Sept 7-11: Went to JavaZone for a great conference. I flew from Hartford to Phillidelphia before heading out to Oslo, it was really weird being back in the US for the first time in a long time. My mother dropped me off in Hartford. I snapped this picture as a good bye to Les Etats Unis (notice how heavy people are? that floored me in my few days back in the US)
After about 7 hours of red eye excitement I landed in Oslo, I had thought that the conference started the day that I arrived but it was just the setup and after the speakers dinner. I didn’t have a hotel room so I went to an internet cafe and found a cheap hotel (650 KR <> $130USD which is extremely cheap in Norway as its common to spend $50 USD on dinner at a not so nice restaurant).
One interesting tidbit is ALWAYS take the trains in Norway. I took a taxi from the airport to downtown as I didn’t know any better, it is maybe a 20 minute ride. Price? 940kr <> $200USD ugh!
The hotel was a bit different than most US hotels, you had to put the sheets etc on the bed yourself and although it had a private bathroom most rooms shared communal bathrooms. Although a private bathroom it was far from the lap of luxury.
I went to the speakers dinner that night at a small bar/restaurant, there wasn’t much food more like a buffet of appetizers so perhaps it should have been called speaker’s drinks. I was jetlagged and stayed out pretty late in a delirious state hoping that some drinks would make me tired and able to sleep. Complete and utter failure.
This is the sun rising at about 5 am the next morning. I fell asleep shortly after at about 6:00. Luckily my session was not until 3pm although falling asleep at 6:00 did not help my jetlag very much, it persisted for about 2-3 days.
For my session I was talking about Domain Driven Design, always fun with Eric Evans (the creator of Domain Driven Design) in the audience. I was also speaking in the big room (about 500 people on 2 sides) for the first time at a conference. The room was quite intimidating.
You can’t really see it in the picture but the side I took it from is a mirror image of the side in the distance.
My session went pretty well, as of now I have received my reviews and I was well above average in terms of ratings (I would guess in the top 15-20%) which is always good to hear.
After my session I participated on a panel discussion on some subjects related to the topic which was fairly interesting. That night we went out again.
Out with Eric Evans (left) and Randy Stafford (right). Randy took us to dinner on Uncle Larry (Ellison’s) budget but we had already decided to eat somewhere reasonable and were too tired to switch directions and go eat somewhere else. You got lucky this time Larry but next time we are eating better!
One thing I I had to take a picture of before I left was the beer that we were drinking … I mean where else in the world can you have Ass Beer?
The rest of JavaZone was a lot of fun. I didn’t get a picture but they had a smart card operated machine that dispensed beer to “heroes” … too cool!
After JavaZone it was time to fly back to Holland. I remembered to take the train this time!
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