Audiostretto 59/4/24 English

When I was a child, I was fascinated by Legos. And then suddenly Lego figures came onto the market. It was like jumping into a whole new world. Now it was no longer just vehicles and buildings that could be constructed, but you could really play with people, roles, various professions and tasks with the figures. This awakened a whole new part of the imagination and when I look back, I really immer...

The owl is the symbol for the intelligence service. I imagine it is for two reasons: firstly, because the owl is said to be vigilant, nocturnal and cunning. Secondly, because I think it is secretive. And it's not for nothing that there's the saying "Talk is silver, silence is golden". I'm sure you've also found this to be true in certain situations. But sometimes you see...

I know some people who love travelling. Of course, you can be travelling in your own country or much more often in other countries and therefore other cultures. A trip like this, especially if it is longer, is planned carefully and with enough time in advance for planning and booking, and finally you get in the mood for it. I imagine that you then also have certain ideas of what it will be like an...

I imagine that if I had seen a fruit of the cocoa tree for the first time, I would have been really happy that it was so big and I would have thought that it was really good. If I then opened it, I might be disappointed to see that there wasn't much flesh inside, but a considerable number of seeds. Would I then have thrown the fruit away in disappointment or ignored it in future because it was...

In the colder months of the year, we are glad to have heating. In the case of central heating systems with radiators, the maintenance of the system is very important for its effectiveness. While the heaters are not in use during the warmer months of the year, air can build up in the radiators - and this then prevents the desired heating effect. These radiators must therefore be vented regularly so...

In the German language, it is not automatically clear what the term "Strömung" refers to. Is it about the current in a body of surface water or rather a group of like-minded people who have a definite opinion on a certain topic and represent it? Depending on the strength of the current, the latter are enormously influential - the term "influential" is also used here in the cont...

When you move house, you have to take down lights in the old place and hang them up again in the new one. This means that you also have to insert the lamp wires into the designated positions at the new location and screw them on. To do this, the two wires of the lamp are stripped at the end so that the current can then flow and the lamp can light up. Without stripping, no current flow would be pos...

When I was a child, my father showed me how to slate with stones. In other words, you throw the stone just above the surface of the water and it bounces there and then bounces on until it sinks into the water. The choice of stone and the way it is thrown are crucial. You can refine your throwing technique by practising. However, the quality of the stone is almost more important: it works best with...

Imagine in your mind that you have to put a small Matchbox racing car in front of you. How would you place it? So that it would drive in the direction from right to left or from left to right? Somehow we all have our preferences. If it's different, it's not wrong, but it still somehow doesn't suit us. You could do the same with crossing your arms: which one is up: the left or the right...

A figure of eight in a bicycle wheel means that the wheel is no longer running true because it is "wobbling". This happens when the rims are deformed because an external influence has caused this deformation and thus twisted the entire wheel. To prevent this from happening, or in the ideal state, the spokes serve to keep the wheel in a balanced tension frame to enable optimum riding. Whe...

As humans, we are - technically speaking - a mechanism that is very well equipped with various sensors. We perceive through our senses and we process these impulses in real time and thus act according to the situation. While many technical components do this in a similar way today, most of these objects only work for the moment. Measurements are taken, analysed and an action is triggered. And that...

What comes to your mind when you hear the word "goodness"? If you are religious, then you know this word from this context. If not, you may relate it to the area of quality assessment or a statement about the quality of something. The latter indicates the nature of a product or object, at least in German. So when you say that something is of high quality or high value, you formulate it l...

How do you define diversity? Do you associate positive things with it? Primarily, diversity sounds quite good: there is a lot. But diversity can also mean: Contradictory things are present at the same time. In politics, for example, there are often very opposing opinions, views, attitudes and people. Depending on the tone, this can lead to very heated disputes. This is not always pleasant. And it...

I was in Greece the other day and went outside in the morning when it was still dark. I had a relatively wide view of the horizon and could see how the horizon began to glow as a sign that the sun would soon rise and the day would soon begin. I was thrilled by this sight. While I was still standing in the darkness of the night, the day was already heralding itself with this ever-increasing brightn...

Just a few years ago, opening and closing a door was clear: with a metal key. Today, this is no longer so clear. While there are still locks that are considered mechanical locks, electronic locking mechanisms are also used today. I can operate a locking device in a hotel with a card or a chip and in other places with a smartphone or in a car with a contactless electronic signal. In German, people...

When I was recently in Greece on business, the breakfast buffet included a kind of bread roll ring with sesame seeds. So I decided to look up what sesame is and whether and if so, how healthy it is. I was amazed when I read what sesame is used for and what it is good for or supports health. It has very good fats, is rich in protein, supports healthy digestion, lowers blood pressure, has a positive...

At televised sporting events, experts are often used as co-presenters for the live event. Sometimes - taking football as an example - they look anything but sporty: they are sometimes relatively old with gray hair or no hair at all, don't exactly have an athletic body and don't look very sporty in their overall appearance. The eye is deceptive. They are often men who have had a very succes...

In an athletics stadium, the runners run on a special track that is divided into several lanes. It seems logical that a complete lap on the outermost lane is longer in terms of distance than on the innermost. It's like circles: the larger the circle, the larger its circumference, depending on the radius. Nevertheless, the athletes all run in the same direction, pursuing the same goal, albeit i...

We use the phrase "a ten a penny" to express an unimaginably large number. When we think of the vastness of the universe, it has long been beyond our imagination. If we think further, we realize how small we actually are. This can lead us to freeze and live our lives fatalistically in view of the smallness of our own being. What is interesting, however, is that this is not how people hav...

Maybe you also like cake. Two different cakes come to mind: a cake with a super smooth, perfect gelatine surface on the one hand and a crumble cake from a tray with angular crumbles on top on the other. Perhaps you have a preference for one or the other. The crumble cake is made by grinding the still solid butter with flour and possibly other ingredients to form crumbles. At first glance, it doesn...

I was at a fair the other day and saw cotton candy being transported in a large plastic bucket. I interpreted that this was because if the candy floss was squeezed or otherwise came into contact, it would collapse or break. It's similar with certain hairstyles that are very airy and stylish: you don't want to wear a cap or a bicycle helmet on your bike so that the beautiful hairstyle and t...

When a company designs a logo, it does so in order to create a recognition effect. So if someone sees this logo repeatedly, they associate it directly with the company. The same applies to advertising with a slogan, a melody or any other sequence. Recognition is the key word. Sometimes it's the same with places: when we pass a place, it triggers memories or experiences or whatever else we asso...

Impressions stay in your memory. For example, if I have watched a film in the evening, individual sequences or images from the film keep coming back to me the next day, even though I may have only watched it to switch off and not really consciously or with much intention. I sometimes notice the same thing with things I've heard or when I cycle past an advert. Much of what our senses perceive i...

As I work a lot in the field of cartography, I spend a lot of time working with maps. Among other things, there are always maps that show the administrative borders in Switzerland. It's interesting to note that because I've repeatedly worked with this data over the past few decades, I can directly recognise individual areas even without their spatial context. I am so visually familiar with...

Are you someone who keeps up with fashion? Perhaps you're now saying: no, I'm resistant and don't go along with every trend. Maybe so. But the fact is that we can hardly avoid it: for example, we can only buy clothes that are available - and these are often created according to the latest fashion. Perhaps it's different with hairstyles or with men: moustache or beard or whatever fa...