extended character set (11. 953)

Finding the diglossia between written and spoken Japanese and Chinese languages to be a highly engrossing topic, we really appreciated being directed to this essay on what’s been termed “character amnesia”—coined and studied by our friend Victor Mair from Language Log for the past decade—from the universal and age-old lapse called ‘lift the pen and forget the character’ (提笔忘字, tíbǐwàngzì). Given over thirteen-thousand glyphs (four-thousand required for basic proficiency) and the relatively high learning-curve, various attempts (with varied success and reception) have been instituted for reform—<from the introduction of an alphabetic script to character simplification, reducing the complexity and number of brushstrokes, though literacy rates for mainland China and Hong Kong, Taiwan and Macao (that maintain the classical characters) are about the same. Hanyu Pinyin (漢語, spell the sounds) was formalised and introduced post war to facilitate trade and teach standard Chinese to non-Sintic speakers (see also) and unlike previous systems of phonetics accorded for tonal qualities and aided the nation’s transition into the digital age—but with the drawbacks that come with outsourcing one’s knowledge and the code-switching of such short-cut keys. The article compares it to the recognition of the treble clef (🎼) plus an array of symbols used alongside out activity of composition and committing ideas to the page, which typing reinforces, whereas the others must be learnt and it would be a challenge to draw such a symbol from memory—plus the lost art of penmanship. The pictured shopping list from Mair illustrates the tip-of-the-tongue frustration with the person who jotted down these items eventually giving up, and I can attest to doing the same forgetting the English or German—Kuchenrolle paper towels. Perhaps rallying against the inevitable (though a worth fight to choose), the government of China is trying to combat amnesia through a variety of programmes, including a rather tense, televised game show competition to render characters correctly, as nerve-wracking as a spelling-bee with the contradictory, inscrutable conventions of English.

topographic map non-linear confidentiality algorithm (11. 719)

Lured by the slightly hyperbolic title Every Map of China is Wrong—with one’s mind going elsewhere to Tibet, Taiwan and maritime trade routes at first, via ibīdem, we are directed to a rather fascinating look at geodesic reference points (see also), international standards and those conventions that are the exception. China’s coordinate system is informed by Global Positioning System and the US National Geospatial Intelligence Agency surveys but has inserted an obfuscating formula when it comes to matching satellite telemetry with digital maps and is proprietary (in the name of economic and national security, restricted to a handful of domestic companies which foreign interests must partner with) and cannot be aligned because of the randomness of the algorithm. The drift is especially apparent at border regions and for those travelling between Macau, Hong Kong and the mainland, as those special administrative regions are on the international standard. Much more at the links above.

6x6 (10. 151)

teenage rampage: 70s sing-a-long pop was edgier than one thought   

on tyranny: twenty lesson on unfreedom and defending democracy

heptominos: geometric magic squares from Lee Sallows—see also

cross-hatched: dozens of security envelope patterns  

quiet quitting: these scenes of office drudgery are a form of protest

rainbow quest: Pete Seeger’s 1960s folk music television show

this day in colonial history

Commemorated as Australia Day, the First Fleet under the command of Admiral Arthur Philip arrived in Sydney Harbour to found the first permanent British settlement on the continent in 1788. This is also the 1841 anniversary of the formal possession of Hong Kong when Commodore Gordon Bremer arriving at a headland (since moved inland due to coastal reclamation) named Possession Point, the former park developed as a hotel and in the 1980s with the terminal for ferry service to Macau. Finally in 1855, the Point No Point was signed under considerable duress on the northern tip of the Kitsap Peninsula (so named for its appearance from a distance as a promontory but receding as one nears it) in the territory of Washington, with the original inhabitants, the Skokomish, Chimakum and S’Klallam peoples, ceding their land in exchange for a small reservation, concession along the Hood fjord.

