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Friday Funnies

People love a good laugh. It energises, beats stress and boosts teamwork. It also makes people more receptive to fresh insights, especially about their emotional health and wellbeing.

Around two years ago I visited a HR and Org. dev seminar in New Zealand and participated at a several short sessions. One of them had the title "You won´t die laughing". It was awesome, simply hilarious!

Since than, I´m getting each Friday a good selection of jokes, and now I wanted to share one of those and also direct you here, of course only, if you want to read some humour:

"Several men are in the locker room of a golf club. A cellphone on a bench rings and a man engages the hands freespeaker-function and begins to talk. Everyone else in the room stops to listen.

MAN: "Hello"

WOMAN: "Honey, it's me. Are you at the club?"

MAN: "Yes"

WOMAN: "I am at the mall now and found this beautiful leather coat. It's only $3,000. Is it OK if I buy it?"

MAN: "Sure, ..go ahead if you like it that much"

WOMAN: "I also stopped by the Mercedes dealership and saw the new 2006 models. I saw one I really liked"

MAN: "How much?"

WOMAN: "$90,000"

MAN: "OK, but for that price I want it with all the options.

WOMAN: "Great! Oh, and one more thing ... The house I wanted last year is back on the market. They're asking $1,550,000"

MAN: "Well, then go ahead and give them an offer of $1,500,000. They will probably take it. If not, we can go the extra 50 thousand. If it's really a pretty good price."

WOMAN: "OK. I'll see you later! I love you so much!!"

MAN: "Bye! I love you, too."

The man hangs up. The other men in the locker room are staring at him in astonishment, mouths agape...

He smiles and asks: "Anyone know who this phone belongs to?.."

Long time...ya

Right, if it goes like this, you can expect 3 more postings this year :-). Anyway, I choose that black template when setting up this blog, because pictures seem to be sooo nice on a black background. Then I had problems with uploading pics and anyway my camera makes simply shitty pictures. So here I am ... on blue.

Just wondering, where these 3 months flew away, since I am in Stockholm...

Hardly remember the first 2 weeks, when I was sitting at my desk continuously asking my bosses for more work. Definitely those times are gone, and I feel good if I can catch up and make some developments...in my free time at work. At the same time, I just realized, that I needed this period to get deeper into my role here, identify the areas where I can make a difference and where I feel, the gaps and the weaknesses of my department are. And this is good. I feel inspired by the things I see "it could be done much better".

Apart from work, life is going pretty smooth here. Without any hidden goal of doing promotion, I have to say, that Stockholm is just gorgeous! Have never ever thought -and the ones, who know me well would agree- that I can enjoy being in a ´cold´city, where the average number of sunny hours during winter can be less than 6 per day! Sure, you can say, I am still on "honeymoon" as far as the cultural integration goes, but I do hope, it is not just that. Though I also must admit, that I cannot wait for the summer, when sunrise will happen at 3.40am and sunset at 22.03 in Stockholm. And if I find that this is not enough, I can still go to Luleå (North of Sweden) to experience sunrise at 1.34am and sunset at 23.34. That must be real fun!

What is also good, that I am in Europe, which opens several opportunities to travel around easily and cheaper. The next destination will be Amsterdam just in 2 weeks, so if you happen to be there (feb 24-26) as well, let me know and have some catch up.

Right, might be enough for now...

On track (?)

Ok, not much time (still), but I have not blogged a while ago, so I thought to drop at least a couple of lines.

The last, let´s say, 1 month has been just extremely hectic. Three weeks ago I was sitting in the office in Curitiba, Brazil wrappin up my project there and saying good-bye to many people, who I consider true friends now. Then I just hopped onto a bus and left for Sao Paulo, to visit some friends there and do a bit of sightseeing. Also travelled to Rio de Janeiro to learn more about ´Cidade Maravilhosa´.

After leaving this awesome country, which I have been enjoying in the last 8 months, I had the chance to visit home, friends, family etc for 6 days. My time in Hungary was just toooo short! I could not even meet all the people I wanted, I just sort of throw out summer clothes from my suitcase and replaced them with some warm stuffs. Though I feel happy about at least meeting some of my friends, who were even kind enough to prepare some hungarian food for me, which I missed overseas.

Hm, exactly a week ago I checked in to flight to my next destination. (with my boss on board :-)) And here I am.....Stockholm, Sweden. Sure it would be nice to post a picture here, but it just does not work, I tried.

Anyway, first impression: the city is just gorgeous! I have read before, that it is really nice, but to be honest, I just did not believe it until I saw with my eyes. A city on 14 islands, water all over, very nice architecture, ´candle-culture´ etc.....how could that be not nice???

All in all, I´m enjoying my time here (yes, yes, still honeymoon period) and I hope it will last long. Apart from the fact, that each day I´m facing with the core differences between brazilian and swedish culture plus working culture, which makes sometimes difficult to handle things, it´s just awesome to:

* generally ´be´ in the city

* meeting friends at work and at parties, whom I have met before somewhere in the world

* also meeting and getting to know new people

* getting new assignments at work and familiarize with people and my job

* settling in in my new apartman, which I´m sharing with a swedish girl

* taking random walks in the city and discovering it´s cute cafés, shall I say ´fika places´ :-)?

Let´s say, this is enough for today.....

Cultural Capital of Europe 2010

I'm super enthusiastic! There will be two or maybe three Cultural Capitals of Europe in 2010. One of them will be from Germany, the other one from Hungary, and the third one might be Istanbul, Turkey. Among other applicant cities, there was Pécs as well. The city where I was born, and where I lived for 5 years during my secondary school, an amazing time of my life.

From the final 7 best applications in Hungary, our government announced yesterday, that they will recommend Pécs, as Cultural Capital of Europe in 2010! And this is just sooo awesome! I cannot express in words my loyalty towards places I have been living...since it is a feeling, which does not have logical reasons. Though apart from emotions, it is just that I know, it will mean a huge development not only for the city, but also for the region (south-western part) which is my original home. 101% happiness :-).
And here are some shots from Pécs...I think it's gorgeous!

(Unfortunately something is wrong and I cannot upload all my fav pics :-(.)

Danubius online magyarul!

My gosh, after some unsuccessful trials earlier, today I randomly tried again, whether I can connect to my favorite hungarian radio channel on the Internet. Though the nr1 still does not work, I could connect to another one, I really like too!

The pure fact, that I'm listening a hungarian radio with hungarian news in hungarian (does not matter, that I have read all the news already online during the day :-)) is just AWESOME!

In the afternoon I called my mom and we talked quite long, and sometimes I realized, which I never wanted to happen. I simply did not find some words I wanted to say, my pronunciation (even for me) sounds strange and sometimes I even messed up structures. How the hell could this happen? Very sad, very sad. But, no problem, from now on it's not only me talking to myself, I can listen The Radio talking to me too :-)!

Now I decided to leave the computer on during the night, so I will wake up for nice music, or some late morning show, and sun shining right into my room. How this sound?

The surprise cake

Btw, this was my birthday cake at work. Isn't it just tooo cute and nice???
No need to mention, I was extremely happy :-).

I marry you, I marry you, I marry you...

...said Jude Law to Nicole Kidman in the 'Cold Mountain' and then vice versa. I had the same thought today, when (after a tough interview on Wednesday) Electrolux called me today to ask me, whether I would like to continue with them and work for HR Group staff in Stockholm from January onwards.

So, it seems I will have my 3rd marriage with a different country, which is incredibly exciting! I have this calmness feeling right now, because knowing my future allows me more to 'live in the NOW' here in Brazil, where I still have around 3 wonderful months to go.