swiss courtesy

In general I don't find the swiss the friendliest bunch. Not withstanding, there are plenty of friendly swiss people out there - I mean no offense by this statement, it's merely an observation.

There are some things however that I really like about their little courtesies. People greet each other at the doctor's surgery for instance. I like that. With the english being so reserved, it just wouldn't happen there.

By far the thing I like the most however, is the fact that there's more than one way to both greet and say goodbye to a group of people; furthermore, it's not unusual to do so. I just went to the corner shop to buy some beer and there was a young woman in the small shop with me. After my sale was finished it was perfectly natural to say goodbye collectively to both the shop assistant and the shopper.

When I leave switzerland it'll be the little things I miss.

eurovision

I voted.

I've never voted for anything on television before, but voting for UKs awesome entry in eurovision this year was well worth my 70rp. Since bbc prime have decided that eurovision doesn't fit their demographic, it took quite some effort to both watch the contest while listening to terry (a eurovision staple).

Fortunately however the time delay created by watching swiss tv and listening to internet radio meant we could appreciate both the swiss commentators cynical and terry's sardonic comments.

It's waiting time now - the half time show is on. Britain are predicted to come 24th - that's flat last. Well at least they did better than DJ Bobo.

how do they do it?

On the bus this morning I was thinking about deaf children and how they grow up. If a child is profoundly deaf, how do they learn to read? How do they mentally pronounce the words that they come to understand?

A quick google when I arrived at work has taught me that hearing aid and cockler cochlear implant technology is much better than I gave it credit for, and according to this, deaf children should be taught to understand and speak before learning things like written word, lip reading or sign language.

This quick lesson has made me happier in the knowledge that your child being born deaf isn't as tragic as it first may seem.

cultural laws

In england you're not allowed to talk to people you don't know, even if they have a t-shirt on it that says "please talk to me". There needs to be some sort of unspoken request allow before any audible communication is permitted.

For instance, if you're wearing a cap that has the logo of a sports team on it, someone may want to tell you that they support the team too, so they might subtly nod. Your responses can be one of many:

• A nod combined with a half smirk, half smile smile combined with a short exhalation through the nose means "I see you support the team. While I appreciate that, I don't support them, I just like the cap. Don't talk to me"
  
  
• A nod and smile means "I support them too, but don't talk to me"
  
  
• A nod, grunt and smile means "I support them too. If you want to talk, you're now welcome" (The grunt simply initialises audible communication).
  

This incredibly english subtlety combined with understated gestures defines the culture, but is wholly and sorely misunderstood, nay, unnoticed, by others. Wearing a sports cap in the states, for instance, is a license to have people talk crap to at you.

When I move there I'm going to have to be forgiving. Bless their souls, they just don't get it.

coincidence

Having found out that apple have promised to support the final 802.11n spec with their current n devices, I was just looking to see if the mac minis support the n protocol.

I was disappointed to find out that they do not, however I did like the number of search results.

shhhhhhhhh

So I finally bought some noise cancelling headphones and decided to write a non-audiophile's review of them.



The first time I put them on I was really impressed. I was standing in a quiet apartment and only having put them did I notice that there used to be a sound of the air-conditioning and faint background road noise. The nullification of the sound was quite amazing.

I had heard that the bose quiet comfort headphones were substantially better than other companies' offerings, so while I was in the states I put it to the test. I went into a sony store in boston and tried out their headphones and I also tried out all of the headphones on sale at logan airport. I had heard from a friend of a friend that the best way to save $100 on noise cancelling headphones was to just buy the bose ones first. Having tried at least 5 others I have to agree. The bose phones may well be costly, but if you want it to work, then why bother spending half the amount on something substandard?

So, back to the sound itself. The way the noise cancelling works seems to be quite interesting. Having played around with them a while I have come to the conclusion that they only attempt to cancel repetitive noise. This means that you can have a conversation with someone standing next to you without having to take them off. That itself leads to an interesting effect on a plane; because the noise cancellation is so good, you normalise the volume of your own voice according to the volume of the person you're talking to minus the background noise which means that when you speak they can't hear you because you're talking too quietly.

The best effect from the headphones is when the repetitive background noise itself is loud, so on an airplane the effect is unmatched. I was watching a video with my wife on her ipod on the plane using an audio splitter. She was using in-ear buds while I was using the headphones. I barely needed any volume at all to be able to clearly hear the audio. We switched for a while and it was apparent that the clarity of the headphones was great. Using the earbuds you heard less, less clearly with more background noise and they were less comfortable.

Comfort brings me to another point. They are called quitecomfort for a reason. I wore them for 7 hours without discomfort. They also excel on their packaging. They come in a light but solid case that's moulded for the headphoens and all their accessories, including battery charger, cables and aircraft adapter. Additionally, the moulded portion of the case set aside for the included accessories is only attached with velcro which means it can be removed if you want to make room for your mp3 player. It's nicely styled and it's obvious that they really thought about the packaging.

So, are they worth their price tag? They cost $350 so they have a lot to make up for. Earlier I mentioned that they cancel repetitive background noise extremely well - this is very very true. To get the greatest effect just wear them for 5 minutes then take them off and you're aware of sounds that you didn't know were there. The fact that you didn't know that they were there is my point here. If you didn't know they were there, why did you need it cancelling? The brain already does an awesome job of sound normalisation and cancellation by itself... I'm in 2 minds about whether they justify their price tag. For someone like me, they definitely don't, although at the same I don't feel like I wasted my money. If you struggle with noise on a plane, you can't go wrong, if you don't then it's an expensive toy. Justify it whichever way you choose.

The best way to get the effect without shelling out 350 bucks (unless you break them) is to just borrow mine. I'd be more than happy to lend them to you.