2x4 versus Herzog and de Meuron

This is how Graphic artist group 2x4 transformed Herzog & de Meuron's Prada Omotesando in Tokyo:

(Photo source: Nikkei Woman)

A thought on democracy

Why does the international community these days criticize a coup while they are quiet about the democratically-elected government's attempt to restrict free media (as happened in Madagascar before the coup) or to extend the term limit for presidency (as happened in Honduras before the coup)?

Without free media, democratic elections cannot replace an bad-behaving government. Without the term limit, the minority who does not support the incumbent may keep suffering forever. (Imagine the US did not have a term limit for presidency, and George W. Bush won the third term.)

The reason is, I believe, the lack of scientific evidence on what aspects of democracy bring about good outcomes. If there's evidence, politicians and people in the media industry are unaware of it. The international community appears to believe that multiparty elections are sufficient. Alternatively, the media does not loudly report such issues as banning radio stations in less developed countries, and so the international community realize something is going wrong in these countries only after a coup takes place.

We should stop this. And I will devote my life as a development economist to tackle this.

Isola Linear

A kitchen suggested by Toyo Kitchen from Japan.
(The image taken from Excite Ism Concierge, October 30, 2009)

No more nukes. Pray to music.

I'm usually apolitical. And I don't want music to be politically charged.

But in this case, a political message makes music more powerful:

Best sushi in Stockholm

Stockholm has many, many sushi restaurants. I would say the number of sushi places per person in Stockholm is a lot more than in Tokyo.

And everyone in Stockholm asks me which sushi restaurant is the best in Stockholm because I'm Japanese. I didn't know the answer until today.

Sushi Bar Kirin at Brommaplan is the one. For the first time in ages, I feel comfortable eating foods in Stockholm. I mean, this sushi place offers the kind of taste I'm used to.

Although Brommaplan is a bit far from the city center, Sushi Bar Kirin is located quite close to the metro station. So it's not such a hassle to go there from time to time.

I'm grateful to Sandra for letting me know this place via her blog.

Developing Rural Areas

I listened to a podcast of Esther Duflo's lecture on rural development at LSE on 24 September, 2009. It is an excellent lecture in the sense that she synthesizes the latest findings in development economics research from the viewpoint of rural development. This kind of effort has long been missing. The past decade saw an emergence of high-quality research on economic development. But there are so many pieces of such research that it is difficult to grasp a big picture of what's known and what's not in a systematic way.

Anyone interested in economic development should listen to this lecture, available as a video streaming (scroll down within the video player window to 24 September 2009) and as an MP3 file (search for Duflo and click "mp3").

Gareth Pugh from Paris Collection Spring 2010

FT Fashion Editor Vanessa Friedman at FT praises Gareth Pugh's collection. (The image is taken from Style.com.)

Winter has come.

From today I need to wear a coat, a scarf, and winter trousers to go out in Stockholm.

It's still autumn by Swedish standards which define winter as temperature below zero degree Celsius, though.

Gordon Ramsay Plane Food

Flying with British Airways from London Heathrow airport means that you depart from the new Terminal 5 building. After passing the security checkpoint surprisingly smoothly, I have dinner at Gordon Ramsay Plane Food. It could be the best restaurant in London. A poached hake, a rocket parmesan salad, and non-alcohol cocktail called Lemon Tree are all good. Usually, airport restaurants inside the security checkpoint are lousy. But it's worth visiting Heathrow Terminal 5 early and having the last meal in London at this restaurant. (A friend of mine, a frequent flier from Terminal 5, told me that the service could be slow for passengers whose boarding time is fast-approaching.)

Bolitas de espinacas at Navarro's

Have dinner with a friend of mine at Navarro's, probably one of the best Spanish restaurants in London.

Not every dish is great. (I said "the best in London".) Calamares rebozados are horrible. Brocheta de cordero isn't as good as the one I had in Madagascar.

BUT I have to write this down to remember. Bolitas de espinacas are fantastic. They are deep-fried, breaded balls of spinach and ricotta.

Long-lasting insecticide-treated bed nets in Madagascar

There are always things to learn which you would not imagine unless you visit the field.

Long-lasting insecticide-treated bed nets (LLINs) are the main tool for combating against malaria promoted by the international aid community. These nets have insecticide ingrained into the fabric so that mosquitoes with malaria parasites will die as soon as they touch the net. People talk about its durability in terms of how long the effect of insecticide lasts.

Today the head of the malaria control department at the Ministry of Health in Madagascar told us the following:

In 2006, pregnant women and mothers with children under the age of five in the east coast area received LLINs for free at health centers. Since then, the malaria infection rate had been stable around 10 to 20 percent. Last year, it suddenly went up to nearly 50 percent. We investigated what happened. It turns out that those LLINs distributed in 2006 have holes so that mosquitoes can come inside the bed net. Why? People in the east coast tend to have the kitchen inside the house. They burn charcoal to cook. The cooking smoke makes bed nets dirty. So people wash LLINs quite often. After two years, LLINs are worn out.

