Win, Win, Win, Win, Win ...

By THOMAS L. FRIEDMAN
Published: December 27, 2008

How many times do we have to see this play before we admit that it always ends the same way?

Which play? The one where gasoline prices go up, pressure rises for more fuel-efficient cars, then gasoline prices fall and the pressure for low-mileage vehicles vanishes, consumers stop buying those cars, the oil producers celebrate, we remain addicted to oil and prices gradually go up again, petro-dictators get rich, we lose. I’ve already seen this play three times in my life. Trust me: It always ends the same way — badly.
So I could only cringe when reading this article from CNNMoney.com on Dec. 22: “After nearly a year of flagging sales, low gas prices and fat incentives are reigniting America’s taste for big vehicles. Trucks and S.U.V.’s will outsell cars in December ... something that hasn’t happened since February. Meanwhile, the forecast finds that sales of hybrid vehicles are expected to be way down.”
Have a nice day. It’s morning again — in Saudi Arabia.
Of course, it’s a blessing that people who have been hammered by the economy are getting a break at the pump. But for our long-term health, getting re-addicted to oil and gas guzzlers is one of the dumbest things we could do.
That is why I believe the second biggest decision Barack Obama has to make — the first is deciding the size of the stimulus — is whether to increase the federal gasoline tax or impose an economy-wide carbon tax. Best I can tell, the Obama team has no intention of doing either at this time. I understand why. Raising taxes in a recession is a no-no. But I’ve wracked my brain trying to think of ways to retool America around clean-power technologies without a price signal — i.e., a tax — and there are no effective ones. (Toughening energy-effiency regulations alone won’t do it.) Without a higher gas tax or carbon tax, Obama will lack the leverage to drive critical pieces of his foreign and domestic agendas.
How so? According to AAA, U.S. gasoline prices now average about $1.67 a gallon. Funny, that’s almost exactly what gas cost on the morning of Sept. 11, 2001. In the wake of 9/11, President Bush had the political space to impose a gasoline tax, a “Patriot Tax,” to weaken the very people who had funded 9/11 and to stimulate a U.S. renewable-energy industry. But Bush wimped out and would not impose a tax when prices were low or a floor price when they got high.
Today’s financial crisis is Obama’s 9/11. The public is ready to be mobilized. Obama is coming in with enormous popularity. This is his best window of opportunity to impose a gas tax. And he could make it painless: offset the gas tax by lowering payroll taxes, or phase it in over two years at 10 cents a month. But if Obama, like Bush, wills the ends and not the means — wills a green economy without the price signals needed to change consumer behavior and drive innovation — he will fail.
The two most important rules about energy innovation are: 1) Price matters — when prices go up people change their habits. 2) You need a systemic approach. It makes no sense for Congress to pump $13.4 billion into bailing out Detroit — and demand that the auto companies use this cash to make more fuel-efficient cars — and then do nothing to shape consumer behavior with a gas tax so more Americans will want to buy those cars. As long as gas is cheap, people will go out and buy used S.U.V.’s and Hummers.
There has to be a system that permanently changes consumer demand, which would permanently change what Detroit makes, which would attract more investment in battery technology to make electric cars, which would hugely help the expansion of the wind and solar industries — where the biggest drawback is the lack of batteries to store electrons when the wind isn’t blowing or the sun isn’t shining. A higher gas tax would drive all these systemic benefits.
The same is true in geopolitics. A gas tax reduces gasoline demand and keeps dollars in America, dries up funding for terrorists and reduces the clout of Iran and Russia at a time when Obama will be looking for greater leverage against petro-dictatorships. It reduces our current account deficit, which strengthens the dollar. It reduces U.S. carbon emissions driving climate change, which means more global respect for America. And it increases the incentives for U.S. innovation on clean cars and clean-tech.
Which one of these things wouldn’t we want? A gasoline tax “is not just win-win; it’s win, win, win, win, win,” says the Johns Hopkins author and foreign policy specialist Michael Mandelbaum. “A gasoline tax would do more for American prosperity and strength than any other measure Obama could propose.”
I know it’s hard, but we have got to stop “taking off the table” the tool that would add leverage to everything we want to do at home and abroad. We’ve done that for three decades, and we know with absolute certainty how the play ends — with an America that is less innovative, less wealthy, less respected and less powerful.

