New Year parties seem to be the same all over the world. An oversized, hopefully good dinner with ingredients you otherwise would not order, Champagne, a countdown, fireworks, hugs & kisses, a party to follow up. If you are however in Chiang Mai where the laid back and nature-related attitude of the locals would not care about most of the above mentioned (apart from the food maybe), a very traditional, calm and touching event takes place that truly lifts the spirit.

If you want to see many historically valuable artifacts of Thai Culture in one place, Chiang Mai is definetely the place to go. Not only does it have a good climate and friendly people, a diverse cuisine and a very attractive price level, but also a landscape so full of temples that you harldy need to get into a car to see more of them than you would want to see in a day. The different temples, monasteries and surrounding buildings show how religious life truly is interwoven here with everyday life as if the whole town was only one big monastery.

From 1st of January 2008, the Brazilian real (BRL) and the Mexican peso (MXN) are in the currency charts. So all in all we have now 40 currencies listed. This means that you can from that date onwards the historic development of those two currencies and their relationship to all other 38 currencies in our database. Those two currencies are quite important since those two countries are known to be big emerging markets, right next to India and China. Unfortunately we do not have any exchange rate information about those two before 1st of January 2008. However I am sure that the future data for those two currencies will provide interesting insights into their economies.

If you come to Hong Kong in January/February, you might have a sight that is hard to get somewhere in Europe: Thick clouds so low you can touch them, and without climbing a mountain. I am not a meteorologist to know how this happens, but it can become a bit spooky at times. While normally in winter the view in Hong Kong is blocked by thick smog, you will recognize the clouds by the way they crawl over the top of buildings a change density from 0 to 100 in a couple of seconds. Then, it is very handy to be on an elevated spot and have a tripod available at night. You could sell off IFC - the home of many international Banking Coorporations - as the center of a super-evil conglomerate, trying to take over the world, anytime - but those days also by the looks.

The Japanese Zuma Restaurant in Hong Kong has a very prominent address: The Landmark Building. It can get hardly any better than that. However, it is still hard to find. Allmost all shops of the Landmark are reachable via the escalators, but for the Zuma you have to find an elevator, which on one level is hidden inside a Supermarket, on another behind a corner and two more heavy doors. However, the setting is nicer than most other places in the Landmark because you look outside instead of into the mall's courtyard.

Visiting Markets in foreign countries can tell you a lot about the country's culture, health, wealth and customs of its inhabitants. Chiang Mai, in northern Thailand has profited over the centuries of hosting major religious sites, universities and beeing a tourist magnet for locals and foreigners alike. In adition, the Thai sense for style and beauty along with the diversity of the food available in the region make this market a specially nice place to visit. The people are cheerful, friendly and love to present their goods in the most impressive way possible. Whatever you can eat can be bought here, and many other things too.

Wat Phrathat is located on Mount Doi Suthep, above the northern Thai City of Chiang Mai. Its a landmark not only due to its exposed location on a ledge above the city but also because of its bright red roofs of the buildings. To get there, you have to take a 40 minutes drive along a steep winding road and another steep climb many steps up to the mountain. The climb is so steep that there is now a cable car going up to carry the many tourists, most of whom are Thai from Bangkok, spending holidays in the cool north.

In central Bangkok, in the cellar of the Siam Paragon Shopping Mall, you will find the Siam Ocean World Aquarium. It is one of the best Aquariums in Asia, and being in the cellar of a mall also the most surprising one. It is really huge and has some features you would not expect down there.

Today we upgraded the Currency and Index Charts from 2.3 to 2.4.
The improvements are:
- The curreny converter now shows all currencies in a table instead of only the one selected
- The matrix had an error in the form, the descriptions for first date & second date fields were switched
- The end dates for ROL and SIT were wrong in the Legend

Please tell us if you feel that other things could be further improved!