TED - Technology, Entertainment, Design

I've heard about TED a long time ago, and I actually watched lots of lectures and presentations there. But before this summer I did not realize how big this whole thing is. How many lectures/presentations there are on TED and what topics TED covers. When I got to know that, I put together a small "project" or task for myself, to get through all the presentations on TED and to watch the one that might be interesting for me.
I can finally say I have reached the goal so far. Why "so far"? Because there are more and more presentations being uploaded on the regular basis and that means I will keep track in the future as well.
I rather don't do the calculation of how many hours I have spent watching TED and how many videos have I seen. But I did however managed to put together the list of my favorites. There are lots and sadly they are not ranked. I must say there were many presentations that I have watched but didn't make it to my favorite list and I hope there aren't many that I would enjoy watching but I skipped just based on its name and tags.
I started watching posted videos in reverse chronological order and today I have reached the first page and the newest posts. Usually I watched several presentations in a row here and there.
I am glad that I made it through and that also means I'll have a bit more time for some other things (hopefully).

Happy hollidays and mindblownig 2010

Japan

It has been quite a while that I have returned from my trip to Japan. It was mostly business trip, but I still had a week for my own traveling and getting to know Japan.
After my business part was over in Kobe, I (with my mentor) traveled to Himeji to have a look at the nicest Japanese castle. It was worth seeing and it was beautiful. The same day I took the train to Osaka, a city that has more than 2 million people. It's quite big, but still manageable. I stayed there for a night in a really nice hostel put up in some old garage. I went out in the evening to see the city at night. It is very nice and safe. Next morning I went in Osaka castle that stands in the middle of the city in a small palace park behind great walls and pitches.
In the afternoon I went to Nara a "small" city (300k inhabitants) that holds the most temples in Japan. It is a very strange feeling to walk in the park together with hundreds of deers and of-course thousands of tourists. I stayed there in traditional Japanese inn - Ryokan. It's a nice feeling but it does get cold at nights. Two days in Nara passes by quite fast and the railway took me to Kyoto.
Kyoto is the cultural capital of Japan. It holds many museums, temples and castles. It has a very nice rail-station. While there are lots of tourists at sightseeing places the city gets full (and I mean full) of youngsters and others in the afternoon. It's quite hard even to walk in the street because of the number of people. Again two days past very quickly and I managed to get to know few tourists at the hostel I was staying. Quite interesting people I must say.
For the last three days I was staying in Tokyo. I liked it a lot. I went to different parts of the city to see what is the life in different districts like. It is very colorful I must say. While some parts are full of fashion shops others are full of electronics shops and then others are full of pachinko's, manga shops, book stores and so on. I even went to fish market one morning to find that they pull half of the sea life out every morning and sell it while it is still more or less alive. I even went to the Tokyo's highest sightseeing point in one of the governmental building. The subway is a very handy transport there that brings you wherever you want. Once I even went to the new living district on the artificial island that look kinda nice.
To conclude I must say I am very glad I had a chance to be there and to see what is the most developed country like. I must say it is über clean and über safe. I never ever had even a bad feeling and thrashes can only be seen in very few places. I could live there.
You can find some photos here.