The Ji Village News

季庄新闻–Haidong Ji’s Blog

My better half is right. I was mobbed by my fans from all over the world!

I woke up and decided that I’d like to find a cache in Spain. It’s really neat to be able to find treasures in a different part of the world. I opened the window and put my eTrex on the edge outside. It got the coordinate of my location. I then went to geocaching.com and searched for nearby caches using the coordinate. By the way, here is a shot of the view out of my hotel window. Pay attention to the antenna on top of buildings. When I went to high school in my county town almost 20 years ago, there were also many TV antennas on the rooftop of apartment buildings, not unlike what you can see in this picture.

View from my window

It turned out one cache is hidden around Montjuic Castle, 1.5 kilometers away from my hotel. Keep in mind the distance is direct distance calculated by satellite. So you would walk more than that to get there, because it is impossible to walk a straight line in a city.

A few kilometers walk is manageable. So I started climbing toward the mountain behind.

About 2 blocks uphill from the hotel, there appear to be an elementary school. There is a playground next to it.

Playground

Clementine tree next to the playground

I then passed what appears to be a big theatre:

Continue hiking up, I passed what appeared to be another school. Behind the school, I saw this interesting sculpture:

During the hike, I saw 2 persons urinating along the road. One was walking his dog. He stopped and pissed next to the trail. The other parked his moped along the road and released himself on the slope below it. I was a little surprised by that, because although this is not the full tourist season, that area is not totally barren either. However, I don’t want to give you the impression that the mountain is dirty or smelly, though, because it is not. On the contrary, it looks very nice and well-maintained.

After hiking for a while, I got a very good view of the whole city. The following pictures were taken along the way:

Partial view of the city

Looking closely, one could see the harbour where La Rambla ends

View cornor of the castle from below:

Finally, I got to the cache spot. I saw the dog-walker mentioned earlier not too far from it. I waited a while for him to leave. I then found the cache without too much difficulty. Here is what I got:

I went to the castle afterwards, had a sandwich there and visited the museum inside.

On the way out, I saw a bunch of school children on a field trip. They were very curious of me. A few children asked “What’s your name” and “How old are you?”. That was apparently something they learned from their English textbook. And they were eager to practice on this Chinese. There was no point in telling them my adopted English name, so I told them my name and age in Chinese. I then managed to say “Chino” while pointing at myself a few times. That seemed to make them even more curious. A few ran away and told their friends about it. A few more then came over and asked the same questions. Some also told me “My name is so and so”. I managed to count 1 to 10 in Spanish, just to amuse them a little bit. There were a lot of giggles and excitement among them. A good time was had by all.

My first encounter with people of different skin tone happened sometime when I was in elementary school, probably when I was around 10 years old, the same age with most of the Spanish kids I met. I was visiting Mount Tai (泰山) and QuFu (曲阜, birthplace of Confucious). That was the first major trip I took outside of my village, although both Mount Tai and QuFu are in my province. My dad was on a teacher’s retreat. I believe a teacher was allowed to bring along one child. My dad lost all the money he brought half-way through the journey. He stored the money in a plastic bag that he carried, around 40 yuan, if I remember correctly. That is around 5 dollars in today’s rate, but should be less if the exchange rate in the 1980s is applied. I am not sure if he lost it or somebody stole it. In any case, I was very disappointed and afraid that we would have to go home early. The other teachers must have seen that and decided to lend us some money so we could continue the trip. One teacher I remember particularly well is 付员增. I am not sure if I typed his name correctly here, but I appreciate his empathy and compassion very much.

I vaguely remember I tossed an ice-cream wrap on a white person by accident, although the credibility of that memory is in doubt. I may have invented it to impress other kids and adults. I remember I had great curiosity about foreigners too, just like the Spanish children’s curiosity about me. I probably gawked at them, just like the Spanish children gawked at me. However, I wouldn’t be able to ask those simple questions in English, because I didn’t start learning English until the first year in middle school.

