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Saturday, 26 May 2007
Is there anywhere you can't get internet in the Western world? On my way to London today for a weekend holiday before Chris comes. I've done this on a whim; it was only last night that I decided to plan a trip to London and now I am on a train an hour away. Though my train trip was complicated due to rail repairs on the direct rail from Manchester to London. So I have had to make two changes in Sheffield and Doncaster, which will bring me into London King's Cross, which takes me back to Cambridge as this was the station I always came into (from Cambridge) on my daytrips into London. If the direct line would have been in service then I would have arrived at a different station: London Euston. So this slight intrusion into my journey has turned out to be a pleasant memeory. I suppose I had better get onto finding a hostel and plan where and what I will see in the city before I actually get into London. I was looking at the images of Richard Serra's Titled Arc and couldn't help but think that it resembled a wall (read fence). Wall: that got me thinking of other infamous walls... Starting 2,200 years ago, Chinese dynasties built walls to keep the Mongols at bay. The most famous of these is the Great Wall, which is twice as long as the U.S.-Mexico border. Much good it did them. The Mongols overran China. The Romans built Hadrian's Wall across 74 miles of what is now northern England to keep the tribes from Scotland in their place. This did not prevent the Romans from eventually abandoning this outpost of empire. Before the invention of artillery, many European cities had protective walls. Since they are no longer relevant for defense, the cities have grown beyond their walls, and many of the walls have been torn down. While all of these walls were designed to keep people out, the Berlin Wall was a shock because it was built to keep people inside; yet ultimately, this structure fell too.
When the Berlin Wall was torn down in 1989, it wasn't merely a sign that a conflict had ended and the wall was no longer necessary, but rather it heralded the end of a conflict. There are walls being erected in Baghdad to separate Sunnis from Shias. A barrier is going up between Israel and the West Bank. But there are others. Pakistan is building a wall on its border with Afghanistan. India is constructing a wall along its border with Bangladesh. As a recent TIME article points out, this trend appears to be accelerating. It will be interesting to see what effect our latest wall has. With some 350 million legal crossings per year, the U.S.-Mexico boundary is the most frequently crossed international border in the world, according to the American embassy in Mexico City. So as part of his good neighbor policy, President Bush signed into law the "Secure Fence Act of 2006." It authorizes construction of 700 miles of new walls along parts of the 1,951-mile-long border from San Ysidro, California, to Brownsville, Texas. (The Secure Fence Act does not include funding for the project, the cost of which is estimated to be at least $6 billion.)
Today, the idea of walls between nations seems to be in vogue. Does this mean that conflicts are increasing, or that solutions to them seem increasingly hopeless? In any case, today both the Great Wall and Berlin walls are tourist attractions. Hopefully one day the rest of these walls will be mere tourist attractions as well. But in the meantime, many of these walls increasingly appear to be relatively futile moves of desperation. Why is it that we really do love walls? Thursday, 24 May 2007 “One of the preeminent sculptors of our era, Richard Serra has long been acclaimed for his challenging and innovative work,” which emphasizes materiality and an engagement between the viewer, the site, and the work. A new exhibition, Richard Serra Sculpture: Forty Years, on at MoMA from 3 June to 10 September, displays the “extraordinary vision of this formidable artist, who has radicalized and extended the definition of sculpture.” If you so desire you can check out the pictures Tropolism has captured of the “wonderful” moment of a Richard Serra sculpture being hoisted into MoMA's courtyard. But let us remember that public art commissions serve as valuable (and often truer) indicators of the community’s attitude, indeed judgment, of the relative worth of artists and artworks. Perhaps, more tellingly, they can also serve as flashpoints of discord. Over the years, Serra has expanded his spatial and temporal approach to sculpture and has focused primarily on large-scale work, including many site-specific works that engage with a particular architectural, urban, or landscape setting. Still, New York hasn’t always been so accommodating of Serra’s work. In 1981, the Federal Government’s Art in Architecture Program commissioned Serra’s notorious Tilted Arc, a 120-foot long and 10 feet high rusting steel wall, which was installed in Federal Plaza, New York City. Art “experts” championed Tilted Arc as an important work of Minimal art while workers complained that the sculpture blocked their view and shielded muggers; security personnel said it could serve as a blast wall for terrorist bombs; a judge claimed that it was exacerbating a rat problem. Continue reading the critique...
