whitebait

pedestrian studies

Pedestrians in Singapore have been crowned the world's fastest movers in a study of cities across the world.

[...]

Scientists say it is symptomatic of a modern life driven by email, text messages and a need to be available 24 hours a day.

[Really? That seems a big leap in causal logic. Why not symptomatic of too many news images of a boring prime minister having his morning power walk? - W.]

[...]

Pedestrians in Singapore were the fastest, walking 30 per cent faster than they did in the early 1990s, and in China, the pace of life in Guangzhou has increased by more than 20 per cent.

The study was carried out with the help of the British Council, which promotes British cultural links with countries around the world.

Researchers in each city found a busy street with a wide, flat pavement, free from obstacles and sufficiently uncrowded to allow people to walk at their maximum speed. They then timed how long it took 35 people to walk 60 feet (18 metres).

They only monitored adults on their own, and ignored anyone on a mobile phone conversation or struggling with shopping bags.

The times, in seconds, recorded in 32 cities across the world are listed below:

1) Singapore (Singapore): 10.55

2) Copenhagen (Denmark): 10.82

3) Madrid (Spain): 10.89

4) Guangzhou (China): 10.94

5) Dublin (Ireland): 11.03

6) Curitiba (Brazil): 11.13

7) Berlin (Germany): 11.16

8) New York (USA): 12.00

9) Utrecht (Netherlands): 12.04

10) Vienna (Austria): 12.06

11) Warsaw (Poland): 12.07

12) London (United Kingdom): 12.17

13) Zagreb (Croatia): 12.20

14) Prague (Czech Republic): 12.35

15) Wellington (New Zealand): 12.62

16) Paris (France): 12.65

17) Stockholm (Sweden): 12.75

18) Ljubljana (Slovenia): 12.76

19) Tokyo (Japan): 12.83

20) Ottawa (Canada): 13.72

21) Harare (Zimbabwe): 13.92

22) Sofia (Bulgaria): 13.96

23) Taipei (Taiwan): 14.00

24) Cairo (Egypt): 14.18

26) Bucharest (Romania): 14.36

27) Dubai (United Arab Emirates): 14.64

28) Damascus (Syria): 14.94

29) Amman (Jordan): 15.95

30) Bern (Switzerland): 17.37

31) Manama (Bahrain): 17.69

32) Blantyre (Malawi): 31.60

OK, so what does the comparison tell us? The longitudinal shift is interesting but ... oh ... who cares, lists are fun!

creatures of the night

[This post was delayed ...]

A couple of nights back Whitebait visited the Singapore Night Safari with some of his teaching crew. For some reason, his expectations weren't that high but we're all still marvelling days later about how terrific the experience was. It was easily Whitebait's best ever zoo experience.

As soon as we arrived we took one of the tram trips (you can explore by a mix of tram and walking loops). Basically the zoo seems incredibly artfully designed in both the interests of the animals and spectators. Thanks to the filtered light and the fecundity of plant life here there is a fairly consistently maintained illusion of no significant barriers between you and most of the animals.The setting--on the edge of a reservoir in the middle of the island--is really atmospheric.

Highlights included:

• the setting: lush tropical forest, the misty atmosphere of which was heightened by some big downpours earlier in the day
• seeing a roster of animals that W. had never heard of nor imagined (eg,  Indian crocodile with a thin snout and knob on the end for males, the mousedeer, the bearded pig, etc)
• a beautiful and endangered animal called a bongo (a forest antelope) The wikipedia entry notes that the 'pigmentation the coat rubs off quite easily with anecdotal reports that rain running off a bongo has been noticed to run red with pigment. ... and we also ate at the Bongo Burger bar!

  

 

• the at least partly deliberate, wacky intonation of the 'tram' tour guide
• the sight of the zoo tram restaurant (yes, there is something more naff than Melbourne's tramcar restaurant!)
• a wildlife show in which Pedro the otter scampered out and sorted paper cups and plastic bottles into the correct recycling bins
• the difference word order makes in this description from the website: 'The tapir drive-through habitat offers guests the enthralling experience of being able to view the elusive creatures at a throw-stone distance'

Only lowlight was a stupid red re-admission stamp that seems to have stained one of my tee-shirts and the classy, life-saving manbag that FrauleinDrDr gave me as a present recently. A small price to pay.

