Manuela's blog

Discovery!

2007-09-06T13:40:00.000-07:00

Som sa dnes len tak browsovala cez tie reporty z pripady, pozerala si vyriesene ulohy co my mame, a zrazu mi to tak dokopy zacalo make sense... a som to ukazala do Prestona a on hned pochopil co s tym. No a poslali sme tam jedneho znameho, no a teraz mame tie zahadne plany. A tie teda make sense nerobia. Aspon zatial.

Ale my to pohneme. A najviac dolezito, sa mi zda, ze nikto iny o tom nevie... we might be onto something here :)))

Stuck

2007-08-18T03:47:00.000-07:00

To je neuveritelne. Niekedy staci sa len pozriet a uz je vsetko jasne. Take tabulky alebo hlava, to som len pozrela a vedela a bolo. (Ved tu hlavu aj som musela, to by bola hanba keby ja som to nevedela.) A teraz? Life uz tyzden som leniva a Preston tiez, no a z chripky mi uz usi to... ringing...
ani neviem ci tie vety spravne su Slovensky.

Dvaja patraci

2007-08-14T08:02:00.000-07:00

Ked rodina predala domenu detektivnej agenture, sme este netusili, ze onedlho pre nu budeme aj my pracovat. My sme s Prestonom boli prisli na Slovensko sa naucit po Slovensky lepsie a stretnut rodina. On vtedy ukazal mi webpage a sme sa pozerali a nas to zaujalo.

Phew. I fear I still can't get the grammar right, but my Slovak vocabulary keeps on improving. Anyway, since we both returned home, we are both spending a lot of time investigating the mysteries for the Haluz agency. Wish us luck :)

P.S.: google docs really rock if your teammate is half a world away ;)

Correspondence

2006-09-13T14:07:00.000-07:00

Never ever would I dare to guess that so many people will contact me to get the puzzle papers. I'm starting to feel more and more involved in this "hunt". And somehow I can't get rid of the feeling that this is all according to my grandfather's elaborate plan. Who knows ;)

By the way, I'm starting to get the hang of all the puzzles, too. Now I only need to find someone (not involved in the competition, of course!) who will help me to give some names to the things I found in "random noises" :)

Solving all the puzzles

2006-09-01T05:27:00.000-07:00

At first I considered it impossible, but I actually managed to solve some of my grandfather's puzzles. It was quite a surprise, as I don't speak Slovak too well, but it turned out that it's not really necessary for some of them. Try this one: maze1. It's really easy, you can solve it without even knowing what the answer means in Slovak. On the other hand, I have absolutely no chance at all to solve this one: book. I barely understand the text, something about the Russians and Englishmen sailing on some ships.

For some of the puzzles I wasn't really sure whether my answer is correct, and so I registered a team and tried to submit them. Only afterwards I realized that in this way I might have revealed my existence. My first impulse was to rename the team and hide it -- what if someone happens to notice it and...

But then I realized -- why bother? Laissez faire... Qué será, será. Nejako už len bude.

P.S.: If you are interested in the puzzle papers Abraham sent me, drop me a line: manuela at alpertron com ar

Puzzled -- twice

2006-08-22T17:31:00.000-07:00

After I spent two days locked up in my room, and the next few googling, I now know a bit more about the entire issue. My Slovak grandfather was apparently a practical joker. Instead of dying quietly and leaving his family to argue about his legacy, he hid it somewhere. And not only that. There seems to be a huge set of puzzles that supposedly contain clues to where all the money (or whatever it is) is hidden. You can find out more at http://haluz.org/, provided that you speak Slovak, of course. Anyone can participate and get a chance to grab all the good stuff Grandpa had hidden.

But there is one thing that is far more important than all this odd stuff. I have a new family. I know who my father is.

I'm not really sure what to do. I read each of the family blogs line by line for something like ten times. It is clear that if Abraham really is my Grandpa, then Dusan has to be my father. He is still alive, and it seems that he's doing just fine. In fact, more than that. He is married, and I have two step-siblings.

And I'm convinced that this is really the case. I haven't been able to find Dusan's picture yet, but with Lenka (my step-sister) I had the feeling as if I always knew her -- both her looks and her way of thinking. How similar are we? If I grew up in Slovakia, would I be like her?

THE question: What shall I do now? Shall I announce my existence to the entire family? Contact Dusan only? Or just let them live in peace? What would be the best solution for all of us? Is there any best solution?

I don't know. I just don't.

A coin and three papers

2006-08-15T08:20:00.000-07:00

I finally went to the post office, and imagine my surprise when I saw that the envelope´s origin was Slovakia. I ripped it open, and a small Slovak coin fell out. Apart from it, the envelope contained three papers. One of them stated that my grandfather (I never saw) is dead. The letter said nothing more about him, not even the point I was interested in most of all: how did he know about me???

