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4/26/2014
4/18/2014
Nobel winner Garcia Marquez dies at 87
A prolific writer who
started out as a newspaper reporter, Garcia Marquez's masterpiece …………………………………… ( be
) "One Hundred Years of
Solitude," a dream-like, dynastic epic that …………………………………… ( help
) him win the Nobel Prize for Literature in
1982.
Garcia Marquez's novel …………………………………… ( tell
) the story of seven generations of the
Buendia family in the fictional village of Macondo, based on the languid town
of Aracataca close to Colombia's Caribbean coast where he …………………………………… ( be
born) on March 6, 1927, and where his maternal grandparents ………………………………… ( bring
) him up.
His novel …………………………………… ( sell
) over 30 million copies, …………………………… ( be ) published in dozens of languages
and …………………………………… ( help ) fuel a boom in Latin American fiction.
A stocky man with a
quick smile, thick mustache and curly hair, Garcia Marquez said he …………………………………… ( find
) inspiration for the novel by drawing on
childhood memories of his grandmother's stories.
"She …………………………………… ( tell
) things that…………………………………… ( sound
)supernatural and fantastic, but she …………………………………… ( tell
) them with complete naturalness," he …………………………………… (
say ) in a 1981 interview.
Although "One
Hundred Years of Solitude" …………………………………… ( be ) his most popular creation, other classics from Garcia
Marquez ……………………………………
(include ) "Autumn of the Patriarch",
"Love in the Time of Cholera" and "Chronicle of a Death
Foretold".
Like many of his Latin
American literary contemporaries, Garcia Marquez …………………………………… ( become
) increasingly involved in politics. He …………………………………… ( spend ) time in post-revolution Cuba and ……………………………………
(develop ) a close friendship with communist leader
Fidel Castro, to whom he …………………………………… ( send ) drafts of his books.
"A man of cosmic
talent with the generosity of a child, a man for tomorrow," Castro once …………………………………… ( write
) of his friend.
The United States …………………………………… ( ban
) Garcia Marquez from visiting for years
after he ……………………………………
( set up ) the New York branch of communist Cuba's
official news agency and …………………………………. ( be ) accused of funding leftist
guerrillas at home.
Despite his reputation
as a left-leaning intellectual, critics say Garcia Marquez …………………………………… ( do
- negative ) as much as he could to help negotiate an end
to Colombia's long conflict. Instead, he…………………………………… ( leave ) his homeland and ……………………………… (go ) to live in
Mexico..
García Marquez and
fellow Nobel laureate Mario Vargas Llosa of Perú, who …………………………………… ( be
) once friends, …………………………………… (stop
) speaking to each other after a day in
1976 when Vargas Llosa …………………………………… ( give ) Garcia
Marquez a black eye in a dispute - depending on who one believes - over politics
or Vargas Llosa's wife.
But Vargas Llosa …………………………………… ( pay
) tribute to Garcia Marquez on Thursday,
calling him a "great writer whose novels will live on”.
A heavy smoker for most
of his life, he ……………………………………..... ( be ) diagnosed with lymphatic cancer in 1999, although the disease …………………………………… ( go
) into remission after chemotherapy
treatment.
Garcia
Marquez …………………………………… ( be
) survived by Mercedes Barcha, his wife of
more than 55 years, and by two sons, Rodrigo and Gonzalo.
When he was working,
Garcia Marquez …………………………………….... ( wake up ) before dawn every day, ……………………………… ( read ) a book, …………………………………… (skim ) through the newspapers and then …………………………………… ( write ) for four hours. His wife …………………………………… ( put
) a yellow rose on his desk.
His last public appearance
……………………………………
( be ) when he …………………………………… ( come ) out from his Mexico City home to smile and wave at
well-wishers, a yellow rose in the lapel of his gray suit.
Gabriel García Márquez in quotes
It always amuses me that the biggest praise for my work comes for the imagination, while the truth is that there's not a single line in all my work that does not have a basis in reality. The problem is that Caribbean reality resembles the wildest imagination."
From The Paris Review Interviews, Gabriel García Márquez, The Art of Fiction No. 69
All human beings have three lives: public, private, and secret.”
Gabriel García Márquez: a Life
Fiction was invented the day Jonah arrived home and told his wife that he was three days late because he had been swallowed by a whale."
The problem with marriage is that it ends every night after making love, and it must be rebuilt every morning before breakfast."
Love in the Time of Cholera
Sex is the consolation you have when you can't have love."
Memories of My Melancholy Whores
It is not true that people stop pursuing dreams because they grow old, they grow old because they stop pursuing dreams."
Age has no reality except in the physical world. The essence of a human being is resistant to the passage of time. Our inner lives are eternal, which is to say that our spirits remain as youthful and vigorous as when we were in full bloom. Think of love as a state of grace, not the means to anything, but the alpha and omega. An end in itself."
Love in the Time of Cholera
Nothing resembles a person as much as the way he dies."
Love in the Time of Cholera
My heart has more rooms in it than a whore house.”
Love in the Time of Cholera
But when a woman decides to sleep with a man, there is no wall she will not scale, no fortress she will not destroy, no moral consideration she will not ignore at its very root: there is no God worth worrying about."
Love in the Time of Cholera
The problem in public life is learning to overcome terror; the problem in married life is learning to overcome boredom."
