Corona-virus - Impact of the Health Situation worldwide

[NIK]

1 hour ago, Sasquatch said:

When I lived in Belgium I found their drinking laws were virtually nonexistent,

 

Shortly after renting our first house the Komisaris payed a visit to check our ID papers. I invited him in and offered him a drink. 

"Pinture" (Bier) 

 

Police sergeant drinking whilst on duty at ten in the morning. Living there was going to be a challenge!

 

Hi,

 

I found when visiting Belgium in the past (looking for a famous Belgian) I noticed the yeast used to make their beer appeared to be more alcohol tolerant - a tun full of functional alcoholics. Their Trappist beer leaves you speechless in a good way but your brain is left with just one cell.

 

In Bruges I was told about a famous Belgian but strangely by lunchtime I'd forgotten. Order the Dinde al la Pierre in a French speaking restaurant for a different meal (raw Turkey, salt, veg and a very hot stone on which you cook the meat yourself).

 

Take care.

 

Nick

[MJI]

1 hour ago, LBRJ said:

I love how "no politics" is allowed but there is post after post dissing the President of the United States - is that not politics?

 

Because he is an idiot and I am sure most on here agree.

[runs as required]

8 hours ago, Joseph_Pestell said:

GTECH's efforts to invent a new, very simple ventilator, was featured on our TV Regional News a couple of days ago. Great work, not just now but for the future of medicine in less developed countries.

The CEO had his sleeves rolled up and was clearly enjoying a spell back in the workshop. Definite candidate for the next awards in my view.

 

Does no one at all recall Ernst Schumacher and "Small is Beautiful"?

I had the privilege of working with him in West Africa with his Intermediate Technology Development Group (ITDG - which spawned the AT Centre in Mid Wales at Machynlleth on the site of the Corris Railway).

We worked on village soap plants, rural linked tourist artefact production for the US 'Roots' Back to Africa boom and vehicle repair, bicycle and simplified locally produced equipment for hospitals.

Sadly I doubt whether much of this proved sustainable through half a century of coups, war, ebola and ISIS in WA.

 

Only last week I was reminding  an ICU Anaesthetist of the potential of IT ventilators with this collaboration we once made together

 

"Is She Still Breathing ?" sculpture. 

 

It made  whirring,  clicking  reassuringly regular BREATHING sounds as it alternately inflated and exhausted a rubber lung and ruffled the feather boa and undies on the hospital bed screens.

Sadly we have mislaid the video loop.

 

Edited March 26, 2020 by runs as required

[MJI]

51 minutes ago, NIK said:

Hi,

 

I found when visiting Belgium in the past (looking for a famous Belgian) I noticed the yeast used to make their beer appeared to be more alcohol tolerant - a tun full of functional alcoholics. Their Trappist beer leaves you speechless in a good way but your brain is left with just one cell.

 

In Bruges I was told about a famous Belgian but strangely by lunchtime I'd forgotten. Order the Dinde al la Pierre in a French speaking restaurant for a different meal (raw Turkey, salt, veg and a very hot stone on which you cook the meat yourself).

 

Take care.

 

Nick

 

The only one I know is Thierry Boutson

[EddieB]

So has Godwin’s Law been superseded where Hitler is replaced by Trump?

[LBRJ]

26 minutes ago, MJI said:

 

Because he is an idiot and I am sure most on here agree.

 

I prefer a slightly more thought out conclusion when thinking about anything, one with even some smattering of evidence.

 

In basic terms I do agree with your conclusion; but I really dont agree that he did not somehow be elected by the good people of the United States by some sort of chicanery - He was the best of a very bad choice that was somehow all they had.

 

To think that either of them is the best that a nation of 300million people can come up with is more than scary, its horryifying.

 

[Ozexpatriate]

6 hours ago, Nearholmer said:

The US also has a ‘coastal vs inland’ political and sociological-cultural division (clearly more complex than that, but nevertheless true), and because the virus has attacked the more outward-reaching coastal areas first, that seems to be translating into a ‘this is a big thing’ vs ‘this is a storm in a tea cup’ or God’s judgement’ division of attitude.

As you say, "clearly more complex" than that.

 

The division is between large conurbations versus lower density, rural areas. This correlates with, and is conflated with geography.

 

Unsurprisingly the viral pandemic would hit a high density area harder and so it has. It happens that these are largely coastal (if you include the Great Lakes as "coastal") but it is a function of population density, not proximity to the ocean.

 

Tensions stem from the conurbations preferring a political flavour (that emphasizes a social compact) and more rural areas preferring an alternative political flavour (that emphasizes independence and self-reliance).

 

That's as "political" as I am comfortable with here, and that is a good thing. (I had actually written and deleted this post - and then I saw all the more overtly political recent posts so thought, "what the heck". Nevertheless I'll spare you what I'd really like to say.)

 

Edited March 26, 2020 by Ozexpatriate

[Ozexpatriate]

26 minutes ago, EddieB said:

So has Godwin’s Law been superseded where Hitler is replaced by Trump?

One hopes he never reaches that level of notoriety.

[Sasquatch]

Sorry I wasn't trying to get political, Knocking the president  seems to be more of a hobby in these parts and I seem to forget that on here!

 

Anyway there's a bar back in Oudenaarde Belgium which has a big fish tank full of money. If a patron wants to take the challenge to drink 4 Duvals without getting up or falling off his bar stool in 1 hour he puts money in the tank and proceeds to drink. No one ever succeeds.

 

If the Belgian police find someone passed out in the street drunk they usually take them home! Got to love the Belgium cops.

 

[Ozexpatriate]

1 hour ago, LBRJ said:

He was the best of a very bad choice that was somehow all they had.

 

To think that either of them is the best that a nation of 300million people can come up with is more than scary, its horryifying.

