Thứ Bảy, 30 tháng 11, 2013

Terminal Three of China"s Shenzhen airport: A feast for the eye, but not for ...

It’s a temple to aviation that the architects hail as a design on a `cathedral-like scale’, bigger than Terminal Five at Heathrow and built far quicker at a fraction of the expense. Yet, judging from overseas airlines’ appetite for flying to the city, Terminal Three of China’s Shenzhen airport near Hong Kong could prove to be a white elephant.

The terminal, which has just opened, replaces the existing facilities with a structure of dramatic looks and huge capacity. It can handle 45 million passengers a year, 30 per cent more than Terminal Five. It cost $1bn (£612m), just one-seventh the cost of the Heathrow project — which was Europe’s biggest construction project up to its opening in 2008. And while the Heathrow facility had been 20 years in the making, the full Shenzhen project took only five.


The Shenzhen terminal was the first airport project by the Rome-based architects, Massimiliano and Doriana Fuksas. Studio Fuksas says basic concept `evokes the image of a manta ray and features a striking internal and external double `skin’ honeycomb motif that wraps the structure’. From above, it resembles an aircraft complete with wings and a tailplane.


Features include stylised white `trees’ that serve as air-conditioning vents. Glass panels punctuate the facade, allowing natural light to filter through. Artificial lighting was provided by an Edinburgh firm, Speirs and Major. As with Heathrow Terminal Five, Shenzhen’s new facility is experiencing teething problems. The planned Metro rail connection has not yet been extended to the airport. A longer-term concern, however, is the appeal of the airport to airlines and their passengers.


Among Shenzhen’s tourist attractions is a former Soviet aircraft carrier (complete with fighter jets) called `Minsk World’. Another is Dapeng Fortress, a battle site during the 19thcentury Opium Wars against the `British colonial invaders’.


Unlike the largest Chinese cities, however, Shenzhen does not allow a visa-free stopover. Shenzhen airport’s website boasts a wide range of international destinations, including Dubai, Cologne and Sydney. But a trawl of sources, including airline websites and the aviation data specialist, OAG, failed to find any services to or from these airports.


Existing links seem to be purely regional, to cities such as Bangkok, Kuala Lumpur and Singapore, with additional destinations that China regards as `domestic’ in the shape of Lhasa in Tibet and Taiwan’s capital, Taipei. The sole US destination, Anchorage in Alaska, is served only by the cargo carriers UPS and Federal Express.


Neil Taylor, who pioneered travel to the People’s Republic with his company, Regent Holidays, said: “One has to wonder who will fly here from outside China, given the choice of flights to Hong Kong and to Macau, both actively promoted in the UK, both nearby and both visa-free. Shenzhen had its appeal as a small village when China first opened up in the late 1970s, but tour operators will find it hard to promote now.”


So what can Britain learn from China’s newest airport project? Given the differences in how the countries are run, it’s difficult to say. China has been developing its transport infrastructure at a phenomenal pace, building new airports and high-speed rail lines across the nation as its economy grows at a huge rate compared to the UK. The state directs big projects, and — unlike in Britain, where a third runway at Heathrow has been continually stymied — there is little effective local opposition.


It may serve as a warning to expanding airports when bigger competitors exist nearby. Shenzhen suffers from the proximity of Hong Kong airport. Hong Kong handles twice as many passengers, with far more international destinations.


The biggest Chinese cities continue to attract new flights from Europe. Last week the French airline, Aigle Azur, announced a new link from Paris Orly to Beijing. But the expected surge of connections from Europe to large `secondary cities’ in China has not materialised. British Airways this year added a link from Heathrow to Chengdu, but elsewhere momentum has slowed.


Finnair has shelved plans to increase services to Xian, while reports in the French press suggest that only heavy subsidies from the local Chinese authorities are sustaining the Air France link between Paris and Wuhan. Le Figaro claimed that the airline was rewarded with a 30,000 subsidy for every flight.



Terminal Three of China"s Shenzhen airport: A feast for the eye, but not for ...

Bali urged to focus on Asia-Pacific tourism market

Bali urged to focus on Asia-Pacific tourism market


Bali has to focus on enhancing the Asia-Pacific tourism market as competition among ASEAN member countries is getting strong, an official has stated.


Ida Bagus Kade Subhiksu, head of the Bali Tourism office, said that the newly established Bali Tourism Promotion Board (BPPD) must look to the Asia-Pacific region.


“We are facing edgy competition from neighboring countries such as Malaysia, Thailand, Vietnam, Cambodia and the Philippines in terms of drawing tourists from the region. We [ASEAN member countries] have similar natural and cultural attractions,” Subhiksu said.


