Chiperoni ku Basel

Category: General

  • Basler Brunsli

    Apparently the Basel German word for biscuits/cookies/Kekse is Gutzi and not Gutzli.
    I was fairly confident that the bakery at the supermarket across the road from my office had introduced a typo.
    Turns out it’s not a typo. In my part of Switzerland, people say Gutzi, while in the Zurich area they say Gutzli.

    Anyway… i’ve started to search the net for a good recipe for Basler Brunsli. I’ll try out the recipe in the next couple of days/weeks. And post a summary of my findings.

    Basler Brunsli

    Zutaten
    200 g dunkle Schokolade gerieben
    250 g Zucker
    250 g Mandeln, nicht geschälte, fein gehackt
    3 Eiweiss
    2 EL, gestr., Kartoffelmehl
    2 Msp. Zimt
    1 Msp. Nelken

    ZUBEREITUNG

    Eiweiss zu Schnee schlagen und nach und nach mit den restlichen Zutaten vermischen, bis ein Teig entsteht. Den Teig wenn möglich 1-2 h an einem kühlen Ort ruhen lassen.
    Den Teig dann auf einem mit Zucker bestreuten Brett kurz kneten und in 3-4 Stücke teilen. Die Stücke auf Zucker 1 cm hoch auswallen und beliebige Formen ausstechen. Die ausgestochenen Formen auf ein mit Backpapier ausgelegtes Backblech legen und über Nacht trocknen lassen. Dann 3-5 Min. bei 200 Grad backen. Sie sollten aussen fest und innen feucht sein.

  • lead the way

    [Linguistic nit-picking on a Friday evening]

    Stumbled across the word bakkie in this article:
    To celebrate 35 years of the Toyota Hilux bakkie on the African market including Malawi, Toyota is also displaying the Toyota Hilux Legend35 double cab with chrome bull-bars and anti-roll bars.

    In Malawi, the term pick-up is more commonly used to refer to lightweight trucks. Bakkie is very South African. I guess, the reporter just copied the press release / marketing collateral.

  • ticino weekend

    sono tornata a Lugano per un weekend.

    a sunny and warm day on Monte Bre

    Un espresso, per favore!

    ristorante in sight

    dolce fare absolutamente niente su Monte Bre.

    dolce fare absolutamente niente

  • Quote of the Day

    Juergen Klopp, football coach of 1. FSV Mainz 05, said

    Leidenschaft und Bereitschaft sind bei uns immer da – was kann da schon passieren? Schlechtestenfalls verlieren. Aber das nimmt uns, solange wir kämpfen, in Mainz keiner übel.

    Source: Focus

  • Hopes of malaria vaccine by 2010

    The vaccine was used to protect 2,022 children in Mozambique and cut the risk of developing severe malaria by 58%.

  • message from the admin

    upgraded to wp 1.2.1

    In addition, I’ve managed to find a solution to the escaping comment form problem in IE.

    I replaced 100% by 400px in the css controlling the text area field:

    #commentform textarea {
    width: 400px;
    }

    If you don’t know what I’m talking about, sorry to late… the admin has fixed it! For IE and Opera, I hope, pray and believe. Still need to check it in Firefox. Going jogging now…

    [update Oct 10] I’ve been changing the css settings and have started customizing some of the php files.
    If something doesn’t work, please leave a comment below. Please let me know how the comment form behaves in your browser. Does the comment form still expand to infinity when you start typing?

    BTW, we’ve got perfect chiperoni weather in Basel today! Constant drizzle and fog.

  • Mailand oder Madrid – Hauptsache Italien *

    I came across a number of Italian language links this week:

    * The former German national football player Andreas Möller supposedly said this in an interview.

  • dog abandoned at supermarket

    Apparently somebody abandoned (or forgot?) a puppy at the supermarket opposite of our office. There was a quite a commotion… The police came to pick up the young dog. The puppy looked really forlorn and lost. Poor guy. Cos he didn’t want to follow or wasn’t used to walking on a leash, the policeman ended up carrying him to the police van.

    I wonder why somebody would abandon their dog like that…

    In the same way that some people over-exaggerate and treat their pets like children, others fail to recognize that animals are not objects that you can simply throw away at will.

  • wir bieten die beste grammatik an

    search for wir bieten die beste grammatik an

  • The Use of a Blog

    Today i found out how useful old blog postings can be. Wanted to remove some Moire patterns from a newspaper scan and i knew that I had posted an entry on my old blog site. I get to minimize Moire patterns once a year at the most… and I easily forget which filter gives the best results. These days most scanners have an option to remove Moire patterns automatically… this scanner didn’t.

    Note to myself: your blog can be useful to store tidbits of information you don’t always need. Esp. if you regularly work on more than one computer. I find that no matter how much you organize yourself, the info you’re looking for is bound to be on your other computer. Plus: somebody else might find your notes helpful.