Love in the Time of Cholera
I don't believe in God, but I'm afraid of Him."
Love in the Time of Cholera
He soon acquired the forlorn look that one sees in vegetarians."
One Hundred Years of Solitude
If I knew that today would be the last time I’d see you, I would hug you tight and pray the Lord be the keeper of your soul. If I knew that this would be the last time you pass through this door, I’d embrace you, kiss you, and call you back for one more. If I knew that this would be the last time I would hear your voice, I’d take hold of each word to be able to hear it over and over again. If I knew this is the last time I see you, I’d tell you I love you, and would not just assume foolishly you know it already."
from The Guardian
4/13/2014
A Move to Limit Off-the-Clock Work Emails
PARIS — Given France’s
35-hour workweek, generous vacations and persistent reputation for indolence,
it may come as a surprise that the French are only now considering limits on
the work emails and phone calls that come at all hours of the day and night.
Last week labor unions and corporate
representatives in France agreed on an “obligation to disconnect from remote
communications tools” that will apply to 250,000 employees of consulting,
computing and polling firms.
After the Labor
Ministry approves the accord, the employers will have to verify that all
workers spend 11 hours of uninterrupted daily “rest
Under the agreement
each company will develop a policy and enforcement mechanisms. One might choose
to block communications from 11 p.m. to 10 a.m. by shutting down its email
servers, while another might simply ask employees not to check email between 9
p.m. and 8 a.m.
Similar limits have been tested
elsewhere. In 2011, Volkswagen started shutting off its BlackBerry servers at the end of the workday, stopping some
employees in Germany from sending or receiving
emails. Last year, the German Labor Ministry ordered its supervisors not to
contact employees outside office hours.
But
the British press did not seem to notice the German precedents, and several
websites, Twitter feeds and other news outlets in Britain confirmed stereotypes
about the French and claimed “Work emails after 6pm are banned in France. The accord will cover all French 35-hour-a- week
workers”.
The image of French
people “who don’t get anything done, who just take vacations — that’s not what
this is about at all,” said Max Balensi, an official with the Syntec
federation, one of the employers’ groups that signed the accord. Mr. Balensi,
who said he previously worked for Accenture and BP — not French companies —
called such reports “disinformation.”
In fact, the agreement
will affect 250,000 consultants and technology workers whose contracts
stipulate only an annual number of workdays, but not daily working hours, said
Frédérique Lebon, a spokeswoman for Cinov, another employers’ federation that
signed the deal. The agreement will establish safeguards that will ensure
balance in the lives of employees, many of whom work with foreign companies in
far-flung time zones, Ms. Lebon said.
Mr. Balensi, at
Syntec, said, “If you don’t have employees who are in good health, your
competitiveness is going to fall.”
Google to sell Glass to public next week
Google Inc will take online orders for its Glass wearable gadget starting on
April 15, in its biggest push to get the $1,500 Web-ready glasses out to the
U.S. public.
For a limited time starting Tuesday Google will make the wearable device available to more than just the select
group of users such as apps developers in its Glass Explorer program.
In a blogpost, Google said the quantity of pairs will be limited.
"Every day we get requests from those of you who haven't found a
way into the program yet, and we want your feedback too," the company said
on a Thursday blogpost.
"That's why next Tuesday, April 15th, we'll be trying our latest
and biggest Explorer Program expansion experiment to date. We'll allow anyone
in the U.S. to become an Explorer by purchasing Glass."
Tech analysts estimate wearable devices will go mainstream this year,
extending smartphone and tablet capabilities to gadgets worn on the body, from
watches to headsets.
Some legislators will soon propose bans on Google Glass based on privacy
concerns.
4/05/2014
V2V technology
Some 3,000 vehicles equipped with wireless technology have taken to the roads in Ann Arbor in the world's
biggest field test of V2V and V2I technology (Image: GM)WASHINGTON — U.S. regulators are discussing new standards for vehicles to communicate with each other. They hope the new technology will reduce traffic accidents. If the regulation is approved, within three years, automakers will have to equip all new cars with the so-called ‘vehicle-to-vehicle’ or 'V2V' communication devices.
Using a short-range communication technology, vehicles will exchange 10 times per second vital information about location, speed, acceleration and braking. Cars will be able to calculate the hazard risk within about 300 meters and alert their drivers or even take automatic collision-avoidance action.
The drivers will be able to see, hear and even feel the hazard signals through vibration of the seat.
The U.S. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration expects the new system to reduce the number of car accidents by as much as 80 percent, especially those where alcohol is not a factor.
Greg Winfree, a U.S. Department of Transportation official, said “The new technology will change the whole attitude toward car crashes. The first 50 years of transportation safety were focused on surviving crashes. We see the future as technology that avoids crashes overall”.
Critics admit that V2V technology is revolutionary, but warn about possible conflicts in the wireless bands in which it will operate.
Scott Belcher, the Chief Operating Officer of the advocacy group Intelligent Transportation Society of America, said, "If there's interference, we won't be able to avoid the crash because someone else is using the spectrum.”
Belcher said the public may be concerned about privacy and the possibility of tracking individual drivers and their driving habits.
Government agencies and the private sector have invested almost $1 billion in research.
Officials say they plan for the new technology will become mandatory by early 2017, and they see it as a first step toward a futuristic 21st Century integrated transportation system.
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