Author: Willem

*A factoid is a questionable or spurious—unverified, incorrect, or fabricated—statement presented as a fact, but with no veracity.

(Long post ahead!). North Korean Dictator Kim Jong Il’s funeral was Wednesday.  Regarded as one of the few Stalinist regimes persisting into the post-Cold War era, North Korea—along with its culture, history, and society, and the daily lives of its residents—is hidden behind iron curtains even in today’s information age.   One official picture (first one below) turned out to have been Photoshopped – to make people milling around in the white snow section on the left disappear by adding ‘snow’ over them.

But more information from North Korea is emerging. Further down are pictures I took a few weeks ago from NHK World’s TV coverage when Kim Jong Il died, as well as some culled from the web.   The map picture shows the major roads in the country, even though private car ownership is almost non-existent.   (You use the bus or a train to get around).   What about flying?  Well, North Korea’s sole airline, Air Koryo, currently has scheduled flights from Beijing, which depart at 11:30AM every Tuesday and Saturday, and return from Pyongyang at 9AM on the same days.  Air Koryo is the only 1-star (worst) airline on Skytrax’s list.  (Yes, you can fly in on this airline – but only as part of an official tour group. Another option is to go check out the jointly controlled truce village in the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) dividing the two Koreas, which has regular one-day bus tours from Seoul).   The airline does operate internal flights as well.

Where does the flag (next picture) come from?  It came into being in 1948 when the country was founded as a result of the post-colonial settlement handed down by the United States and the Soviet Union (USSR).  The Korean War between the north and South Korea of 1950-1953 in which some 54,000 US personnel were killed is sometime called The Forgotten War (from the US perspective).  And today I learned that M*A*S*H (popular 70s-80s TV series) stands for 4077th Mobile Army Surgical Hospital in Uijeongbu, South Korea, so it depicts the Korean War and NOT the Vietnam War.

Food? Frequent food shortages.  Basic food is rationed, while one can buy canned meat or a small amount of vegetables either from a store or farmers’ market.  The local specialty liquor is insam-ju, Korean vodka infused with ginseng roots.  Spicy food seems to be is short supply; there is no kimchee (spicy cabbage, found everywhere in South Korea, as in the picture I took at a shop at Seoul’s international airport).  No candies or sweets for children.

Language?  They speak Korean, much the same as in South Korea.   From Wikipedia (I will have to research what the heck this means) ‘The genealogical classification of the Korean language is debated by a number of historical linguists. Most classify it as a language isolate while a few consider it to be in the Altaic language family.  The Korean language is agglutinative in its morphology and SOV in its syntax’.  Ooh, sounds complicated.  I love it !

Cell phones?  There has been cell phone service since 2008 and reportedly 60% of Pyongyang residents and many ordinary citizens now have phones.  (And some even have iPhones).  An Egyptian company was contracted to help build out the infrastructure.

Defections.  I think the last picture I snapped from NHK TV shows the latest defectors in 2011 that were found by the Japan Coast Guard – a wooden boat carrying nine people, three men, three women and three boys. The group had been sailing for five days towards South Korea but drifted towards the Noto Peninsula.   The first famous defection occurred shortly after the signing of the armistice ending the Korean War, on September 21, 1953, when then 21-year-old No Kum-Sok, a senior lieutenant in the North Korean air force, flew his MiG-15 to the South.  No was awarded the then immense sum of $100,000 and the right to reside in the United States.

 

 

Alright, here are the ‘official’ answers! (picture from Wall Street Journal Weekend Edition Dec 24-25, 2011).  And how did I do? (If you are a Google recruiter, stop reading).  My response to Question 1‘s answer is .. Ok, if you say so (there is an infinite number of correct answers).   I didn’t get it.  I tried prime factors, differences to three levels and other weird things. Which, after not working, is of course a clue that it’s something still different.  Then I thought it could be years in the 20th century with significant events, but still no luck.    Question 2.   I thought the answer is, first – the balloon stays put for an instant, due to inertia (Newton’s First Law), and then thought it would move forward but couldn’t explain as nicely as in the newspaper answer as to why.   Question 3.   I got this one .. and I got Question 4.  Fairly easy to solve with algebra, and making the number of pages in the book the unknown quantity x to solve for in a single equation.   Question 5.  Missed it!  Aargh.  Best I could offer was that it was a reference to Wheel of Fortune (very popular TV game show), and that the guy tried to spell ‘HOTEL’ or something of that sort, and lost the money he had.

.. that’s what this weekend’s Wall Street Journal Review section challenges its readers with, with an article about interview questions candidates can expect at Google.   Want to give them a try? (If you don’t have training in math and engineering, just try Question 5).   I’m going to take a crack at them myself without peeking at the answers at the back of the newspaper, and will report back tomorrow!

Question 1 : What is the next number in the sequence 10, 9, 60, 90, 70, 66, .. ?

Question 2: You’re in a car with a helium balloon on a string that is tied to the floor. The windows are closed. When you step on the gas pedal, what happens to the balloon – does it move forward, move backward, or stay put?

