This is only funny because it sounds like nobody was injured.  Listen to the voice-over of the on-lookers at the end, too funny.  I definitely want a person flying my planes for the forseeable future…
Airplane Crashing On Landing - The best bloopers are a click away 

Traveling to Singapore is like stepping into a tropical version of London. The city is a fantastic place to do business and an even better place to watch ex pats make fools of themsleves. First off, prepare for humitity, think New York City in July, but never ending. Second, get ready to have a great time. The food is fantastic, the bars are a blast and you can eat and drink outside along the river or harbor. As the regional hub for my business I was excited to be in town to get to know the local markets and understand some of the challenges our team is facing, however I got much more than I ever expected by discovering a truly great international city.

Some must do things if you visit:

1) Have dinner at one of the fine restaurants on Sentosa Island, you will feel as if you are in a tropical wonderland

2) Go out drinking along Clarke Quay (I recommend the fine establishment One Night Stand, and no it is not a whore house)

3) Eat, Eat, Eat - from fine chinese to great indian the food is fantastic all over town

4) Shop!! - Every brand you have ever heard of has an outlet along Orchard Road

One thing to avoid at all costs, the live music, unless of course you like slow 80’s tunes, every bar seems to have a band and every one is awful (Except the band at one night stand which totally rocked the joint)

Having just returned from my first trip to China, I have one word to summarize it all - WOW.  The picture above is taken from the 29th floor apartment I was staying in for a week in the Central Business District of Beijing.  As you can see, there are some enormous buildings, all of which are surrounded by additional construction.  And this going on ALL OVER Beijing. 

We were staying in the CBD, but had to travel 45 minutes each morning to get to Tshinhua University up in the Northwest corner of the city.  Needless to say, nearly the entire drive had scenery like the picture above - big buildings interspersed with small buildings interspersed with run-down hovels.

This trip was a perfect example of “see it to believe it”.  You can read all the stories about the phenomenal growth in China, but it never really sinks in until you are right in the middle of Beijing (or any other city for that matter) seeing the increased level of activity for yourself.  To be sure, this kind of growth wouldn’t be possible without some fundamental drivers.  In my opinion, it comes down to the people in China and their passion for education, but more on that later.

For this weary traveler, all it took was one week to fall in love with China and the Chinese people.  I can only hope to return again soon.

Browsing the web and I found a fun website with some cool facts.  The 15 Best Skylines in the World list Luigi Di Serio’s top picks with fun facts about buildings and great photos.  I think this gives me a great list to start my list of “Cities I need to visit”.  I haven’t gone anywhere besides New York (#4) and Seattle (#15), but Schlosser just got back from Tokyo (#5), Castle went to Toronto (#7) to watch a F1 car race, and Hooper just went to Shanghai (#3).  I love cool cities, so I am going to start making my list.  Look back here in about a week or two for my list!  I totally want to visit Hong Kong and Shanghai, so a trip to China might be in order for me.

Most people don’t live where they work, at least that’s what I would think.  Some people work across the lake, some work in different states, some work only blocks away.  People have to commute to work, and they use various modes of transportation.  Plane, train, automobile, bus, motorcycle or even a bicycle.  I live about 7 blocks away from work, so my commute is pretty much non-existant, and I don’t have too many options besides the 2 feet attached to me.  (It’s up a big hill so a bicycle isn’t really worth the effort).  Depending on costs of time, money, and effort people choose a specific method.  I am writing this post via Cingular’s HSDPA (high-speed downlink packet access) network (coverage map) or their EDGE network, and I have already accomplished 3 work related tasks, checked in with my girlfriend, and checked out some news.  It is so great that I think this changes my needs!  I NEED to have this kind of internet access if I ever need to commute to work.

Seattle’s Sounder offers 802.11b/g wireless, but just not on the trains that go to Tacoma yet, but I hope they will do it very soon.  The pilot beta program also has 5 buses that go from Redmond to Seattle on Route 545 that has been running since December.  The Wi-Fi is currently free, and I hope that it stays that way when they continue the program.  If they were smart and wanted to charge, they should offer a commuter rate that ties into your monthly pass.  Anyway, I think this would make a lot of people re-examine their use of automobiles.  I can now work, or play, instead of fighting traffic and have gained time back!

 Anyone know of other cities with commuter sponsored Wi-Fi access points?

I just got back after a week spent with the MSN team in Tokyo, this was my first trip to Japan and all I can say is WOW! Tokyo is like no place I have ever been before, talk about density, the city seems to simply extend forever, and when I say city I mean skyscrapers stretching as far as the eye can see. Given the density a couple of things really stood out to me:

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Thats right its a Plane!!! Alaska has cancelled flights left and right, rumor running around the airport is that the FTA is forcing them to cancel flights due to problems with pressurization. Alaska has had a ton of problems lately with their planes and these cancelations seems to be stemming from those issues. Luckly my flight is only two hours delayed, but the level of service from them is awful, heads up to other flying alaska you may have to build some flexibility into your plans. It continues to amaze me that Alaska opperates as a major airline and at times has trouble just keeping its planes running. Our plane eventually showed up, but it took them two hours just to move it over from the hanger, you would think that they would do some level of mechanical check on the plane and set up a back up plan if something goes wrong.