“The quality and quantity of promotional activities in the Asia-Pacific region must be increased. Bali has unique opportunities to lure more visitors from the region because of its distinguishable  natural and cultural assets,” he said.


 Bali could benefit from its location and tourism facilities. “Bali has opened direct flight services from and to major cities in the region,” he stressed.


As of 2013, Bali has 179 potential tourism markets, comprising 28 countries in Asia, nine in ASEAN, 38 countries in Africa and others in the US, Europe, Australia, Latin America and Middle East countries.


In 2012, tourists from the Asia-Pacific region, excluding ASEAN, contributed to around 50.02 percent, with 1,706,910 out of the total 2,892,019 tourist arrivals. Tourists from ASEAN countries contributed 12.85 percent or 371,631 persons.


As of September 2013, Bali had welcomed 2,409,334 tourist arrivals, of which 57.84 percent came from the Asia Pacific. ASEAN tourists amounted to 281,392 persons in the same period.


“Australia, Japan, South Korea, China, Taiwan, Malaysia, Singapore and Thailand have been Bali’s traditional tourism markets. We have to maintain them carefully,” Subhiksu suggested.


He went on to say that new emerging markets in the region included New Zealand, India and Hong Kong.


Ketut Ardana, chairman of Association of Indonesian Tours and Travel Agencies (ASITA) Bali Branch, agreed that tourists from the Asia Pacific had outnumbered those coming from the island’s previous traditional markets, such as the US and Europe.


“We do not have enough direct flight services connecting Bali and other destinations in the US and Europe, especially when Garuda Indonesia stopped its services to Europe,” Ardana said.


Rapid economic growth in some Asian countries, China in particular, and in the emerging economies of ASEAN countries, had boosted these markets, Ardana said.


“Middle-class growth in the region has created a new opportunity for Bali,” he said.


Hans Prawira, the owner of a travel agency focusing on the Asia-Pacific market, said that Bali should be creative and innovative in promoting its tourism packages.


“ASEAN countries have come up with brilliant tourism packages. ASEAN tourist hubs remain in Singapore and Bangkok,” said Prawira said.




Bali urged to focus on Asia-Pacific tourism market

FIFPro tells Qatar to abolish kafala system for players

(Reuters) – Qatar has been told by the world players’ union FIFPro to abolish the kafala system for footballers and respect international standards for their contracts.


The 2022 World Cup host nation also heard that it was essential to allow the establishment of a local players’ union.


“FIFPro has the attention of Qatar’s leading football officials,” said FIFPro delegate Mads Oland after meeting Hassan Al Thawadi, secretary general of the Qatar 2022 Supreme Committee, in Doha on Saturday.


“FIFPro, as the representative of all professional footballers worldwide, will be heard loud and clear.”


The meeting came two days after French footballer Zahir Belounis arrived home, having allegedly been prevented from leaving the country after falling into a long-running dispute with a local club.


Belounis said he had been unable to obtain an exit visa which has to be applied for by his employers under the kafala, or sponsorship, system.


“We have a structure in place now that paves the way for FIFPro to launch several critical objectives in Qatar,” said Oland in a statement issued by FIFPro.


“Qatar heard FIFPro’s wish to abolish the kafala sponsorship system in its application to footballers. This goes to the heart of respecting their basic human rights.”


“There is a clear understanding on all sides that the level must be raised for the best of the football industry in Qatar.


“The level must be in line with FIFA standards within the Qatari professional league, including the application of minimum contract requirements and dispute resolution.”


“FIFPro made it very clear that the establishment of a free, independent FIFPro affiliate, a players’ union that puts the welfare of footballers first, is essential.”


“As of now, the players who FIFPro protect cannot be guaranteed that their rights will be respected. That has to change.”


FIFPro also discussed conditions for the migrant workers employed in the country’s construction industry following reports of ill-treatment and abuse.


“We raised the concerns about the conditions for workers building infrastructure for the 2022 World Cup and the core labour standards which Qatar needs to meet,” said Oland.


(Reporting By Brian Homewood; Editing by Ken Ferris)




FIFPro tells Qatar to abolish kafala system for players

ALI nears acquisition of Panlilio properties in Cavite

MANILA, Philippines – Property giant Ayala Land Inc. (ALI) is moving closer to beefing up its resort holdings by acquiring properties from the Panlilio family’s Boulevard Holdings Inc. (BHI).


The parties are expected to sign a memorandum of agreement for a partnership in a Cavite resort development next month or early next year.


In a regulatory filing, BHI said its board of directors “approved to amend the terms of reference executed between BHI and ALI in April 2013 in favor of a more beneficial arrangement involving a recurring income stream on new property sales for an infinite period, subject to topographical feasibility.”