A fantastic and fun experience overall.

be still my beating heart

Spotted at a supermarket in Holland Village (and snapped on Tezza's sexy new Sony Ericsson K800i).

1. An explanatory footnote for those readers outside of Australia - the 'great banana crisis' has been ongoing in Oz for some months following a severe storm/hurricane up north that destroyed many banana plantations. Consequently many mom and pop investors have traded in their telstra shares for this incredibly valuable fruit.
2. A second explanatory note for non-Singaporean readers - pricing here is per 100 grams.
3. A third explanatory note for Australian customs officers - those will not be endangered animals stuffed in my jacket and down my trousers ...

when the kibble hits the fan

OK, Whitebait is posting this because he doesn't have an actual cat (though he would like to be among those who post on such matters), and he just discovered the appealing Get Fuzzy comic strip in the Straits Times last weekend. (Not sure about the grammatical soundness of that previous sentence but do click on the strip below to get enlarged laughs).

arab street

No teaching on Tuesday so after doing some work in the hotel in the morning Whitebait headed out in the afternoon to meet an ex-postgraduate student and blogger, gen x-i, and her friend WC. They very kindly took Whitebait on a fun and informative tour of  the Singapore Art Museum then for a walk around the muslim/Malay quarter of the city (as designated in the colonial planning period). This includes Arab Street and the fashionable Haji Lane (though it possibly comes alive a bit more at night).  A great mix of architecture was seen along the way.

 

*  *  *  *

On a different note ...  Whitebait has been catching up of lots of interesting stuff happening on the legal/political and other fronts in Singapore (either currently or in the not so recent past). Such as:

-first arrest of someone (a 17 year old polytech student) for 'wifi mooching' - that is, being sprung for tapping into someone else's bandwith through their unsecured wifi connection - the maximum penalty is a $10,000 fine and/or 3 years jail.

-decriminalisation of sodomy and oral sex for heterosexuals and lesbians but not gay men.

-the government's Social Development Unit (operating for 22 year as a public dating agency designed to encourage population growth) is reducing its role to vetting private agencies (see gen x-i)

-the Maintenance of Parents act introduced in 1996 allows parents to sue children for not adequately providing for them in their old age.

repetitions and lunch

Hmmm. Was going to post this photo from my Singapore hotel room (Whitebait is back here teaching for two weeks) ...

Then Whitebait realised that he posted something almost identical the last time he was here. A bit sad and predictable that. Actually, he has been doing a lot of the same things this time round ... the same lectures on popular culture, same oversampling of good hotel breakfasts, same answering work emails, same noting of the tom wolfe guy who is at breakfast most mornings, same drinking far too many g & ts, same eating fine fish curry in little india, same marvelling after a week at the heat rash that first appears on my foot and moves up my leg ... and it's pretty, well, OK. He knows he should get out and about and see some of those parts of the island-city-state he hasn't encountered but the time has gone by very fast and there is still the recovery from a cold to deal with. It's a bit embarrassing in class as I'll be talking away and suddenly there my voice moves into some delirious honky quality and I make a face like a flying fish who has hasn't landed back in the ocean but on the beach instead. 

So, instead, given that it has been a lazy Sunday afternoon let me insert a photo of one of my few purchases in Tokyo where W. came here from. Am really pleased with these lunch boxes. Two compartments and microwave and dishwasher safe. The green one doesn't have the built-in chopsticks and holder but I liked the size and that it reminds you on top to 'Please be happy all the time'. These objects do make Whitebait feel content.

photo stats

Just noticed during the upload of some Sydney photos that my typepad host has separate stats for photo albums. For no other reason besides the fact that Whitebait is bloggin' (relatively speaking) like a madman at the moment ... here are the numbers of page loads associated with each album.