Wednesday, 23 May 2007 I have decided to copy part of a conversation I have been having with Tabitha. I hope that you will be able to discern her intelligence and recogize the light to the world that she is. Tony! Re: Tuesday, 22 May 2007 Hollyoaks is a British soap series which I am addicted to. (It's so addicting Megan has even gotten into it and she's only been here a week.) I don't know how I will cope without seeing it after I move back to the States; hopefully it is on youtube. Otherwise I will have to get it on DVD somehow. My housemate has been joking that he will have to record it and send it to me. And my AS level students and I always talk about what the latest scandals: who is sleeping with who, and subsequently who is cheating on who, and who has gone mad as toast. The current (and typical) predicament goes something like: “Things have kicked off between Craig and John Paul, as Craig seems to have finally given in to his feelings. You see John Paul is gay and has a boyfriend, Spike, but his supposedly straight, friend Craig has become jealous of John Paul and Spike and is now trying to stir trouble between the two of them using John Paul’s former girlfriend to split him and his Spike up, but I think this is all to cover up that Craig might not just have be best friends with John Paul, but likes him (in that way). How will it affect their long-standing friendship? Will they be lovers??? "But after Craig and John Paul do give into their feelings, Craig is determined to block out what happened between him and John Paul. You see, Craig has feelings for John Paul, but doesn't know exactly how to express it.Declaring he's in love with Sarah, Craig's gone mad and decided he's certainly not gay and John Paul is devastated. Craig has always had the tendencies to be crazy, you know, he’s a little weird and he has the crazy look in his eyes. Mind you Spike has no idea any of this has happened. What will happen to these best mates now that they've slept together? Can things ever go back to the way they once were?”
So yea, can't wait to see Hollyoaks tonight; it's my daily weeknight meeting with the television at 6:30PM. Sunday, 20 May 2007 Here are some pictures of Megan and I's adventures since she's been in the greater Manchester area.
A lot has happened since I last posted, which I suppose could be the reason for not blogging. Since last time: 10 May: I became an uncle. My step brother Jake and his girlfriend Maria had a little boy, Logan Jakob Tews. Also on the 10 May I chaperoned my Year 11's Leaver's Due, which is a close equivalent to the prom. The Leaver's Due is a formal for Year 11s only (versus in the States where often all upperclassmen can attend). They get all dressed up in elegent (expensive, some as much as £350!) dresses and sophisticated suits or tuxes. Some of them get limousines while others just get on the coach (remember they cannot drive until 18 years old here, and Year 11s are only 16). They go to a reception hall where they eat a proper, five-course meal, together as a class. After which there is a dance that lasts until midnight. Many of the teacher's attend to wish the graduates farewell and to chaperone the event. What's lovely about the setup is that there is a bar where teachers can have a drink or two and converse with each other while the students mingle and dance. Whereas, this would positively be frowned upon on any school gathering in the States, there seems to be no qualms with it here. Somehow in the States the logic follows that teachers can't be trusted to consume alcohol because they might pass it on to students or that it will set a bad example for them – as though teachers would do something as rehensible as giving their students booze or get completely pissed in the presence of them (or other co-workers). I don't see why students and teachers both can't have a good time! 12 May: Whilst graduation was taking place for friends back in Oshkosh, I had a meeting with the other student teachers from Wisconsin, teaching in the Manchester area. We went out to dinner and for drinks where we shared our observations about teaching in the UK. Congratulations to Leisha, Eric, Tabitha (on her Masters), and anyone else I have missed. 15 May: My sister arrived from Paris, and ealier than that, Seville, where she was studying for a semester. In her infinite wisdom she came to the UK with a whole £90 (~$180) which is quite possibly the most foolish thing a person can do considering the UK must be the country with the highest cost of living (taking into account the US's lousy economy, and thus miserable exchange rate). I barely live for cheaper than £90 per week. Though this is not entirely her fault since she had to pay an extra (exorbitant) fee to bring her extra piece of luggage with her on her continental flight from Seville to Paris (to the tune of €150). Not to mention she needed a train ticket to London from Manchester as her flight leaves London Heathrow, and that was £25, effectively leaving her with £65. So that slated weekend holiday to London I was looking forward to can be scrapped. Looks like a cheap weekend in Manchester. 