In April, ALI agreed to acquire certain landholding assets of BHI, which owns a vast landbank in Ternate, Cavite that includes the 3,000-hectare Puerto Azul complex.


Specifically, BHI said, ALI will develop only up to 25 percent of the property in line with its environmental ethics.


In the April to October topographical survey, the property showed more slopes than expected, BHI said.


The listed firm tapped international planning and design service firm AECOM to formulate a masterplan for the resort development. AECOM is the designer of 2012 London Olympics Legacy masterplan, Abu Dhabi’s Saadiyat Island masterplan, Universal Studios Island of Adventure Theme Park in Florida, Disney’s California Adventure Park and Universal Studios in Singapore.


“The board has received inputs from Panlilio family members here and abroad to accommodate ALI, and not to give it a difficult financial time to complete its project inside Puerto Azul,” BHI said.


The Panlilio family is keen on reviving Puerto Azul, which was once dubbed as “Asia’s Paradise Resort” and the “World’s Golfing Capital.”


Under its previous plan, BHI intends to build 11,563 residential units over a period of 20 to 25 years starting with 350 units of apartment residences. The resort component also involves the development of hotels, golf courses, country club, marina, theme park, sports and recreation facilities.


Early this year, ALI announced its plans to expand its presence in the country’s beach resort segment to capitalize on the anticipated rise in tourism arrivals in the country. In particular, ALI plans to develop tourism estates in Luzon and Visayas with robust marine life and world-class beaches.



ALI nears acquisition of Panlilio properties in Cavite

Alex Atala: Brazil"s taste envoy

Chef Alex Atala highlights the cuisine of the Amazon.



BRAZILIAN chef Alex Atala, widely seen as one of South America’s culinary wizards, is making his name by highlighting the little-known cuisine of the Amazon region.


From an almost accidental start in the business – he took a cooking class in Belgium in order to get his visa extended – Atala is using his star status to promote Brazilian food and defend sustainable production.


“Cooking is a mix of magic, alchemy and exact sciences,” Atala said in an interview at his award-winning D.O.M. restaurant in his native Sao Paulo.


Atala grew up in suburban Sao Paulo. As a punk youngster, he experimented with drugs and embraced tattoo art.



At age 45, he still cuts a rebellious figure, with his numerous tattoos and greying red beard. When asked what remains of his edgy youth, he says enthusiastically, “Everything!”


But with success – D.O.M. ranked sixth this year on the British magazine Restaurant’s list of the top 50 eateries – has come some mellowing.


“Life forced me to mature. Cooking gave me method and discipline,” said Atala, clad in his crisp white chef’s attire.



From house painting to cooking


In his late teens, Atala went backpacking across Europe. In Belgium, he painted houses to make money and when his visa was about to expire, he enrolled in a cooking class in order to extend his stay.


He thus began his culinary training at the age of 19 at the Ecole Hoteliere de Namur. He later headed to France and Italy to widen his repertoire.


In 1994 he returned to Sao Paulo, having learnt one lesson.


“I realised that I would never be able to cook Italian food like an Italian chef. But I could distinguish myself as a Brazilian chef with recipes and ingredients of my country,” he notes.


In 1999, Atala opened D.O.M., which stands for Deo Optimo Maximo (or “To God, most good, most great“) and is viewed as the best restaurant in South America.


The menu there notably features unconventional ingredients that includes palm heart fettuccine; pirarucu (Amazonian fish) with tucupi (traditional Brazilian sauce from wild manioc root); and banana ravioli with passion fruit sauce and tangerine sorbet, as well as insects burnished like jewels. An eight-course dinner cost around US$250 (RM802).


“The Amazon is the new frontier of taste. Its richness and possibilities are infinite,” says Atala.


“Everybody knows the word Amazon, but nobody knows the taste associated with it.”


In 2009, Atala opened his second restaurant, Dalva e Dito, also in Sao Paulo, to critical acclaim.


He has also worked in advertising and runs the ATA foundation, which champions the indigenous people and produce of the Amazon.


Atala says he likes to eat street food, especially Brazil’s popular fried empanadas. As a child, he used to go fishing and hunting with his father and grandfather, and he says he is trying to resurrect such memories by promoting an “emotive cooking”.


Time magazine included Atala on its 2013 list of the 100 most influential people in the world.


Fellow chef Rene Redzepi described him in his introduction as “the most dedicated person in his field”.


“Selflessly, he has surrendered to the enormous task of shaping a better food culture for Latin America. His philosophy of using native Brazilian ingredients in haute cuisine has mesmerised the continent,” wrote Redzepi, a Dane whose restaurant Noma in Copenhagen tops the World’s 50 Best Restaurants list.