Here is one picture of the children:

On the way down, I saw a group of probably 10 people climbing up. One of them approached me. I thought he must want me to take a group picture of them. But actually he wanted to take a picture with me. This group was from Italy. Fortunately, that person was the only one that wanted a picture with me. Crazy fans, what can I say?

Going further down, I went through a garden I passed through on the way up:

In the picture above, the man in red coat asked me the name of the big tree in the picture. He thought the garden is Japanese-style and mistook me as a Japanese. After apologizing, we chatted briefly. They are retirees from Holland. He told me that his friend’s daughter studied in Beijing for one year and her whole family visited and had a good time there.

In all, it was a great side trip. Based on the number of people who wanted to talk to me, I can only conclude that my book has brought me fame from all over the world

Now promise me, don’t believe everything the tabloids say about me, ok?

I got a chance to see Sagrada Familia today.

Once again, Metro is my preferred way of transportation. Transfer to different lines on Metro, where available, is free. Based on my experience so far, I like the subway system here. The trains are all punctual and fast. There is a display at each station telling you when the next train will come, with great accuracy. The display is relatively big and has at least 3 rows, plenty room for train direction and next train’s arrival time, so the text is not crawling on a single row of display, like Chicago’s EL. You can see an example here. The quality of this shot is not very good, it’s kinda blurry:

Within the car, there is a display right above the door that shows exactly what the next stop is and the direction the train is travelling. Again, I liked this method. See picture below:

At Metro Espanya station, which is the closet station to my hotel, I bought a bottle of water. The store owner also gave me a sample of this:

I don’t know the English or Spanish name for it, but I know what it is. In Chinese, at least in my dialect, I call it 皮肚 or 油花子. When I was little, we usually buy pork that has pig’s skin and a few inches of meat below it, most of which is fat. We then fry that in a covered wok, so the fat does not splash everywhere. When it is done, the fat would be collected and saved as cooking oil, kind of like the practice of using butter or margarine to pan fry stuff in the West. The residue, which is really fried pig skin, will be saved for snack or used to cook soup. I’ve also seen similar things in Mexico City.

Anyway, I got to Sagrada Familia in no time. Before I got inside, I strolled around so I can take better pictures of it. And I saw 2 persons playing table-tennis on this cement ping-pong table:

That brought back memories, because outdoor cement ping-pong table in school ground was very common when I grown up. It was cheap to set it up and the pad and ball were cheap to get. We usually didn’t have a net though. We would just put a row of bricks in the middle. The competition can be heated and we all played with gusto. I remember there was a big ping-pong rivalry between my two elder brothers.

Back to Sagrada Familia. It was very impressive. Construction started in the 1880s and it is still not done to this day, having been interrupted by wars, poor finance, and other reasons. That’s why you will see cranes and scaffolding stuff in pictures, because construction is on-going.

From outside, it has a funky look, but the sculptures, bell towers, and various biblical scenes were done with great attention to detail and precision:

Antoni Gaudi, the renowned Catalan architect and apparently devout Catholic, models a lot of his design on his observation in nature. Once inside, the tree structure of columns are apparent:

There are stairs where you can climb to as high as 75 meters.

I didn’t go all the way, because after around 250 stairs, there was a slow line going up. But I was glad that I climbed, because the view was very nice and I got to take a few more pictures.

Anyway, Sagrada Familia is a must-see if you ever come to Barcelona.

Before I forgot, smoking is allowed in majority of restaurants and bars, and many customers do smoke. For vegetarians, your choice of food can be limited.

I made it to Barcelona all right. And I loved what I’ve seen so far.

My trip was almost derailed at the last minute, because the visa duration was invalid! The Spanish Consulate gave me entry from 20-01-06 to 29-01-06 on 31-01-06, the day they issued me the visa. By then it had already expired. Go figure!

I am embarrassed to admit it, because I did scan through the visa when I got it but still didn’t catch the error. I guess there are mainly 2 reasons: 1. the different date format used in different countries apparently is too much for my brain to handle; 2. the starting date, the 20th, happened to be the day that my flight would arrive.