The other two papers were... let´s say strange.

I´ll write about them later, now I need to lay down for a while and think about this. I´m excited, scared, and confused at the same time.

Some people are so lazy!

2006-08-09T21:13:00.000-07:00

Laziness can really make me angry!

This evening I went to pick up my mail from my mailbox (the real one for a change :)) . I found a note from the postman saying that I received a letter to be delivered into my own hands, and that he wasn't able to reach me. The point is, I was working from home for the entire day. The postman didn't even bother to check whether somebody's home, he simply dropped the note and went on. Now I'll have to drag myself to the local post office and pick it up. I wonder when am I supposed to do it, my schedule for the next few days is pretty full.

My favourite comic series

2006-08-07T09:22:00.000-07:00

For quite a while I've been addicted to several webcomics. First, there is Megatokyo. The story has quite diverted during the years, and it is developing at an incredibly slow pace, but somehow I can't stop reading it. If only to find out whether Piro "gets the girl" in the end.

Then there are some "professional" comic series: UserFriendly, and CtrlAltDel. Both are oriented on IT readers (well, CtrlAltDel is more a gamer comic, but still it counts), and they both make me laugh quite often. Oh yes, and I shouldn't forget to mention TheNoob, the ultimate roleplayer's webcomic. I did read some Dilbert, but it didn't really catch my heart. Hackles was close to the top of my list, too bad it's over now -- but still it's worth the read!
And from a slightly different heap, I mustn't forget to mention the Bunny Suicides. They are (sadly) not available online, but you can buy the books at Amazon... and they are worth every penny! (Some of my female friends didn't share this point of view. However, most of my co-workers did.)

Happy reading, fellow addicts! :)

It's a rainy day...

2006-08-02T01:14:00.000-07:00

... but the sun will shine -- at least so go the lyrics of one song from the eighties (or maybe nineties?). During my whole sick leave the sky was heavenly blue, and now that I recovered from my sickness it won't stop raining. Maybe there's some truth in the Murphy's laws after all ;)

As I couldn't splend much time outside yesterday (without getting soaking wet), I went to the movies with a friend of mine, and finally saw The Dead Man's Chest. It was... Umm... the first half of the movie? The overall atmosphere of the movie was great, and I'm still glad I went to see it, but the story didn't really catch my heart. Now I have an urge to pick up one of the old Monkey Island games, they have both the atmosphere and a story I will never stop laughing at. And they even have a zombie pirate captain! :)

Sick :(

2006-07-29T07:11:00.000-07:00

Sorry for not writing anything, but for the past few days I've been terribly sick -- high temperatures, headaches, and lots of other unpleasant stuff. I promise that I'll write more as soon as I get better. Take care, and remember to wash your hands frequently! ;)

Hovoríš po slovensky?

2006-07-20T07:15:00.000-07:00

I bet you are wondering why would a girl like me learn such a weird language as Slovak. Why not something more common?

It's quite a long story, and a sad one. I grew up as a half-orphan (is that the right word?). Never in my life have I seen my father, and I don't know anything about him. Mother apparrently knows more, but she's reluctant to speak of him. The only things she told me (on my fifteenth birthday) were that he was an engineer from Czechoslovakia. He was in our town on some errand in the local power plant, and as far as I know he stayed here roughly for a year.

The reason why I couldn't get anything else out of my mother is probably that she assumes I would run off to see him... and between us, she's right. I mean, wouldn't you want to know your father, if you were in my place?

I remember the first time I saw Star Wars, and the "I'm your father, Luke" scene as a little child. The night after I awoke screaming, having a nightmare about my father being Darth Vader. I know it sounds stupid, but I was really scared back then. It was then when I promised myself that one day I'll find him and get to know him. But so far, all my efforts were in vain, I couldn't find out anything about him.

The rest of the story is simple: Once I met an old European lady in the local library. After a short chat I found out that she and her husband moved here from Czechoslovakia in 1968. As she didn't have much other work, I managed to convince her to give me lessons in Slovak after my school was over. I'm nowhere near fluent, but I think I wouldn't die of hunger in Slovakia :)

As they say in Slovakia, "Dovidenia, priatelia!"

Dear diary...

2006-07-18T03:52:00.000-07:00

Umm, wait... that's not a proper start of a blog. After all, a blog is not my personal diary, it is here for you, dear reader, a small window into my soul.

So the best way to start is by properly introducing myself. I'm Manuela, in a few months I will be 23 years of age. My native language is Spanish, and I'm also fluent in English and know a bit of Slovak. Strange, huh? I promise I'll get to explain this in my future posts :)

Recently I started working as a programmer for a local tech company (I prefer not to name it). Being the only woman in our department made me feel good about myself, but, you know... I think that this comic strip puts it better than I ever could. I admire Jorge for his insight ;)