It's not about the durability of insecticide but that of nets themselves that matter to Malagasy people.

Ambodisaina village in Atsinanana region of Madagascar

Hi from the capital city of Madagascar

On the day of our arrival in Antananarivo, the capital of Madagascar also known as Tana (pictured above), the current and former presidents of the country, visiting Maputo, the capital of Mozambique, agreed to set up a transition government which will supervise presidential and legislative elections during the next 15 months. (See BBC News for more detail.) On the way from the airport to the hotel by taxi, we saw many, many residents of Tana lining up alongside the road, waiting for the current president, whom the international community does not recognize the head of state of Madagascar, to come back to the country.

With my colleagues from Tokyo, I'm visiting Madagascar to launch a research project on the impact of long-lasting insecticide-treated bed nets (famous for its preventive effect against malaria infection) on poverty reduction. If I have time and connection to the Internet, I'll keep updating this blog LIVE FROM MADAGASCAR.

Good design helps newspapers

A TED talk (February 2009) by the designer who revolutionalized newspapers in Central and Eastern Europe.



I would add that this guy's design of his presentation slides is also excellent.

The least hard-working nation in Europe

So this is why, ever since I moved to Sweden, I always feel discouraged from working hard.

By the way, the above linked article shows why Sweden's only English news media, The Local, is a crappy news outlet. It doesn't explain what "collectively agreed" annual leave or "collectively agreed" working week really means. This is the most crucial piece of information because the whole article bases its information on the statistics for these two things. If you don't speak Swedish in Sweden, The Local is the ONLY source of local news. This country doesn't have any printed media in English.

How to "Save As ..." in Excel 2007.

For the first time ever, I use Excel 2007. And I don't know how to "save as", that is, to save a file in a different format than the default Excel format.

So I google it, and find this page from Digg.

I'm amazed that many people think it's a stupid question. Many people don't answer the question, just saying the guy who asked this question is retarded. They say, "To publicize how stupid this question is, let's keep posting!" How mean they are. As a result, I have to scroll down quite a bit to find the solution:

RIGHT CLICK on quick access toolbar
SELECT Customize quick access toolbar
SELECT Show All Commands from "Choose commands from:" drop down
SELECT Save As
CLICK add

The guy who asked this question (and I myself) is not retarded. It's Microsoft Excel developers who are retarded. How can you design the updated version of software so un-intuitively to the users of the previous version? (They completely reshuffle which command belongs to which menu bar.)

And the most annoying feature of Excel, namely, a pop-up window always shows up when I want to close a file that is already saved in the non-Excel format, still remains in this new version of Excel. It is Microsoft Excel developers who are retarded.

And when I enter "mar2003" (as the survey identifier for the one conducted in Morocco in 2003; "MAR" is the ISO code for Morocco), Excel 2007 recognizes it as 3/1/2003 (as the previous version of Excel does). Who would enter "mar2003" for 1st March 2003? It is Microsoft Excel developers who are retarded.

I'll Be Your Love

Composed by Yoshiki
Performed by Nicole Scherzinger (vocal), Yoshiki (piano), Ikuro Fujiwara (conductor), and Tokyo City Philharmonic Orchestra in Tokyo on December 2002.



For most of you, this video is a rare footage of Nicole Scherzinger before she broke through as the lead singer of Pussycat Dolls. For me, Yoshiki's killer melody is the most important although I do think Nicole's beautiful voice really fits this song.

Done with the revision of the last chapter in my PhD thesis

My PhD thesis, completed two years ago, has four chapters. One chapter was already published in a non-peer reviewed journal. Another chapter was published as a book chapter. The third chapter was submitted to and then rejected by a journal and then re-submitted to another journal last April.

Today I finished revising the last chapter (finally) and submitted it to a journal.

Now I can fully move on to new research projects (until journal editors either ask me to revise the submitted papers or tell me that they decide to reject them).

Tokyo Subway Map for your iPod

I just discovered Gizmobies. It's a stylish protector skin for iPod, iPhone, Blackberry, and Nintendo DS. This is what I wanted for my iPod Classic. And my hesitation to buy an iPhone due to its rather ugly design will go away with Gizmobies.

It originates from America, and its Japanese store has the "Japan-only" patterns. I hope Scandinavian designers will soon join the bandwagon. They should do a better job.

And what's surprising to me is that one of the patterns available in US is the Tokyo Subway Map (see above). This is a cultural shock to me.

London's tube map is a design icon.


On the other hand, I always thought Tokyo's counterpart was ugly.


But for Americans, Tokyo is cool, and so its subway map is also cool, as it seems.

分島花音 (Kanon Wakeshima)

Ayumi Hamasaki + visual-kei + breakbeat + classical music? Kanon Wakeshima is at least different.

still doll


砂のお城 (Sand Castle)