All posts by johncohn

Thursday night Kracow

April 5, 2012 johncohn Leave a comment

Andrej and I left the hotel this morning at 545 am..once again I was seeing beautiful Slovenia without the benefit of son..but I really love the place. As we drove to the airport i marveled at how close everything was around here.

the airport lounge was busy even though it was hardly 6AM.. we looked at Slovenian trinkets.. this guy is their national poet.

the irport launge offered beer for breakfast.. why not ?

checking out the local newspapers..

eeek I’m in one !

we transfered at vienna and got in the large puddle jumper for the trip to Poland.

the flight over was uneventful ( i slept).. then we got a quick cap to IBM)

hari took andre j and me to lunch…

then it was back to the lab for 6 hours of great meetings/

Andrej and I then caught a cap back to our hotel and then ventured out in search f food and adventure

first stop was the famous dragon sculpture.. a beautiful bronze of a dragon that occasionally shoots fire. it used to be in response to an sms message.. now it seems to do it on a timer. I absolutely need to build one like this of Champ !!!!

i left a samstone on the sculpture.. just .. cuz !

then we walked downtown in search of food…. there Easter fare was getting set up in the old town village square.. It was small but still looked magical .

the town is beautiful.. just as I remember it !

ok.. I need more than 4 hours sleep tonight.. so I’m going to bed.. more tomorrow !!!

nite all. nite sam

-me

Wednesday night – Slo day

April 5, 2012 johncohn 1 Comment

Oooops.. just saw this didn’t publish yesterday.. sorry !

Just spent a really wonderful day in Slovenia… where you Say ? Slovenia is like OZ.. a place only few come to.. but anyone who does will surly fall in love with the place.. it reminds me of new zealand in that it’s it’s own little world.. with great geographic diversity, .. and all in all awesomeness. Everyone I met here was a) smart, b) nice and c) pretty happy.. can’t ask for better than that.. with a population of just about 2 million its pretty tiny.. but has the highest GDP in eastern Europe..
I was here once 33 years ago and the place has changed remarkably.

I spent teh day meeting with clients, ibm folks, journalists and students..

Here are the folks from ‘Take a bite out of science’ a science promotion tv show for kids and other humans.. they were just so great.. they asked great questions.we tied out the electric pickle experiment with a a red pepper and a hot dog.. fun and smelly

here’s the view of Croatia from the balcony..

after the IBM forum.. we headed back to Ljubljana to the university.. I got a good view of the coastline by day..

There’s was a nice crowd at the technical university tonight. It was an IEEE meeting.

i enjoyed given my talk there.. what a great group of folks. Three of them I’d met in belgium 2 years ago now that’s a small world. Here I am with Andrej’s son Jore who goes to school here.

afterwards a couple of us went out for dinner and Jore took me for a quick tour around Ljubljana at night.. what a gem !

ok.. time for just 4 hours sleep…

miss my homies.. love to all

nite all, nite sam

-me

Tuesday night (late) – What the Heck ?

April 3, 2012 johncohn Leave a comment

Greetings from Portaz in Slovenia.. I’m right at the Croatian border.. In fact, I can see the lights of Croatia from my room in the hotel. It was a longggg fun day. My buddy Andrej had lined up a bunch of talks with IBMers, Students and journalist.s.. Tomorrow it’s all Clients.. which will be fun..

Hungary was a real treat..t eh people are great, the landscape is great.. the language is… er… impenetrable. I like to think that I’m pretty good at languages.. but I don’t even recognize a single word of spoken Hungarian.. .. The one word I recognized on a sign today was ‘heck’.. and who knows what that really means.. what the heck anyway.. everyone I spoke to today was more fluent in English than I am !..

Here are some signs from the university technology park where I spent the day.. here’s the Citadela by day.

diu

After leaving Budapest , Andrej and I had a good long (7 hour ) drive down to Slovenia.. We stopped at lake

yudtegxtdytewgciuewhdiuewyduwgtdiuewdxajdoiedi8yewdiuewyd7ewyd9ew87yd98ewyde98w

or.. at least that’s what it sounded like.. it was beautiful and idyllic.. like the rest of the Hungarian countryside.

Sam is there now…

Then we reached Slovenia.. also very beautiful.. but in a different way.. very much like Austria..

We stopped breifly to meet andrej’s very nice wife and daughter.. and see his house.

We greabbed a traditianal snack.. then made the 2 hours drive more to here…

now it’s 2 am and I need to sleep. More in the morning..

big talk tomorrow.. hope it goes ok !

nite all, nite sam

-me

Monday night – Three country day

April 2, 2012 johncohn 2 Comments

Whirlwind day through three countries.. Day began at 7AM in Austria.. my freind Andrej from Slovenia picked me up at Osman and Katerine’s place on the west side of Wien.. but 8:00 we were crossing the boarder to Slovakia through fields of wind turbines.. they were everywhere !

Brataslava was a nice town.. definitely on the rise.. beautiful architecture and really nice folks

Here’s our little IBM mobile for the week

I put a samstone in a small park before we began our day in slovakia

One great stop was with te great people of Fun Radio.. a really cool and intelligent talk show on the radio.. I looked them up. they have some amazing guests.. (and a really cute dog under the desk). I really enjoyed speaking with them !

ten lunch (here’s my octopus soup.. RELEASE THE KRACKEN.. or the crackers at least !)

And another cool /smart journalist there to talk to !

Then to the technical university for my talk..

talk went well. I really enjoyed speaking with the students and faculty.. I felt very, very welcome !

Here’s Andrej wit our comms handlers.. (Hi comms handlers.. thanks for your help today !)

then a quick tour of the IBM site and some meetings with the folks there..

me and my boy TJ Jr.

then back in the car.. and a 2 hour drive to Budapest.. trough even more windmills.. a beutiful spring drive.. everything here is green

Checked in to the hotel in Budapest only o find the last 4 digits of the internet passcode wiere the last 4 digits of my drivers license… (queue the spooky music !!!)

Budapest is gorgeous.. I emailed my old buddy Zoltan and he met us for a late tour and dinner..

Here’s the state house.. right next store is the presidents palace.. he resigned (!!!) tonight due to a scandal about his PhD thesis 20 years ago !

At my request, Zoltan drove us up to the citadela monument.. About 30 years ago I got chased out of there at 3AM by a soldier with a gun.. (long story) .. but it looked different now. .The soviet era statues had been moved away leaving the lone statue of a woman looking to the north.. It’s actually a memorial to the preWWII leaders son who was shot down over the soviet union. It’s been restored since the fall of the eastern block . No guns up there tonight.. just a beautiful view of the city !