Food links ‘nature and culture’


A restless traveller, Atala attends conferences around the world, cooks in Chile or Singapore and occasionally treks into the Amazon rainforest in search of exotic new tastes.


He insists that Brazil is a country “which still has a lot to show” if it decides to follow the example of countries such as Peru, which have learnt to promote their cuisine.


“Food is the best link between nature and culture … The modern chef and many of us today have become disconnected from the original ingredients.”


During a recent event in Denmark, Atala was criticised when he killed a hen in front of his audience, but he dismissed the issue.


“Today, a chef sparks a controversy if he kills a hen, but our grandparents did this routinely.


“They used the feathers to make pillows and the legs for other things. They made full use of everything. At the same time, there is a lot of waste in the food business. We need to rewrite this story and value life, vegetal or animal,” notes Atala, who says he likes to spark debates.


Atala has three sons from two marriages and says that if he had not pursued a culinary career, he might have become a veterinarian or a biologist. – AFP



Alex Atala: Brazil"s taste envoy

Neighbours know Singapore will not harm their interests: Shanmugam

Foreign Minister K Shanmugam gave his first comments on allegations that Singapore had spied on its neighbours, saying at The Straits Times Global Outlook Forum on Friday that “the Indonesians and Malaysians know that we won’t do anything to harm their interests”.


He said that on intelligence matters, the Singapore Government will not confirm or deny any specific reports even if they are untrue, because the ensuing back-and-forth would be “never-ending”.


“You cannot say, this is 5 per cent true or 95 per cent true, that we work with the Americans, Australians, Malaysians and Indonesians on this aspect of counter-terrorism but not this aspect. Never-ending. The point is that the Indonesians and Malaysians know that we won’t do anything to harm their interests,” he said.


Asked by moderator, ST editor Warren Fernandez, if the allegations that were published in an Australian newspaper this week would harm Singapore’s bilateral ties with Indonesia and Malaysia, Mr Shanmugam said that it should not, as “what we do is known to all of us.” The pressure of domestic politicking around the allegations would be stronger in Malaysia and Indonesia, but “that is not new and we just have to deal with it”, he added.


In the 90 minute dialogue, Mr Shanmugam was also asked about tensions over China’s new air defence identification zone that covers disputed territory with Japan, as well as its ongoing terroritorial disputes in the South China Sea with Asean countries.


He said that all the major players in the ongoing disputes – China, Japan and the United States namely – face pressures of nationalism, and these stand in the way of a resolution.


“In the public arena, China bashing is very fashionable in the US, it’s going to require the administration to be able to move beyond that. It’s going to require China to be able to handle its own politics. A lot of people think China doesn’t have politics but that’s untrue. China has a huge amount of politics. Five hundred million netizens are pushing and putting pressure on the leadership. It’s going to require Japan to be able to look beyond the purely nationalistic considerations and local domestic considerations.”


True resolutions to the territorial disputes would take time and probably would not happen in his lifetime, said Mr Shanmugam, adding that he hopes only that they would not escalate into military action.


As for what Asean can do to resolve the territorial disputes in the South China Sea between some of its member states and China, Mr Shanmugam said that “we must not kid ourselves that these fundamental national sovereignty issues can be dealt with at multi-national forums.” But he emphasised that peace and stability in the region is the bedrock of Singapore’s, and Asean’s prosperity, and that recent developments reflect worrying trends.


rchang@sph.com.sg



Neighbours know Singapore will not harm their interests: Shanmugam

India Growth Quickens From Four-Year Low as Rate Increases Loom

Indian economic growth quickened

last quarter from a four-year low on higher factory output, a

revival threatened by looming interest-rate increases to fight

rising prices in the nation of 1.2 billion people.


Gross domestic product rose 4.8 percent in the three months

ended September from a year earlier, compared with 4.4 in the

previous quarter, the Statistics Ministry said in New Delhi

yesterday. The median of 44 estimates in a Bloomberg News Survey

was for a 4.6 percent gain.


“The down trend has been arrested, but a meaningful

recovery is still some distance away,” said Radhika Rao, an

economist at DBS Bank Ltd. in Singapore. “The outlook is

cautious because fiscal rationalization is on the horizon and

monetary policy will remain tight.”


Asia’s third-largest economy has struggled to take off as

the central bank boosts interest rates to curb inflation and

pressure grows on Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to cut spending

to meet a budget-deficit target. The rupee’s 12 percent fall

against the dollar this year has boosted exports in recent

months, shielding factories from slower demand in a country

where some 825 million people live on less than $2 a day.


“The recovery will be gradual and tentative,” Vishnu Varathan, a senior economist at Mizuho Bank Ltd. in Singapore,

said before the report. “The overall tighter financing position

will take a bit of a toll.”


