Tiramisu recipe !

Dear reader,

I just wrote this receipt for a friend, and I thought that it could be useful to have it for everybody:-)

Enjoy your Tiramisu.

Tiramisu' receipt for four persons

4 eggs
500g mascarpone (the Italian cheese)
4 (big) spoons of sugar
caffe (as much as you need)
cacao (as much as you need)
biscuits, about 150g, maybe more

Step to be done to prepare tiramisu':

1. Separate between yellow and white part of the eggs
2. In the meanwhile prepare the coffee, that you have to use later
3. Mix yellow + sugar and white alone
4. Add the mascarpone to the yellow+sugar cream, and apply the mixer again
5. Afterwards mix the white (that now should look like snow, or at least a dense cream) with the yellow+sugar+mascarpone cream. After mixing that, the final cream is ready.
6. Decide how to place the biscuits into the container, afterwards soak the biscuits one by one into the coffee (this last must be cold), and place them in the container.
   
7. Once the first layer is finished, ladle the already prepared cream on this first layer of biscuits. You must ladle an abundant quantity:-).
8. Once this is done, start with the second layer. Once this is finished, ladle the cream once again (this is the last layer, so you should ladle a bit more).
   
9. As last step, dust the tiramisu with cocoa (dust cacao).
   

Now, you will place the tiramisu into the fridge, and wait for four-five hours.
After that, you can eat it!

Who is still skeptic about solar energy?

Dear Readers,

I perfectly remember when some years ago, talking with a professor at my university I asked him which was the efficiency of a solar cell. His answer was straight away: theoretically, 25%.

Nowadays, thanks to two different research groups, the efficiency of the solar cell might be dramatically increased.
The two independent and separated researches have been carried out in:

• The Netherlands, at the TU Delft, by Prof. Laurens Siebbeles' group.
• in the USA, at the M.I.T. in Boston, by Prof. Marc Baldo's group
  

The first investigation (see figure above), proved that the efficiency of a solar cell might be, from a theoretical point of view, double by exploiting the so-called avalanche effect, which generates, under particular conditions, from one received photon more than one electron.


The second research analyses instead an innovative way to trap the solar light into a material in order to improve the efficiency of a solar panel.
The technique (displayed in figure aside) uses transparent dyes to capture, concentrate and finally redirect light along the surface of the glass to photovoltaic cells in the frame, which convert the light into electricity. This last technique seems promising from a cost-production point of view.

Clearly, these two represent important steps to increase the efficiency of solar panels, and to strengthen the position of who wants to finally get rid off the oil consumption by implementing renewable source of energy.

best wishes,
Antonio

Sometimes the economic hit men get hit too!

Dear Readers,

Few weeks ago I reported the review of one of the last book I read, "Confession of an economic hit man", written by Mr. John Perkins.

Yesterday I found the following news on my favourite source of information: BBC:

Venezuela takes over cement units, and Venezuela to seize cement plants.



They both describe the ongoing nationalization of cement companies in Venezuela.
In fact, the Venezuelan government, lead by Mr. Hugo Chavez, deliberated the nationalization of the cement companies, which were mainly owned by foreign corporations, in order to lower the price of the cement inside the Latin American country and also to concentrate the sales inside the continent rather than overseas.
This nationalization follows the previous ones concerning oil, telecommunication, iron and steel industry and electricity companies.

If we keep in mind the John Perkins's work, we could state that sometimes the economical hit men are hit instead of hitting.

The Venezuelan nationalizations are part of the so-called XXI century socialism program.
And although I do not personally entirely support Mr. Chavez policy, I have to recognize that he is one of the few strong and charismatic leaders capable to defend the interest of the poor people of his country against the power of Corporatocracy.
Mr. Chavez, along with some of his colleagues leaders of Latin American developing countries. is seeking a new (different) way to rescue the martyred population of that continent from the foreign (western) interests that for more than 500 years have decided the destiny of South America. Therefore, I believe he needs our support.

