO today must be my day, ANOTHER food slobbering hi-fi gob dickhead just joined the other guy. I need to get away from this lounge... I MEAN, I AM IN A BUSINESS LOUNGE HOW COMES THAT THESE PEOPLE ARE HERE!?!?! WHERE ARE THE CLASSY PEOPLE?! Oooohhhh..... [5 comments] Michael Jackson [Saturday 27th June 2009] Yesterday Michael Jackson passed away. I guess that I have never been a great fan of his latest songs, but I do recognize that with his first albums (up to Bad) he really changed pop music around the world. I think that Thriller was the turning point for his career and eventually affected all much of the music that was produced after by other artists too. I remember that the video costed something like a million dollar, that at that time was quite a great sum for a 5 minutes short movie. The eyes that he showed at the end of the video were quite a touch and imagine for a 7 year old like me what an effect they must have had. Surely music lost a great character, though much was said about his private life and the way he lead especially the latter part of his presence on this earth, the great artist remains. Here in China, from where I am writing, the news of his death have been on all newspapers and tv shows. I guess that the same happened a bit everywhere and you must give credit to a man that gets so much coverage al around the world. I want to remember a piece of one of his most popular songs, a piece that I especially like: "If You Wanna Make The World A Better Place Take A Look At Yourself And Then Make A Change" Farewell Michael, I hope that your afterlife is going to be a bit more easy than the one you've had on earth... [1 comment] Tales from a lost PDA - Tonight? [Tuesday 23rd June 2009] Though on a business trip in Hong Kong I have decided to revamp the Tales Section a little, with a very short piece that summarizes the spirit and soul of many business trips around the world. He's in Russia apparently and Mr.Roman, a friend of another company is with him after a quick dinner. -- Mr.Roman, with a very lively and chirpy woice "Ehi Mr.X so what are the plans for the evening? Some whores perhaps?" Mr.X "Naaaaaa not tonight, I am tired" -- Older Chapters in the Tales from a Lost PDA series: I - The Lesser Damage II - Good Times III - We Need to be a Team IV - Sledgehammer [4 comments] Tales from a lost PDA - Tonight? [Tuesday 23rd June 2009] Though on a business trip in Hong Kong I have decided to revamp the Tales Section a little, with a very short piece that summarizes the spirit and soul of many business trips around the world. He's in Russia apparently and Mr.Roman, a friend of another company is with him after a quick dinner. -- Mr.Roman, with a very lively and chirpy woice "Ehi Mr.X so what are the plans for the evening? Some whores perhaps?" Mr.X "Naaaaaa not tonight, I am tired" -- Older Chapters in the Tales from a Lost PDA series: I - The Lesser Damage III - We Need to be a Team No comments] Drinking Brunello in Jakarta [Friday 19th June 2009] Brunello di Montalcino is one of the wines that we produce in Tuscany, it is considered to be one of the best around Italy, undergoes 5 year ageing in a oak barrel and all in all is the type of drink that normally here in Asia is not well known. Since when you travel you meet a lot of interesting people, I had to see it coming sooner of later, that I was to find some Asians that actually know and like this type of drink! Let's take a step back, I am in Indonesia, for the first time in my life, and I decided to spend an extra day here to take a look around, grab the feeling of the city while not working. My client is taking care of everything, from passport controls at the airport (he has people that know people that get you through passports in 4 minutes flat instead of having to wait hours in a queue), to transportation and of course meals. The country is what I would describe a typical southern Asian country, there is a very big gap between the rich and the poor, but the degree of progress is stunning if I compare it to other places that I have been. You can find anything you like here, all the major chains, brands, goods are not just represented, are everywhere. Of course that is the spanky Jakarta that we are talking about, there is also another Jakarta that lives near polluted gutters full of still water (and mosquitoes), that earns 60 dollars a month, that runs on mopeds that I dare say are keeping together with a lot of glue and good helping of faith. Corruption is widely accepted and practiced at all levels, but that doesn't surprise me as in Pizzaland things used to be like that and now they are a bit less under the sun. Indonesia is a Muslim country, so the minarets are everywhere, but the general feeling that I have had is that it's much more easy going than other places like Morocco where we could feel not welcome in some places. Having said that there are a lot of police checks and in the places where we went to eat, or even at my hotel, you get really tight checks at the car and then before entering. I guess that these checks are there just to make you feel more secure (they are carried over is a superficial way sometimes), in the end they are quite pointless (why sneak a bomb in from the main gate?!?!). My client is a very cool guy, and so is his friend that was with us the first two nights. First of all their English is quite great so that helped communication a lot, and they are both young, we all studied abroad, and their mindset (probably because they hold very high positions in their respective companies) is very international. It was them bringing up the Brunello story, and soon after, I was at a very nice restaurant, talking about life, experiences, ideas and dreams, eating a marvellously soft Aussie beef and sipping Brunello overlooking Jakarta by night. And for a brief moment, all of a sudden, it felt like home... Well business trips cannot always be stressful occasions!!! ;) [2 comments] Singapore by night [Tuesday 16th June 2009] Finally I landed in Singapore, after a couple of days spent in Kuala Lumpur in Malaysia. The business trip continues pretty much as usual, I managed to go to the gym three times so far, which is a world record for me, considering that I have to do it in the early morning. But the knee now needs more training