Rate Increases


The central bank will raise the benchmark repurchase rate

by quarter of a percentage point by March, Varathan said,

reflecting a view shared by ICICI Securities Primary Dealership

Ltd. and DBS Bank.


Private consumption growth accelerated to 2.2 percent in

the last quarter from a year earlier, from a 1.6 percent pace in

the previous three-month period, yesterday’s report showed.

Government spending contracted 1.1 percent, while investment

jumped 2.6 percent.


The rupee weakened 0.1 percent yesterday to 62.4487 per

dollar while the SP BSE Sensex share index rose 1.3 percent.

The yield on the government bond maturing in November 2023 rose

to 8.74 percent from 8.72 percent on Nov. 28.


Growth eased in the first half of the fiscal year that

started on April 1 in part because of global factors out of the

government’s control, Chakravarthy Rangarajan, chairman of

Singh’s Economic Advisory Council, told a conference in New

Delhi yesterday. India’s expansion has lagged behind regional

rivals from China to Indonesia, and the South Asian nation’s

companies are grappling with conditions akin to stagflation.


Factory Output


“I am optimistic that the second half will be spurred

along by increased manufacturing, leading to a more stable

rupee,” Rangarajan said. China grew 7.8 percent last quarter

and Indonesia 5.6 percent.


Factory output climbed 2 percent in September, the

Statistics Ministry said this month, less than the median

estimate of 3.5 percent in a Bloomberg survey. Sales growth

dropped to a four-year low at Indian conglomerate ITC Ltd.,

partly as profit at the hotels business fell.


Reserve Bank of India Governor Raghuram Rajan is expected

to raise the policy interest rate to 8.5 percent next year from

7.75 percent, Goldman Sachs Group Inc. said on Nov. 21, building

upon two increases of a combined 50 basis points after he moved

to the central bank in September.


‘Unenviable Task’


The central bank faces the “unenviable task” of

controlling inflation while boosting an economy that grew at the

slowest pace since 2003 in the last fiscal year, the RBI said in

an economic review last month.


Finance Minister Palaniappan Chidambaram, who has

repeatedly said he’ll stick to deficit targets, will reduce

planned outlays on items such as roads, ports and welfare

programs by about 700 billion rupees ($11 billion) this fiscal

year, according to Yes Bank Ltd. Chidambaram has pledged to

narrow the deficit to a six-year low of 4.8 percent of GDP in

the 12 months ending March 31.


India’s credit rating may be cut to junk next year unless

the general election leads to a government capable of reviving

economic expansion, Standard Poor’s said earlier this month.


The central bank under Rajan, a former International

Monetary Fund chief economist, has offered concessional dollar

swaps to banks to spur inflows of the U.S. currency and bolster

the rupee. The currency has appreciated about 10 percent since

slumping to a record low in August.


Fastest Inflation


Graft scandals and budget and trade deficits have made it

harder for Singh to ease supply bottlenecks that are

contributing to consumer-price inflation of 10 percent, the

fastest in a basket of 17 Asia-Pacific economies tracked by

Bloomberg.


Singh began a policy overhaul in September 2012 to spur

growth. Steps have included gradual increases in diesel prices

aimed at containing subsidies, and lifting curbs on foreign

investment in the retail and aviation sectors to attract capital

flows.


Opinion polls signal neither his Congress Party nor the

main opposition Bharatiya Janata Party, whose campaign is led by

Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi, will get a majority in the

general election.


“Clearly the investment cycle has not picked up and it is

uncertain whether it will happen before elections,” Prasanna Ananthasubramanian, a Mumbai-based economist at ICICI Securities

Primary Dealership, said before the report.


To contact the reporter on this story:

Unni Krishnan in New Delhi at

ukrishnan2@bloomberg.net


To contact the editor responsible for this story:

Daniel Ten Kate at

dtenkate@bloomberg.net



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Traffic Moves During Rush Hour in New Delhi


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Prashanth Vishwanathan/Bloomberg


Traffic moves along a street during the evening rush hour outside Nehru Place business complex in New Delhi.


Traffic moves along a street during the evening rush hour outside Nehru Place business complex in New Delhi. Photographer: Prashanth Vishwanathan/Bloomberg



India Growth Quickens From Four-Year Low as Rate Increases Loom

Tiwtiwong in Singapore

SINGAPORE, Singapore – Kawayan and his bunch of merry friends went on a round trip to Halsema Highway last year on a Dangwa bus. Actually, it wasn’t even a bus. It was a tarpaulin made to look like the iconic red, yellow and gray Dangwa and inside was the makeshift exhibition area and moviehouse where people along the highway would visit in that two-week trip.