white x mas

a beauty in the day

also in the night

Dupli.Casa, Ludwigsburg, Germany

Architecture- For I. M. Pei, History Is Still Happening

Hassan Ammar/Associated Press
The Museum of Islamic Art at Doha, Qatar, was designed by I. M. Pei. The building is on a small man-made island that is accessible from a short bridge. }

By NICOLAI OUROUSSOFF
Published: December 12, 2008

I CAN’T seem to get the Museum of Islamic Art out of my mind. There’s nothing revolutionary about the building. But its clean, chiseled forms have a tranquillity that distinguishes it in an age that often seems trapped somewhere between gimmickry and a cloying nostalgia.
Part of the allure may have to do with I. M. Pei, the museum’s architect. Mr. Pei reached the height of his popularity decades ago with projects like the East Building of the National Gallery of Art in Washington and the Louvre pyramid in Paris. Since then he has been an enigmatic figure at the periphery of the profession. His best work has admirers, but it has largely been ignored within architecture’s intellectual circles. Now, at 91 and near the end of a long career, Mr. Pei seems to be enjoying the kind of revival accorded to most serious architects if they have the luck to live long enough.

But the museum is also notable for its place within a broader effort to reshape the region’s cultural identity. The myriad large-scale civic projects, from a Guggenheim museum that is planned for Abu Dhabi to Education City in Doha — a vast area of new buildings that house outposts of foreign universities — are often dismissed in Western circles as superficial fantasies. As the first to reach completion, the Museum of Islamic Art is proof that the boom is not a mirage. The building’s austere, almost primitive forms and the dazzling collections it houses underscore the seriousness of the country’s cultural ambition.

Perhaps even more compelling, the design is rooted in an optimistic worldview, — one at odds with the schism between cosmopolitan modernity and backward fundamentalism that has come to define the last few decades in the Middle East. The ideals it embodies — that the past and the present can co-exist harmoniously — are a throwback to a time when America’s overseas ambitions were still cloaked in a progressive agenda.

To Mr. Pei, whose self-deprecating charm suggests a certain noblesse oblige, all serious architecture is found somewhere between the extremes of an overly sentimental view of the past and a form of historical amnesia.

“Contemporary architects tend to impose modernity on something,” he said in an interview. “There is a certain concern for history but it’s not very deep. I understand that time has changed, we have evolved. But I don’t want to forget the beginning. A lasting architecture has to have roots.” This moderation should come as no surprise to those who have followed Mr. Pei’s career closely. I recall first hearing his name during construction on his design for the Kennedy Library in Boston in the mid-1970s. The library, enclosed behind a towering glass atrium overlooking the water, was not one of Mr. Pei’s most memorable early works, nor was it particularly innovative, but the link to Kennedy lent him instant glamour.

The building’s pure geometries and muscular trusses seemed at the time to be the architectural equivalent of the space program. They suggested an enlightened, cultivated Modernism, albeit toned down to serve an educated, well-polished elite. Completed 16 years after the assassination of John F. Kennedy, the library’s construction seemed to be an act of hope, as if the values that Kennedy’s generation embodied could be preserved in stone, steel and glass.

In many ways Mr. Pei’s career followed the unraveling of that era, from the economic downturn of the 1970s through the hollow victories of the Reagan years. Yet his work never lost its aura of measured idealism. It reached its highest expression in the National Gallery of Art’s East Building, a composition of angular stone forms completed in 1978 that remains the most visible emblem of modern Washington.

