Category: Travels
Can Nigeria teach the West a thing or two?
That is the topic of my latest Bloomberg column, here is one excerpt:
The reports of Boko Haram and terror killings are well known, and they reflect the interlocking and sometimes deadly combinations of regional, religious, sectarian and ethnic identities in the country, not to mention extreme inequalities of income and opportunity. Yet Nigeria has about 180 million people and is larger than Texas. The violence is the most frequently reported story in the West, but the underlying reality is far more complex and shows positive features.
For instance, the city of Lagos is in many regards a marvel of religious tolerance. Nigeria is about 50 percent Muslim and 40 percent Christian, and the area surrounding Lagos is also highly mixed in terms of religion. That may sound like a recipe for trouble, but in matters of religion Lagos is almost entirely peaceful. Religious intermarriage is common and usually not problematic, as is the case in many (not all) other parts of Nigeria as well. Many top Nigerian politicians have married outside their religion, kept two separate religions in the family and enjoyed continued political success.
Consider the scale and speed of this achievement. Lagos, with a population of about 20 million, is larger than many countries. It is the most commercially oriented part of Nigeria, and it grew so large only in the last few decades, as it attracted entrepreneurially minded people from many parts of Nigeria and other African countries. By one estimate, 85 new residents arrive every hour. That may sound chaotic, but in essence Nigeria has in a few decades created an almost entirely new, country-sized city built on the ideals and practice of religious tolerance. The current president, Muhammadu Buhari, is a Muslim who was supported in his election by many Christian leaders, on the grounds that he would fight corruption more effectively. His running mate served as a Pentecostal pastor.
There are several other points, including an assessment of on the ground safety (better than you might think), do read the whole thing.
Lagos, Nigeria bleg
I’ll be there soon! What should I do and see and eat? I thank you in advance for your suggestions.
I am a big believer in going places to learn things and for me this is the next step. I am looking forward to the trip.
The Decline of Car Culture
UMTRI: About 87 percent of 19-year-olds in 1983 had their licenses, but more than 30 years later, that percentage had dropped to 69 percent. Other teen driving groups have also declined: 18-year-olds fell from 80 percent in 1983 to 60 percent in 2014, 17-year-olds decreased from 69 percent to 45 percent, and 16-year-olds plummeted from 46 percent to 24 percent.
Cars used to represent freedom. Today WiFi does. The decline of young drivers is likely another reason the roads are getting safer.
Hat tip: @counternotions.
Addendum: Steven Kopits argues (youtube) that this has more to do with lack of employment of young people than with a change in culture.
Where to dine in London
Jinan and Qufu notes
Jinan is the second largest city in Shandong province, and a good place to see “normal China”; it is much more in the “concrete and motorbikes” mode than is Qingdao.
Qufu is the birthplace of Confucius, and a longstanding home of the Chinese nobility and Chinese scholars, with monument-building visits by various emperors. Reputedly the town is full of fine-featured individuals with very exact patterns of speech. In any case downtown is pleasant to walk and shop in, and has relatively few environmental problems.
The tomb of Confucius was my favorite site. There is a continuity of civilization (if not regime) for over 2500 years, and visiting the tomb drives this point home. Even the Cultural Revolution did not much damage this area of homage, in part because of loyalty to Confucius, itself a form of Confucian behavior.
Many of the flowers on the tomb were left by the national television station, perhaps as advertising and also signaling loyalty to Confucian ideals.
But that is not China’s oldest heritage, far from it:
This research reveals a 5,000-y-old beer recipe in which broomcorn millet, barley, Job’s tears, and tubers were fermented together. To our knowledge, our data provide the earliest direct evidence of in situ beer production in China, showing that an advanced beer-brewing technique was established around 5,000 y ago.
One local functionary said to me: “We think Trump will win. You always surprise us — he is the next surprise.”
VPN in China
What is the deal these days? How well are VPNs working, and which do you recommend? Can Apple iPhones and iPads still access the “real web” directly through 4G, as was the case as recently as last year? I thank you in advance for your assistance, it is much appreciated.
Coordination Failure in Work and Leisure Makes People Poor and Unhappy
People often bunch their activities at common points in time. Most people work from 9 am to 5 pm rather than from 10 pm to 6 am. One reason is that these are daylight hours, but another reason is because everyone else is working during this time. If you and your coworker are in the office at the same time, it is easier to collaborate. Furthermore, it makes working more fun to be there with other people.
…Most generally, many economic activities bunch or cluster in time because it pays to coordinate your economic actions with those of others. That just means that we want to be investing, producing, and selling at the same time that others are investing, producing, or selling. In short, economic activity tends to cluster together in time just as it clusters together in space. (What do we call a cluster of economic activity in space? A city.)
The desire to coordinate work-time amplifies shocks and so can contribute to business cycles (hence, time bunching is one of the transmission and amplification mechanisms discussed in our principles textbook from which the quote is drawn).
