Spending Time

My colleague Undi has an interesting hobby, if you can call it that. I have teased him as a person who has prioritas tidak jelas (unclear priority), with a peculiar inkling towards books especially in their handling.

Like most people who love books, he can’t resist from buying books. Yet unlike most people who love books, he worships books to the extent that he would copy his own books and read the copies instead. For treasured books, he would scan them, save them in his external hard drive, print copies of the scan, and read the copies.

I asked him this morning why he would bother doing that, considering the time and effort it takes. He said it’s mainly for safekeeping. In case all his books burn down, he still have multiple copies, both soft and hard. Hard core obsession if you ask me.

But then this remind me of a comment another friend made after reading my blog recently. He said that I should be spending the time instead to read journals to extend my own learning, which is what he would do in his spare time.

Same finite spare time, different choices. I guess we all have some obsessions which others would find peculiar, or simply a waste of time. Does it mean some people value their time more than others? Or is the way we spend our time reflect our values in life?

Bottomless Pit

Flood in Bandung. More ferry and plane accidents. Sigh.

Had lunch with Head of Outreach from a well-known educational foundation that conducted teacher trainings, distributed scholarships, etc. Asked him how they go about selecting the schools to target their teacher training programs, and how the responses are.

It hasn’t been easy. Most teachers and headmasters would rather not get any programs running in their schools. Extra programs mean extra work. There is no need to further their own knowledge. As is, they are content. Have a nice, easy life. Why bother?

Sigh.

How long can one go before they hit absolute bottom and realize that it’s time to change? Or is it a bottomless pit?

On Eating Habits

Recently I’ve been working on a survey for a continuation of this study. My colleagues and I are interested in how we can infer a person’s habit in delaying instant gratification. I came up with this idea that since some people would eat their best meal last, wouldn’t it reflect their behavior in saving the best for last?

This naive idea was soon dropped out of the survey as in a quick survey with family and friends, it became apparent that eating habit did not really reflect anything about delaying instant gratification. But there are more interesting findings.

My sister and I both would save the best bite for last. My brother also has this tendency, but his pattern is more carefully planned. In eating a plate of various foods, he would sample all, eat the least tasteful, then the better one, back to the least tasteful before diving into his last very tasteful bite.

My friend Fendelina would eat the best bite first until she is satisfied, and then move on to the least tasteful. When she’s full, she would stop eating. Ferdinand would eat according to his mood. Sometimes it’s saving the best for last meal, other times it’s the reverse, and still others he would eat based on the visual appeal of the foods on his plate. He also mentions that he always plan how he would eat his meal, which is strange considering he is probably the most laissez-faire person I know.

Kayee would eat her meal according to the practicality of eating. She usually starts with food she can eat using only a fork, then a fork and a spoon, and last the one she needs to dig her fingers into.

What is your eating habit? What do you think it entails?

The City: Whose Responsibility?

On Monday, Institute for Ecosoc Rights (Ecosoc) organized a workshop on public participation in urban planning, inviting various stakeholders of Jakarta from citizens, professionals, academics, activists, and government officials. A brief summary of the workshop was covered in this Kompas article [1].

What I found interesting from the workshop was the comments that were brought up by the audience. The participants representing stakeholders of the city were skeptical and defensive of each of their roles in the city.

Academics and researchers questioned Ecosoc’s decision to use Bangkok as comparison instead of other best practices from within Indonesia, mentioning Jakarta as the more diverse and complex case, and the fact that Bangkok’s culture and political system was different than Jakarta’s. Does it mean that comparative studies can’t be useful? Does it mean that Jakarta is utterly hopeless?

Activists and community representatives mentioned that most members of the urban poor community didn’t know how they could participate, and most of them were not interested to participate until they were encountered by problem such as eviction. Does it mean they can’t be informed? Does it mean they can’t understand the importance of civil society?

Government officials on the other hand said that most members of the community were so used to being colonized that they had mentality that would make it difficult to progress. Well, does it mean that the government can’t do anything to educate the community?

Two issues could be underlined. Firstly is that most of Jakarta’s stakeholders would rather avoid taking responsibility and ownership of the problem of the city. Most would rather blame it on other parties, rather than thinking what each could do to contribute. Secondly, the feeling of distrust exists among different stakeholders. Where would you start?

Added:
[1] Note that I wasn't aware there was a journalist in the audience. He did not interview me and I can't remember saying the words within the quotation marks. All that was written in the article was just the journalist's own interpretation. Another example of bad journalism?

The Value of Lives in a Flat World

A child in Morocco, his life ended by gunshots.
A Japanese teenage girl, drowned by her own sorrowful thoughts.

Babel. Alejandro Gonzales Inarritu's.

The American couple was saved by a U.S. helicopter from a remote Moroccan village.
Their Mexican nanny was soon deported from the U.S.

What is the value of a life?
Is it depend on we the living?
Or on them who govern nations and decide upon how much lives should be valued?

Bono in his introduction to Jeffrey Sachs' “The End of Poverty”:

“… the idea of equality. What is happening in Africa mocks our pieties, doubts our concern, and questions our commitment to that whole concept. … Deep down, if we really accept that their lives – African lives – are equal to ours, we would all be doing more to put the fire out. It’s an uncomfortable truth.”