5678  - Chicago
371    - Singapore
344   -  Hiroshima
300    - Tokyo
242    - Yokohama
205    - Nagasaki
180    - Kyoto
102   -  Osaka

How interesting! (for Whitebait anyway). The Chicago album has been up the longest time but the number compared to the others is still suprising (especially given that these are mostly architecture photos that aren't particularly brilliant). Go windy city!

skylines

A recent post saw Whitebait misreading Myrick at Asiapundit and initially missing a great link to Diserio's 'Top 15 Skylines in the World'. It is the kind of list that makes grown anal-retentive bloggeurs go weak at the knees.

His list (including excellent images):
1. Hong Kong
2. Chicago
3. Shanghai
4. New York City
5. Tokyo
6. Singapore
7. Toronto
8. Kuala Lumpur
9. Shenzen
10.Seoul
11. Sao Paolo
12. Sydney
13. Frankfurt
14. Dubai
15. Seattle

Well, Whitebait certainly agrees on his number one and the top four overall. But to W's mind, New York should go to number two, Shanghai three and Chicago fourth. Tokyo, as readers will know, is a much beloved city for Whitebait but it doesn't rank as highly for this bloggeur in the skyline stakes. The dispersion of its skyline into multiple nodes produces a different kind of urban effect that almost takes it out of a consideration of 'skylines' in the conventional sense (though the view from the Rainbow Bridge is outstanding). In a different way places like Rome and Paris, which have sublime cityscapes, are similarly ineligible for this list. But that is a discussion for another post.

Back to the list then.  Sydney seems a bit hard done by here and to Whitebait's mind should probably pip SIngapore. As for the rest ... erm, he isn't sure as he hasn't had a chance to visit those cities and assess yet. Research funding offers welcomed.

BTW, he is not meaning to damn with faint praise when he says if we were to start a 'boutique skyline' list, Whitebait would be nominating Brisbane (viewed from Storey Bridge) as a top contender. It is certainly the best Australian city skyline after Sydney. Biggest ain't necessarily the most impressive.

the expatriate asian life -singapore pips tokyo

Mercer Human Resource Consultants have released their 2006 report on 'Managing Quality of Living for Expatriates'. Normally a mention of consultants would prompt Whitebait to spew forth invective about what is wrong with contemporary management and economic practices blah, blah,  but on this occassion he makes an exception because this tantalizing report offers a  detailed city comparison. Tantalizing, mostly in the sense that you have to part with huge wads of cash in order to actually get hold of the whole report. But what is there on Mercer's site as a teaser is worth reproducing in part (via Asiapundit and Iz).

The report is based on '39 key Quality of Living determinants'. ( Besides usual suspects like transport infrastructure, health services and so on, one of these determinants is evidently the quality of the skyline. Good call!  Whoops - misread Asiapundit's post)

Singapore overtakes Tokyo as the top Asian city, moving into 34th position. Despite Singapore's gain, Japan remains the strongest Asian country with the next eight Asian cities based there. Hong Kong (68th) breaks that run, and China's top city is Shanghai (103rd), falling one place. In India, the top cities are Mumbai and New Delhi (both 150th). Indian city rankings are improving slowly due to India's improving political relationships with other countries. Also, local authorities in India are feeling pressure from multinationals who want to locate there to improve quality of living standards.

Elsewhere round the globe:

Zurich, Geneva, Vancouver and Vienna remain the top scoring cities on the Quality of Living index, with all four cities improving on last year's index rating. One of this year's biggest improvements has been in Chicago, rising 11 places to 41 from 52. This significant rise has been attributed to a decreasing crime rate in the city.

