Serendipita

Museums

Today, André and I visited the Kunst- und Ausstellungshalle der Bundesrepublik Deutschland, one of the museums here in Bonn. The KAH houses different exhibitions, many of which are very good and worth seeing. Today was the last day they showed Japans Schönheit, Japans Seele (Japan’s beauty, Japan’s soul) with exhibits from the Tokyo National Museum (site in Japanese and English). The exhibition is said to be the biggest and most spectacular exhibition of Japanese art since World War II. There also were No masks and photos from a camera museum. All the texts on the pages linked above are in German, but you can see lots of photos of the exhibits; for example, take a look at this shogun! Even more photos are available here on the website of the Tokyo National Museum; here’s the same shogun up close and personal.

The other exhibition we visited is Azteken. It was done in cooperation with the Royal Academy of Arts, so there’s a site about the exhibition in English: Aztecs. There were a lot of very impressive sculptures, some of which you can see here.

Fun Mathematics and Origami

There is a lot of fun mathematical stuff on Jürgen Köller’s Mathematische Basteleien, for example origami, puzzles and some playing with numbers. Even though the title is German, almost all of the pages are available in both English and German.

One of the origami classics: How to make an origami crane. Divided into several pages, lots of photos to help you along.

What you are seeing is not what you are seeing

Grand Illusions a “site for the enquiring mind. With optical illusions, scientific toys, visual effects, and even a little magic.”

Link via MetaFilter.

Colour on the Computer

Yet another colour scheme chooser that looks interesting. (I previously linked to A recipe for color and Martin’s 6-Colormatch. I should start to collect these things in one place, it seems.)

Link via Sheila.

Old houses mended…

Jeanne and Aaron bought a 1914 bungalow in Chigago with the intention to restore it by themselves. They chronicle their advancement on a weblog named House in Progress. The previous owner of the house seems to have collected anything and everything and left a lot of the stuff behind when she moved out. Now they are sorting through it all, giving some away, selling other stuff at a garage sale. Take a look at descriptions and photos of memorabilia, kitchenware and mysterious things from the last few decades: What on earth? (page contains a lot of small images and will take some time to load).

Link via MetaFilter.

Deja vu?

Das könnte mir nie passieren…

Das will ich im Kino sehen

Spiegel online: Star Trek auf Plattdeutsch – Einmachtopf in der Gartenlaube.

Herzlichen Glückwunsch

Happy second birthday, Ian!

Science is fun

The MetaFilter thread on flaming pastries and exploding fruit and the links within kept me busy for a long time. I especially enjoyed the science club episodes and the How much is inside adventures at Cockeyed.com.

Special bonus for Berliners: The funniest part of Rob Cockerham’s Europe travel journal for me was this. While in Berlin, he wrote:

“The big blank spot on the map that I thought was the town center was actually an airport, There was a plane on display from the Berlin airlift. I chose another direction.”

Was sagt der Korrespondent aus Berlin dazu?

Mathematics

What’s special about this number? list the numbers from zero up to a thousand and list their special facts about them. More interesting than I make it sound.

Link via Ralf.

Physics

Reflections on Relativity is a book about the Einstein’s theory of Relativity. It’s part of MathPages.com, a huge collection of articles on mathematics and neighbour sciences.

Link via Schockwellenreiter.

Web design

Tile-a-day has beautiful background tales that you may use. I feel the need to redesign this site… but that will have to wait until after my exams.

Link probably via someone, but I don’t remember where I found it.

Another interesting site to check out might be web design practices.

Link via Garret.

Diese Woche in der Zeit

Leben in Deutschland (3): Wie man in Deutschland Natur erlebt. “Wir lieben sie als Freizeitpark, beklagen ihre Gefährdung und opfern sie unseren Interessen. Unser Verhältnis zur Natur ist voller Widersprüche.” Von Christiane Grefe.

Telekom: Versteckte Tücken. “Tarifwechsel bei der Telekom. Ein Selbstversuch” von Güven Purtul.

Grundwissen: Die Maus hat’s raus. “Ganz schön kompliziert, die Politik! Lach- und Sachfragen an einen Fachmann fürs Einfache: Christoph Biemann, Autor der ‘Sendung mit der Maus’. Warum sind die Deutschen immer so unzufrieden?” Von Menschen und Mäusen. “Schwieriges einfach zu erklären ist gar nicht so leicht, meint der Maus-Macher.”

Sitten & Gebräuche: Heiß und kalt. “Wie man sich kleidet, ohne zu wissen, wie warm es draußen ist.” Von Mark Spörrle.

Reiseführer: Backpackers Bibel. “Vor 30 Jahren erfand ein britisches Paar die Reiseführerreihe Lonely Planet.” Von Cosima Schmitt.

Ich habe mal gezählt: In unserem Haushalt gibt es immerhin neun Reiseführer von Lonely Planet.

Interview: Was die Schule lähmt. “Hohe Personalkosten und das Versagen bei der Ausländerintegration – ein Report des Max-Planck-Instituts durchleuchtet das deutsche Bildungswesen. Wir sprachen mit” Jürgen Baumert und Kai S. Cortina.

Siehe dazu auch: Nur die Besten sind gut genug im Spiegel online.

Zeitläufe: Zwei Wochen im Grab. “Wie elf Bergleute 14 Tage verschüttet waren und wiederauferstanden: Vor 40 Jahren geschah das ‘Wunder von Lengede’ – ein Mythos bis heute.” Von Stefan Willeke.

Entscheiden: Fliegen zum Klassenzimmer. “Ägypten, USA oder Spanien – Austauschprogramme gibt es auch für Lehrer.” Von Christa Pfafferott.