Exploring New York @ May 2013

Brooklyn / Will.i.amsburg

Just forget it.


Wait, wait, there is something to say, in case you are a sensitive soul, do not read this.
Brooklyn's Williamsburg is achieving an altitude of cultural hegemony within the Non-Manhattan-scene-propaganda which a good reason to get afraid or angry.
A chain reaction was following those reports in mass media between 2005 and 2010, that had reported on  Williamsburg as a interesting place beyond Manhattan's long term cultural ruling times. Yes, indeed, Williamsburg has been interesting. Many people went there. many people experienced nice streets with some bars, clubs, bakeries, boutiques and hotels. The chain reaction mentioned above came after a the huge body of copy-and-paste-journalism and it was produced by the Williamsburg folks. Travelling there often for many years, I have to state that this fame is not in a reciprocal relation to the real "realities" on Williamsburg. Either in the media conveyed reality or in the real world on "streets" the first and foremost phenomenon which one is encountering is a bunch of  overbearance, cockiness and hubris personified in young, explicitly bearded men with very slim trousers and a non-achievable niveau of sophistication.
The real and measurable outcome of cultural values, economic dynamics,  scientific knowledge or even, because often proclaimed, of their "creativity" is merely low.
Williamsburg is, evidently and obviously, a low intensity area in regard to  cultural values, economic dynamics, scientific knowledge and creativity.
It is, clearly, a high noisy ara: noise in the sense of physical noise (Rauschen) and in the sense of being just too loud. Implicitly echoing to it self.

 Ok, just forget it.     

Exploring New York @ May 2013

Bowery and NoLiTa are getting more mature.

In terms of cool urban places that offer a variety of subtle and small zones of comfort, no one beats NoLiTa. It 's just beautiful. It's a vision of city in the very European understanding: CafĂ©s are (almost) European, the coffee is (almost) Italian, the bakeries are (almost) German and Austrian, groceries are (almost) Dutch or French. And I hope, indeed, they never became entirely European, the notion of being almost something is the most attractive thing about NoLiTa. 

Exploring New York @ May 2013

NY's Lower East Side is gentrifying, hell, why not?


China Twon is still, now for years, as I could remember, a well defined 3rd world enclave within the turbulences of gentrification, velocity, digital revolutions, big money, big data and big media.

Still, folks in China Town are wearing the same clothes they wore in the time of arrival. An arrival that could have been happened in 70ies, 90ies or three years ago. It does really not matter, when they came to NY, or why they chose NY as "exile", they work hard, as they did in other places, they earn their own money, and, indeed, they reject any kind of symbolic, representational or material assimilation with non-China-Town areas of NY or other urban epicenters of USA.

Still, folks in  China Town have similar habits on streets in regard to body movements, direct contact, noise production, symbolic gestures, wearing clothes, combing hairs, and looking people in the eyes; they had previously somewhere else. A subtle charm, a curious and distant gaze, and, more interestingly, a shameless ignorance of the surroundings.

I liked  China Town very much, and the people there. Their cool resilience, their calm resistance, their altruistic 3rd world charm and the look.

Exploring New York @ May 2013

Again, NY is a marvelous place to be

In-transit BKK to Singapore

It's actually all about temporal dynamics, spatial density and probably about a 

pressing drill of modernitĂ©. Asian cities are supposed to be the laboratory, where 

times is compressed and space is extended vertically.

Exploring Asia @ Spring 2013


Bangkok  @ March 2013

Since cities, specially southern and southeastern Asian cities, have become epicenters of cultures in all their variety;  economic hubs, places of enhancement of communication and inducing mobility, it is obvious that the way of life and all those modes of exchange and channels  of communication within these giving geographic areas we call city are supposed to be determined by the very URBAN specifics.