Am not sure if Melbourne was even part of the study. This is of interest due to the continuing marketing of W's home due to its past very strong performance in a different 'World's Most Liveable City' index.

music and the rest

Whitebait doesn't usually do 'what I did on the weekend' kinds of posts but sometimes a change is good so here is a grab-bag of the things, erm, grabbing his attention over the last few days:

-Finished David Mitchell's Cloud Atlas earlier last week. Here is an A.S.Byatt review of it - but it is an unecessary read really and probably a whole lot better if you just go and get this book if you haven't already read it.  The most exciting and gripping book Whitebait has read for years. Anyway, so W. went on a mission on the weekend to get some new reading. Ended up with Mitchell's first book, Ghostwritten,  and Delia Falconer's The Lost Thoughts of Soldiers (which W. has been meaning to get for ages - is true D, if you happen to be reading!).

-Got a plug from the talented and funny 'l'nfantile terrible of Singapore' himself, MrBrown, who quoted a recent comment by Whitebait to the effect that he is an 'A-grade gear slut'. I hasten to add, dear readers, that this was in fact a compliment to Mr B. (In fact I'm hoping to use Mr B's famous name to help me with the speedy replacement of an external hard drive, purchased at Singaporean electronics mecca Sim Lim Square, which soon after died - 'yeah, Mr Brown say you replace or else he will go to Funan IT mall'). Mr B used your bloggeur's compliment (yes, really) as a nice anecdotal beginning to a satiric column in Today (Whitebait may have to go into transnational competition with MrBrown's frequent partner in blogging crime, Mr Miyagi, whose tagline used to read (just noticed!) 'as spoken about in the Sydney Morning Herald' but is now the equally droll  'Miyagi.SG: We don’t talk about the elections here'. Whitebait in the City - as mentioned [in] Today. Excellent.

-Celebrated FrauleinDrDr's birthday in a very low key but lovely way with a trip to the Vic markets and some breakfast at the nearby Piazza Vittoria cafe (an old standby on a Saturday morning). Had to come home and do some journal entry marking for work but felt more relaxed once that was polished off.

-Went with FrauleinDrDr to The Empress on Saturday night to catch workmate M. who is the driving force behing Koshowko who were playing support for winduptoys (another member of the fabulous Clan Analogue, an Australian electronic music collective). Koshowko  (featuring two performers that night) was outstanding and it was inspiring to hear a combo of laptop, synth, saxaphone and flute working so well. Yay for local live music of this calibre. But have sent M./Koshowko an email about the quote on his home page about music writing, dancing and architecture as W. suspects it was Elvis Costello rather that Frank Zappa. Am hoping he doesn't find that too querulous.

-Bought a copy of Lotek Hifi's Mixed Blessings album after watching a great one hour 'in-the-studio-making-a-track' with Wayne 'lotek' Bennett. The album is a real grower - like it a lot. Bennett is a charming guy who you can imagine it would be great to hang out with and talk about geek-boy computer music stuff and old movies. His best gear story was about a mission 5.1 centre speaker he picked up for a one pound because the store owner thought they usually came in pairs. The interview was on a dvd that came with a music-making mag purchased on Friday.

-Inspired by general music vibe in the air spent most of Sunday working on the first co-written original track with FrauleinDrDr. And it sounds respectable and listenable he thinks. Will take a couple of weeks work but will post it here eventually to get some feedback. Have had the luxury of a spare room to set up a studio space since return from Japan and it has a great vibe. Gratuitous and pointless photos coming soon.

-Also, a link arrived from Whitebait's good Japaneses friend K (I will write soon K - I promise!) to a video featuring his friend and all round nice guy, Ami, who is a Tokyo dj and producer in the psy/trance scene. Whitebait was fortunately enough to meet Ami and hear him play when living there (a favourite was a set of old japanese pop tunes from the 70s that Ami played in a tatami-matted chill space - a perfect surface for dancing in bare feet). Even better yet, Ami had the extraordinary patience late one night in a Shibuya cafe to work directly on a Whitebait track and to not laugh but to instead offer a few invaluable tips about getting the bass and kick working together.  Anyway, Ami also has a background as a vocalist and here he is in an extraordinarily hybrid track from Israeli trance crew Skazi's and their  'Hit and Run'. Ami looks pretty tough and scary here (he has some great Japanese tattoos) but, be reassured, he is a lovely guy and actually rather dapper-looking in person.

Enough already.