A shooting incident that linked them all.
Inarritu’s way of interpreting and representing the world that to Thomas Friedman is flat?

And Jeffrey Sachs’ own words:

“Am I an optimist? Optimism and pessimism are beside the point. The key is not to predict what will happen, but to help shape the future.”

Navigating Space with Poor Signs (1 of 2)

It’s been a while since I passed through Meruya in West Jakarta until the other day when I found that the otherwise straight route now has two additional detours. The first detour enforces vehicles to turn left into a side street right into a housing area and before turning left again to reach the main street. The second detour enforces vehicles to turn left again, makes a U-turn before turning left again to reach the main street. Along with a previously existing detour, now when you passed through the main street, you would have to detour three times with a total distance of a kilometer or two.

I am not going to complain about the shortcut regulations again here. But as I was trying to ignore my growing anxiety of being lost in an unknown area so I wouldn’t lose my orientation towards the main street, it suddenly dawned on me why I dislike detours in Jakarta. It’s because most of them only have one sign pointing towards the direction of the detour, and then no other signs could be found to direct you back to where you want to go in the first place. It wouldn’t be a big deal if the streets are laid out in grid or if you have good sense of orientation. But otherwise, I’m sure you’d agree with me that it’s not easy to navigate ourselves in Jakarta in an unfamiliar area, and especially if there happen to be some detours in the area.

A phrase from Learning from Las Vegas makes perfect sense in relation to this:

“A driver 30 years ago could maintain a sense of orientation in space. At the simple crossroad a little sign with an arrow confirmed what was obvious. One knew where one was. When the crossroads becomes a cloverleaf, one must turn right to turn left, … [but] the driver has no time to ponder paradoxical subtleties within a dangerous, sinuous maze. He or she relies on signs for guidance – enormous signs in vast spaces at high speeds.” [1]

And where are those signs in Jakarta?


Note
[1] Venturi, Scott-Brown & Izenour, "Learning from Las Vegas", MIT Press, 1977:9.

Jakarta’s Flood: Monument to National Embarrassment

Over the past week, as I watch and read the news of Jakarta’s flood, I couldn’t help feeling helpless and hopeless for this country. First it’s the reactions of the victims, and second it’s the reactions of the governments.

Most of the victims, rather than getting very angry towards the government for not taking responsibility of the flood, are pasrah - accepting with a sense of helplessness and waiting for help to come. The second majority are the opportunists, who, rather than helping the victims, are taking advantage of the situation to get extra income. Within this opportunists group are those who help the victims in order to get media exposure for political or commercial. And the minorities (in comparison with the population) are those who try to help themselves and help others for humanity’s sake.

I’m hoping these are simply because the immensity of the disaster is such that delayed reactions could only be expected. Or perhaps the media coverage simply has focused on the more appealing part of the events.

Then it’s the reactions of the governments, who literally ‘blame it on the rain’ and/or on other departments, onto which they have no control over. Sure, who would want to risk losing their political seats when they can get away without doing so. By them my deepest despair is caused.

At least the central government now seems to have plans in the forms of offering transmigration and public housing for the poor. Despite the fact that transmigration and public housing have been highly criticized due the more problems they caused rather than solved, the plans show some kind of political will in solving the problem. But why they keep doing things that don’t work is beyond my understanding.

The complexity of the problem – ranging from management of land zoning and development, control of environmental issues, waste and drainage management, planning and building regulations – from regional to neighborhood scale, need long term and integrated planning that can’t be solved by simply moving people away from the city. If anything could be learned by the government from this disaster is that they should no longer take shortcuts in solving the problem.

Rate of Change

We all know that the world is changing. But have you ever thought about how fast is the rate of change? A presentation at “Creativity or Conformity? Creativity in Higher Education” Conference at University of Wales Institute Cardiff, by Rodney Hill, professor in Teaching Excellence at Texas A & M University, got me thinking:

By 2014, your iPod will hold the contents of the Library of Harvard University.
By 2017, your iPod will contain the US Library of Congress.
The twentieth century alone features more turning points in the history of mankind than the previous five centuries put together.
At the 2007 rate of change, the entire 20th Century would take place in 25 years.

Half of what students learn in their freshman year about the cutting edge of science and technology is obsolete, revised, or taken for granted by their senior year.
A third of the jobs that will be available in 2015 have essentially not been invented yet.
Two thirds of the jobs that will be available in the world by 2020 haven’t been invented yet!
In less than 20 years, the majority of college graduates will be working at jobs that
don’t even exist today!

“In just the space of a few years, we went from competing with firms down the street to competing with firms across the globe. Our core competence and focus is now on all those things that cannot be digitized.” (The World is Flat, Thomas Friedman)
Knowledge Creators are the only people whose jobs cannot be outsourced.

The person that cannot understand and accept the possibility that their discipline or domain might come to a sudden end will not fare well in the 21st century.

Maybe my questioning of architectural practice is justifiable after all :) For Rodney Hill’s full paper, click here.