I wish you all the best,
Antonio

How would you define a country?

Dear Readers,

have you have ever thought about the definition of country?

I picked it up this argument several times during my life and I never came up with an unique conclusion.
But let us proceed in a systematic way.
Therefore let us define the main characteristics of being a country (but they do not need to be satisfied all at the same time).

A geographical area is a country if :

1. It has well defined borders
2. It is officially recognized
   
3. It has a parliament legislating on it
4. It has its own constitution
   
5. It has its own police, army, educational system etc.
6. It has its embassies all over the world
7. It has its official language (or more official languages)
8. It has its own shared history
9. It has its own traditions (religious, food, etc.)
10. ...
    

According to these definitions, the most of the countries on this earth can satisfied the majority of them, and therefore they theoretically have the right to be called: country.
On the other hand, we know several other places which, although they respect these definitions, they are not yet officially recognized with this political status.

Let us take some examples: Palestine, Kurdistan, Taiwan, and Chiapas.
All of the them respect condition 1, 3, 4 and 5, which are in my opinion the most characterizing and most complicate to be fulfilled, but...
All of them do no respect condition number 2, which is in the current world the most needed. In fact, this condition basically states that "you legally exist only and only if the others (the powerful nations) allow you to legally exist".

This principle is against any morality!
Let us make a comparison: we take a no official country as Kurdistan and an official country as San Marino. Which of them does better fulfil the country definition?
San Marino occupies a small territory in the north of Italy. The territory is so minuscule, that if you do not know exactly where it is, you can pass through without knowing that you just crossed the borders of one of the richest country in the world.
On the other hand, Kurdistan is approximately as big as 5000 times San Marino, but it seems that it does not deserve the same status.

You can observe that the size is not important to identify a nation. I accept this observation.
But what about the fact that San Marino mainly exists because some rich people needs it in order to carry out their money laundry and Kurdistan must not exist, because it is divided among three countries, which wants to exploit its natural resources as oil and copper?

Before I conclude I would like to remark that there is a huge number of geographical areas like ones mentioned above, which do not have a recognized international status just because some powerful nation needs them in order to exploit their natural resources, while on the other hand very small islands, outlying place in some ocean, officially exist just because of the need of money laundry. Money earned, either in a illegal or illegal way, by the wealthy nations.
Moreover, the population of these areas are usually treated by the media of the nations which are exploiting them or using them as terrorists, bandits and in general criminals.
And seldom, very seldom, they are referred to with their real name: Victims!!!

Please comment it, and please justify your opinion.
All the best!
Antonio

Speech - Statement on the Assassination of Martin Luther King

Dear Readers,

here another speech delivered by Sen. Robert Kennedy, for the italian version click here.
The 4th of April 1968, Sen. Robert Kennedy communicated to a gathered crowd the dramatic news of the cruel assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King.

In this short and extremely intense speech, Sen. Robert Kennedy addressed the audience to avoid to feel into the trap of violence, by strongly underlining that USA did not need a further escalation of hatred and violence, but rather love and compassion. He concluded his talk, by begging his countrymen, once arrived home, to pray for Dr. King family, and for the USA.

The moral depth of this statement provided by Sen. Robert Kennedy, in relation with this tragic event, assumed an even higher value considering that after only two months and two days, he would have been himself victim of another brutal assassination in Los Angeles.

Compared with the extraordinary high moral values expressed into the speech, my comments are useless. Therefore I will leave you alone with Sen. Robert Kennedy own voice in awhile.

But before I terminate, I want to strongly prod you to meditate on Sen. Kennedy words.
Meditation alone is, by the way, not enough...and paraphrasing a famous Latin sentence, we could say that "scripta volant, res manent"!
Therefore let force each of us (only for whom did not start yet) to actively contribute to change this world and make it a better place for us and for whom will follow us. Let us fill humanity with compassion, love and help, exactly as Sen. Robert Kennedy asked us to do.

yours sincerely,
Antonio