This being a country-and-western haven, Kawayan’s friend, DH Mark Zero, even held a Benguet cowboy remix concert at where the former Abatan Records was. Kawayan et al (more formally known as AX(iS) Art Project, painted on the rockwalls, balanced boulders along the way and played the gongs on their way from Baguio to Sagada. They promised to make a repeat journey and what a return journey it was.


This year, Kawayan’s bus brought them from Sagada to Singapore. Being a part of the Philippine delegation to the 2013 Singapore Biennale, they turned one room of the Singapore Art Museum into one fun journey indeed. The AX(iS) exhibition is called “Tiwtiwong: The Odds to Unend,” “tiwtiwong” an Ifugao term to “involuntarily losing your way.”


Kawayan de Guia is the co-curator of the exhibition and practically conceptualized how the trip would look like.


346aa bencabagawin%2520 %252020131130 BENCABAGAWIN. All photos by Arnel Agawin


Bencabagawin. National Artist Bencab (Benjamin Cabrera) did this huge drawing of people representing the different ethnographic groups in Baguio. He did this on a huge Tibetan handmade paper. Collectors had been bugging Bencab even before he finished this but yes, this is not for sale.


346aa bulolagawin%2520 %252020131130 BULOLAGAWIN.


Bulolagawin. The late Baguio artist Roberto Villanueva did not finish this documentary on a gongmaker in Kalinga entitled “The Last Gongmaker.” Rica Concepcion and Tad Ermitano collaborated on this conceptual piece. If you move the mouse on the gong, parts of the footage of the film would show on the blank wall. The bulol was carved by Jason Tuguinganay based on a huge sketch by Villanueva.


346aa leonardagawin%2520 %252020131130 LEONARDAGAWIN.


Leonardagawin. Leonard Aguinaldo was the last to win the defunct Asean Art Awards 10 years ago using rubber sheets which he etched and colored. He utilized the same distinct technique for this huge kandong (an endemic tree in Upper Ilocos Sur) tree showing the salt trade that cemented the partnership of upland Cordillera and lowland Ilocos.


346aa villafuerteagawin%2520 %252020131130 VILLAFUERTEAGAWIN.


Villafuerteagawin. Young artist Carlo Villafuerte (that’s him with the sad face and long hair) hand-stitched this huge work entitled “Wagwag Wonderland” using textile from discarded second-hand clothes. Villafuerte never uses a thimble and sewing machine so this is one thorough and painful art.


c68d5 mightybhutensagawin%2520 %252020131130 MIGHTYBHUTENSAGAWIN.


Mightybhutens. This huge mosaic snake is Halsema Highway. And the pictures on the side showed part of the 32 waiting sheds made into art by Baguio and Manila artists like A.G. Saño, Willy Magtibay, Dex Fernandez, Sultan Mangosan, Butch Guerrero and the Mighty Bhutens, a trio of mosaic makers led by Kawayan’s brother Kabunyan. The Mighty Bhutens taught schoolchildren how to make mosaics and collaborated with them for this “Waiting Shed Project.”


c68d5 agawin1%2520 %252020131130 AGAWIN.


Agawin. You stand on this compass (see the Axes?) and the music above you amplifies. This is the 24-hour musical loop made by Shant Verdun to recreate the sounds and noise of Cordillera in one day.


c68d5 kidlatagawin%2520 %252020131130 KIDLATAGAWIN.


Kidlatagawin. Kawayan’s father, Kidlat Tahimik, not only debuted his 30-year-in-the-making film about Ferdinand Magellan and Enrique de Malacca in Singapore, but he also made this installation, which shows Filipino sailors on a balangay. By the way, this is the Ifugao goddess of the wind blowing the skirt of Marilyn Monroe.


c68d5 santibose%2520 %252020131130 SANTIBOSE.


Santibose. Tuguinganay also carved this 3-faced bulol from a print made by the late Baguio artist Santi Bose. There were 82 other bulols exhibited here made by 40 carvers from a Grade 4 pupil in Ifugao to an 80-year-old farmer in Sabangan, Mountain province.


c68d5 tattoo%2520 %252020131130 TATTOO.


Tattoo. On the glass wall of the museum are transparent photos of Ruel Bimmuyag of the traditional tattoos made by Fang-od, one of the last female tattooists in Kalinga and probably in the whole Cordillera. She does her pricking with a thorn from a lemon branch and soot.


c68d5 aso%2520 %252020131130 ASO.


Aso. This dog and the table were taken from a former dog eatery on Katipunan Street in Baguio which was turned into a tongue-in-cheek dog-eating museum by Kawayan and his Aso-ciates because dogmeat is no longer served there. – Rappler.com



Tiwtiwong in Singapore

Where to from Hong Kong?