Since that popular triumph Mr. Pei has often seemed to take the kind of leisurely, slow-paced approach to design that other architects, no matter how well established, can only dream of. When first approached in 1983 to take part in a competition to design the addition to the Louvre, he refused, saying that he would not submit a preliminary design. President François Mitterrand nevertheless hired him outright. Mr. Pei then asked him if he could take several months to study French history.

“I told him I wanted to learn about his culture,” Pei recalled. “I knew the Louvre well. But I wanted to see more than just architecture. I think he understood immediately.” Mr. Pei spent months traveling across Europe and North Africa before earnestly beginning work on the final design of the glass pyramids that now anchor the museum’s central court.
In 1990, a year after the project’s completion, he left his firm, handing its reins over to his partners Harry Cobb and James Ingo Freed so that he could concentrate more on design. More recently he has lived in semi-retirement, sometimes working on the fourth floor office of his Sutton Place town house or sketching quietly in a rocking chair in his living room. He rarely takes on more than a single project at a time.

Such an attitude runs counter to the ever-accelerating pace of the global age — not to mention our obsession with novelty. But if Mr. Pei’s methods seem anachronistic, they also offer a gentle resistance to the short-sightedness of so many contemporary cultural undertakings.

Many successful architects today are global nomads, sketching ideas on paper napkins as they jet from one city to another. In their designs they tend to be more interested in exposing cultural frictions — the clashing of social, political and economic forces that undergird contemporary society — than in offering visions of harmony.

Mr. Pei, by contrast, imagines history as a smooth continuous process — a view that is deftly embodied by the Islamic Museum, whose clean abstract surfaces are an echo of both high Modernism and ancient Islamic architecture. Conceived by the Qatari emir and his 26-year-old daughter, Sheikha al Mayassa, it is the centerpiece of a larger cultural project whose aim is to forge a cosmopolitan, urban society in a place that not so long ago was a collection of Bedouin encampments and fishing villages. The aim is to recall a time that extended from the birth of Islam through the height of the Ottoman Empire, when the Islamic world was a center of scientific experimentation and cultural tolerance.

“My father’s vision was to build a cross-cultural institution,” said Sheikha al Mayassa, who has been charged with overseeing the city’s cultural development, during a recent interview here. “It is to reconnect the historical threads that have been broken, and finding peaceful ways to resolve conflict.”

Mr. Pei’s aim was to integrate the values of that earlier era into today’s culture — to capture, as he put it, the “essence of Islamic architecture.”

The museum’s hard, chiseled forms take their inspiration from the ablution fountain of Ibn Tulun Mosque in Cairo, as well as from fortresses built in Tunisia in the eighth and ninth centuries — simple stone structures strong enough to hold their own in the barrenness of the desert landscape.

In order to create a similar sense of withdrawal from the world, Mr. Pei located his museum on a small man-made island, approachable from a short bridge. Seen from a distance, its blocklike forms are a powerful contrast to the half-finished towers and swiveling construction cranes that line the waterfront. Stepped on both sides, the apex of the main building is punctuated by a short tower with an eye-shaped opening that masks an interior dome.

From certain angles the structure has a flat, chimeric quality, like a stage set. From others it seems to be floating on the surface of the water — an effect that recalls Santa Maria della Salute, the imposing Baroque church that guards the entry to the Grand Canal in Venice.
As one approaches the building, the full weight of the structure begins to bear down, and the forms become more imposing. The bridge, flanked by rows of tall palm trees, is set diagonally to the entry, which makes the stacked geometric forms appear more angular and the contrast between light and shadow more extreme.

Soon a few traditional details begin to appear: the two small arched windows over the entry; a covered arcade that links the museum to an education center. These touches seem minor, but they provide a sense of scale, so that the size of the building can be understood according to the size of the human body.

The blend of modern and Islamic themes continues inside, where Mr. Pei draws most directly from religious precedents. The hemispherical dome, an intricate pattern of stainless steel plates pierced by a single small oculus, brings to mind the geometric patterns used in Baroque churches as well as in ancient mosques.

