Hotel Balcony Safety - and Keys - Locked out, climbed balcony, died - prevention?

 

A hotel bedroom key with a large fob, from Spain in 2024. Photo by Angela Lansbury, Copyright

This happens too often. What could be done? 

Design balconies so you cannot climb from one to another, except as a fire escape beding bars to protect you from falling. Singapore makes cat owners install glass and/or barriers to stop cats jumping and killing themselves or people underneath so it is both practical and affordable. 

Secondly, all residents sharing a room should be allowed a second key, or told they can call reception for an escort with a pass key or show iD or give their home address to get the room key.

If a key has a large heavy fb, you cannot lose the key,, and it is more likely to be left back at reception.

Useful Website

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-13899283/footballer-dies-fall-ibiza-hotel-balcony-door-locked-inquest.html

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Two exhibitions hidden in Changi Airport, Singapore, Marvellous Monet, and cats in colour and cartoon style

 My family member was looking for a Starbucks for a coffee in Changi airport.

He pointed out something interesting. Starbucks is landside, at arrival. So when you get off and are waiting to be collected you can have a coffee. 

He was looking at the restaurant area, which is usually upstairs on the terrace. Beyond the restaurants he found a Monet exhibition. 

Claude Monet

Not originals but nonetheless very interesting. Paintings showed the different seasons, Spring, Summer, Autumn, Winter. Plus Monet's comments. Although he is best known for his paintings of his garden, with the bridge over the water and the lily flowers floating, he painted many more subjects. 

The big surprise to me when I saw a Monet at the art gallery in Switzerland, was the size of it. The painting stretched wall to wall. I don't know how he painted it. He either had a huge studio, or did it in sections.

Monet's garden in France. 

Cats

Beyond that was another exhibition which would appeal to children. cats. Cats with clothes expressions like human beings. The artist is Louis Wain.

The largest collection of Claude Monet's impressionist paintings is in Paris, France. But you will find his paintings everywhere, from Boston to Buffalo and Washington DC and San Francisco in the USA, Tokyo in Japan, Cairo in Egypt, Switzerland, and many other countries.

Louis Wain led an extraordinary life, with touches of tragedy, and financial ups and downs, illness and mental illness in the family. He is credited with making cats popular as pets. 

Useful Websites

Musée Marmottan Monet (English: Marmottan Museum of Monet).

https://www.changiairport.com/en/discover/events-at-changi/monet.html

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mus%C3%A9e_Marmottan_Monet

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_paintings_by_Claude_Monet

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louis_Wain

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Electrical_Life_of_Louis_Wain

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Useful Websites

https://www.changiairport.com/en/discover/events-at-changi/monet.html

Watch your background on Zoom! Unintentional Humour. Intentional Humor.

On Zoom you can create virtual backgrounds showing yourself in front of famous landmarks, or on the beach with the waves rolling in behind you. A moving background can be distracting.

Even worse is a real life moving background. It is not new for passers-by to accidentally walking across behind a live reporter, or to stand behind making silly faces. The technical term is photobombing. Wikipedia found me these.

 Many people turn off their cameras at home for good reason. They are eating. They are half naked.

Others do not check their backgrounds. You can see all sort of personal stuff. 

 What is on the wall behind, you, on the desk, or cabinet. An interview candidate for a job had to quickly remove empty bottles of alcohol, kept as souvenirs and decoration. He was applying for a job in Pakistan.

Children and Pets

Hilarious moments from the early days of working from home and meetings on zoom included backgrounds of dogs or cats which wanted to read the news or express their reaction. Others included children bursting into the room, dragged out by a crawling mother.

Bedrooms

At my Toastmasters meetings, I was once mesmerized by the speaker's girlfriend, lying in the bed behind him, every now and then turning over. My mind was inventing what she could do, alone, or if he would later join her, unaware that the back of the room was on camera.

Toilet, Bathroom and Shower

One Toastmasters International member frequently tells the story of how she went to the toilet wearing a pin-on microphone.

Recently I watched a visitor yawn, move the camera, get up and disappear into the shower at the back of the bedroom. The shower water started to run down the glass.

I was waiting to see a silhouette. It reminded me of Psycho. Would an evil stranger creep in? If so, we could not contact him.

I was unable to concentrate on my speeches and roles. Why? Because I was watching to see whether he would emerge wearing pyjama bottoms, a towel, or neither.

Some of the professional Zoom applications allow you to set up your group shots of audience faces in settings such as a classroom of tiered seating, or even mirror photos with frames. For single individuals, yourself, add humorous hats, moustaches and glasses. Key words to search for are: facial effects, studio effects, and make up filters.

