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Sri Lanka

Researching inspiring locations for summer holidays.

For a quarter century, Sri Lanka seems to have been plagued by misfortune, including a brutal civil war between the Sinhalese majority and Tamil minority. But the conflict finally ended last May, ushering in a more peaceful era for this teardrop-shaped island off India’s coast, rich in natural beauty and cultural splendors. The island, with a population of just 20 million, feels like one big tropical zoo: elephants roam freely, water buffaloes idle in paddy fields and monkeys swing from trees. And then there’s the pristine coastline. The miles of sugary white sand flanked by bamboo groves that were off-limits to most visitors until recently are a happy, if unintended byproduct of the war.

Photo Credit: Keith Bedford – New York Times

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Face to face interaction


Tom Wilson wrote a long paper on digital interaction/social communities. Long story short, down with email, up with immediacy and face to face. Helping to refresh the list of reasons why I hate emails longer than 3 lines.

Miscommunication – In a study reported by New York Times, it was found that face-to-face interaction is full of information. We interpret tone, body language, pacing and other factors besides the verbal message to convey a message being transferred. In sending an e-mail, typed words lack rich emotional information that would have been transferred through a phone conversation. Many times words have different meanings through different tonal pitch inflections and pitch inflection can create a positive or negative spin on a sentence. Through e-mail their is no verbal tone, no verbal pitch which can create confusion in interpretation, especially when communicating with an anonymous individual (Goleman 2007:1).

Although e-mail is quick and efficient, it increases the chances of miscommunication and mis-interpretation, leading to possible conflicts which could have been avoided with a personal phone call.(Daniel, 2007) The use of e-mail also leads to the decline in phone conversations, which creates social isolation, as the time it takes to respond to e-mail is not instant as in a real conversation. The use of e-mail creates a social isolation and a distant connection that lacks emotional content that can lead to a decline is social capital.

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New York Times critic, Herbert Muschamp.

New York Times architecture critic, Herbert Muschamp rhapsodizes about Seattle’s new Central Library calling it, “The Library That Puts on Fishnets and Hits the Disco”. Seattle is a town with a big case of boosterism. Towns with this affliction usually have an inferiority complex derives from their envy of big cities like New York, Los Angeles and even San Francisco. This is precisely the case here. So when a big, bold, beautiful new edifice goes up, the local papers pull out all the stops. And they won’t disappoint with their coverage of Koolhaas’ Central Library. NY Times article