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Travel


Date


December 1, 2013


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cb507 127 Michael Gebicki 90x90


The Tripologist


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Singapore says no desire to "harm" Malaysia amid spy row

62a5a singapore skyline kdpsuarez Oil down in Asia on eurozone bank bailout concernsFile photo by Rappler


SINGAPORE – Singapore has assured Malaysia that it will not do anything to harm relations as the city-state grapples with allegations that it was part of a US-led electronic spying operation in Asia.


“We have no interest in doing anything that might harm our partners or the friendship between our two countries,” Ong Keng Yong, Singapore’s high commissioner (ambassador) to Malaysia, said in comments carried by the Straits Times newspaper on Wednesday, November 27.


“We have an excellent bilateral relationship and cooperate closely on many matters of common interest,” he said without addressing the spying issue directly.


Singapore’s envoys to Malaysia and Indonesia were summoned by their host governments Tuesday following an Australian media report that implicated Singapore and South Korea in a spying ring.


Singapore’s foreign and defenSe ministries have not replied to Agence France-Presse queries about the report, based on leaks provided by fugitive former US intelligence contractor Edward Snowden.


Southeast Asia’s biggest telecom firm SingTel, which had been identified in Monday’s report as a key party to the alleged tapping of undersea telecommunication cables, also declined comment. SingTel is majority-owned by state investment firm Temasek Holdings.


The Sydney Morning Herald said Singapore and South Korea played key supporting roles in a “Five Eyes” intelligence network grouping the United States, Britain, Australia, Canada and New Zealand.


As a major hub for regional telecommunication traffic, high-tech Singapore was an important link in the surveillance network, it said.


Indonesia’s President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyuno on Tuesday, November 26, reacted angrily to the reports of Singapore and South Korea’s involvement, and said both countries’ envoys would be summoned.


His comments came amid signs of an easing in a diplomatic crisis between Jakarta and Australia, which had allegedly tried to listen to the phones of Yudhoyono, his wife and his ministers in 2009.


Singapore is a long-standing military partner of the United States. The US military operates a post in the city-state that assists in logistics and exercises for its forces in Southeast Asia.


The US Navy maintains a logistical command unit – Commander, Logistics Group Western Pacific – in Singapore to coordinate warship deployment and logistics in the region.


Squadrons of US fighter planes are also rotated to Singapore for a month at a time, according to a report by the US Congressional Research Service. – Rappler.com



Singapore says no desire to "harm" Malaysia amid spy row

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Grimsby Lincoln News

Grimsby Lincoln News



It’s that time of year and I’m sitting in my cold study holding the end of a branch to a candle flame.  Holding and holding…



Wait a minute, wait…let me explain.  I don’t have an annual tradition of indoor branch burning, nor am I doing this to keep warm – I suddenly realize how that sounded.  What I mean is, my study is cold this time of year and I’m sitting here preparing to write my monthly nature column (Gasp, upon re-reading this I just realized that this is my 100th column!).  To set the mood I have a two and a half foot long Australian sandalwood branch in my hand. It’s almost four and a half inches in diameter at one end, the other end graceful and wavy, and when I sit it on a table it looks like a piece of driftwood art with a couple of short branches angling out of it. I’m holding it to the flame to try and char the end to have the fragrant sandalwood incense floating through the room as I begin to write.  And there is a reason: I don’t usually do this as a ritual to write my column.



I’d been asked to speak to the Thursday at Ten members in Grimsby by Bev Jarvis, and we had decided it would be about “Eco Adventure Tours.”  The Thursday at Ten calendar said, “On November 28, we will listen to speaker Carla Carlson, who operates a highly rated Eco Tour Company in Vineland.  She will share with us her experiences in ecotourism in Niagara. Carla will follow up with a presentation of her wonderful adventures in Western Australia.”



I had earlier in the week found my box labelled Australia down in the basement and had the contents, including my sandalwood branch, laid out all over the dining room. Sorting through the contents was fun and brought back so many memories.  However, I was more than dismayed to not find the speech I wrote to go with the presentation I had made with photos, shortly after I had come back from Australia. I did that presentation for the Peninsula Field Naturalists, excitedly wearing my Australian bush hat and my brand new Rossi boots.



Now, to explain to you how I came to be in Australia. I had started my Niagara Nature Tours in 1996 after being downsized from my beloved job in Ornamental Entomology at Agriculture Canada, Vineland Research Station. In part I started an ecotour company because I had high hopes of travelling the world. 



Within three years my company was highlighted in the Canadian Tourism Commission’s “Catalogue of Exemplary Practices in Adventure Travel and Ecotourism.” This was published in 1999 as a lead up to the 2002 International Year of Ecotourism and because of that, the catalogue was circulated all around the world. And I indeed did get a couple of contacts through the catalogue, congratulating me. Time passed and it was now the winter of 2002, and six years into running Niagara Nature Tours, I had only done tours in Niagara with one foray in to Toronto.