Useful Websites

Zoom on facial effects to enhance

https://support.zoom.us/hc/en-us/articles/115002595343-Enhancing-your-video-in-Zoom

https://shotkit.com/funny-zoom-backgrounds/

https://www.ricotta.team/blog/zoom-memes

Humorous zoom effect tutorial

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3v0Y9b--zBM

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George's Villa Joys - A Cypriot Surprise of Solar Panels And Sweetness

 We stayed in several amazing hotels in Cyprus but George's Villa was an unending pleasure and a non-stop surprise. His email message on the morning of our arrival was reassuring. George is, if not eccentric, at least an individualist. He has a huge number of solar panels, putting power on and off the grid, and chickens to provide breakfast eggs.

We had expected it to be good because it had rating of over nine out of ten on booking.com. We were a little apprehensive when we turned off the motorway, though narrow lanes across a field, under graffiti-covered pillars of the motorway, twisting turns around more fields, along a narrower and narrower road, past a derelict building, up to the a remote wall with barbed wire on top and a high gate.

However, it was a relief when the gate swung open and a beaming little man raced forward to greet us. Followed by his two dogs and several cute cats. How many cats?

They have about twenty cats - 'I've lost count!' grins George. Two docile dogs. 

We parked beside his solar panels. At my husband's request, George gave us a guided tour of the panels and told us how they work and how he sometimes takes power from the national grid and sometimes passes power back to the grid.

A cage of ducklings. Swallows' nests. Arbors of grapes. 

The bedroom was up an outside wooden staircase. He helped us carry up our suitcases. His Vietnamese wife, Hana, came running to help us.

Beautiful Bedroom

Bedroom in George's Villa. Photo by Angela Lansbury.

The big bedroom has a big bed. More than twenty three pin sockets. Two phone adapter slots. A Tiffany style bedside lamp. Loads of hangers.  34 handles to drawers or cupboards to wardrobes. 

The kitchenette area with full size, double door, working cold fridge. 

The large glass top desk, big enough for two of us, had a black world map on the top (actually stuck on the underside where it cannot get damaged and showing through the glass).

Best Bathroom

Angela Lansbury in the bathroom beside the spa bath in George's Villa. Photo by Trevor Sharot.

When using the  Jacuzzi bath allow fifteen or twenty minutes to fill it. You must cover the outlets with water. The top jets send water arching up, so you should fill the bath with water higher than the water jet.

A glass of fresh orange juice was presented to us on arrival. 

Hana (think of Hannah) brings a breakfast tray at only 5 euros per person extra, well worth it, for the food and fun. The room had a toaster. Anything missing - butter. No coffee maker, but a kettle and Nescafe. I should have saved the coffee capsules from our one expensive night, the expensive luxurious hotel Indigo in Larnaka, three times the price of George's, and decanted the coffee grounds.

Hana is a nurturer. She is quick to understand complicated questions when you ask and point. 

Surprises? Search for the toilet control behind you to flush the toilet and you will set off the single water jet in your behind. 

Shower

The shower has six working body level light sprays, activated when you turn one of the knobs. (Another knob is on off for the water shower from the hand held shower fixed on a slider. 

I didn't find out what operated the overhead shower. Three kinds of shower in one shower is one up on the two in the other hotels we visited. I read on Tripadvisor that the radio controls worked a few years back. I did not get them working but didn't spend time trying them out.

Noise and Windows

The noise from the motorway is heard on the terrace, but cannot be heard in the bedroom when the shutters are shut.

Insect Netting

The windows are shielded from insects with metal netting - another thoughtful touch missing from every other hotel we had visited.

We though George's villa was a bargain. (In the photo of me beside the spa bath, I am wearing another bargain, a butterfly pattern top bought in Nicosia for three euros. See me in more clothes on my other blog dressofthedayangela.cblogspot.com)

If you google George's Villa you will find that there are several George's Villas around the world. The one which I visited and recommend is the one in Perakhorio, Cyprus.

Useful Websites

booking.com

https://www.booking.com/hotel/cy/george-39-s-villa-perakhorio.en-gb.html

https://www.tripadvisor.co.uk/Hotel_Review-g190383-d11788132-Reviews-George_s_Villa-Nicosia_Nicosia_District.html

Common rock thrush Calling, Lissen Birds - Natural Birds Voice, Bird Nat...

In London the busiest birds in our garden are the four magpies, a couple of parakeets, the occasional robin, some wood pigeons or collared doves, and a very busy woodpecker, pecking away, plus a blue jay.