Anyway, the check-in agent at O’Hare noticed the error. It so happens that she knows the Spanish Consulate. She called him. He then faxed the agent a letter explaining the mistake. I carried the fax with me and was allowed entry.

Now I warn you, don’t bet on having the same luck I had, and please, please double, triple check your visa to any country when you get it. I was really lucky since I got to the airport 7 hours early, because I had something else to do and wanted to get the boarding pass early. At that time Iberia agent had not officially started their day yet.

Getting a visa is a pain and most times a humiliating experience, because you are presumed “guilty” unless proven otherwise. So most people want to get it over with as soon as possible. But considering all the effort you put in, you might as well make sure it is done right.

Now back to the trip. I borrowed 6 or 7 books about Spain and Barcelona from the library. I read most of them on the flight. That really paid off. By the time I got here, I had detailed plans of where I wanted to go, what food I wanted to try, and how to get there, etc..

I arrived at Madrid airport first. The airport code is mad, no pun intended. I like the design and architecture. Here is one picture:

Also, I met James Luetkehoelter at Madrid airport, who I met the first time at PASS last year in Texas. We had a great conversation. As I mentioned before, networking is the single most important you can get out of this kind of conferences. Thanks for the taxi ride James.

Anyway, I got to the hotel. On the way here, one observation I had is that for all the European countries I’ve been (some just for transit), it seems that European cars are much smaller than their American cousins, which may not be a bad thing. James commented that bigger cars do not fit well on old and narrow European streets, which makes sense.

There are a few things in the hotel that I found interesting:

1. After entering the room, you need to put the keycard into a slot to turn on everything electronic in the room, which I think is a great idea. For one, it is energy-efficient; for another, you will always know where your keycard is!
2. The bathroom has a separate urinal, right next to the toilet. I guess Spaniards really does not want to go through the trouble of lifting the lid up Or maybe that is a bidet? I never see a real bidet before, so I am not sure. I remember a scene in “Riding in Cars with Boys” where Drew Barrymore’s love interest drank water from a bidet, and it shot water up. So I thought a bidet should always shoot water up so the reproductive organ can be properly washed. (That is a great movie, by the way. Drew Barrymore was not just a pretty face in it. She really showed a lot of depth in that movie.) Anyway, I don’t see this device can shoot water up:

I then took a short nap, a shower, and headed out to La Rambla. I bought a 10-pass T-10 ticket (6.75 Euro, or 6,75 as in Spain, Sweden, and probably Germany too) at Espanya station, which is a short stroll from my hotel. I consider the ticket a good deal and pretty cheap. I attempted to buy it using my credit card first. After inserting the card, the machine asked for my personal number. I had no idea that I am supposed to have a personal number for my credit card! I panicked a little because I was afraid the machine would not return my card, since it had sucked my card in earlier. Fortunately, I was able to cancel the transaction and got the card out. I then promptly paid in cash.

Walking on La Rambla is very relaxing. I saw people wondering around or sitting on the bench chatting; I saw quaint shops in narrow alleys; I saw vendors and street artists conducting business; I saw a market where fresh produce are sold and people enjoying fruits and smoothies; I saw people enjoying a late tapa lunch, washed down with a glass of beer; I saw beautiful and charming buildings along the street. At the harbour, I saw the interesting bridge, Christopher Columbus statue, and a fancy mall; all along, I could feel the gentle and cool Midterranian breeze. All these gave me the lazy, easy, and worry-free feeling, which is very nice. I heard pickpockets are active here, but luckily I was not affected.

Here are a few pictures:

Got to plan for next day and retire soon. Thanks to Prince Roy for his travel journals. I got a lot of inspriations out of it.

Sweet dreams.

