Into the World:
The Random Thoughts in My Mind

The rising importance of "soft power" in modern society is unmistakable and unavoidable . In an era when more deadly weapons and less urgent conflicts make wars among established nations less likely, the battle for supremacy between nations is increasingly shifting to ones dominated by positive image and cultural influence. While one may not feel just how fierce this quiet cultural battle is, when one finds oneself living in the supposed "cultural melting pot" of Europe and America, the issue of cultural interaction and communication becomes a matter of daily life. Yet, occasionally, it is more interesting to see how some cultures do NOT interact, and attempt to stay insular in an otherwise extremely multicultural atmosphere. Instead of "melting in" and mixing with elements of other peoples and customs, the similarly "foreign" cultures imported to a third country may implicitly but surely, battle for influence, both in order to remain true to ...

In a day and age where tens of thousands of well-educated college students go on demonstration to protest the disproportionate amount of global wealth held by the elite "1%," it is glad to see, perhaps a bit ironically, that the very icon of someone, at least in financial profile, leading the pack of the global "one-percenters" is, in fact, receiving a rather pleasant reception from the student population. In his quick, 3-second move from the lecture hall from which his delivered his web-broadcast address to his awaiting black van was anticipated by a massive crowd clicking away on their cameras, waving, and chanting in joy. If there is anything that can be said of Mr Bill Gates' few-hours-long visit to the LSE, it is about just how divisive a term like "1%" really is, even for people who belong solidly in the 1% (such as Mr Gates) or the people who are very likely to belong in the 1% in the near future (the excited LSE students flanking his van and u...

除夕 (Tsu-shee), or the eve of Chinese New Year (春節, "Tsun-jae"), is today, and atmosphere certainly showed on the main street of the London Chinatown. The usual suspects of red lanterns and shops going on New Year sales aside, the crowds filled the street, filling nearly all eateries to the maximum capacity. Not only were the British Chinese present, the tourists from China, as well as non-Chinese British residents and tourists alike congregated to make the red, gold, and people-filled little district quite picturesque in a highly China-esque way. Indeed, on this Year of the Dragon, even the least knowledgeable foreigner with access to a bit of information outlet could not have avoided the bombardment of the Chinese New Year-related activities. On one hand, foreign dignitaries, from the UN secretary to presidents of major powers, have wasted no time courting the favors of Chinese officialdom and people with official new years greeting videos partially done in badly pronounc...

While economically the world continues to live through the uncertain futures of the Great Recession, it seems that in the political front, there are increasingly optimism and hope that the next few years will offer the sort of global conciliation and peace needed to create the stable environment desired for economic growth. Over in the Middle East, the wars of Afghanistan and Iraq finally seems to be drawing to a close, despite the indefinite presence of myriad local ethnic conflicts . The tension with respect to Syria and Iran, while leading to local bloodshed and show of force, has yet to become seriously disruptive on a global scale. Over in Asia, the two traditional hot-spots, Taiwan and Korea, are also somewhat "cooling down" vis-a-vis the major powers involved. The presidential election of Taiwan reaffirmed the strength of forces favoring preservation of economics-focused status quo , much to the relief of Washington and Beijing. And the sudden transfer of (heredit...

Gone are the days when any analyst seeking to get a clear picture of Sino-Taiwanese relations would have to first look into the military aspect. Are the American aircraft carriers going to enter a war in case of mainland invasion, and how much advanced weaponry can the Taiwanese procure to deter the potential invasion, thankfully, are no longer the primary concerns when we address the future developments across the Taiwan Strait. Indeed, even as the PRC government continue to point thousands of missiles at the end, there has been more talks of non-violent means of resolving the decades-old "problem." And the Taiwanese presidential election results published yesterday indicates that on that aspect of toning down the traditional militant stance, both sides are increasingly converging toward a single view. The reelection of "moderate" (at least with regard to China relations) president Ma Ying-jeou shows that the the Taiwanese public, in their current economic inst...

Around Day 27 of my 30-day, 30-country mega-trip across continental Europe , my usual (and often exclusive) source of self-expression, i.e. Facebook account, suddenly was suddenly disabled without prior notice or warning. After contacting the customer service personnel, the account was not reinstated until this morning, nearly a week later from the mysterious suspension. In the mean time, there was a frantic effort to set up and expand other SNS accounts to replace the inflows of readers entering this blog from Facebook. As much as the amazing power of the user-generated contents (UGC) in social networking is confirmed , the propagation of the UGC through cyberspace is by all means quite murky. One can share a link as many times as possible in as many places as possible to get maximum possible exposure of the link among the largest possible group of SNS users, but the fact the link pops up on the front page of everyone's favorite SNS all the time does not guarantee that the link...