In Singapore, we recorded a bird singing on a balcony. We set the camera up on a tripod, focused on the balcony railing. At first we were too far away to get the bird in focus and the song loud enough to hear. We gradually moved the camera nearer and nearer.

We do have a remote clicker to operate the clicker. But it is designed to take you own photo or yourself with a group and the camera facing you. No good for the camera facing away from you.

We looked online to see cameras you can set up.

In Singapore we have always had plenty of birds. Singapore is a garden city. The palm trees and high trees abound, keeping birds way above the ground. Birds can fly from balcony to balcony.

Cats
What about cats? Yes, there are cats. If you have a balcony, you can only keep cats if the balcony is copletely railed so the cats cannot jump over.

About the Author
Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer, author and speaker

How to Translate And Not Be Lost In Translation when it's raining cats and dogs

Problem
I was teaching Intermediate English in Singapore to pupils wanting to pass the English exam which would enable them to attend English speaking schools or colleges in Singapore.

After the lesson I and one of the pupils looked out of the window, waiting for the rain to stop before we set off for our homes.

I said, "It's raining cats and dogs."

He replied, puzzled, "I see cats - but I don't see any dogs."

I said, "It's an English expression. It means raining hard."

I looked up the translation on the internet.

You can find translations of many idioms into a page of different languages. It's interesting to see how many use similar expressions.

The Chinese Mandarin and Cantonese use the expression:
basin-bending big rain.

That's a translation into a Chinese idiom, with the words translated back more or less exactly.

For more idioms, go to:
omniglot.com

Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer, author and speaker. Teacher of English and other languages.

Colourful Cats by Carlos in Uruguay And His Fantasy Hotel Beside His Museum

This you must see, colourful cats. Two cats, four cats, cat in a bathroom, couple in a bar watched by a cat.

I also love the fantasy hotel - it's a village, house, museum. A must see. The artist lived here and kept adding on rooms. He lived to the age of 90. It looks so light and white against the blue sky.

Then the cats are vivid colours.

Hotel With Pool and Poetry
If you want to stay in the hotel, it has rooms, apartments and a heated swimming pool. Every evening before sunset they play a recording of the late artist reading a poem saying goodbye to the sun. You don't get that everywhere.

You can see the swimming pool in this picture. 

Cat Paintings
The paintings are quirky. They look simple, but are full of patterns. Sometimes the figures of animals or people's faces are edged with black. Other times the black line is further in, echoing the edge.  The curves and semicircles and lines run parallel.

Casa Pueblo Museum
Punta Ballena (8 miles from Punta Del Este). The name ballena comes from the whales - yes, there's whale watching seasonally.

Summer High season is December to February.

Useful Websites

http://www.clubhotelcasapueblo.com

https://www.booking.com/hotel/uy/club-casapueblo.

https://thegreatcat.org/the-cat-in-art-and-photos-2/cats-in-art-20th-century/carlos-paez-vilaro-1923-2014-uruguayan/

Author
Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer, author and speaker. See my other posts on Fray Bentos in Uruguay and learning Spanish and Portuguese.

Where Can I Get Advice On moving A Washer-Dryer? And Other Moving Advice?

Problem
You want a new washer dryer installed.
You want to move with one.
You are an absentee landlord and need a washer-dryer moved into a property and the old one removed.

Answer
I read some really handy tips from this great company's great blog. First, the reminders about turning off the electricity and turning off the water supply. You need somebody on location who knows how to turn off the water. They also need to turn the water on again later.  There are four or five considerations:

Phone Warning Of Arrival
Will the removers phone fifteen minutes in advance when they are on the way so they don't turn up when you are in the bath? (John Lewis department store in the UK says their department store delivery team are told to do so. However, items delivered from a factory simply turn up within a four-hour window.)

I could see that a tenant's washer-dryer or contract needs instructions that they must clear the washer-dryer lint to prevent a fire. I didn't know you could buy something called a moving blanket. (From DIY stores, same as you can buy carpet protector sheets when painting.)

I decided I would definitely ask this company for a quote. When I registered the move from address and the move to address no quotation came up. I retyped. Then I guessed what was wrong. I checked their location and alas I was right. The company is in America - and the washer-dryer I wanted moved was in London, England!

USA Removals
If you are in the USA, check out all their handy advice on moving washer dryers, moving with cats and all sort of things. If you are elsewhere in the world, you might still find their tips useful.

https://dolly.com/blog/how-to-safely-move-a-washer-and-dryer/

Author
Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer, author and speaker.

