Shame on you Football Fans.

The only football event I usually follow is the World Cup, so you can say that I’m a fan of the game once every 4 years. Recently, Algeria and Egypt were competing to qualify for the World Cup and if you follow politics or sports I assume you already heard about the ridiculous, aggressive and juvenile behavior of their fans in the last 2 weeks.

It’s not the first time fans get aggressive against each other around football matches. It happens all over the world, but this time it really got to me because the stupidity is coming from two countries I love. I’m pretty “old skool” when I’m cheering in sports, and I get quite aggressive swearing and cussing at players on TV, but I cannot understand when cheering escalates to physical assaults, or even organized crime. This crime could be real or virtual. whatever.

I think if a person’s biggest concern in life is that his team should win, and he is willing to do everything (literally everything) to achieve this then this person in my opinion is unworthy of being a human being. A human is about building, loving, learning, achieving … if I reach a level where sports make me not sleep at night, or hate a country or a group of people then I really need to reevaluate my priorities.

Competition is what makes us shine and innovate, competition is essential for our survival as a species. But if we do not draw a line between competition and hate that’s when we self destruct.
Shame on you fans, shame on you wherever you are.

BORDERLANDS REVIEW– Mind Blowing Insanity

I honestly cannot remember the last time I enjoyed a game this much.
Borderlands is a creative blend of RPG and FPS, it’s not a 5 hours game, and every thing about it just feels right. When I started off playing it I felt a bit confused, there is a lot to learn but this is the case with all RPGs. One of the amazing things about Borderlands is the colors. I know Fallout and Oblivion produce much better graphics than this one, but Borderlands’ graphics are very colorful. It’s nice to see an open world with a lot of fascinating colors.
I always avoid spoiling a game in my reviews, so below is a simple list of reasons regarding why you should get Borderlands immediately:

Value for money: This is not a short game and there is a good 20+ hours of fun in it. 

Graphics: The game looks amazing. I’m playing it on the PS3, not the 360, there are few frame drops here and there but given the big world you are running in, you will most probably not notice them.

Just about right: The game is not easy, and not difficult. What’s nice about it is that missions of certain levels open before you actually advance to those levels. I mean you could be level 9, and play a mission that is level 13. If you choose to do so, level 13 becomes really tough but if you wait to gain more skills then the level becomes easier.

Weapons: Guns, guns and more guns: It’s just difficult to run out of bullets, and there are dozens of different guns in the game. Rifles, snipers, revolvers, shotguns, you name it.

Diverse: in Borderlands, you are not only walking around shooting people, you get to talk to characters, buy and sell weapons, ride vehicles, and the map is so large you will still get lost in it 10 hours after you start playing the game. You also get to play the campaign with 4 different characters, each with a unique set of skills.

Multiplayer: It’s fun to have 4 friends in one campaign running around. Gamespot.com say that the multiplayer mode on the Xbox360 is better than the PS3, more stable. I have both consoles, but I got the game on the PS3 because my online subscription for the 360 expired. I haven’t faced any problems with the PS3 version, just make sure you install the update when asked to.

If you like shooting, if open worlds turn you on, if you are looking for long games, if you are into multiplayer fun, make sure you play Borderlands. I’m off now to start Dragon Age Origins, can’t wait.

Abu Dhabi F1 Grand Prix Pictures

If I regret one thing this year, it’s not attending the Abu Dhabi Formula 1 Grand Prix. I had signed up last year to be one of the ushers on the circuit but unfortunately I couldn’t pursue that because of a very busy schedule. I just received the below pictures in a forward on email, I don’t know who took them or what there origin is, but I thought I have to share them with you.
enjoy!

A BMW mechanic holds out his hand as BMW-Sauber Formula One driver Robert Kubica of Poland drives in for a pit stop during the race.



A photographer takes pictures at the newly built Yas Marina circuit


 
BMW's mechanics rehearse their pit stop routine in the pits of the Yas Marina Circuit

 
Brawn Formula One driver Jenson Button of Britain arrives with his girlfriend Japanese model Jessica Michibata at the Yas Marina.



Brawn GP driver Jenson Butto.



Brawn GP Formula One driver Jenson Button of Britain drive during the qualifying session at the Abu Dhabi F1 Grand Prix.



Brawn GP Formula One driver Jenson Button of Britain drives during the qualifying session of the Abu Dhabi F1 Grand Prix



Brawn GP mechanics push the car of Jenson Button of Britain through the pit lane at the Yas Marina racetrack



Brawn GP's Brazilian driver Rubens Barrichello drives at the Yas Marina Circuit



Brawn GP's Brazilian driver Rubens Barrichello salutes people in the pits of the Yas Marina Circuit



Brawn GP's British driver Jenson Button



British F1 driver Lewis Hamilton of McLaren Mercedes steers his car during the Formula One third practice session



Ferrari Formula One driver Giancarlo Fisichella of Italy drives during third practice at the Abu Dhabi F1 Grand Prix at the Yas.