All good things have to come to an end, and as I spend my final night here on the Continent awaiting my morning flight to London from Berlin, I still somehow lament the unlikely finale of a trip that was at the same time too long but also in a way a bit too short. Yes, I am ready to go back home, settle down, and get some studying done again, but the accumulation of the many experiences and stories of the road must still be regurgitated, digested, continually reflected, and if anything, requires further reinforcements to prove them to be generally valid rather than simple one-time exceptions. But before I go on, here is the final authoritative list of countries touched and visited on this trip out of London and terminating here in Berlin: (1) France, (2) Belgium, (3) the Netherlands, (4) Germany, (5) Denmark, (6) Norway, (7) Sweden, (8) Finland, (9) Estonia, (10) Latvia, (11) Lithuania, (12) Poland, (13) Ukraine, (14) Moldova, (15) Romania, (16) Bulgaria, (17)Turkey, (18) Greece, (19...

The communist leaders of Eastern Europe had a knack for building monumental structures. From massive office and apartment towers in the style of “Soviet classical realism” to the various sculptures of brave World War II soldiers and anti-Nazi civilians commemorating communist heroism and victory, the architectural vestiges of communism are still very much visible across the East. Yet, in the anti-communist drives of the wildly capitalist post-Cold War atmosphere, many in the East have been busy tearing down these last remainders of their dark past. For some reason, East Berlin proves to be a startling exception to the trend. The communist victory monuments and showpiece TV towers have not only been maintained after the collapse of the East German regime, the government and the people of the united Federal Republic have come to embrace them as symbols of reunification. Unlike in the other parts of the East, the communist past have not been simply and completely denounced in the nega...

The yellow faces come in many forms and many languages, but there is no doubt where they come from. The definite voices of spoken Chinese, Korean, and Japanese echoes through the major tourist sites of the Continent, even, in some broken, ill-pronounced forms, among the local tour guides and shop owners seeking to get some extra businesses from these arrivals from the other side of the world. And the Oriental hordes have made their presence felt. In sheer numbers, a crude observation show them to be just as numerous as, if not more than, visitors from other European countries, much more cheaply and easily reached from these destinations. And the willingness of the Asian hordes to spend and consume at these tourist destinations have completely beat out European tourists. The Asian tourists are snapping up expensive local produce, luxury brands (cheaper than their home countries), and pieces of kitschy souvenirs in quantities inconsistent with the state of the world economy. The Eur...

The international traveler is often keen on comparing the prices of basic commodities among different countries, often as a simple-minded effort to gauge the local standard of living. Here in Europe, the same basic travel necessities a traveler comes across in different countries, such as a bottle of Coke, a kebab, or a bar of soap with the same brand name, happens to fluctuate enormously from country to country, even if the towns of different countries use the same currency and are literally less than an hour away from each other. Massive differences in prices between short physical distances are especially the case across the old “Iron Curtain” between the long capitalist Western Europe and the “transition economies” of the East. In one instance, the traveler snacks on a hot dog and a bottle of diet Coke first in Slovenia, costing him a total of 1.40 Euros. Then the traveler heads to Austria, a couple of hours to the north, and orders the same thing. He is shocked to find that th...

The travel guide books tend to make it clear how difficult it is to travel, even in convenient and relatively safe continent that it Europe. “Even for 3 weeks, travel seems to become...work,” the books say simply. And after personal experiences doing exactly the many things the travel books recommend travelers to do, the travelers would unequivocally agree with the books’ sentiment. But amid the tiresomeness and desperations of continued travel, what becomes more important, upon retrospect, are things that the travelers seem to forget when they are on the road. (1) When the travelers are still energetic at the beginning of the trip, they tend to carefully track their spending and remember to budget for how much to spend every day and each destination. Three weeks later, that financial meticulousness goes out the window as fatigue sets in. The travelers would eat whatever whenever they want; they would stay in much nicer lodging because they cannot be bothered to seek out those che...

Many non-Asians traveling through the less touristy parts of Asia often complains that they receive too much unpleasant and unwanted attention from the locals simply because of skin color. Of course, the source of the attention is justifiably obvious: the locals simply have not come across many foreigners before and are expressing their surprise/curiosity/”joy” of seeing foreigners in ways that the foreigners would consider them rather obnoxious. The Asian travelers, unfortunately, usually do not understand just how unpleasant it is to be on the receiving end of such unwanted attention against foreigners because they tend to always end up in places where Asians faces are common. In Asia, they can blend in as locals. In the West, they can be one of the millions of Asian immigrants. And in popular vacation destinations such as Athens and Istanbul, the foreign crowds, whether it be tourists or businessmen catering to the foreign crowds, are often predominantly Asian. Locals in these ...

Sitting in the city center of Sarajevo, right in front of the bustling main bus and train stations, is one of the most massive gated compounds one could ever imagine in the middle of a city. Surrounded by tall white walls and patrolling armed guards in military uniforms, the compound consisting of three well-maintained concrete towers stretched well over two and a half standard street blocks on what must be some of the most expensive real estate in town. In front of the big entry gate, the golden letters marked “EMBASSY OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA.” One would normally be awed by the sheer size of the buildings, especially considering that this is Bosnia, a country where there is barely any presence of American citizens outside the few, like myself, who drops by from nearby countries to check out the well-preserved ancient townscapes of Sarajevo. But the American representation here in Bosnia is nothing compared to the grand residence of UN and NATO representatives in downtown Pr...