On China

This is a post that will hopefully keep getting updated and republished as I learn more (and correct my earlier knowledge).

One of the big new things that I've been exposed to here is all things Chinese.

One of the 'aha' moments in that matter has been, that China is a significant portion of the ethnic origin of many countries around it. Singapore of course is 75% ethnic Chinese, Malaysia has a significant minority, Thailand has a significant minority (though the Chinese component has now assimilated deeply and is not so distinct, for eg. in the names. Many Thai PMs including Thaksin Shinawatra have some Chinese in their blood).  Indonesia has a 1% which is relatively small but a decent chunk of numbers. Will update as I find info about other countries too. And looking wider there are significant Chinese pockets in many major cities, Los Angeles, San Francisco and so on. The point is that it must give a great deal of national confidence to see your spread and impact outside your borders. It must give you a different almost paternalistic perspective on the world or atleast portions of it (the mothership kind of thing).
In contrast India has precious little such populations. And interestingly, where there are such populations they are Tamil! Sri Lanka, Singapore and Malaysia. (Though no doubt the Andhraites will soon form a significant minority in the US.)

Another fairly simple fact that I didn't know, is the way Chinese write their names, the family name or last name comes first. Lee Kuan Yew for eg. , Lee is the family name. I haven't yet found out how the other two names work, if one of them is a 'primary' first name or what. Sometimes the Chinese take on a 'Western' name , and then they write their name like so 'Rebecca Lee' .

Kishore Mahbubani's 2nd Dean's Lecture, this time together with Prof Khong Yuen Foong on "Eternal Lessons of Geopolitics".  This one left me cold. I find International Relations and geopolitics distasteful. All this discussion of great powers and national interests while there is a body count every day in different parts of the world. I'm sure we would have a different world if each class on international relations was preceded by a moment of silence for everybody who got killed or injured or displaced that day in the international conflict du jour. After the talk I made a muted attempt to communicate my position with Prof Khong. He responded very quickly on the lines : "You do social policy right, international relations people in your country keep you safe so you do do your stuff". Touche I suppose.

The photos were taken with digital zoom hence the distortion and halo effects.

This week's photos

 Sleeping Buddha

'Snow Ice' - A Chinese Dessert 

 Official photo for the LKY website etc... Looking like a bureaucrat

Talk by Prof Rohan Samarajiva on "ICT Impacts In Developing Asia: What we know and what we need to know" .

I didn't have particular strong takeaways from it, which reinforces my general bearishness on ICT for Development ..

Institute of Water Policy research seminar. "Putting Women in Charge: Examining Gender Differences in Quality of Water Services Delivery", a paper  by Namrata Chindarkar and Yvonne Jie Chen, Assistant Professors at the School. They surveyed  borewell maintenance services in villages in Gujarat and found that quality of service was better in those that were serviced by women borewell mechanics. And this had the double benefit of freeing up more time of women in these villages so that they could engage in more income generating activities.  

A talk by author John Burgess on his book "Temple in the Clouds", about the conflict between Thailand and Cambodia over a Buddhist temple on their border, Preah Vihear.
http://www.amazon.com/Temple-Clouds-Faith-Conflict-Vihear/dp/6167339546

Its a privilege to have access to these kind of talks that very quickly inform you about a topic that you didn't even know existed ('didn't know that you didn't know') and in addition fill out some detail on the larger  South East Asian story. This talk was particularly romantic and poignant.

Preah Vihear -  would this have come from "Priya Vihara" ?

I'm taking a course this semester from Drs. Asit Biswas and Cecilia Tortajada  on Water Governance and Policy. 

Robert Wasson of the Institute for Water Policy spoke on the 2013 Uttarakhand disaster; there's a research paper forthcoming. 

Kishore Mahbubani talked to us today on "Why Mr. Lee Kuan Yew Succeeded?".  According to him it was "Meritocracy", "Pragmatism", "Honesty". And a strong dose of 'cunning' ; LKY was the most astute politician he had ever seen. Many more interesting vignettes: how the Hong Kong billionaire Li Ka Shing made a $100 Million donation to the School, and that 80% of the bottom 20% economic strata of Singapore own their own home - a signal achievement. How one of the key elements of pragmatism for Singapore has been copying the best of other countries. He claimed that Deng Xiaoping learnt something from Singapore and some Chinese classmates were not amused :-) . 

Comparing cultures

My sister asked me today if I preferred Singapore to the US and I didn't have an answer but it set me thinking. Singapore is like a busy buzzing place, people running around making good things, running countless retail shops, good quality, good design, pleasant, keeping the MRT (Mass Rapid Transit) going etc. The US brings to mind individualism and a self-destructive streak ,great creativity and achievement, all the attitude and ego and drug addition. One surmises that Lee Kuan Yew really could not handle the nihilism of the drug culture that he saw in the West and hence the draconian anti-drug laws in Singapore. It scared him at some deep level.
And what to say about India in comparison to the above ?

In the profusion of cuisines that is Singapore, one particular dish stood out for me (in my limited exploration). This was the Japanese  counter at the food court in the Lee Kuan Yew School. They serve a noodle soup with slices of pork that is so clean and refined, and other little details about the experience work too. I will maybe write a post and put up a photo of that later, but the reason I bring it up here, is that Japan is another distinct cultural stream. I would love to go there and experience it,