Ferrari Formula One driver Kimi Raikkonen of Finland



Ferrari supporters relax on a boat inside the Yas Marina racetrack



Ferrari's Finnish driver Kimi Raikkonen drives at the Yas Marina Circuit



Ferrari's Finnish driver Kimi Raikkonen drives at the Yas Marina Circuit



Ferrari's Finnish driver Kimi Raikkonen leaves the pits of the Yas Marina Circuit



Flight attendants talk in the pit area during the first free practice session at the Yas Marina racetrack



German driver Sebastian Vettel of Red Bull Racing team



Jenson Button



Jenson Button of Britain steers his car during the first free practice session



Jessica Michibata, the girlfriend of Brawn GP Formula One driver Jenson Button of Britain



McLaren Formula One driver Lewis Hamilton of Britain



McLaren Mercedes' British driver Lewis Hamilton drives at the Yas Marina Circuit



McLaren Mercedes' British driver Lewis Hamilton enters in the pits



Partial view of the Yas Marina Circuit



Red Bull's German driver Sebastian Vettel



Red Bull's German driver Sebastian Vettel goes straight on a chicane at the Yas Marina Circuit



Scores of Ferrari cars drive along the highway from Dubai to Abu Dhabi



Toyota's Italian driver Jarno Trulli drives at the Yas Marina Circuit



Toyota's Japanese driver Kamui Kobayashi drives at the Yas Marina Circuit



US singer Nicole Scherzinger at the Yas Marina racetrack in Abu Dhabi



walk at the Yas Marina racetrack



Women spectators watch the second free practice session at Yas



Yas Marina



Yas Marina hotel marina is seen at the Yas Marina F1 complex about 20 km north of Abu Dhabi

The End of The World

Today, at 14:03 I started drafting a blog post offline, after finishing the post I couldn’t publish it because of problems in Blogger. I ran Tweetdeck immediately to tweet about the incident, but Tweetdeck wasn’t working either. I felt paralyzed, I remembered when Gmail was down once, I remembered when Facebook and MSN were down. A couple of days ago I installed an app on my Blackberry that messed it up, I stayed awake till 530 am fixing it. I couldn’t accept leaving the house in the morning without it. Last week, the internet was not working on my iPhone, I called the ISP 3 times, waiting for 20 minutes on hold every time until I got an answer. This is not a joke. I just realized how dependent I became on technology.

Let me put it like this, I cannot live without my bb, iphone, gmail, facebook or twitter. Each of them fulfills a gap in my life. If one goes, I become unbalanced. Do I have a choice? I don’t think I do. To me the internet is like drugs, you either use it, or you don’t. If you do you get addicted to it and you only realize how bad your addiction is when you do not have access.

Just checked if Blogger is back online, the whole internet is not working here. I hope no cables got cut. Last time it happened I was downloading at 50 Kb/s for a week. I wonder what happens to the world if an online tragedy occurs, I hope this never happen because if it does I’m sure it will be the end, the end for me at least.

How to transfer contacts from Nokia to Blackberry

Ok, believe it or not there isn’t a perfect way to copy your contacts from a Nokia phone to a Blackberry. There are ways around it though, but they don’t all work always.

Method one: Copy your contacts to your Sim card from your Nokia, then from the Sim card to the Blackberry. This method loses formats of contacts like pictures, it also doesn’t work if you have more than one number under one name, and it doesn’t work if you have a lot of contacts. I have over 1300 contacts, and my old sim card can save only 100.


Method two: Synchronize your Nokia with Outlook, then synchronize your Outlook with your BB. This method is actually the best, when I did it, I lost some numbers, but it’s still the best available method. Basically you lose numbers if you have for example 2 numbers saved for Nancy, and each are saved under the field (Mobile). Also, there are fields on Nokia like (Home2) that are not compatible with Outlook. If your contact list is simple, this method is good. The big disadvantage of this method is that not every one owns or uses outlook. I used to have Outlook in my old job, but now I don’t.


Method three: Exporting your list to ASCI file, then importing the file from your BB.
Connect your Nokia phone to Nokia PC Suite, and go to Contacts. then highlight all your contacts, then click on File, go to Export and export the list to a file saved on your desktop. Pictures below:




Then start BlackBerry Desktop Manager:


Go to Synchronize, then click on Configure and click on Reset Configuration. After that click on Synchronization:

choose Address Book, a screen like this will pop up, choose ASCII Importer, then choose the direction of Synchronization, it can be one way to the device, or both ways, to the device, and from the device to the file.



After that, browse for the file you saved on your Desktop, and click next.

This will Copy all the contacts to your Blackberry, but again, here you will face a lot of problems IF your contact list on your Nokia is complex. You will lose all the pictures, possibly some emails, fax numbers, or numbers that are saved under fields not compatible with your BB.


Method 4: I really like this method, it’s Synchronizing your Nokia contacts with Gmail, then using Google Sync again to synchronize them back to your Blackberry.

In order to do this, you will need to download Google Mobile App to both phones. Once you install the app, Google nicely explain how to execute the task on this website. This method is brilliant, but like previous methods it is not flawless. Although it transfers pictures, it can lose some numbers. I also noticed that some names were transferred without numbers!

I hope the above is helpful. If your address book on your Nokia is simple, then use any of the above. If it’s complex, try all and see which one gives you the best result!