Come Undone

Fragment

Go green

What do people think of Earth Day, now that it's been a yearly ritual all over the world? Living in an environment-conscious country, when I go to a local fast food chain MAXI, I'm reminded by the burger menu how much CO2 emission would be associated with each meal. I think it's a better call this way than putting forward all the PR-stuffs and diverting the attention from the environment impact of their core product, which is food. On the other hand, isn't the fact that, in term of the amount of greenhouse gases caused by its production, meat ranks the worst offender in all types of food, posing an inherent challenge to a burger restaurant, just like forcing the Tobacco companies to add a health hazard note to each cigarette pack sold would do?




Also, remember the Earth Hour? In 2009 the dairy maker Arla had started a public campaign in which their milk packages were painted all black to raise the awareness of the EH message that lights be switched off for one hour on the event day. What I found interesting was what happened after the campaign just ended, and here's one visual testimony in a grocery store the day after:




I'm supporting all the green initiatives, just people need to understand it's not about merely wearing politically correct tags and feeling good but our everyday lifestyle that can make a real difference to tackle the environmental challenges the world is facing. Like now, in springtime, I believe every day is an Earth Day, and everyone can be a TreeHugger. These are my Easter prayers.




P.S. In case you'll take a ride when visiting Stockholm in the summer, aside from taking more rented bikes for transportation, you may wish to try the Eco "Car" that has been introduced to the Swedish capital:

FxCamera

TechCrunch reported this week that, on Flickr, Apple’s iPhone 4 is set to overtake Nikon D90 and become the most popular camera used. I'm an Android user, the only thing I envy about the iPhone is its Hipstamatic app which I find great fun to play with. But today I finally found an Android app that could do a similar job as Hipstamatic: FxCamera. It's a free product from Android Market, so worth a try. Here is my first phone camera shot processed by this software. -> Check out the complete gallery: pbase.com/tsienni/mobile

Au commencement

Au commencement l'homme créa son Dieu. Puis il fut tellement déçu de lui qu'il voulût l'abandonner. Il est maintenant seul, voulant rien qu'un espoir qui le berce, sur la terre comme au ciel.

La fin.

Portrait

Random encounter in Kungsholmen today. Meet the current owner of Café FIX, Stockholm's oldest café - Razai, an Arabic-speaking immigrant originally from Syria.

がんばれ日本

小時讀過魯迅的《在仙台》， 今天生平第一次看到發自仙台市的電視畫面竟然會是這樣， 海嘯漩渦恍如世界末日。 讀著這裏各位日本友人的無事報告， 突然想起早已失掉聯系的道子， 好想能對她說聲保重， 気をつけてください ...

Design Week 2011

During the Design Week 2011 this month, there were a lot of activities going on for Nordic design in the Swedish capital city. The main event, Stockholm Furniture Fair, is said to be the world’s biggest meeting place for Nordic design. If you are interested, here's the slideshow of what I experienced at the furniture fair:
www.pbase.com/tsienni/nordic_design&view=slideshow

I was also at Design House Stockholm's special evening event at the company's Norrmalmstorg headquarter when I happened to stand by the side of Amanda Dameron, from San Francisco-based Dwell Magazine, who was at the time doing a small interview with a young talented Swedish designer Fredrik Färg. They talked about the ongoing exhibition at Biologiska Museum, with a theme aptly called "Design in the Swedish Nature", of which Fredrik was one of the creators and the curators. To check out more of this gorgeous exhibition, take a look at this presentation by Dwell (Link). Out of curiosity, I asked him, since his family name "Färg" really means "color" in Swedish, if Fredrik likes working with colors aside from his obvious professed love of form plays. He answered that, until his latest design product, which is in red, he basically was a black and white guy. Hmm, I guess that preference is perhaps reflective of certain core values of Nordic aesthetics: chiefly, to stay simple, respectful and essential.

Biologiska Museum at Djurgården, inspired by the medieval Norwegian stave churches:

歲暮

今天終于看到小R的阿毛， 小R挺著大肚子在一起吃飯也就一年半載前， 一下著就多出一個新的生命， 而且生長速度之快真讓我大吃一驚。 小家夥看上去好象和我很有緣， 拉著我的手不放， 那表情我無從去琢磨^^ 生命真的是多麽神奇， 只是有一天他感受到喜悅的時刻， 離也明白不開心的滋味不遠矣。 古時蘇子說水與月， 逝者如斯， 而未嘗往也； 盈虛者如彼， 而卒莫消長也。 其實是以不變者觀之。 生之須臾， 人面變異而不自知。 不過假如可以回到過去， 那些抛擲的流光我想我會一樣放手。

歸心似箭的說， 在這個歲暮。

Gorgias

Je l'ai lu et je l'ai adoré. Peut-être que Socrate aurait pu être un bon économiste? "Si bien que la recherche d'une beauté empruntée fait négliger la beauté naturelle..", comme il le dit. Et si l'on remplace le mot "beauté" par "argent", cela veut-il dire que "l'argent emprunté porte tristesse"? Eh bien, n'est-ce pas sage, cet avis, franchement, sur lesquel l'Etat grec actuel devrait réfléchir un peu?

Andas

Ännu ett år, igen. Dagen har gått i lugnets tecken medan den djupaste själsliga skräcken lurar i mörkret. Ingen fara, för evigheten är blott ett närvarande.

Gallery "City & Nature"

Umbrella Story

Dunno why, but I thought about this song the whole day. One unjustly forgotten classic from the London Suede, the single wasn't included in Suede's latest compilation "Best of" from 2010. (See Amazon.com listing)

Track No.3 on the single "Obsessions" (CD 2), written by Brett Anderson and released in 2002.

Rainy Day Girl
youtube.com/watch?v=2uLTtvFlk10

Photo taken at Ung08 summer concert at Kungsträdgården. Summer! Arhhhh.

Thoughts of a Snowman

-25º this evening! Guess I'd better go under Hibernation Mode during the holidays. Zzzzzzzz

When I first read H. C. Andersen's The Little Match Girl story at 7, I remember I couldn't understand why it's important for the girl to strike one match after another to keep the vision of her grandmother alive, and how it's possible for someone to die staying outdoors without a shelter for just one night. But now it's the opposite: I think it's only sensible that children's books contain more truth than what adults would 'seriously' read everyday. At some certain point of my life I felt I stopped growing any more. Or in the words of Thomas Hardy, "every spirit upon earth seemed fervorless as I", he wrote in his New Years Day poem The Darkling Thrush, originally titled By the Century's Deathbed. That's why I appreciate Andersen's fairy tales more and more even as I'm no longer a child - the stories are not just wise, they really read like a blessing if your heart is receptive enough for the messages.

All of a sudden, I thought about the night before Christmas Day when I departed for the Holy Land ten years ago. Life was then like an uncharted sea voyage, full of nervousness but also fun and longings. Only the sweet dreams and didn't wish to wake up again too soon. So, Merry Christmas and Happy New Year! :-)