On your guard in Lux

The Grand Ducal Palace in Luxembourg City is the official residence of the Grand Duke of Luxembourg, the head of state. Soldiers of the military of Luxembourg have been performing guard duties since 1966 with frequently only one guard visible at the palace. The representative of them I met once was a perfect example of "life in slow motion"
(for impatient spectators: guard's walk time 1:00 -> 1:33).

It happened that he was offered some help... The enthusiast volunteers tried their best but apparently it's not just a piece of cake to be a perfect Duke's guard!

You can play the movie by clicking on the picture. Credit: bober88

The Luxembourgish guard stayed cool but one day he might take the revenge the same way as his hardcore colleague at Buckingham Palace...

Once upon a time in Luxembourg

Behind forests, mountains and lakes there is a city where its crazy statues become temporarily alive, most of them at night (there are some practical reasons for that as you'll see)...

They leave their cages...

...observe everything carefully and spread gossips with the speed of light...

The most noble of them Gëlle Fra plays serso with her laurel wreath...

Others, symetry freaks, arrange French style gardens everywhere possible (be conscious that one day you can find a little piece of Versailles in front of your house)...

It's them who grow popcorn on shrubs called snowberries and distribute its fruits in the Luxembourgish cinemas...

...and once, in January 2011, the statues made Hamelius bus stop bursting with green leaves in the middle of winter, just for fun...

In the morning there are only few traces and subtle signs of their secret activity left in the city... like the statues' orientation point near the airport...

...some cigars petrified in their mouths...

...confusing sticker art...

...or even Snoopy and Woodstock glued to the somebody's mailbox...

Just be attentive! :) The evil is in details...

Stereotypes

I'd like to share with you some amazing videos about Luxembourg.

Is it true what they say about Luxembourg? People live on trees, color TV is expected by 2025 and fun is illeggal? Check here...



And how about luxembourgish wine? It's made for people with peculiar taste, also used as fuel for spaceships and gives you a funny feeling ;) ? You can verify here:



Credits: station.lu

3 strangest window displays

This is how luxurious Luxair Travels and Tours ("we are known as All travel Luxury in one bag ") is tempting its clients with Wellington boots and plastic snow slider...



And this is a surprising window display of one of the luxembourgish hairdressing salons (your hair will grow like a weed, sorry, like a tree ?):



And here's another one hairdresser studio in Eich that displays in the window the protest of his owner against long-term construction works in the neighberhood that have destroyed the building where the studio is. What is more interesting the display changes and seems to be the hairdresser's frustration blog.

In November 2010 he wrote "This building has been destroyed for 3 years by the neighbour's one extension and they do not want to take responsibility for their actions" :

[Please note that this archival photo and only this one is taken from the salon's website.]

In February 2011 the same but newly arranged display reminds of the forth anniversary of constant inconveniences...

Richard Allan from Facebook about safety

Today in Luxembourg the question "No privacy online anymore?" was in the air. In the evening before European Data Protection Day Mr Richard Allan, director of Policy EU of Facebook arrived to the special conference to the capital. As Facebook is a social phenomenon and even the "hero" of the film ("The social network"), Allan was hosted here like a star in the glare of publicity. Of course he was surrounded by excited luxembourgish cameramen and of course the audience bombarded him with detailed questions.

After listening to him for 2 hours I can say that he's a nice guy with a strong sense of humour. Here's one of the introductory slides of his presentation:

It's reference to the adage "On the Internet, nobody knows you're a dog" from the cartoon by Peter Steiner published by The New Yorker on July 5, 1993 (by the way the most reproduced cartoon from this journal ever). Even though Facebook's creator, Mark Zuckerberg, anounced some time ago that "the age of privacy is over", his colleague Richard Allan believes in selective privacy.

He talked about the personal management of different privacy levels for Facebook accounts, about options "Deactivate (hibernation), Delete, Memorise (for the families of facebook users who have gone)" and subject acces reaquests as well as cooperation of Facebook and DeleteMe.

The discussion had hot moments ;) (hmm, did I hear it right?)

Everything was nice till the moment when Allan got werbally attacked by one of the guys from the audience that reproached him for talking about preventing hacking instead of preparing the strategy of solving possible (sorry, "sure" according to him) large-scale attack. People are so serious about fb - imagine that this inquirer was afraid of his social security number kept in his profile :) Well, you don't have to be security expert to know that it's not a good place to stock this kind of data...

To give you some practical guidelines I will use this photo from the booklet for young luxembourgish internet surfers (by Bee-secure) that is aimed to warn them from revealing too much on Facebook. The authors suggest that beeing to honest "is not supposed to help youngsters at school or when looking for summer job"...

(Explanation for English-speaking lecturers: Sandra de Stroy 666 from Bertrange hates everything, especially one of the holidays.)

To finish with, you can take a security quizz if you want to (be more secure)...

Magic pills...

In MUDAM gallery in Luxembourg they have pills for everything ;)

The pills maker Dana Wyse has also special cloning kit...

To complement treatment Nedko Solakov proposes  "A Little Thing For Preventing From Premature Luck" - see explication:

It looks like that:

If you don't find it interesting, just take it ;)  :

Psychodelic rabbits and duck madly in love...

...or 19 Exposition international du petit-betail a Luxembourg-Limpertsberg (19th Small Farming International Expo in Luxembourg), 15-16 January 2011.

I've discovered it by chance during Saturday walk and recorded some interesting animals for you. Enjoy!

Here's the strangest hen ever that looks like poodle:

Here's the "love story" I spied during the Expo - bird in love without mutuality of feelings... Poor one. Seems that it happens to the animals as well.

And finally let me present you the rabbit Eyore-like, a psychodelic one...

Written on the wall

Just arrived, the first thing you see on the railway station in Luxembourg City, in the richest country in Europe...

Explanation: defence d'uriner = pissing prohibited (EN), zakaz sikania (PL)

Other interesting graffiti (in Limpertzberg):

English translation: "Nothing is Real, Everything is Permitted".

But unfortunately the nihilistic effect is spoiled by this smiley...

Religious accents in strange places

Restauracja "Ostatnia Wieczerza"

Kiosk "Paternoster Tabac"

Pamiątki z Luksemburga, a wśród nich souvenir - talerzyk z podobizną JP2

Serek "Niebiański kaprys - Boże, ależ to pyszne..."

Very special bus - in Luxembourg only...