currybetdotnet Travelogue archive
H.N. Werkman's "ASCII art" in the Van Gogh Museum
I spent a few days last week in Amsterdam with my wife, enjoying a short break and some sight-seeing after my appearance at the Euro IA Summit. We purchased the 'I Amsterdam' card, which we found to be excellent value for money. On the first day, by the time we had visited the Rijksmuseum, the Van Gogh Museum, started using our 72 hour travelcard and taken a boat trip around the canals, we had already recouped our money. I enjoyed...
Live plugin streaming at The Waag
After the EuroIA Summit I took the opportunity to stay in Amsterdam for a few extra days and do some sight-seeing. One of the older buildings in Amsterdam is The Waag, which formed part of the old city walls and defences. The building featured in a ghost walk we did around Amsterdam because of the grisly history it had as a theatre where the public could pay to watch the dissection of the corpses of criminals - and there will...
The beautiful people and the badly-dressed Brit: Touring Miami's Art Deco district
I wasn't quite sure what to expect of Miami. My only experience of the city was from watching CSI:Miami, Miami Vice (the 80s version, not the movie remake) and playing Grand Theft Auto: Vice City. So I kind of thought I might instantly get into some sort of gangland action. Actually, when I got there, I just got into a really, really, really long wait for the not-so-Super Shuttle to take me from airport to hotel. It was the Grand...
Postcard from Macau #11: The EA Games centre in Hong Kong
I recently spent three weeks visiting Macau, the former Portuguese territory on the south coast of China. As a former colony like Hong Kong, it is now a 'Special Administrative Region'. This post is the last of a series looking at aspects of information design, user experience, internet use and journalism that interested me when I was there. Whilst I was staying in one Chinese 'Special Administrative Region', it made sense to visit the other, Hong Kong. During my...
Postcard from Macau #10: The grave of the magnetic telegraph engineer
I recently spent three weeks visiting Macau, the former Portuguese territory on the south coast of China. As a former colony like Hong Kong, it is now a 'Special Administrative Region'. This post is one of a series looking at aspects of information design, user experience, internet use and journalism that interested me when I was there. As Macau was a Portuguese colony, the chief denomination of Christianity in the region was Roman Catholicism. That meant that for many...
Postcard from Macau #9: Information design on Macau's transport system
I recently spent three weeks visiting Macau, the former Portuguese territory on the south coast of China. As a former colony like Hong Kong, it is now a 'Special Administrative Region'. This post is one of a series looking at aspects of information design, user experience, internet use and journalism that interested me when I was there. Whilst I was staying in Macau I mostly got around by public transport. There is an excellent network of buses across the...
Postcard from Macau #8: David Beckham in Hong Kong
I recently spent three weeks visiting Macau, the former Portuguese territory on the south coast of China. As a former colony like Hong Kong, it is now a 'Special Administrative Region'. This post is one of a series looking at aspects of information design, user experience, internet use and journalism that interested me when I was there. Whilst I was in Macau last month, it seemed simply churlish not to take the hour ferry ride across the Pearl River...
Postcard from Macau #7: Information design in 3 languages
I recently spent three weeks visiting Macau, the former Portuguese territory on the south coast of China. As a former colony like Hong Kong, it is now a 'Special Administrative Region'. This post is one of a series looking at aspects of information design, user experience, internet use and journalism that interested me when I was there. The unique appeal of Macau is that it is a former Portuguese colony located in Southern China. In fact, it is less...
Postcard from Macau #6: The land of SMS spam
I recently spent three weeks visiting Macau, the former Portuguese territory on the south coast of China. As a former colony like Hong Kong, it is now a 'Special Administrative Region'. This post is one of a series looking at aspects of information design, user experience, internet use and journalism that interested me when I was there. Macau's telecomms industry seems to have a great deal of competition in the mobile network sector. With leaks from mainland China, at...
Postcard from Macau #5: Hong Kong's Edison Chen sex photo scandal rumbles on
I recently spent three weeks visiting Macau, the former Portuguese territory on the south coast of China. As a former colony like Hong Kong, it is now a 'Special Administrative Region'. This post is one of a series looking at aspects of information design, user experience, internet use and journalism that interested me when I was there. "As of this evening, the police have made significant advances towards solving this malicious crime. As from the beginning I will continue...
