clean cities

Montrealers are familiar no doubt with Gerald Tremblay and Benoit Labonté’s campaign to clean up Montreal. Another mayor, in Sao Paulo, has also launched his own cleanliness campaign: he passed a “Clean City Law” so comprehensive that it deals not only with air, water and waste, but also with visual pollution. It also bans outdoor advertising. Since the law was passed, billboards all over the city have stood blank, or covered with white paper.

Autumn windfall

I realize that i have thought about many things i should commit to press, but published very few.

A number of the following posts may therefore be temporally disjointed, as their drafts date back to late spring.

tumbleweeds

I haven’t written in a while.

I feel that is subject to change.

Panama hats

In a land dominated by crocodiles, gated communities, where “affordable housing”means “trailer park”, I am pleased to report that being part of a strip mall has not dispossessed this Fort-Lauterdale café, the Vienna coffee house, of its character or homeyness.

In fact I am quite enjoying its authenticity – relievingly more honest than this morning’s wanderings around Miami. Among the brilliant art-deco hotels of South-Beach I found myself wanting to speak Spanish – the secret language everyone was speaking among themselves. They meticulously reverted to English to speak to the customers.

Oscar’s quite the cat

I sit here watching the Oscars, giggling to myself because someone thanked the NFB, because Leo is a democrat, and because Catherine Deneuve is disdainful about the uncultured Americans.

And I am reminded of Peter Hall’s book Cities in Civilization, of the chapter on Los Angeles more specifically. Hollywood, an icon because it is the seat of the cinematic industry.

Le forum PQ du pays

I have decided to get informed before this year’s election, and will be posting my notes and impressions of the platforms our provincial parties have made public on their sites. I will try to reserve my comparisons and final conclusions until I have read all the platforms. So no conclusions today.

The first platform I am reading is the Parti Quebecois‘.

The greatest anarchist project

Mark recently posted a video on facebook about net neutrality. As I was watching it, two of my ideas seams to crystallize.

First, what we (perhaps most) appreciate about the internet, our ability to appropriate it, is what has made it the most dangerous for large corporations. Because we are able to contribute our own content and access a multitude of other contents at our leisure, we develop a sense of control, and the impression that we have staked our own little territory.

What is your AJAX?

Is it a cleaning product?

Is it a premier division football club?

Or related to coffee at the wrong time of the day?

As was recently determined at a dinner with my father and brother, the meaning of the words we use is increasingly diffuse, even though we are technically speaking the same language. If you need IP advice, do you hire a lawyer, a computer geek, or maybe Steve Jobs? Thanks to the interweb, you can ask all three simultaneously, many different questions with one click of the mouse.

Amazed at my own ability to open more tabs than can fit the firefox screen, I must admit that my virtual interconnectedness is increasing exponentially, at a rate only equalled by the number of passwords I must now remember.

I am still a little bit of an internet agnostic though, unsure that I have found the best avenue to extract my ideas.

log

I am finally taking the time to start this blog rolling. After the many exciting conversations I have had about this public display of communication, you can expect that in the next little while we bring up topics including dystopias, utopias and objectives, representative democracy vs. participation, the urban-rural divide, spaces for social interaction (real and virtual), the sacred rituals of a profane population, immigration, naturalisation and getting lost in the wilderness.

Of course, we accept suggestions from readers, so please feel free to send them along. Please note that the plural is meant to be inclusive, rather than pretentious as other people will also be posting.

Incipit

Welcome to the wild world of Anjali’s inner thoughts.
Oddly enough, I am watching a show where large white orbs are controlling prisoners.
Like inverse foetal reflex – these people are looking to be born into a world of independent decision.
Bear with me and this *might* get more interresting.
Be seeing you.