People “also like to party at the same time and to see movies and concerts with other people” so there is a desire to coordinate leisure-time as well as work-time. The coordination of leisure-time is the subject of an excellent paper by Young and Lim, Time as a Network Good: Evidence from Unemployment and the Standard Workweek, in Sociological Science.
From the abstract:
Drawing on two independent data sets, with more than half a million respondents, we show that both workers and the unemployed experience remarkably similar increases in emotional well-being on weekends and have similar declines in well-being when the workweek begins. The unemployed look forward to weekends much the same as workers. This is in large part because social time increases sharply on weekends for both workers and the unemployed. Weekend well-being is not due to time off work per se but rather is a collectively produced social good stemming from widely shared free time on weekends. The unemployed gain comparatively little benefit from their time off during the week, when others go to work.
Figure 2, from their paper, shows the basic story. Workers report more positive emotions (top panel) and fewer negative emotions (bottom panel) than the unemployed but both workers and the unemployed are happier and less stressed on weekends.
Thus, coordinated leisure is more valuable than free time per se.
The benefits of coordination also occur at longer time scales. It’s March Break at GMU this week so both my wife and I have some free time. Unfortunately, GMU’s March Break is not coordinated with that of Fairfax County schools so we can’t plan any family travel time! In two weeks, the situation will be reversed. Ugh.
George Mason University could raise the value of its March Break to many of its employees by coordinating with Fairfax County Schools–a free way to raise faculty and staff salaries! If only some Angel could make this possible.
The benefits of coordinated leisure also suggest that a national holiday is of more value than everyone having a day off but potentially a different day, so-called flex-time. I wouldn’t go as far as the French, who shut down in August, but it’s odd that the United States has lots of winter holidays but only one summer holiday. Let’s coordinate to create a national summer holiday. A 3-day summer-weekend will increase everyone’s happiness.
How to visit Singapore
Two different people have asked me this question this week, so I thought I would write out my answer. My approach is slightly unorthodox, but here goes:
1. Go to the top of Marina Bay Sands hotel and get a view of the skyline, the harbor, and the Straits. Watch the ships queuing. This is one of my favorite views in the whole world. Most of all I am struck by the contrast between what Singapore has achieved so quickly and also its continuing ultimate vulnerability; the view captures both of those. If you can afford it, stay in the hotel and swim in the Infinity Pool. That alone justifies dragging your body all the way to Singapore.
2. Organize the rest of your trip around food. For Malay food, visit the hawker centre at Geylang Serai Night Market. For Indian food, go to the hawker centre at the entrance to Little India, and walk around the adjacent shopping bazaar as well. For Singaporean food, there are many good choices, depending on your location. The optimal time to arrive is by 10:30, before most of the queues start. Ask cabbies for the best chili and pepper crab.
3. Eat at David Thompson’s Thai restaurant, in the mall next to Marina Bay Sands.
4. Once it is dark, and edging toward 9 p.m., walk around the Merlion area and the bridge, where the city comes to life.
5. Spend the rest of your time seeking out “retro Singapore” as much as possible. Haw Par Villa is one place to start, but there are multiple substitutes, including the hawker centres away from downtown and their special dishes.
6. The Asian Civilizations Museum is by far the best museum in town. The zoo and the bird park are first-rate.
7. Much as Singapore calls itself a “city-state” I think of it as a “suburb-state,” unlike Hong Kong which is a true city. I consider this high praise, but Singaporeans often are slightly insulted when I put it this way. Your mileage may vary, but I say enjoy it as you would a suburb.
8. Talk to as many Singaporean civil servants as you can.
9. Take a day trip by cab or bus into Johor Bahru, in neighboring Malaysia, a thirty minute trip if there are no delays. The food there is even better and you will learn some political science. Read this book for background on both countries. Read Lee Kuan Yew.
Here is my earlier post “Why Singapore is special.” In a nutshell, it’s one of the world’s greatest trips, safe and easy to deal with too.
The unknown Anacostia
I am known for giving house guests, especially if they are from abroad, strange tours of random parts of the United States. Yesterday it was a mix of Northeast D.C. and Anacostia.
Maketto on H St. offers Cambodian and Taiwanese cuisine in hip surroundings. The Dolcezza factory near Union Market serves gelato without freezing it, so it is superior to the other branches, and Righteous Cheese is the best shop of its kind in town. St. Elizabeth’s Hospital, in Anacostia, was the first federally supported mental hospital, dating from the 1850s; John Wilkes Booth spent time there. The architecture looks like something from Shutter Island or a Stephen King novel, and if you are clever you can talk your way in through the front gate. The Frederick Douglass House is the standard Anacostia site, worth more than one visit. The Big Chair originally was an advertisement for a furniture company, but has evolved into an Anacostia landmark and it was renovated in 2006. It since has fallen from the biggest chair in the world to no better than number three. At The Big Chair Coffee and Grill, reopened by African immigrants I might add, drinks are remarkably cheap.
Overall Anacostia is improving at a rapid clip, with lots of new town home construction and even some shops. In terms of greenery and views, it is one of the nicest parts of town and someday it will be very expensive indeed.