16 May: Mom's Birthday, had better send a card a make a call home. Wednesday, 9 May 2007 Tony: I am bumming internet from my neighbor wirelessly Check it out on youtube, otherwise you might not get it. Absolutely hillarious. Tuesday, 8 May 2007 ...mí bag's been nicked. On Thursday night (2 May) my bag was nicked (swiped, burgled, stolen) whilst in a bar. The next day the situation was foolishly weighing on me, as though I should regret something I could not, now do anything about, or give any amount of time to pondering the type of person who would do such a thing. I was out with a friend at this bar/club place and having a couple of drinks. I moved chairs, got slightly preoccupied and when we were ready to go I found it missing. I think what was most annoying was the fact that I was only a few feet away from it the whole time. Needless to say I lost my bag, about £5 (about $10), a favorite striped jumper (sweater), and my new (pink) iPod mini. I think that I could safely say that this wouldn't happen in the States, or at least at Peabody's. Monday, 7 May 2007 Sweet potatoes, Rhizomes (in both botany and philosophy), strawberrries, van Eyck's Arnolfini Portrait, Byron's story Manfred, the Corinthian order Was America a mistake? and a new-type of solar energy plant is in commericial production in I think one of the best bits about living in England is the BBC. They're proper good. The quality and breadth of reporting avoids the sensationalized news (read rubbish) that plagues so much of the news broadcast by the networks in the States. Shall I recall the "Missing white woman syndrome." Since I have been here there have been news features and documentaries on obesity in America and the UK, British army soldiers dodging their recall into service, and the tactics supermarkets use to sell products. It also seems as though every day the BBC has a news story that has references the impending global warming crisis (rather than treating it as a mere political dispute). Not that the BBC doesn't ever overdo a story on the Royal family every now and again, such as Prince Williams recent breakup with his girlfriend: or Prince Harry's decision to go to Iraq with his army troupe: Still, I find their coverage of US news to be concise enough for me to catch the happenings in the States without taking too much time away from my to-do list here, yet thorough enough for me to understand the essence of what is unfolding whilst I am away. So the first story reports on a debate that was held at Oxford University on whether or not America was a mistake – the motion "this House regrets the Founding of America" was overwhelmingly squashed. I am glad that they have concluded that 'we' weren't considering the Brits (along with the rest of Western Europe) were the ones to create America. I think I sense a bit of contempt. Can they not criticize our leaders without regretting our existence? So what if America had never been founded. What would the world be without? We would not be listening to George Bush's fluent English or had the benefit of Donald Rumsfeld one-liners or clogged our arteries on a Big Mac. But what music would we be listening to on our iPods and watching on our TVs? Would the world even have an iPod or a television? Granted European minds have contributed to these inventions, but they have come together under American companies and auspices. So much for iPods... what about ideas? How different would the world be without the Bill of Rights? What about the Declaration of Independence: the quintessential treatise of self-determination? If America had never been founded it would have remained unwritten. And who can imagine life without the Dumb Waiter, another Jefferson innovation? (With thousands of restaurants in London and the restrictions on space practically everywhere in Europe, requires most restaurants to have a downstairs kitchen which sends food up to the dining area on the ground floor via a dumb waiter.) The list goes on and on: Thomas Edison, the Wright brothers, Bill Gates, Grey's Anatomy and Six Feet Under. It is very easy to find Americans who disagree with our current direction in world affairs. Guantanamo Bay, the Abu Ghraib prison scandal and yes, so many aspects of the war in Iraq, were big mistakes. They are lamented as much inside the US as outside. Yet I think you'll be hard pressed to come across those who regret its very existence. As Bill Clinton once said, "There is nothing wrong with America that cannot be cured by what is right with America." Next up: Sevilla's new solar thermal power plant. A concrete tower – 40 stories high – stands bathed in intense white light. The rays of sunlight reflected by a field of 600 huge mirrors track the sun and direct its rays to a heat receiver at the top of the tower. The receiver converts concentrated solar energy into steam that in turn drive turbines and thereby generating power. It is Europe's first commercially operating power station using the Sun's energy this way and at the moment its operator, Solucar, proudly claims that it generates 11 Megawatts (MW) of electricity without emitting a single puff of greenhouse gas. This current figure is enough to power up to 6,000 homes. Does't this solar system seem more attractive than power from coal or gas? I wonder if the U.S. has one of this type of solar power plant? At any rate hopefully this idea will catch on, especially in places like Arizona or New Mexico. The vision is of these systems in sun-blessed lands with the power cabled to the drizzlier lands of in the North. |
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