I believe it may have been a February day (sitting in my cold living room), working on my computer, when I received an email from an unknown name, a Dr. Ross Dowling, an associate Professor of Tourism at the Edith Cowan University, in a place called Joondalup in Western Australia. With disbelief I read this most astonishing email that invited me to be the international keynote speaker for the Forum Advocating Cultural and Eco Tourism (FACET), for their 2002 FACET Conference Tourism Information Exchange.  He went on to say that they could pay my way but he was very sorry, however, that they could not afford to put me up in hotels, and that I would have to stay at BBs and in private homes.  Well, let me tell you, that was not a deal breaker.



I was so thrilled to have been recognized in such an official way, internationally.  Some of my experiences in my own back yard were not quite so uplifting, to say the least. The most telling story to relay was when an Eco and Agritourism Conference was being planned for Niagara-on-the Lake. Despite having paid $500 annual membership fees to Niagara Falls Tourism, and the Ministry of Tourism representative for Niagara having been to my office a year or so before when she had started her new wonderful important, high paying job (leaving after an hour of me explaining what Niagara Nature Tours was capable of doing, and with a binder of my programming)…despite these two women sitting at the table for the conference planning-committee, arranging speakers and tours for it…my name NEVER came up. When I heard about the conference I confidently called my Niagara MOT representative and excitedly asked how I could help, how I could be part of it, perhaps to be a speaker?  However she thought I could fit in, I’d be proud to do it. She made very short work of me, telling me I was not experienced enough and even raised her voice at me when I tried to explain what I could offer.  I was devastated. I was the only ecotour operator in Niagara and I had serious agritourism programming under my belt having worked at Agriculture Canada for 14 years, having graduated from the University of Guelph in Agriculture, and having conducted agricultural tours for about the past five years.  In fact as far as I knew, I was also the only agritourism tour company in Niagara as well.



But that’s another story.



So, on the 16th of May 2002 I stepped onto a plane that routed me from Toronto to Los Angeles, and to a stopover in Singapore. The Singapore Changi Airport has to be one of the most stunning airports in the world.  I wandered for hours past what seemed like miles of waterfalls, and lush container gardens dripping with orchids and exotic (native) plants. I just now Googled the airport and it says, “Our first terminal, reimagined and reinvented for an urban tropical experience.” Gosh, their website is stunning, it is worth a visit in itself.  It seems to be a self-contained city, within a city.



Then we were told that if we handed in our passports, that we could pay to go on a city tour. We stepped from the cool of the airport into the debilitating (79 per cent) humid heat of this highly urbanised republic, with very little primary rainforest remaining. I was standing 137 kilometres (85 miles) north of the equator!



We were whisked by an open-topped bus through a most stunning city of high-rises and, sitting beside a young woman who lived there, I learned lots about their city life of tiny living spaces and pretty good jobs. We were then plopped into a midsized boat, with a tarp over our heads protecting us from the beating sun. I wiggled my way to sit beside the local steerer of the boat, both of us perched precariously on the edge by the motor. He was delighted to talk with me as we floated through the city as in a dream, through canals perhaps and a sea, I can’t quite remember.



I spent so much time at this airport, waiting for the plane change that I decided to get my long hair cut, thinking it would be fun to say, “Oh, yes, I had my hair cut in Singapore.”  Who gets to say that? The problem with this idea was that Dr. Dowling and his wife Wendy then couldn’t find me in the airport, when they came to pick me up, because I was not the longhaired woman in the photos.



It took me two days and three nights by the calendar, to get from the Niagara peninsula to Perth, the capital of Western Australia. My Niagara Nature Tours had finally gotten me out of Niagara! I was now down under for the first time.  In 1989 I had been on the other side of the world, but on top, in India. I was now in for another life changing adventure.



Please call Niagara Nature Tours 905-562-3746 or email info@niagaranaturetours.ca if you would like beautiful Christmas Gift Certificates for the Niagara Land Trusts January 18 Niagara’s Amazing Winterfest of Waterfowl Tour of the Niagara River. Or for Carla’s Owl Prowl, either one a unique and wonderful Christmas present. Or for a generic Gift Certificate which can be used for any tours throughout the year.  Or, for her BB!



Carla’s Bonnybank Bed and Breakfast www.bonnybank.ca will be closed from Dec. 11 through to Christmas, because she is flying away with her mom to meet her sister Linnea and extended family in the Dominican Republic…for her first holiday in more than 18 years she figures…and her first tropical winter time going to a tropical country, type of holiday. She’s excited.




 



Grimsby Lincoln News