    Maybe this may seem obvious to you and not worth an entry. But I believe one of today’s challenges is managing information. Who would have thought a couple of years back, that your email archive is a reason to get a larger hard disk and more back-up space? Just cos people are afraid to trash emails which might have some useful info. Or cos they require a fallback if other systems have failed.

    My blog is a sort of online scrap book, where I collect links, develop ideas, make notes, display photos and publish my views. Nothing really important. But it’s nice to see it’s useful as well… It’s also a fun way to keep up-to-date with current web technology. I can see how a RSS feed could be useful to distribute the company press releases and news I write during my day job.

    BTW, I wasn’t really planning to migrate my old blog entries to my new home… 😉

  • Online Tutorials

    list of useful online tutorials for sql, html, php, css
    at scriptygoddess

  • freie sicht aufs mittelmeer

    Here’s an interesting production playing at the Theater Basel.

    The stage is the streets of Basel…
    I saw an interview with Dani Levy, and I’m planning to go see the show.

    [Update Saturday Oct 30] I managed to get hold of a ticket despite the fact that the show is sold out for the season. Sometimes it helps to voice your leisure plans at work…

    The play starts in the courtyard of the city prison. Headphones and rain capes are distributed. And then the entire set, audience, sound and light engineers move from building to building in the St. Johann’s Quartier of Basel. Video and live scenes mix. And there’s an excellent use of the real setting. At times I felt I was witnessing real disputes as a passer-by, in other cases I felt I was watching a movie.

    Highly recommended. A great show! Different but not too experimental. Plus you get to know another part of Basel…

    See also: NZZ | Wikipedia

  • about returning to africa

    The idea of returning is a dream that teases and torments many African expatriates.

  • What is Chiperoni?

    If you’re from Blantyre, you are familiar with this word. 

    What is the meaning of Chiperoni?

    • It’s the name of a drizzle rain in Malawi.

    Here’s an official definition by the meteorological department:

    Chiperoni: Malawian name for influx of cool moist air from the south east, bringing overcast conditions with drizzle on windward slopes along the Northern lakeshore and in particular to many areas in the South of Malawi. This phenomenon can persist for up to a week but the usual duration is two to three days.

    Source: Malawi Meteorological Services

    There’s a mountain in Mocambique called Chiperoni or sometimes spelled Chiperone. When the winds blow the clouds over this mountain, the Shire Highlands get chiperoni weather.

    Sometimes chiperoni forces a change in travel plans. The constant drizzle can turn gravel roads into a soap-like mud adventure.

    It’s also used as a brand name. There used to be a blanket factory in Thyolo called Chiperoni. The factory has closed down or moved but the brand name still exists. (update 28.05.07: it seems they are still producing Chiperoni blankets).

    Chiperoni is one of my favorite words. I like the sound of it. Chiperoni could also be a spicy chili snack or the name of a hot, new, hi-tech gadget. From Chip + Peperoni.

    For now, it’s the new home of my Malawi blog.

    I saw this sign advertising “Chiperoni blankets” in Blantyre.

    chiperoni blankets available here

  • css

    I’ve started playing around with the css…
    I’m very much in “playground mode”. Everything is in transition…
    And this process will take some time. Cos my day job also involves sitting in front of “The Great Monitor” for hours on end, I try to use my free time to recover from the side effects of working long hours. Essentially this means it will be a while before the design is final (don’t know about final…. maybe “has settled” is what I mean). Apologies for hurting designer eyes along the way… BTW, if you know of some cool links or have some advise, please feel free to comment below.

    I’ve started by defining a color scheme and I’ve prepared a basic design in Photoshop.

    The current colors:

    {#7786b2}  
    {#abc0ff}  
    {#b3b3b3}  
    {#ffffff}  
    {#4d4d4d}  
       

    The file to change is wp-layout.css.
    I find these links useful:

    wp-layout explained – description of the css file

    css explained – step by step procedure

    I’m using a text editor and Dreamweaver 4 to change the code.

    Can’t decide on a font yet… I’ve tried Verdana.

    [update Jan 11, 2005] found this link on building full CSS layouts

  • the last wave

    saw Peter Weir’s “The Last Wave” at the Stadtkino yesterday evening.

  • installing wp

    Just decided to add my experience on installing WordPress…

    I set up the MySQL database, modified the wp-config.php as required, uploaded the files, and then triggered the installation. Well, all I saw was a long error message… it took me a while to find out but for some reason PHP wasn’t working. After this was corrected, the install was easy and fast!

    Next step: change the look and feel of the blog.
    Apparently the design is css-based…

    My first impression of wp: good.
    Suitable for non-geek bloggers, who just want to write!

  • the first post

    welcome to chiperoni.ch