deux es machina

today i encountered something really crazy, unimaginable and scary but somehow awesome and simply amazing! check this out:

this „thing“ can speed up from zero to 100 (km/h) in only 3 seconds!! the whole body of the „deux es machina“ (thats the official name) is like an exo-sceletos with bionic muscles supporting your body. top-speed is 120 km/h … i want one!!! but ok, it looks little bit scary though…

strategy: back to basic

in martial arts when it comes to a competition, in my case usually a fight looks like this: the first time you face your opponent you have to check his abilities. standing in front of him, you check his posture, his movement, his face expression and especially the eyes. you need to know what kind of fighting style he adopted: a more aggressive one, with fast, powerful movements which are usually less precise and energy wasting (but devastating when you get hit) or a concentrated, calculating guy who uses fast and very precise moves to hit you in weak spots, which does not need that much energy at all. this moves are usually not that hard in the first place but its hard to foresee and therefore prepare for them which can also be very critical. also, you have to take the risk and take one or two hits just to see whether you are able to take them and compete. in my opinion, there is no use to fight an opponent if you cant take even one hit. furthermore it is very important to notice his way of breathing, this will show you about his condition. in case your condition is worse, the fight shouldnt take long and you have to become more offensive in order to take him down before your condition gets down.

this is just a very small insight of things you get confronted with when you train for competition. as you can see, fighting is not that simple. it requires your full concentration and also a trained and resistent body. it gets more interesting even after the fight and especially when you lost, cause then you usually recall all the hits and the moments you made a mistake, analyze it, try to develop a counter-technique or some very special move the opponent may not be able to foresee and then… then you cant wait to meet this opponent again and use the knowledge to take him down… but sometimes unexpected difficulties occur, no matter how hard you try the opponent seems to foresee every move and is just beating you down… what usually helps then… is to go back to the roots. to the very basic techniques which are simple but effective and… proofed.

the financial crisis is a very strong opponent we are hardly able to face. even though every economist knows what would be necessary to fight this crisis in a way which would be actually most healthy for the economy and for the future development of the market, no politician will ever allow this to happen – and also a lot of managers up there have a strong interest in not letting this happen.

after the real estates and the financial industry, the crisis swept over to the next industry: cars, automobiles and therefore also their subsidiaries and supplying companies. this is not the end, it will continue on and on since everything is so strongly connected with each other…

what should happen? in economics it is called „to slim down“ or in my language: going back to the basics. the companies with the worst troubles are the huge companies like GM which do business in different fields, operate in many areas and developed into huge conglomerates which are difficult to control and where it is difficult to calculate their risk profiles. therefore, this companies should go back to their main business, concentrate on profitable areas and earn money with what they can. why this doesnt happen? because this would mean to close facilities, sending thousands of people into unemployment and of course cutting down the worth of business as well as earnings which will also mean less money for the management… only few managers are willing to accept this and no politician will ever let such a thing happen. reelection is very important, right?

but all the intervenience by the state will only create the next big bubble and therefore there will be a crisis after this. hard to say how this crisis will look like but it will come for sure… interesting thing: only few months ago, i was speculating on my old blog about what would happen if such a crisis would occur and the world demand for goods produced in china would decrease. china’s growth is based mainly on export but with a decreasing demand on the world market, they should face some serious trouble – and exactly this is happening now. just today i was reading an article about this. according to the financial times, chinas growth might go down to 6 or even 4%. right now, thousands of companies have to close their business, we will notice very soon what effects this will bring…

for everybody who is interested in economics, i guess the financial crisis is one the most interesting „events“ ever. it shows us all the connections and boundaries around the globe among companies, politics, monetary flows etc. and seeing all this happen makes it so interesting to learn and study about it.

rise & fall

a new finance world order. this is what the „chiefs“ of all the economies around the globe expect very soon. how will this new order look like? one thing is for sure: less liberalism, more control-mechanisms. the result should be something like „more transparency“ and less „greed“ but since „greed“ is not really something you can control, we should call it perhaps „less possibilities for actions which satisfy greedy people doing greedy things“. 

honestly, i do not think this will work. i just finished reading „the crash will come“. i started reading this a long time ago but since the book was not very good i never finished. now, after a lot of things that have been mentioned in the book really happened it turned more interesting. really, i do not know how to solve this problems the world is confronted with right now BUT what i do know is, that there should be some bigger, more sustainable change not only in the finance system. i think we need something like a new idea for a political order. any ideas?

yeah, but what i wanted to write about today is… china. step by step, things start to change. today i read an article about the company „MARS“. you know, they produce this chocolate sticks. few years ago they moved a big part of their production facilities to china but due to all the food-scandals they reputation suffered a lot. so far, during the last few years china had some huge scandals about killing toothpaste, killing milkpowder, killing toys, killing animal feed, killing medicine, etc. the trust in chinas food reached ground zero. check this blog for more. i remember the last time when i was in japan the news there have been reporting about food scandals in china almost 24/7. this is not only a japan-story anymore. people all around the world are confused and mistrust china on this – so the MARS corporation decided to leave china – until things change.