Postcard from Macau #4: Hong Kong's missing TV archive
I recently spent three weeks visiting Macau, the former Portuguese territory on the south coast of China. As a former colony like Hong Kong, it is now a 'Special Administrative Region'. This post is one of a series looking at aspects of information design, user experience, internet use and journalism that interested me when I was there. In the first of my posts about my recent trip to Macau, I mentioned the Sunday Morning Post. This is an English...
Postcard from Macau #3: An idiot's guide to Chinese piracy
I recently spent three weeks visiting Macau, the former Portuguese territory on the south coast of China. As a former colony like Hong Kong, it is now a 'Special Administrative Region'. This post is one of a series looking at aspects of information design, user experience, internet use and journalism that interested me when I was there. The south-east Asian region has long been reputed as a hotbed of CD and DVD piracy. I saw many stores selling 'suspect'...
Postcard from Macau #2: Measuring customer satisfaction at the Chinese border
I recently spent three weeks visiting Macau, the former Portuguese territory on the south coast of China. As a former colony like Hong Kong, it is now a 'Special Administrative Region'. This post is one of a series looking at aspects of information design, user experience, internet use and journalism that interested me when I was there. During my stay in Macau I made a day trip into China proper. Macau is a 'Special Administrative Region' as part of...
Postcard from Macau #1: Selling adverts in the Chinese 'free' press
I recently spent three weeks visiting Macau, the former Portuguese territory on the south coast of China. As a former colony like Hong Kong, it is now a 'Special Administrative Region'. This post is one of a series looking at aspects of information design, user experience, internet use and journalism that interested me when I was there. One of the English language newspapers available in Macau is the South China Morning Post. The first weekend I was in the...
My photographs of Sedlic Ossuary gaining a wider audience
I was contacted a few weeks ago by some people asking if they could use my photographs of Sedlic Ossuary in a 'Sacred Destinations' travel guide for the area, and of course, I was delighted to agree. Sedlic is located in Kutná Hora in the Czech Republic, and was somewhere we visited quite early on in our tour of what is now known as "formerly Eastern Europe". The "attraction" of the church is that it is decorated with bones. "This...
Haunted Malta
Our recent trip to Malta and Gozo would not have been complete without a spot of ghost-hunting. Before we went away my wife acquired a second-hand copy of 'The Ghosts Of Malta' by Joseph Attard. It wasn't, to be honest, the easiest of reads, as the prose style was quite difficult to get into. The thrust of the book was a narrative of how a newly independent Malta had shunned the heritage of ghost stories around the island as belonging...
Malta and Gozo - Day Six
Earlier this year I spent a week in Malta and Gozo with my wife and a couple of our best friends. We'd made all sort of provisional plans for the Sunday, our sixth and last full day, but in the end the sunny weather dictated that we head for Golden Bay. This was much more developed than Ramla Bay on Gozo, and a lot less relaxed, with big parties of teenagers with blaring radios, and a hideous shrieking family group...
Malta and Gozo - Day Five
Earlier this year I spent a week in Malta and Gozo with my wife and a couple of our best friends. On the fifth day we were in Gozo, and had quite an exciting Secret Seven style adventure in our hostel, the Maria-Giovanna, to get the day going. There was a door to a small cupboard in the bathroom in our room, but closer inspection of the fire escape map suggested a mystery was afoot. Upon opening the door we...
Malta and Gozo - Day Four: 'Il Forno'
Earlier this year I spent a week in Malta and Gozo with my wife and a couple of our best friends. On the fourth day there we made our way to Gozo, and had a great day out in Victoria (Rabat) and Dwejra. For the evening we headed back to Marsalforn where we were based, in the Maria-Giovanna Hostel, to find somewhere to eat. We at first headed to the Eastern end of the harbour, assessing each place as a...
Malta and Gozo - Day Four
Earlier this year I spent a week in Malta and Gozo with my wife and a couple of our best friends. On day four we started our 'holiday within a holiday', as we headed off to to get the ferry to Gozo. We had booked to stay overnight at the Maria-Giovanna Hostel. The owners there were lovely, and even offered to drive from Marsalforn to Mgarr to meet us from the ferry. In the end we opted to hire a...
The ignorance of the Great British tourist
Eboracum Ahoy! A visit to York
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Day of the Triffids
If everyone suddenly went blind, how long would the Internet survive, and could you still publish news on it?
With professionals of this quality, who needs 'citizen journalist' enemies?
It is hard to argue that ethics and quality set the 'professional journalist' apart from the amateur blogger, if the 'professional' keeps publishing articles so wrong that they have to be deleted.
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