Question 3 : Using only a 4-minute hourglass and a 7-minute hourglass, measure exactly 9 minutes – without the process taking longer than 9 minutes.

Question 4 : A book has N pages, numbered the usual way, from 1 to N. The total number of digits in the page numbers is 1,095.  How many pages does the book have?

Question 5 : A man pushed his car to a hotel and lost his fortune.  What happened?

I love this picture.  Look at the faces (and is that a baby crash helmet the kid is wearing?).  The photo was snapped by Mark Gormus from Associated Press and made MSNBC’s Year in Sports Pictures for 2011.  The caption reads : Tiffany Goodwin of Fredericksburg, Va., robs her husband Allen, at right with glove, of a foul ball while holding 8-month-old son Jerry during a minor league game between the Richmond Flying Squirrels and Harrisburg Senators in Richmond Va.

After 5 months I finally got my 2010 Federal tax refund from the US Treasury (it was a complicated tax return).  Yes, it took a long time, but they paid out 5.6% in annual interest in addition to the refund.   So off I went to my Wells Fargo branch office to deposit the check.  (Wells Fargo has a market cap of US $143 billion and 263,000 full-time employees.  All this to say it is a really, really big bank).  The deposit made, the cashier makes me see a financial adviser.  Here is more or less how the conversation went.  And what will I do with the money after it clears the checking account?  Put it in a Wells Fargo savings account?  Oh, I have a savings account already (with an interest rate of 0.01%! incredible but true).   Ah, but they can upgrade the account.  Then it goes from 0.01% to 0.4% interest.   That’s 40 times the current rate, says the adviser.  (Thinking).  OK. First, I can do the math.  Second, on-line bank ING Direct offers 0.8%.  (Yes, which is still next to nothing).

So! After being annoyed at the US Treasury for holding on so long to my money, I now want to give it back so they can hold it some more.  Bankrate.com says that even if one has $100,000 of cash AND deposit it in a CD for 5 years, the best return offered is some 1.8%.   One could always try Dividend.com to find high-dividend yielding stocks.   Just don’t pick France Telecom with a fantastic dividend yield of 13%, but off 34% from its 52-week high.

Here’s the seal of the Department of the US Treasury.  The Treasury prints and mints all paper currency and coins in circulation through the Bureau of Engraving and Printing and the United States Mint.  The Department also collects all federal taxes through the Internal Revenue Service, and manages U.S. government debt instruments, with the major exception of the Federal Reserve System.

Could nine pillows on one’s bed be a few too many?  (From my Marriott Hong Kong Sky City hotel room bed.  I’m making my way back to Seattle on Wednesday morning).   I guess all these afford the sleeper a lot of choice between softer and firmer and bigger and smaller pillows.      Or maybe it could make one dream of being on cloud nine (a state of total euphoria) ?

Never mind that is does not snow in Hong Kong.  One can always shake up a snow globe like I did on Sunday in a Godiva chocolate store  (the one in the picture).    The ‘Belgium 1926’ is a reference to Godiva’s founding country and date.   Legend has it that the Anglo-Saxon woman Lady Godiva (1002 – 1066) , rode naked through the streets of Coventry in order to protest high taxation imposed by her husband on his tenants.

And how long have snow globes been around?   Seems the first ones appeared at the Paris Universal Expo of 1878, featuring a little Eiffel Tower inside.

It’s Friday!  This is from the Japanese TV channel NHK World in my hotel room.  Bactrian camels (two humps; dromedary camels have one) are native to the steppes of central Asia.    There are 2 million of them, all domesticated.  Wikipedia says that some 800 were remaining in the wild in northwest China and Mongolia as of 2002 and were classified as critically endangered on the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species.  This camel seems to be well taken care of – in a zoo in Japan from what I can tell.    The reporter admires the beast’s furry coat and then shows off its lunch : giant carrots filled with olives.  Hmm.  A yummy treat for a camel, I suppose?

I gauge the day’s temperature by walking out on my balcony in the morning before I go downstairs for breakfast.  This was the beautiful sunrise Thursday morning at 7.15am.  We’re back to light jacket weather, and the humidity is low so the air is cool and crisp.

Late Thursday night I caught the Audi R8 in the lobby bidding a handful of admirers good-bye : I guess it was time to go back to the showroom.   Or maybe it found a driver to rev its engine?   And check out the blue LED Christmas tree in the background.

No No! cries the cat on the gas tank flap of this Nissan Tiida hatchback that I spotted from the bus this morning.    What does the cat want?  He says not to raise gas prices.  (Gas prices in China are on average 30% higher than those in the US .. so not as bad as in Europe, though).

Below is the view early Sunday morning from the hotel balcony.  That is the Hong Kong territories in the distance.   It was 16 C (61 F) but felt quite a bit colder because there was a strong wind.    I looked for lunar eclipse pictures from Saturday night and liked the one of a goddess playing with the moon on-line.  I’m not sure where this was taken.   (A total eclipse was visible from China, but I was otherwise occupied with the Saturday night barbecue!).