usually i would not mention this, but just few days ago i told mejulie that i changed during my time in korea, now i take more care about food in different ways and also take more care about hygiene standards. for example: i almost completely stopped eating street-food cause a few times i was feeling bad after this and had trouble with digestion. she got upset and told me i will have no choice in china since the street-food there is the best… well… i dont know on this one…

MARS is a huge company. if china wont react on this and put some at least basic standards on production management, more companies will move. chinas rise during the last years was some kind of miracle which changed the whole world order. even though the finance crisis had not a big effect on china until know, things can change very soon and scandals like this can lead to big collapse. the higher you climb, the harder you fall.

obama and south korea

obama will be the new president of the us. great stuff. but what does it mean for korea? i thought it might be useful to collect some points of his program, statements and promises concerned with north and south korea. first lets check his agenda:

• Seek New Partnerships in Asia: Obama and Biden will forge a more effective framework in Asia that goes beyond bilateral agreements, occasional summits, and ad hoc arrangements, such as the six-party talks on North Korea. They will maintain strong ties with allies like Japan, South Korea and Australia; work to build an infrastructure with countries in East Asia that can promote stability and prosperity; and work to ensure that China plays by international rules.
• Talk to our Foes and Friends: Obama and Biden are willing to meet with the leaders of all nations, friend and foe.They will do the careful preparation necessary, but will signal that America is ready to come to the table, and that he is willing to lead. And if America is willing to come to the table, the world will be more willing to rally behind American leadership to deal with challenges like terrorism, and Iran and North Korea’s nuclear programs.
• Strengthen the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty: Obama and Biden will crack down on nuclear proliferation by strengthening the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty so that countries like North Korea and Iran that break the rules will automatically face strong international sanctions.
• Eliminate Iran’s and North Korea’s Nuclear Weapons Programs Through Tough, Direct Diplomacy: Barack Obama will use tough diplomacy – backed by real incentives and real pressures – to prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons and to eliminate fully and verifiably North Korea’s nuclear weapons program.

i leave the interpretation to you guys. what else might be interesting? for example this:

• 3 June 2008 - Leading U.S. presidential candidate Barack Obama, who is close to securing the democratic nomination for president, came out criticizing the Korea-U.S. Free Trade Agreement. Speaking to an audience at a rally in South Dakota, Obama said, “While Korea has exported hundreds of thousands of automobiles (a year), the U.S. has barely exported 5,000 units.” He also sent a letter to U.S. President George W. Bush on Thursday, calling the KORUS FTA “badly flawed.“ He argued that Korea’s huge non-tariff barrier is well demonstrated in the auto sector.”
• FTA could be facing renegotiation

what else? it might be interesting to see who will be responsible on korea related topics, i simply assume that obama is not a korea expert, so:

• who will advise obama on korea policy?

pretty interesting. by the way, do we have a korea expert in the german foreign policy team? not sure about this but i guess… not – yet. i am pretty sure i know somebody who would be very interested in such a position. more stuff to come very soon. if you find more interesting links, tell me.

the „hate korea“ community

sometimes, when i have a bad day or there is something that disturbs me about korean culture or korea in general, all i need to do is to read some comments on english articles in korean newspapers online or visit some blogs or forums about korea. it wont take more then 5 minutes and i will see again, why i am still so much into korea and miss it only few days after leaving it.

one of the reasons is the fact that there are soooo many people out there who lived, live, study or work in korea and that most of this people seem to have really a hard time there – at least you get this impression by reading their comments. the complaining about almost everything seems to have an unlimited source and everytime i read this stupid remarks, even though sometimes i get a little bit upset about the ridiculous statements some really dumb people use to post, in most cases it makes me feel better cause then i can see so clearly how much i learned during the last 3,5 years.

i write about this today cause i followed and partly took part in a discussion with some english teachers and also koreans (english students) in a forum about korea, about the english native speakers who teach english in korea. amazing. prejudices, stereotypes, offence, politics and altogether huuuge misunderstandings on both sides on a scale so huge, that you can not only see but almost feel the huge difference in way of thinking, interpretation of actions and expectations. this sounds quite neutral but in fact the result was all but no good.

i dont know what to say but this one thing: if you go into another country you are a guest. no matter what you do there, assimilation is not only the key to get accepted but also to be able to accept things you might not understand at first. also, there is absolutely no need to expect something that you wouldnt even get in your home country. so to all the haters out there: stop complaining and start learning. its worth it.

i just notice… that i miss korea again…