and some build up, so the fact that I can use weights is actually beneficial, in Florence I cannot do them as that would require a gym that I do not want to join as I think it's utterly boring to be in one of those things. Jet lag is not as bad as usual but the adrenaline rush of having to move every other day and to meet a lot of people is surely there to keep me awake longer than I would really need. I met a new client today, a Chinese guy that is Christian. Me an Italian guy that is atheist. Interesting how the world goes, certainly we are a strange couple, the fact that I knew more about the bible than him should make me think about his knowledge of Christian religion, but I guess that if he's happy with it I am in no position to make him think differently. Certainly travelling is good to meet a lot of people, most of my clients are stinking rich, I get to touch with my hands a world that probably will never be mine at all. Ok, let's say I am working for it! :D Tomorrow more Sing action and then on Thursday it's time for the second novelty of the trip: INDONESIA! [No comments] Yangoon [Friday 12th June 2009] I am in Yangoon for the first time of my life, as usual the fascination for a new place makes me think that I want to come back maybe to stay for longer, though the hard fact is that I haven't even set a foot out of the hotel since I arrived yesterday night. I made the mistake of going to bed too early, 10,30 PM and woke up at 3 AM. Fortunately Chiara was on Skype and I spoke to her for a while, since all the mobile phones are blocked here and even my Gmail accounts are unreachable (all blocked), I could not even say that I arrived and that I was fine. Soon after the talk with Chiara I went to the training hall, during this trip I must try my hardest to work in the gym possibly with weights, surely running or cycling. The leg is fine now, but I am still lacking some muscular tone and I am resolute to at least train my right leg as much as I can (I do not hope for some serious muscle building as it requires more programmed and precise training). Breakfast was grand, I ate a lot, which brings the other light motive of this business trip, I need to try to loose 3 kilograms, I lost already quite a bit of weight thanks to the rehabilitation but usually business trips are terrible because you eat a lot of shitty things especially on the planes. My hope is that by eating a little less and the gym workout I can reach my goal. Today meeting with clients and then tomorrow some Yangoon action, I hope that I can take a lot of pictures, there is a great material out there as the architecture is strictly Victorian/English but the surroundings are terribly tropical/Asian so the mix is quite interesting! [No comments] Wasted Day [Monday 1st June 2009] It's quite possibly the fact that today I decided to take a day off and we organized to go at the seaside with Chiara that made the whole day "different". A shame that the difference remained pretty much on "paper" and not on the actual life, due to several reasons. Chiara was due to come back home in the late afternoon so that we could join our friends to drive down to the beach and have a night out at the seaside, nothing special to be honest, but considering that I am not one of those hard core weekend travellers, it was quite a good effort. Of course the weather had to turn sour and spoil it all, we are experiencing a very hot start of summer and of course today had to rain and go back to autumn standards, effectively spoiling all the day. I also think that the fact that I just lazed about the new house all day did not help, I have eaten loads of junk food (that I managed to avoid eating after the surgery as I am trying to keep my weight under control), and did not exercise as I planned to... Work-wise even if I was at home it was like if I was at the office, after all checking work related emails and calling your boss to complain pretty much about everything it's much better than staring at the wall. I am leaving to Asia in 10 days, it's going to be yet another of those long trips that will take me around the world. I am starting to think that maybe I am not really enjoying this life anymore, travelling so much is spoiling any other travel that I do "off the job", and that it's not nice. Holidays are also approaching and with them the eternal decision of having to chose where to go and what to do. Chiara would like to go just the two of us, I'd like to go in a group of people, as I think it's much more fun. As you can see the start it's not the easier that we could choose. Money is also an issue, with increasing rumours that the company is going down the drain I feel a bit hard pressed on what to do : "shall I spend 2000+ euro on a trip, or shall I keep it a bit more on the sensible side?". [2 comments]

Lox, Lorenzo... ME!! A little introduction about the author and the blog itself. Plus contacts and CVs... You never know! Pictures A Selection of the best pictures that I have taken all over the world during the years, all nicely indexed by year and geographical area. Jolly good! History of this Blog A collection of all the articles that I have wrote so far, divided by month/year. I have had the bad idea of writing my e-mail address on the board before, so this time I'll try to prevent some spam to get to me by putting this little image.. Let's hope it does the trick! [--------------------] A reminder to Myself Left and right Like day and night That's what makes the world go round In and out Thin and stout That's what makes the world go round For every up there is a down For every square there is a round For every high there is a low For every to there is a fro To and fro Stop and go That's what makes the world go round You must set your sights upon the heights Don't be a mediocrity Don't just wait and trust to fate And say, that's how it's meant to be It's up to you how far you go If you don't try you'll never know And so my lad as I've explained Nothing ventured, nothing gained You see my boy it's nature's way Upon the weak the strong ones prey The human life it's also true The strong will try to conquer you That is what you must expect Unless you use your intellect Brains and brawn, weak and strong That's what makes the world go round [------------------------------]