Bjørn Stabell 白熊

This was ours (Exoweb’s) first EuroPython, and our first to CERN and Geneva as well.

Geneva and CERN were wonderful. Geneva was charming and beautiful, CERN and its projects were mindblowing. A picture is worth a thousand words, so see the photo album of the Geneva and CERN visit. There’s also flickr photo pool for EuroPython 2006.

Between sampling a meter of beer we managed to go to many interesting talks and meet many like-minded people. It seems companies are often struggling with the same issues, one recurring one is how to organize and manage a distributed software development company practicing agile methodologies. Both the Programmers of Vilnius and Canonical held talks about this.

I also participated in the first day of the PyPI Sprint with Richard and Johannes. The Python Package Index—PyPI, also known as the Cheese Shop—is a very important project with a lot of potential. A comprehensive, well organized, easy-to-use package library is essential for Python’s future. The Cheese Shop and Python Eggs should be what CPAN is to Perl, and Ruby Gems is to Ruby. More on this later.

Richard’s been working hard at it, but he needs more help, so if you’ve got free time, please contact him. PyPI is implemented in a minimal home-grown Python framework using ZPT/ TAL/ TALES. It’s okay, but it would’ve been nicer in Django

I’ve added two new photo sets on flickr:

• Ken and I visiting Ken Ronny, Torgrim, and Tobias in Tromsø, Norway
• me visiting my family in Havøysund, Alta, and Oslo

Although it’s relaxing and nice to visit relatives in Norway, I’m starting to look forward to EuroPython 2006 next week in Geneva, Switzerland.

Exoweb is going with three people: Ken Wong, Gzregorz Jakacki, and me.

Are you going as well? Drop us a line. Would be fun to meet up and chat, especially if it’s about Python, Django, Dojo, or Postgres.

Sipping a US$ 13 beer I cannot help but feel Norwegian again, even if the beer is a Kilkenny.

There are of course many contrasts between Norway, my home country, and Beijing, where I spent the last 8 years of my life.

Norway is very rich in natural resources—espically in oil, which has seen some growth recently—has a small population, and a “Robin Hood” social democracy.

The entire population is one big affluent middle class; nobody’s rich, nobody’s poor. With overtime pay the cleaning staff of my school made more money than the head of education in my county, even if they were both working about the same number of hours. This is perhaps as close to the communist ideal as you can find in a materialistic world, making Norway the 2^nd highest GDP per capita in the world, and the 1^st in terms of human development accoring to the UN.

And when the oil prices crash? Well, Norway’s saving its money in a petroleum fund, currently at US$ 245 billion.

This lack of income disparity has one very apparent effect: services become very expensive. Combined with a weak dollar and yen it’s perhaps no wonder Oslo surpassed Tokyo as the most expensive city in the world.  Swedes are taking over a lot of the service jobs as they know the language, the pay is better, and the working hours less than back home; as much as 2 hours less per day for, e.g., nurses.

Here’s a quick a dirty chart of the costs of some items in Norway and Beijing, all converted to US$ for easy comparison:

Huge taxes on gas and cars combined with high wages explains the big difference in cab fares. Kilkenny is an import in both countries, and only the service is really different, meaning less difference overall; electronics are even closer in price. Installing a stone wall involves a lot of service: some digging, transportation, installation, and cleanup, thus the big price difference; there’s certainly no lack of raw material (stone) in Norway.

So if you want to see what it’s like when the world is completely flat—when globalization has had its way and equalized all wage disparities—head to Norway. Be sure to bring enough plastic money, though.