几个星期前读完了龙应台的《人在欧洲》。这是北京三联书店1994年出版、1997年再版的。我是从芝加哥公共图书馆借到的。

龙应台的作品我不是太陌生。记不太清什么时候读了她写的《中国人，你为什么不生气？》及其他评论文章。那时我深为她犀利的文笔、透彻和精辟的分析所吸引。当时读她的文章，有一种痛快淋漓的感觉。

十几年前读她的书觉得过瘾，现在倒是未必。其主要原因是我觉得她的文笔太狂，不少的时候偏激。总而言之，就是太“生气”。所以当我拿起这本书时，是有一些犹豫的。但当时我刚读完毛毛的《我的父亲邓小平》，所以想找一本内容和风格不同的书来换换口味；加上媒体上又有报道她炮轰中宣部的关闭冰点的决定（我个人对冰点基本上一无所知）和我个人对于东西文化比较的兴趣。所以就拿来读一读。

读完之后的感觉和上面所写的并无太大变化。她的笔锋依旧锐利，一针见血。在我看来，不少情况下她的分析都是切中要害，毫不留情。她的不少观点我也会鼓掌赞成的。

但不少时候我也觉得虽然她的出发点是好的，但她的结论下得太早、太快，有以偏概全、格式化、笼统化的嫌疑。举例来说， 她的关于瑞士人的有计划及刻板的描写，关于瑞士幼儿园的描写，都是单维及单向性的。还有更多的例子，这里不好一一列举，因为书已经还掉了。

对于一个文化、一个社会的观察，管中窥豹的评论只能给人简单的、模式化的理解。这对于文化交流的意义不会很大。

但如前所说，龙应台的文笔和类比确实不错。现引她的《思想栏杆》的两段话做结。在《思想栏杆》里，她从反面描述了一个公正、客观媒体的重要性：

一个渺小的个人的文字，一旦成为铅印，就罩上了一层“权威”的外衣，以新闻为媒体，就更加上了“客观”的金冠。几百万人读这篇报道，几百万人中有多少人会注意意识形态的诱导而有所警惕？

你见过养猪的人如何把几十只肥猪引导到同一个出口吗？只要用栏杆围出一条长长的窄路，连到出口，猪就会一只一只排队走向你要它走的地方。无形的思想栏杆，也是如此。

As posted here earlier, I will be in Barcelona next week to deliver a session on sqlcmd for PASS 2006 European conference. I have some time for sight-seeing. So I am seeking comments and recommendations on anything you can provide: must-see, food, places of interest, etc.. I may even do some geocaching, if possible. So recommendation on good and easy caches is also appreciated.

I will blog and post pictures when possible.

Here are some details of my itenarary:
Arriving at Barcelona airport at 10:10am on 2006/02/20, Iberia Flight 6274
Staying at Hotel Fira Palace, Av. de Rius i Taulet, 1-3. 08004 Barcelona. Spain
Leaving Barcelona at 9:30am on 2006/02/26, Iberia Flight 6275

In this post, I talked about some potential permission issues facing average users regarding Sql Server Management Studio (SSMS) reports.

When you manage Sql Server 2000 servers with SSMS, those reports will not be available, for the simple reason that most of those reports are based on DMVs, which are newly introduced in SQL Server 2005 and do not exist in Sql Server 2000.

However, you will not be able to manage SQL Server 2005 servers with Sql Server Enterprise Manager that comes with Sql Server 2000. When you try, you will get this error message:

To connect to this server you must use Sql Server Management Studio or Sql Server Management Objects (SMO)

If you are so inclined, you can still connect to SQL Server 2005 Servers with Sql Server 2000 tools like Query Analyzer, osql, and isql. I’ve tested all three and they all work. That should not be a surprise, if you think about it, since they are all standard database applications.

In addition, the object browser in Query Analyzer works also. However, you will not see all the new views, assemblies, and other newly introduced SQL Server 2005 objects.