We could have a long political conversation with some of the assertions there, but I won't here.

[LBRJ]

1 minute ago, Ozexpatriate said:

We could have a long political conversation with some of the assertions there, but I won't here.

 

I should sincerely hope not, cos neither would I.

Its not the place for such things, as I hope others note

[Ozexpatriate]

9 hours ago, Ian Hargrave said:

Mario Cuomo is a man to watch.

I presume you mean Andrew Cuomo. Mario (also Governor of New York and Andrew's father) died on January 1, 2015.

[TT-Pete]

7 hours ago, NIK said:

 (looking for a famous Belgian)

 

Infamous to model locomotive builders of all scales and solely responsible for so many choosing to model the GWR (and hence responsible for the plethora of GWR branch line terminus layouts at exhibitions) I give you, Egide Walschaerts.

 

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

 

[TT-Pete]

7 hours ago, NIK said:

I found when visiting Belgium in the past (looking for a famous Belgian) I noticed the yeast used to make their beer appeared to be more alcohol tolerant - a tun full of functional alcoholics. Their Trappist beer leaves you speechless in a good way but your brain is left with just one cell.

 

 

When working for IBM in Brussels I was liaison for young graduates coming to Brussels for a 1 year placement. There was this one particularly obnoxious chappie from somewhere on Tyneside fresh out of Uni with a massive superiority complex about how everything was rubbish in Belgium and everything so much better in the UK. We got heartily sick of him. On a night out down town with a group of them one Friday he was sounding off about how rubbish Belgian beer was, tasteless, weak etc. So to demonstrate his superiority to the group I challenged him to down a Chevalier (a 1 litre bulb-shaped glass designed for drinking in the saddle when on horseback (inventive these Belgians)) of Bush beer (12%) in one...

 

Sorted. :^)

[robert17649]

6 hours ago, MJI said:

 

The only one I know is Thierry Boutson

Willie Coppens. Eddie Mercx, for two more

[Oldddudders]

Famous Belgians? How about Hergé, creator of Tintin? Real name Georges Prosper Remi.

 

EDIT - Upstaged!

Edited March 26, 2020 by Oldddudders

[Joseph_Pestell]

1 hour ago, Ozexpatriate said:

I presume you mean Andrew Cuomo. Mario (also Governor of New York and Andrew's father) died on January 1, 2015.

I don't know. At least a dead man as President would not make stupid remarks.

[robert17649]

4 minutes ago, Lantavian said:

 

Audrey Hepburn

Dirk Bogarde (ethnically half-Belgian)

Jacques Brel

Siouxsie Sioux (half-Belgian)

Mercator (of Mercator's projection)

Alfred Belpaire (famous mainly in railway circles for his firebox)

Leo Hendrik Baekeland -- to be fair, the plastic he created, Bakelite, is more famous than he is.

Adolphe Sax -- again, his creation, the saxophone, is probably more famous than he is

Claude Lévi-Strauss -- general purpose post-modernist

Eddy Merckx -- cyclist

Hergé -- creator of Tin Tin

Bruegel and his family of painters

van Eyck brothers -- painters

Marc Dutroux -- murderer, rapist, #######

 

 

 

and dont forget Sir B Wiggins Esq, born in Ghent possibly as a result of a race from Aix

[Joseph_Pestell]

3 minutes ago, Oldddudders said:

Famous Belgians? How about Hergé, creator of Tintin? Real name Georges Prosper Remi.

 

EDIT - Upstaged!

 

Most famous Belgian of all, surely Audrey Hepburn. Unless you are in France, in which case Johnny Hallyday (Jean-Paul Smet).

[Ozexpatriate]

10 minutes ago, Lantavian said:

Coastal regions tend to be better connected with the rest of the world, so they probably have more visitors from infected regions.

The days of the tramp steamer bringing passengers from Hong Kong to San Francisco are essentially over.  This virus traveled here by air and then spread by community transmission. The biggest cities have the most air traffic.

 

Having said that, there were situations with infected cruise liner passengers in coastal locations but these were not the people spreading the disease. They were carefully monitored and quarantined.

[Ozexpatriate]

3 minutes ago, Lantavian said:

Coastal cities tend to have more people with international backgrounds than cities inland. 

I think you'll find that cities like Chicago are very international.

 

In Europe, Paris is hardly a "coastal city", nor is Madrid or Berlin, etc.

[Ozexpatriate]

1 minute ago, Lantavian said:

And Chicago is an international city because it is connected to the sea. 

 

Being close to a river also increases the openness of a city because of trade.

Humans always settle near water. It's essential. Almost every city is near some body of water - with some exceptions of course.

 

While navigation on the Great Lakes is possible, Chicago is a big international city because it rapidly expanded in the late 19th century due to its role as a major railroad hub.

[Ian Hargrave]

2 hours ago, Ozexpatriate said:

I presume you mean Andrew Cuomo. Mario (also Governor of New York and Andrew's father) died on January 1, 2015.

Of course.Sorry for the silly error.

[Neil]

1 hour ago, Oldddudders said:

Famous Belgians? How about Hergé, creator of Tintin? Real name Georges Prosper Remi.

 

EDIT - Upstaged!

 

Surprised you didn't mention Jacky Ickx.

 

From the world of design and architecture there's Victor Horta and for all fans of Eurotrash Eddy Wally.

[melmerby]

I see that some people are still not social distancing in the UK.

Two of my neighbours had visitors yesterday, one for many hours in the evening, another had the builders in to do some loft work, a lad two doors away went out in his car for the evening, his workmate called for him to go to work in his small van this morning. Lots of routes for spreading infection there.

 

How do I know?

My model making area is in a front bedroom and I can't help noticing people moving around!