Chocolate World Opens at New York-New York

Hershey’s Chocolate World opened at New York-New York on Tuesday, June 3, 2014. The 13,000 square foot, two-story flagship store features an 11-foot, 800-pound replica of the Statue of Liberty that was hand carved from milk chocolates. There is also a replica of the Empire State Building, made out of 1,800 Hershey’s Milk Chocolate bars. Customers can mix and buy their favorite Hershey’s candies, customize their candy bar wraps, and purchase a large selection of accessories such as T-shirts, stuffed animals, mugs and key chains.

On an unrelated note, one year ago, Edward Snowden revealed highly-classified National Security Agency (NSA) surveillance documents through Glenn Greenwald's report in the Guardian on June 5, 2013, sending a shockwave throughout the world. It is important for us to continue the debate so that the freedom and liberty can be preserved, and Lady Liberty wouldn't end up just being a prop.

Postcard US-2236311 to Ukraine and US-2566020 to Italy shows a half-sized replica of the Statue of Liberty in front of New York-New York Casino and Hotel. In 2011, The U.S. Postal Service issued a Statue of Liberty stamp, accidentally based on this replica in Las Vegas rather than the original in New York City.

A Postcard to Iran

President Barack Obama spoke with Iranian President Hassan Rouhani today, as the Iranian leader was heading to the airport to leave New York after attending the U.N. General Assembly meeting. During his time in the U.S., Mr. Rouhani made a number of public addresses indicating that Iran was open to restoring relationship with the U.S. and resolving conflict around the nuclear program in Iran. It is the first time leaders from the U.S. and Iran have direct communication since the Tehran hostage crisis more than three decades ago in 1979.

I was given an address in Tehran from PostCrossing on August 23, 2013. I hesitated to send out a card for a few days because I didn't want to give a reason to the NSA spying for communicating with people in Iran. However, since we PostCrossers had already been sending out mails oversea for sometime, we would have been targets already if they chose to do so. Traveling postcard US-2379246 shows a pair of table tennis paddles and a Ping-pong ball. Each paddle is decorated with a U.S. national flag and a Chinese national flag respectively. The postcard refers to the Ping-pong diplomacy that started with the exchange of table tennis players between the United States and People's Republic of China in the early 1970s. The event marked a thaw in U.S.- China relations that had been frozen since 1949 and paved the way to a visit to Beijing by President Richard Nixon. If history can be a guide, I am hopeful that an improved U.S - Iran relationship would contribute to the peace and prosperity in the Middle East and the world.

Update: The postcard was sent on September 2, 2013 and received on October 7, 2013.

DefCon

DefCon 20, 2012

DefCon 21, one of the world's largest annual hacker/computer security conventions, is currently held in Rio Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas, Nevada from August 1 to August 4, 2013. The first DefCon took place in June 1993. The postcard, sent to Taiwan last year, shows the logo of DefCon 20, July 26-29, 2012.

Attendees to DefCon include computer security professionals, journalists, lawyers, security researchers, and of course, hackers. However, the trend has been shifted from "hacking" in early days to "computer security" in recent years. For me, it's a great place to learn the impact of advance of technology to the civil liberties and privacy. ACLU will present a panel discussion: "NSA Surveillance and More" this year. Electronic Frontier Foundation has a session called "Ask the EFF: the Year in Digital Civil Liberties". 

Federal law enforcement agents from the FBI, CIA, Department of Defense, United States Postal Inspection Service, and other agencies regularly attend the DefCons. Last year, four-star General Keith Alexander, head of the NSA, was a keynote speaker at the event. However, DefCon founder Jeff Moss requested government agencies to stay away from the event due to the recent revelation of the NSA surveillance program by Edward Snowden.