The weight of the interior’s chiseled stone forms, with the dome resting on a faceted drum and square base, evokes both classical precedents and the late works of Louis Kahn, whose fusion of modern structure with a timeless monumentality was a turning point in Modernist history.
Mr. Pei’s design lacks the depth and cohesion of Kahn’s greatest work. The structural system that supports the dome, for instance, is not particularly elegant; on one side the drum that supports it rests on slender three-story-tall columns, on the other it extends down to meet a wall that encloses a floor of offices before resting on a series of shorter columns, upsetting the room’s natural symmetry.

Nonetheless the meaning of the space is clear. Mr. Pei has created a temple of high art, placing culture on the same pedestal as religion. His aim is both to create a symbol of Islamic culture and to forge a common heritage for the citizens of Qatar and the region.

The grandeur of the atrium is only a prelude to the real climax: the galleries, which are as intimate as the atrium is soaring. Objects are encased in towering glass cabinets set on tables, giving them an accessibility rare in a major museum. There is also just the right amount of space between the objects — enough to let them breathe without being isolated.

And like the building itself, the collections are a reflection of the notion that Modernity and Islamic culture are not in opposition, but woven out of the same historical thread. There are dazzling scientific objects here, including a display of astrolabes, as well as priceless works of calligraphy. (Philippe de Montebello, the director of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, which owns one of the world’s premier collections of Islamic Art, put it best when I spoke to him at the museum’s inaugural gala: “Many of the pieces I’ve bid on over the past 10 years, they got.”)
Yet the most moving works are those that underscore the cosmopolitan values that are at the core of this museum: the notion that the free, open exchange of ideas is what builds great — and tolerant — civilizations: a matrix of Spanish Corinthian columns with Islamic flourishes; early translations of classical texts that formed the hinge between antiquity and the European Renaissance; a silk tapestry of a couple in front of a tent, illustrating the Islamic fable “Laila and Majnun” that is likened to Romeo and Juliet.

These are the moments that Mr. Pei’s architecture is meant to embody. His museum reminds us that building a culture, as much as a political or social agenda, can be an act of healing. Like all great art, it requires forging seemingly conflicting values into a common whole.

Sydney Opera House architect dies

The Danish architect of the iconic Sydney Opera House, Jorn Utzon, has died at the age of 90, after suffering a heart attack.
Mr Utzon, an award-winning architect, put "Denmark on the world map with his great talent," said Danish Culture Minister Carina Christensen.
Having won a competition in 1957 to design the building, he left the project before it opened in 1973.
Mr Utzon never visited the completed landmark, after disputes about costs.
He had quarrelled with the Australian client and the costs overran by 1,000%.
Even decades later he declined invitations to return to Australia, but did design, with his son, a new wing which opened in 2006.
In 1998 he told Associated Press news agency: "It's part of education - I can't be bitter about anything in life."

Most of the interior of the opera house was not completed according to his plans after government-appointed architects took over the job.
The Sydney Opera House planned to dim the lights on the sail-shaped roof on Sunday to mark Mr Utzon's death.
The chairman of Sydney Opera House Trust, Kim Williams, said: "Jorn Utzon was an architectural and creative genius who gave Australia and the world a great gift.
"Sydney Opera House is core to our national cultural identity and a source of great pride to all Australians. It has become the most globally recognised symbol of our country."
Mr Utzon also designed the National Assembly of Kuwait and several prominent buildings in Denmark.
Danish Minister of Culture Carina Christensen paid tribute to him, saying: "Jorn Utzon will be remembered as one of the Danes who in the 20th century put Denmark on the world map with his great talent."
Mr Utzon won several international awards, including the Alvar Aalto Medal for architecture and France's Legion of Honour.
In 2003 he won the prestigious Pritzker Architecture Prize for his design of the opera house.

escaping the body

退化

我覺得
我真是一個膽大包天的員工
明明老細就坐在我不遠的後方
(即是佢行過黎我唔會見到那種，除非我有後眼啦!)
我竟然在寫blog lor!
難道在我的潛意識之中
我已經決定唔撈??