BKK is not merely the "dream city" of youth and aged subpopulations originating from  rural areas of Thailand, who may move transiently or permanently to the city, in order to receive education, to find work, to be included in the society, thus to enhance the standard of life. Some move back, the vast majority, still, stay in the city for longer times than planned.  The recent fresh air, encompassing minor changes in the political arena, the decrease of administrative power of military, mirco reforms of the legislative and executive organs; and especially, the rise of a middle class with a solid educational background acquired in USA, UK, Japan or India is correlating systematically with the increasing financial potency,  has caused basic tectonic movements in Thailand. The epicenter of the tectonic moves has always been BKK. The wave of critically acclaimed social organisations founded in the last decade, the impact and the radius of their cultural influence and with special regard to their mass media transmitted color coded visibility (yellow shirts, pink shirts) in Asia and abroad, seem to cause sub-terrain chain reactions within the politics and in the realm of the urban cultures. This, will change BKK's economic functions and cultural impetus, respectively.
 

Retrospectively seen, BKK has been for long time, at least in the last three decades, a classic touristic destination  for the small but economically potent group of upper society of India, Bangladesh, Pakistan, Indonesia and other Asian countries.

Here, the situation has been changing more forcefully and with a unseen velocity than the internal Thai  developments would have made it imaginable.

First, the emerging economies of Southern Asia since end of eighties, creating new classes and social groups, inducing new exchange cultures and communicative streams in the region; has been producing a strong push in the region. Thailand, and its economic hub, BKK, got affected positively by this dynamics. The Thai economy has been triggered in the same direction as they were in Singapore, Taiwan, Malaysia, Philippines and Indonesia.

Second, the rapid explosion of the Chinese economy since mid nineties, influenced the region and the the world. Almost everything has been said on this topic.

Third, India is awaking. To date, March 2013, 15 % of the population could be defined as a middle class by economic parameters, re-directing cultural and social criteria in the subcontinent and in Asia.
Indian people have immigrated in large groups to BKK since mid seventies, importing not just special skills and knowledge, but huge cultural influence. The new Indian middle class needs simultaneously new fields for expanding business and for selling goods made in India, they need also places for vacation and consumption. This is, how BKK is getting more Indian, than ever before.

Fourth, since the tourism from Golf states has been long time a productive factors for local BKK business in terms of consumption, the context of involvement of Arabs is changing now from the passive consumption to active business in real state, light industries and service industries.  This means, again, more cultural impact in the realm of the daily life and increasingly in the mass media.

Fifth, the russians are coming. Massively.

Not to forget, the Japanse highly appreciated invasion of the high-end luxury hotels, restaurants and SPA's.

Last but not least, new and old riches from Iran or West African countries, as well low income immigrants looking for work or any kind of social activities from these regions, have become a factor in BKK: visible and involved.

BKK is becoming a global hub, a paradox hybrid, geographically condensed in the urban spatiality, determined by mobility and communication technologies and strategies, culturally diversified in a unimaginable way.
Gone are days of Britisch clubs and middle age English men with Arsenal shirts and Gin and tonic. Gone are nights of American tourist groups, made of Vietnam war veterans, getting nostalgic for those lost memories.

BKK is hosting forty-something Japanese business men in larger quantities than ever in a marvelous place simulating little Tokyo, but, in real, better than Tokyo, BKK is hosting  fifty-something Japanese women in super luxurious hotels haunting for European Farangs, hotels they dream of in Kyoto and Osaka, but dreams are becoming reality in BKK. It is transporting thousands of Russian guests from the deep cold Siberia through the city, which are evidently suffering the heat and smiles and touching density. BKK is home of large families from Golf states, feeling good at Soi 1-3 Sukhumvit, listening the Egyptian music telling stories of pain of all those days gone lost. West African magicians, Iranian basar entrepreneurs, Turkish DJ's are in BKK present, representing attitudes, desires, expectations, nightmares and multiple futures.
And, yes, I admit, you also find all those backpackers from Berlin, Barcelona and Poznan, who really did not get anything from this global city and its unconditional beauty.




Bangkok  @ March 2013

At the bright day, BKK is merely a victim of different shades of gray. The sky is gray and tired, the light falling from sky is at its best colorless, if not clearly gray differential. And it is obviously obliged to be, nothing more. Major urban infrastructures, determining the city, as they are buildings, this endless silhouette of skyscrapers, seem to reflect the grayness of the sky. All those highways, navigating cars and sky trains, do the same. In spite of being dynamic, rapid, noisy, dirty and unbearable hot, BKK is bored at the day.