Update on Hemingway's cats and Hurricane Irma

Problem
1 Why are the cats called Hemingway's cats?
2 Why didn't the museum curators leave?

Answers
1 The cats are indeed 'Hemingway's' cats, that is to say, not the original cats he owned (he died in 1961), but their descendants. How do we know they are related to the original cats? After all, cats wander off, mate with other cats, and stray cats can wander in, especially if you have large numbers of cats and entrances.

Hemingway had identifiable and unusual cats, six-toed cats. The present day cats include six-toed cats.

2 Why didn't the curators' leave?
Hemingway's house is on a hilltop, safest place to be. If anyone was going to survive, it was them. If you were to choose a place to seek shelter from flooding, it would be there.

Americans are more clued up on Hemingway than the rest of the world. Here's a potted summary from Wiki:

Ernest Miller Hemingway (July 21, 1899 – July 2, 1961) was an American novelist, short story writer, and journalist. His economical and understated style had a strong influence on 20th-century fiction, while his life of adventure and his public image influenced later generations. Hemingway produced most of his work between the mid-1920s and the mid-1950s, and won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1954. He published seven novels, six short story collections, and two non-fiction works. Additional works, including three novels, four short story collections, and three non-fiction works, were published posthumously. Many of his works are considered classics of American literature.

Hemingway was raised in Oak Park, Illinois. After high school, he reported for a few months for The Kansas City Star, before leaving for the Italian Front to enlist with the World War I ambulance drivers. In 1918, he was seriously wounded and returned home. His wartime experiences formed the basis for his novel A Farewell to Arms (1929).

Americans say raised. Brits would say brought up.

The Daily Mail comes up with an amusing headline, Six Cats and Nine Lives. I must remember that trick. If you can't find two numbers which match, just do a comparison. Take any two numbers and it works.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-4870610/Caretaker-Ernest-Hemingway-s-FL-home-rides-storm.html
https://www.visittheusa.co.uk/USA

Author
Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer, author and speaker.

The world oddest places to eat and stay: memories of the magic of the cat café, open and closed

Problem
Can't be bothered to go out. Bored? Depressed? Want to entertain children, the elderly, foreign visitors, have a memorable romantic date?

Answer
The internet and TripAdvisor and full or odd restaurants and hotels. I've been to quite a few. Trouble is, many of the best just disappear fast. I have written previous posts on the magi hotel and restaurant. I often look longingly at treetop hotels, and pop-up ice hotels, cafés featuring unusual usable toilets, or toilets as decoration. The more usual and widespread and enduring ones are forest or oriental scenes and guitars (Hard Rock) and waterfalls and aquariums in theme parks and Disney resort hotels and parks.

Story
The Magic Restaurant, San Francisco
Alas closed. Open the wardrobe door and see a cow and start a recorded message telling you to come to dinner.

The Magic Restaurant, London
Alas, closed. Entry door hidden behind a bookcase. Menu appears on white hanky used in a vanishing trick by the person serving you.

The Rainforest Restaurant, Piccadilly
The one in Singapore disappeared under redevelopment of the block near Orchard Road but the one near Piccadilly in London is still there. A real parrot or a parrot video or a parrot mural or fake parrot on a perch always entrances me.

The Cat Cafe in Bristol
The idea behind this is that cat lovers cat curl up surrounded by cats and if they fall in love with one of the cats then adopt a cat needing a home. Unfortunately, I found links to a site saying that the local cat rescue centre did not favour the idea.

Meow Cafe
Denmark Lane,
Bristol
England
UK

http://www.youandmeow.co.uk (Update 2024. It's still there.) 

https://www.theneighborscat.com/you-meow
https://shop.trycelery.com/page/

Tips
Watch out for the opening of The Cat cafe in Bristol. It was supposed to open in January 2017. I discovered it when I clicked on a BBC article on breeding poisonous frogs (why would you?) which was reported in a Bristol newspaper, then spotted the link to an earlier article on the cat café.

I went to the website and there's still no phone number or email for me to check if there's a firm opening date. However, I found some amusing cat themed jewellery and scarves.

Not everybody wants cat theme items just because they like cats. I have a friend who has a cat and she says her friends inundate her with cat theme gifts and she has more than enough. She likes real live cats, not 2D cats. So, maybe check before you buy, subtly if you want your gift to be a surprise. If you are buying for ourself, you don't have that problem.

Author
Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer, author and speaker. See my profiles and posts.. Many more posts and blogs on this sites and others. Facebook. LinkedIn. Twitter. Please follow, like and share.

Russian words: my memory aids for Duolingo words

I'm struggling to remember the Russian words. Here are my hints to myself which I hope will help you. I learn the word on Duolingo then go back to test myself.