The book I co-wrote on Sql Server Integration Service (formerly know as DTS) has been selling pretty well at Amazon. I received 10 copies from the publisher a few weeks ago. I must confess that I felt pretty good seeing my own picture on the book cover. It should reach bookstores soon. However, don’t use that as an excuse for not ordering it at Amazon or other online bookstores

This is the first book I wrote that is available at a brick and mortar bookstore. My articles have appeared on three volumes of Best of SqlServerCentral.com book, but those are only available at SqlServerCentral.com. All 3 are real books, in the sense that they all have ISBN numbers and catalogued by Library of Congress. But this one is “available whereever books are sold” (For my readers living outside the US, that is a typical US promotional phrase. I use it here for humor.)

When I wrote my chapter, I chatted frequently with fellow co-author Andy Leonard. Thanks Andy for the comradeship. Andy joked then that when the book comes out, he would go to the bookstore and wonder around where it is shelved and see if anybody recognizes him. I thought that was pretty funny. I told it to my better half, she suggested I should do the same, except that I should bring a friend along. The friend can play the role of bystander-turned-admirer, if nobody recognizes me

Fellow co-author Jason Gerard suggested that when the book reaches his neighborhood bookstores, he would go there frequently and make sure it is displayed in a prominent position.

The other day I brought a copy of it to work, Maria commented: “You probably should cut off your picture on the cover. You should remain anonymous in case you are harassed by fans on the street in the future!”

Got to love it!

My first-grader lost 2 teeth! For the first one, tooth fairy gave him 5 dollars. The second is 4 dollars cheaper than the first.

So far, it is FIFO (First in, first out), meaning that he lost the 2 that came out first. They are all lower jaw teeth. He was born in June, 1999.

Before losing them

First one

First one with a penny

Second one

Second one with a pea

The fourth time is a charm!

I’ve documented my experients with SQL Server 2005 silent / command line install in 3 previous posts. They all failed. To be fair, I tested it using September CTP, not the finalized RTM release.

After I got the RTM last November, I loaded it on my laptop, so I could test all my code and screen shots for the book we wrote. I did command line install and it was successful. However, to load things quickly, I used ADDLOCAL=All. So every SQL Server 2005 component was installed.

The other day I had a chance to test it one more time using RTM on a server. And it was successful. I am really happy about that.

For this Server, I just want to load the database engine, Integration Service, and AdventureWorks sample database. I do not want the extra stuff, such as Analysis Services, Replication, full-text, Notification Services, Reporting Services, etc.. So, for ADDLOCAL, which defines what you want to install, I just have SQL_Data_Files,SQL_DTS,SQL_AdventureWorksSamples. SQL_Data_Files is a child component of Sql Server Engine. The rule of silent install is that if any of the child component is installed, then the parent component is automatically installed also. Note that you need to separate each component with comma, and do not put spaces between them. They are case-sensitive.

Here is the full content of my SqlInstall.ini file:

[Options]
;--------------------------------------------------------------------
;--------------------------------------------------------------------
; PIDKEY specifies the Product Identification Key.
; Usage: PIDKEY=ABCDE12345FGHIJ67890KLMNO

; NOTE: PIDKEY is not required for SQL Server Express Edition.
; NOTE: Do not include "-" in the PIDKEY.

;PIDKEY=

ADDLOCAL=SQL_Data_Files,SQL_DTS,SQL_AdventureWorksSamples

INSTANCENAME=MSSQLSERVER

SQLBROWSERACCOUNT="NT AUTHORITYSYSTEM"
SQLBROWSERPASSWORD="NT AUTHORITYSYSTEM"

SQLACCOUNT="NT AUTHORITYSYSTEM"
SQLPASSWORD="NT AUTHORITYSYSTEM"

AGTACCOUNT="NT AUTHORITYSYSTEM"
AGTPASSWORD="NT AUTHORITYSYSTEM"

SQLBROWSERAUTOSTART=0
SQLAUTOSTART=1
AGTAUTOSTART=1

SECURITYMODE=SQL
SAPWD=SomeStrongSaPassword

SAMPLEDATABASESERVER=.