lusofonia

Comprised of over two-hundred and seventy million people across the globe that share a linguistic or ethnographic connection to Portugal and its formerly extensive imperial holdings, Lusophone Culture Day is observed today in Brazil, Angola, Mozambique, Guinea-Bissau, East Timor, Goa, Macau, São Tomé and Príncipe and Cape Verde.
The designation is derived from the Latin term Lusitania (after the demigod Lusus, companion of Bacchus, the deity of wine and divine madness), the Roman Iberian province that roughly corresponds with modern Portuguese borders. Comunidade dos Paísesde Língua Portuguesa—the Community of Portuguese Language Countries—representing the commonwealth of diaspora selected this day during a summit in 2005.

a synallagmatic act

While former the former colonial outposts of Hong Kong and Macau are far better known, the port city of Tianjin (天津市, Tientsin) in the northern part of the country on the Gulf of Bohai hosted no fewer than nine concessions (small territories “leased” to foreign powers and because of this contractual nature are not subject to international law) granted at the turn of the last century by the Qing Emperor.
Reasoning that trade and missionary work would destabilise the empire, China tried to restrict such activities to special economic zones but was rather relentlessly pressured to allow in more international businesses. For their militaries’ role in suppressing the Boxer Rebellion (the Yihetuan—Righteous Militia—Uprising, 義和團運動) that sought to overthrow the dynasty and expel foreign consuls, Belgium, Austro-Hungary, Germany, the UK, France, Italy, Japan, Russia and the US were given districts in the city along the Pei Ho (Hai River) and at the railhead that linked the north with the capital. These quarters were self-contained and had their own shops, barracks, schools, churches and hospitals. War, shifting allegiances and revolution have overseen the return of all of these holdings to China and outside of diplomatic compounds the majority of remaining concessions with extraterritoriality are cemeteries and monuments of foreign wars maintained by the sending nation—the exceptions being Guantanamo Bay in Cuba and the Khmeimim Air Base in Syria.

choose your poison or balance of trade

Not terribly keen on Western goods and for the most part self-sufficient, for European naval powers—especially the British with their particular weakness for Asian luxuries and tea—Imperial China from the early nineteenth century became known as the Silver Bone Yard. This comparison to a gilded grave was employed as the only enticement for the Chinese—the only reserve-currency that they’d accept, not wanting truck with pelts, flagons of beer, bales of wool, missionaries or whatever else was a typical European export at the time which was not derivative of what the Chinese culture had already perfected, like gunpowder and the printed word—was silver dollars minted from bouillon from the colonies in North and South America.
The discovery of New World silver had initially glutted the market and the commodity temporarily lost some of its shine. The Portuguese, Spanish, Dutch and British were willing to part with huge sums of specie in exchange for keeping up the trade in tea, silk and porcelain. As more and more silver went into China and none came out, however, a market-correction was due and again prices rose and the demand for precious metal grew, especially with wars to finance at home. In order to reverse the outflows of hard currency, merchants (with support of Parliament) plied the Chinese market with opium culled from poppy fields in Turkey and British-held India—which was an acceptable swap for a spot of tea, in lieu of coinage. Although used recreationally and for medicinal purposes—reintroduced to Western medicine as laudanum—use of opium as a war with drugs does strike me as rather unique, to flood one market to secure cheaper access to another, ostensibly equally habit-forming and ritualised item. Faced with a growing drug problem and traders flagrantly overstepping the bounds that had been proscribed for them, China capitulated (and the degree to which China was compromised is a matter of debate) by expanding access to British merchants that extended beyond a few select entrepôts and granting leases in perpetuity to foreign traders. Though of strategic importance and to modern eyes a serious territorial incursion, China had a standing practise of ceding land in the name of peace-keeping and appeasement, and in addition to the special administrative areas of Hong Kong (UK) and Macau (Portugal)—there was also Tsingtau (Prussia), Tianjin (Italy), Shanghai (Japan) and Shantou (jointly controlled by the English, French and Americans).

5x5

ancient aliens: a look at the three billion year old Klerksdorf Spheres mined in South Africa

∞: floating, figure-eight ferris wheel under construction in Macau casino

word wars: war reporting presented as a Star Wars opening exposition crawl

i am what i play: once in 1979, BBC 1 was turned over to David Bowie

life-long learning: an exploration of how architecture learns and grows after its been built