When you repeat the words several times you remember them. When you are just learning you need to be able to recognise the word - and to remember it when translating the other way, back from English into Russian.

Teaching somebody else reinforces your own memory.

I try to look for similar letters and associations.

Moi - my (m-i) M I
sestri - sisters S ST R revers the vowels in Russia e then i but in English i then e

Girls - devochki - DEV CH_K devoted to chicks - slang for girls in English.The chicks are devoted to chicks. Picture girls cuddling tiny newborn chickens.The chicks are small but the girls are big. The word devochki means girls.

U tebya est' koshki - do you have cats - (think do you take in kittens  T...A  K....I
est mens is in French - not the same but at least you know the middle of the sentence is a verb - I think you take in is it kittens = do you have cats

Plates - in Russian this word has the l and e reversed if you read the word backwards.

e d y a t  (no spaces - but spellcheck keeps changing the word) - eat
E d y A T - EAT

PLAN - PLAN same word in Russian and English

BRaT - BRoTher - (my brother is brat)

Angela Lansbury

Travel, allergies, asthma and health, conference centre design and Excel, World Travel Market

A selection of articles in today's online newspapers make me wonder about the effects of travel and conferences, diet and outdoor activities on health.
I should be looking at transport to England and the World Travel Market.

The event is changing from four days to three. One of the reasons given is that the sales people conducting selling and buying at the show would prefer a three day event to four. Three longer days. That cuts down costs of travel to and from the show daily, the overnight hotel accommodation for foreign visitors and the hours away from the home office desk.

What about the effects on health of the building? Other articles have looked at the effects of sunlight and vitamin D on asthma. We have all known for years that too little sunlight causes health problems, although so does too much. (Too little sunlight ... I'll research this later and come back; too much sunlight skin cancer and possibly an effect on the eyes.)

Quite apart from any difficulty getting out in the case of a fire, it's good to focus the eyes on the distance and to breathe fresh air. Some of the conference areas and bars at ExCel look out over the water. Smokers are ironically the people who go looking for the outdoors. It's a very long walk to either end of the building. So sign of exits along the middle. How do you get out in a fire, or other emergency?

Then there are the simple logistics. Dragging a suitcase on wheels to collect brochures and free samples (exhibition visitors) or set up (stand organisers) - yet you are faced with staircases.

And toilets. Why not have toilets on every floor. Architects should consider this. You have the plumbing in place, the staircases, the water pipes, the sewage pipes. So much wasted time going up and down stairs. You can't take a toilet break.

You lose you friends and family. You break off a meeting. Your contact thinks you have abandoned them and goes away. You leave your heavy bag with a stranger because you can't carry it up and down the stairs to the toilets.You leave your stand unmanned during your food and toilet breaks. In offices you have food trolleys bringing water and coffee. surely these could visit stands.

A conference centre caters to hundreds of people. Some will be in wheelchairs or walking with sticks, have twisted ankles from ski accidents and sports even if young. As for the Over 50 show - do you really expect several thousand over 50 visitors and those at shows for pensioners (retirees) to not need more ground level toilets. (Plus older people need toilets more often. So do younger women, pregnant women and nursing mothers needing to feed children and people with toddlers and those needing to change babies.)

One article I looked at was on the benefits and dangers of cats and dogs and animals and farms in immune systems. Another was on cats and lions can turn on you any time. Another was on vitamin D saving you from allergies. Another thought was that hairless dogs may help those who already have allergies but like dust mites, it's what comes out of, or off, the creature which causes problems. Dogs and other animals lick to clean themselves and the skin dropping is coated with bacteria.On the subject of bacteria, it's the good bacteria in fruit fibres which causes the protective effect.

So what Do I need in a conference building, disco, evening meeting? A chance to walk, eat fruit, drink water rather than alcohol.

My other discovery on the thealh front is that sweet wines have lower alcohol content. I was looking at a bottle of low alcohol lambrusco. A pink drink with only 4% alcohol. Like been's lower level of alcohol. Workers tend to drink beer in the daytime.

Traditionally wine would be drunk in the evening. After six. (When ladies wore diamonds - not during working hours.)You don't want to get drunk while operating machinery, or even walking about.

As for conference centres. No I don't want to drink acohol during my working day and walk up and down flights of stairs, and have long walks to the loo on a diet of coffee and alcohol.

More and more stands are offering free water. The dehydration effect of conference centres makes you tired. One for the road is a glass of water.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-22570859
asthma.org.uk
https://www.nhs.uk/symptom-checker