Split, Croatia bleg
What to do? What to see and where to eat? Our stay there will be brief, but thanks in advance for your assistance…
Yunnan notes
In the summer, up to half of a multi-course meal may consist of mushrooms, the best I have had. Fried goat cheese is served, and the ham exceeds that of Spain in quality. I had not thought that buckwheat flour pizza, dipped in fresh honey, would be a staple in Chinese food. There is also flower soup of numerous kinds, corn dishes, pumpkin, and donkey.
Even the largest city in Yunnan — Kunming — has fresh air, a rarity in China. The weather is perfect year round, and the faces have Burmese, Tibetan, Thai, and Mongolian features. About one third of the population is explicitly classified as “ethnic minority,” and most of the others look like a blend with Han Chinese.
Dali, the second largest city, is nestled into a lake and mountains as a Swiss city might be. You could explore the neighboring villages around the lake for months. I recommend Xizhou, stay at Linden Centre.
The population is pro-American, not always the case in China, and the Flying Tigers, who flew bomber missions against Japan from Yunnan, are cited frequently, including in dinner toasts to visiting scholars.
Yunnan University has a significant program in cultural economics, and as my hosts I thank them for the invitation and for their extreme hospitality.
Yunnan is arguably the nicest province in China to visit, and one of the best trips in the world right now. The quality of infrastructure and accommodations is good, but exoticism and surprise remain high, the perfect combination. Go before it’s too late.
In praise of Porto
Porto is Portugal’s second largest city, but when you turn the corner you never know what is coming: a Baroque or even Romanesque church, wondrous blue tiles, a rotted out building, a coffee and pastry shop, port warehouses and embankments, or a steeply plunging street. If a store displays the sign “Novidades,” that is an indication they don’t have any. Porto is (not) the only European city with six bridges. My conference was held in a very fine Rem Koolhaas venue.
Magellan lived and studied here, and J.K. Rowling’s Porto stint shaped parts of Harry Potter. Libreria Lello is perhaps the most striking bookshop in Europe.
This politically incorrect shop sign would have been taken down a while ago elsewhere in Europe; it is a reflection of the city’s remnant status. The modern parts of town, along the ocean, remind me of California. But the English language section of a used book store will have the titles which were British bestsellers in the 1920s. A 1970s tribute store is called “Spock,” and its sign outlines the Starship Enterprise.
Eat the tripe and white beans at Flor de Congregados, or for fancy try DOP restaurant, worthy of a Michelin star or two but not priced to boot. Peer into the apartments which open out onto the streets of the old town, due to the lack of air conditioning, and check out their crumbling wallpaper and tightly packed collections of icons. Here are ten things to like about Porto.
If you took the brain of Maria Popova, and turned it into a Mediterraneo-Atlantic city, loaded with debt, you would have Porto. Definitely recommended.
Where to travel, a reader bleg
R. asks me:
I’ve been reading your blog for years and it remains my favorite. I am an attorney planning to travel for 1-2 months in Eastern/Northern Asia and Europe this fall before starting work at a law firm. Since you are so widely traveled, I would love to read a post listing the most memorable places you’ve traveled or travel experiences you’ve had.
An answer to that could fill many books, but here is a simple rule to start: follow the per capita gdp. Perhaps my favorite travel experience of all time is Tokyo, but more generally I say master the area lying between London, Paris, Berlin, Rome, and Madrid, give or take. There are so many high quality sights and experiences to be had there you can chunk it many different ways.
If you wish to visit the United States, specialize in the eastern seaboard, Chicago, but most of all southern Utah down to the northern rim of the Grand Canyon, much better than the southern rim but book in advance. That latter part of the country has perhaps the world’s most compelling natural beauty, plus a good look at real American culture along the way. For all its fame, it remains oddly under-visited (thank goodness). Toss in San Francisco for good measure, and then drive through some godforsaken parts for a few days, the worse the better.
For the emerging economies, I say Beijing and Mumbai are good places to start, how can you not wish to be introduced to a country of a billion people or more? Mexico City is extremely underrated, especially if you live nearby in North America, just don’t expect English to be spoken. By the way, it is safer than you might think. Then spend some serious time in the countryside, almost any safe (or unsafe) emerging economy can serve this function.
Voila!
Model this, the Terra Cotta Warriors of Xian
Supposedly they were built to guard the tomb of an emperor:
So what’s up?
1. The emperor had a state-dependent utility function (e.g., money is worth less when you are dead), and this was the ancient equivalent of cryonics. If there was a chance you might be called back to life, spend a lot of resources protecting your corpse and its burial site.
2. The emperor was signaling (sorry Noah!) his ability to assemble such an impressive row of life-size figures, and of course the original had many more than what has been restored to date.
3. This was a form of fiscal policy, to stimulate the economy in slow times, by employing craftsmen.
4. The guild of said craftsmen was an influential interest group.
5. It was intended as a gift to a distant future; what else could they have done that would be of more value to us today?
6. Because the emperor could.
What else?
Los Angeles food bleg
Where to eat? Probably you can forget the rest, unless you ought to rationally think I do not already know of it.