面對一堆工作
我見佢唔趕，不如叫佢等下先啦~
我這積極的態度，是在等退休嗎??

我現在關心的
是今晚家好月圓的劇情呀
你識我咁耐
我何曾為了無線d劇集而咁緊張先

我覺得
我在退化

Carina vs Carrie

Sigh
It’s so annoying that
Ppl keep mistaking me as another colleague named Carrie
Don’t they know English?
Why can’t they use their brain?
They keep calling intercom and asking things I hv no idea what that is!!
Like just now, I heard some colleagues discussing something, and in the end, I heard them said ‘let’s call Carrie to clarify on that la’
And immediately my phone rang!!!!!!!
I don’t even want to pick up the call! Chi sin!

I also get all the mail for Carrie
And hv to forward them to the REAL Carrie -.-“
Don’t know why I also hv to deliver mail lor,
It’s supposed to be somebody else job!
Can they just do their job well?

Sigh, this place is a madhouse!

i just want today to end

we are ready

ohohoh京奧倒數了這麼久
終於也真的來臨了
也許我真的是個超級慢熱(遲鈍?!?)的人吧
我現在才感覺到一點點的京奧熱@.@
我對今晚的opening還是蠻期待的
(但無得睇花好月圓就有d失望lor---我這樣說會給愛國人士追打嗎??!)
而對於京奧開幕有假放的朋友A
我想高呼: 我都好愛國架其實!!!!!

it's crazy!

哈!
新增:我老細既金句 'it's crazy!!!!' (以超大音量和頻率叫出)

我唔明wor
唔係讀番書
點解曉講咁多英文既呢?
it's crazy!

堅持堅持幾多錢一茶匙?

有很多堅持，從前是恪守的
現在最好消失
別的不說，最明顯是道歉這回事
從前的我，沒有做錯事我一定唔道歉
現在嘛，
開口埋口也要先說 '唔好意思'
有時仲要扮晒野講 '對唔住'
可能係我太執著啦
但我到了現在仍很難把自己抽離
口是心非的把 '唔好意思' 和'對唔住'掛在嘴邊
所以當我要為自己沒有做錯的事而道歉，
我還是覺得很委屈

我今日好燥

我老細真係好乞人憎
今日特別乞人憎

佢有三大罪行:

罪行一
佢成日偷聽我同客講電話，一聽到有唔妥(其實好可能係因為佢唔知頭唔知路)，就立即係我身後大叫佢既高見!!!!!!
阿姐呀，你講時個客都講你叫我聽得邊個呀?????
你阿大小姐把聲音確係大，完全蓋過個客把聲lor
成日要我問人 '唔好意思你頭先講mud話?' 係咪好stupid先???
仲有呀
你咁大聲，你真係覺得人地係對面電話聰唔到你狂叫既???
幾失禮人先得架.....

罪行二
佢日日都好多投訴，仲要係以超級高音叫出來，日日都講3 5 7 次
例子如下:
'嘩我原本都唔積極，而家即刻好積極!!!我要做快d做快d!!!' (但其實佢係工作狂，所以佢係笑住講既)
'嘩好慘呀!我地呢d小薯仔ja wor鬼咁多野做' (你係小薯仔咁我係mud呀?薯毛??)
'嘩而家我地真係水深火熱呀' (??!!??)

罪行三
突然無故坐低係你側跟然後撞開你原本放在keyboard上的手，再用埋你隻mouse，指住晒要你咁做咁做。佢真係以為自己係指揮!!!!!!


好!我忍你!!!!!!!!

的小姐

超scary!!!的小姐全都找上門!!!

上星期真係十個忙
忙中有錯都係人之常情姐
我都唔想架
都唔駛而家排住隊來找我霉氣喎
係咪因為今日係大暑大家特別燥呢?

我建議可以飲下涼茶

um,超悶

想唔記得都唔得

知道番工的人永遠不會忘記的是什麼
係 "今日星期幾呀"
今日係星期日明天就係星期一
想唔記得都唔得