Note also that sqlcmd is installed with this minimal installation of Sql Server engine, which I like.

I then went to the command line. I went to the directory where the setup.exe is located. I then typed:

setup.exe /settings c:\LocationOfIniFile\SqlInstall.ini /qn

I will write an article on this and hopefully it will be published at SqlServerCentral.com.

Update: Reader Johan Bijnens from Belgium sent me the following comments, which I agree 100%. He also shared his ini files. Since there are so many, I will not post them here. Thanks so much Johan for sharing:

Installing a default instance works fine, however one will have to know before install if IIS is activates with .net selected if one wants to install ADDLOCAL=All

When installing instances, it also works fine, but performing an uninstall is tricky because you’ll have to specify exactly which components you want to uninstall.

Aparently it does not take into account that there still are other instances on the server so if you don’t restrict an uninstall, it also uninstalls the tools, ..

Update 2: My stylesheet does not display some characters correctly, which will cause you probelms if you use my ini code sample for your silent install. There should be a backward slash between NT AUTHORITY and SYSTEM in the startup account.

记不清是初中还是高中的哪一年级了，朱自清的《荷塘月色》是被收录在语文课本里的。好像课后要求全文背诵。晨读课上，普通话自我感觉良好的我，对此文肯定读的铿锵有力，掷地有声。直到现在，十几年甚或二十几年之后的今天，我还能信口背上几段。

几个月前我从芝加哥公共图书馆里借了一本《朱自清全集》，重读《荷塘月色》，感觉他写得真好。其实好书与好文章是值得多读的，特别是隔了一段时间。那时，人的阅历、经验都更丰富，心境也大不相同，旧书重读，好像故地重游，时过境迁，很多时候会有不同的体会与感想。

我以前就知道《荷塘月色》是删节过的。原装正版好像有少儿不宜的味道。最近读的看来是正版，不是打口碟。

在描述荷花的一段里，以下是原版节录：
“有袅娜地开着的，有羞涩地打着朵儿的；正如一粒粒的明珠，又如碧天里的星星，又如刚出浴的美人”
“又如刚出浴的美人”在课文里被删掉。

在描述采莲的一段里，被删除的又多一些，一下是被删除的部分：
“采莲的是少年的女子，她们是荡着小船，唱着艳歌去的。采莲人不用说很多，还有看采莲的人。那是一个热闹的季节，也是一个风流的季节。梁元帝《采莲赋》里说得好：
　　于是妖童媛女，荡舟心许；鷁首徐回，兼传羽杯；欋将移而藻挂，船欲动而萍开。尔其纤腰束素，迁延顾步；夏始春余，叶嫩花初，恐沾裳而浅笑，畏倾船而敛裾。
　　可见当时嬉游的光景了。这真是有趣的事，可惜我们现在早已无福消受了。”

现在想来，我对删节的看法很矛盾：一方面，如照搬原文，那些文字对于处于成长期、荷尔蒙过剩的少年来说，确有不必要的刺激作用。另一方面，对原文删节，好像情理不通，有悖于作者的初衷。如作者还健在，还会有法律上的版权问题。

所以我想最好的办法是不删节，但也不要把该文放在课本里。相反，应把它列在推荐栏目里，让有兴趣的学生自己来读，自己来做判断。现在的课本和以前肯定大不相同，不知《荷塘月色》还在不在。

其实，比起中外教科书对于社会科学、历史、宗教、以及哲学等科目的处理，《荷塘月色》的删节只能算是小菜一碟，小巫见大巫。我们的历史和社会科学课本的问题，日本对一些历史教科书的篡改，美国的一些人强加造物论于别人之上的企图，阿拉伯及以色列对自己孩子的灌输，等等等等，都是很好的例子。要对这做研究，一篇短文是远远不够的。

已上一段，倒不是给任何人开脱。教科书的选编，和做任何其他事一样，公平、理性、客观、责任感、和对他人的关心都是非常重要的因素。