At the night BKK starts to live. Sky is playing a magic game of colors, starting at late afternoon, aiming to reach the beautiful dark purple and  later the absolute noire. BKK is awaking at night, which is always a long night, starting 7PM till 6Am. 

The first color game of the early and short evening lasts just  45 minutes. It‘s a rush, an obscene move toward darkness, without any warning. A game, which is played almost everyday with a recurrent image and a recognizable pattern. One may be cautious not to oversee the first change away from day gray to a spectrum of red-based colors, darkening toward the real night. Watching the game from a higher point than the ground, seeing the entire sky and not just a small outlook, let‘s say, from the roof at Lebua building or like today from the roof of Baiyoke Sky Hotel (82 fl) 



Bangkok  @ March 2013

Bangkok is noir. 



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Hongkong @ March 2013

Arriving in HKK is inducing good feelings. The avant-garde of Asian tigers, the most greedy tiger at all.


Hongkong @ March 2013

HKK is quite. 

Buenos Aires @ Feb. 2012

What is the hypothesis?

By chance or as they called it in early days by destiny, they have been three men having lived in this city for a significant period of their live in Buenos Aires (BA), who have had an immense influence on material history of the last century: 

First and most important the writer Jorge Luis Borges who was attempting to re-write the history of BA by means of histories and stories, which evidently induced an persisten way of understanding BA by its inhabitants, connoisseurs, admirers and travelers. His poems and stories on BA seem to be today the most read texts on BA. Otherwise,  Jorge Luis Borges re-oriented the weigh and re-directed the significance of writing on time, eternity and the language in a global scale. 

Hypothesis nr. 1 is as following: Jorge Luis Borges '  writing is the most noble art of sublation of time and temporality by means of his "intelectual poetry", a way to go against the time, and against the claim of eternity. His language is a global and globalized langage, before all these term have been used in main stream meta-media; and it is, indeed, deterritorializing dreams and phantasmagories of mankind.

Hypothesis nr. 2 is as following: Diego Armando Maradona' s play was the most noble art of sublation of laws Sublation of laws of physics (gravity, aerodynamics, velocity), of biology (mass, metabolism, movement) and of geometry (spaciality, density)  by his football skills, which transcended the "normal". His physis, his spirit, and his indefinit ignorance seemed to neglect any kwon and established way of movement on the field. His body language has been globalized, thus he became the most popular and beloved player of his and of all times, and it was, indeed, the first mode of deterritorializing dreams and phantasmagories of millions.

Hypothesis nr. 3 is as following: Ernesto Guevara de la Serna 's adventures have merely been the expression of a noble art of sublation of death and dying by means of going voluntary into the death, where it expected him.



Buenos Aires @ Feb. 2012

Buenos Aires @ Feb. 2012


Did Ernesto Guevara de La Serna have any feelings for this town?

Buenos Aires @ Feb. 2012

Buenos Aires @ Feb. 2012

Does Diego Armando Maradona dislike or hate  this town and his bourgeoisie?

Buenos Aires @ Feb. 2012

Buenos Aires @ Feb. 2012

Did Jorge Luis Borges made up this town out his phantasmagories?

Buenos Aires @ Feb 2012



Buenos Aires @ Feb. 2012

Tracing those ghosts and demons of BA, who evidently influence inversely the destiny of this city:

Jorge Luis Borges
Diego Armando Maradona
Ernesto Guevara de la Serna

Expecting a specific spirituality in terms of the magic of BA: "santisima trinidad" der BoMaGe I am walking through the streets of Recoleta, Palermo.



Buenos Aires @ Feb. 2012

BA is an illusion.

Many places from mid 2011 till end 2012

Just no intention to write down anything on this blog from 2011 November till December 2012 (may be later I just transfer text from paper to the blog)


2011

2011 November in Shanghai



2012

2012 April in Barcelona again (ESTRO 2012)

2012 June in Chicago (ASCO 2012)

2012 July  in Hongkong, Shanghai, Nanjing

2012 summer vacation August: London (3d) and New York  (12 d)

2012  October in Florence and Verona

2012 November in Fukuoka and Tokyo