Posted on April 17, 2007 - by jono
Brazil kicks ass
Got back from my trip to FISL 8.0 in Brazil and I had an insanely good time. After my rather tortuous trip, I checked into the hotel, and headed straight to FISL where I met with Sulamita (my tour guide and the queen of sarcasm) and the Intel chaps. I spent three days and took back a number of very cool memories and thoughts, which include:
- The the ubuntu-br team are incredible. They did an excellent job at FISL and were a very cool bunch of people indeed. They did some long days answering the questions and dealing with the huge amount of interest in Ubuntu. Well done folks!
- Was great to meet Aaron Seigo, Keith Packard, J5, Jim Gettys, Simon Phipps, Knut Yrvin and Lucas Rocha again. Aaron never ceases to amuse me and we always have a laugh when we meet up. Hope to catch up with the tiny little bastard again in the future.
- FISL is well run, quite community orientated and has a huge government presence. The talks were well organised and schedule made sense. A well run event that was always very well attended.
- Ubuntu was by far the most dominant distro being used on computers from what I saw. This is pretty much a trend at conferences now. Yes, I know thats a smug thing to say, but I care not.
- A drunk a lot, and slept very little. Every night I went to bed at around 5am having been out drinking with a bunch of people in Porto Alegre. At one point about 100 or so geeks wandered down the road shouting and chanting as we tried to find a bar. Was a pretty unique sight. The last night was great as we drunk through till morning and I saw a nice, crisp early Brazil morning which was fantastic.
- OLPC was rocking and rolling as ever. Great work from the folks there.
- A lot of Brazilians love Slackware, and there was a large Slackware presence there. Slackware was my first ever distro when I got into Linux, good to see it is strong in Brazil.
- My talk went down very well, and the resulting blogs have had very favorable reviews. Thanks so much for your kind comments people. I had a blast doing it, and the audience were very receptive, fun and full of great questions.
- Taxi drivers in Porto Alegre seem to think traffic lights are ambient lighting and other cars are fun things to drive as close to as possible. Madness.
- If you were there, no I don’t have tattoos on my ass, if you weren’t there, don’t ask.
Brazil is a wonderful, wonderful country, and the people who I met there were incredibly friendly and welcoming. As I do quite a bit of travel, I occasionally come back from somewhere with a particular fondness for the country and the people, and Brazil has so far topped my list. I found it a stunning place with incredibly passionate people and a real drive and motivation for free software. I came away from the trip even more enthused and excited about everything we all do with free software than before. I really admire dedication, passion and excitement in people, and the people who I met at FISL have it in droves. Thankyou to everyone who was so incredibly kind and welcoming to me. Rest assured, I will be back to your incredible country. Thanks also to Sulamita for being an excellent tour guide and always demonstrating an ability to take the piss out of me when I least expect. She is a lean, mean, sarcasm machine with red hair.
All in all an excellent, fun and productive trip.
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April 17, 2007
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i went to brazil and i’ve got my kidneys stolen!
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April 17, 2007
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just kiddin’ haha (i’m so funny) actually, i’m a brazilian.brazil is a good place. but only the southern brazil.the north is just shit, poor people and heat
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April 17, 2007
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Great to hear this from you, Jono! We all had enjoyed your visit here!
Its a beautifull country, for sure!. Just for note, when you come back, dont forget to visit Bahia (i told you and you had writed it somewhere
)
Just for a preview, try searching “morro de sao paulo”, “Salvador” or “Itacaré” on google images…:cool:
In a few days, i’ll getting in touch with you about the ubuntu games internacionalization.
Thank you!
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April 17, 2007
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April 17, 2007
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Did you see Theo de Raadt’s speech? or get to chat with him?
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April 17, 2007
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Allix – didn’t see it, and he was around and at a party I was at, but I never got round to speaking to him.
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April 17, 2007
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It makes me very happy that you enjoyed it.
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April 18, 2007
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Hi there. Glad you liked the visit here. We sure enjoyed your stay and your talk(wich was very funny by the way).
Hope you come here more often ^_^
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April 18, 2007
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Its so funny. I´m so happy because the joke of the saturday is not turned the reality. (I´m…I´m….) do you remember? Hahahahahah. Hugs. Nice to meet you!
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April 18, 2007
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To put this into perspective, Porto Alegre is quite detached from the rest of Brazil. It’s wealthier, more liberal, further away, more white, more European.
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April 18, 2007
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Jono.. don’t forget it: Salvador – Bahia – Brazil (in your card)
My city that you need know …
[]’s
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April 21, 2007
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Hey man, nice blog. I’m that guy who was dressing an Ensiferum’s t-shirt. We probably saw each other for three times over there. The first time after Keith Packard have talked about Xorg.
It’s the first time I had at FISL and IMHO the entire atmosphere was great. I will be there next year, for sure.
Be welcomed to be there next year aswell and lots of metal to you!
PS: If you’re going to Wacken Open Air this year, please post something