[PHOTO] Squirrels, squirrels!

Grey squirrel, St. Michael's College
Originally uploaded by rfmcdpei

Black squirrel, St. Charles/Isabella parkette
Originally uploaded by rfmcdpei

The Eastern Grey Squirrel is an interesting species indeed, as shown by the take of Hinterland's Who's Who.

Eastern grey squirrels Sciurus carolinensis commonly occur in two colour phases, grey and black, which leads people to think—mistakenly—that there are two different species. Black is often the dominant colour in Ontario and Quebec, toward the northern limits of the species’ range. Farther south the black phase is less common and is not found at all in the southern United States. This may indicate that the gene responsible for black coloration has some cold-weather adaptation associated with it.

[. . .]

The eastern grey squirrel spends most of its life in trees, where it moves about with great agility. When it comes to the ground to feed or store food in hiding places to eat later, it also has great mobility and can reach speeds of up to 25 km per hour. In climbing or descending a tree trunk it moves head first, and when danger threatens it sidles inconspicuously around the trunk of the tree, keeping just out of sight of the predator. Another protective device is to remain motionless against the bark, which makes the animal difficult to see.

This species is mostly active during daylight, although it can sometimes be seen feeding by the light of a full moon. In summer, activity is greatest early in the morning and in mid-afternoon. Eastern grey squirrels do not hibernate and in winter are most active around midday, perhaps to take advantage of the warmest temperatures.

The eastern grey squirrel is a tolerant species and exhibits little aggressive behaviour. The dominance hierarchy in both females and males is maintained by a bluffing show of force or chasing rather than by actual fighting. Each animal has a home range where it does most of its foraging for food, makes its nest, and rears its young. The home ranges of males are larger than those of females. There is little territorial behaviour and many home ranges may overlap. Individual squirrels are often seen feeding close to each other without any aggressive activity, and in winter several animals may share the same tree den.

Another squirrel photo post I made back in May refers to Rhonda Riche's 2007 Torontoist essaydescribing squirrels' importance to Toronto and Torontonians.

[T]he squirrel, in its ubiquity, has become a symbol of our city. On any given day, you can find tourists snapping shots of the black ones because they are unknown overseas. Squirrels are so cool that Brampton has replaced its former mascot, "Millie the Millennium Techno Bug," with Sassy the Sesqui Squirrel. When Brampton is biting you, you know you're onto something good.

I've another photo of a St. Michael' squirrel here.

[LINK] "Can anyone stop Facebook?"

What did MySpace miss out on? According to Slate's Farhad Manjoo, the chance to become the Internet's glue. It's popular, sure:

Nearly a year ago—in the course of cajoling people into joining the ubiquitous social network—I marveled at Facebook's astonishing growth rate: The site had just signed up its 150 millionth member, and about 370,000 people were joining every day. "At this rate," I wrote, "Facebook will grow to nearly 300 million people by this time next year." I confess, though, that I didn't think it was possible for the site to keep growing at that rate. Every hot Web site begins to fade at some point, and back then, the tech world was enamored of an upstart that was gaining lots of attention from celebrities and the media—Twitter. Even Facebook seemed scared of the micro-blogging site. In June, it redesigned its user pages to display updates as quickly as Twitter does, a move that prompted a barrage of threats to quit.

Those threats were empty. And so, it seems, was any threat posed by Twitter. Facebook's growth rate has actually accelerated during the past year. In September, it announced that it had reached 300 million members, and this week, it passed 350 million. About 600,000 people around the world now sign up every day. Twitter hasn't released any recent usage numbers, but traffic to its site is flattening. Indeed, it's likely that Twitter has fewer members than the number of people who play the Facebook game FarmVille (69 million!).

The site's impact goes beyond numbers.

With Facebook Connect, the company is expanding its footprint beyond Facebook.com, spidering into every far-flung corner online. You can now update your Facebook status, add comments, or chat with your friends while surfing CNN, the Huffington Post, Yelp, Digg, and Slate, among other sites. On Wednesday, Yahoo announced that it would integrate Facebook Connect with all of its services. Though Yahoo hasn't explained how the partnership will work, you'll presumably be able to share your photos between Flickr (owned by Yahoo) and Facebook or comment on stories at Yahoo News using your Facebook profile. This huge partnership will bring Facebook closer to becoming what has long been a holy grail in the Web business—a kind of universal sign-on service, the one place that stores the world's social information.

Facebook's continued rise prompts several questions. Why do people keep joining? Will it peak and begin to decline, like so many social networks that came before? And more importantly, do we want a universal sign-on service, a single Web site that stores all our relationships, comments, pictures, and status updates?

Yes, I think we do. In fact, I'd argue that's why Facebook keeps growing and won't peak anytime soon—it is becoming part of the infrastructure of the Web, every bit as indispensable to our daily wanderings as Google or e-mail. When I pushed people to join Facebook in January, I reasoned that the site had become "a routine aid to social interaction, like e-mail and antiperspirant." In the months since, that has only become more true. It's the first place you think of to find new pictures of your nephew, to share an amusing anecdote with your college friends, or even to look for a job. The New York Times' Nick Bilton points out that Facebook's mutual-friends list transforms new relationships: "When I go to a meeting or party, I take a minute to look up who's attending and quickly explore friends we might share," he writes. "It's the perfect digital icebreaker."

[LINK] "Are Somali-Canadians fighting for the shadowy al-Shabab?"

That's the question that this grim article from the Globe and Mail, by Joe Friesen and Colin Freeze, asks.

The men left the country without a word of warning. They range in age from early 20s to early 30s and all worshiped at the Abu Huraira mosque in North York, community leaders say. Two or three have since called home to say they travelled to Kenya, but didn't say whether they ever plan to return to Toronto. The language they used in the phone calls is similar, an indication that they may have been told what to say.

Security officials believe the missing men have crossed Kenya's northern border with Somalia to join al-Shabab – literally “the youth” – an al-Qaeda-inspired Islamist movement that has swept across southern and central Somalia.

“Somalia's fragile coalition government appears helpless against a widespread Islamist insurgency that is gradually tightening its grip,” RCMP Commissioner William Elliott said in a speech last month. He added he was particularly concerned about the jihad spreading to “Somali-Canadians who travel to Somalia to fight and then return.”

On Thursday, a suicide bombing believed to be the work of the al-Shabab ripped through a graduation ceremony in Mogadishu, killing three Somali cabinet ministers, several journalists and more than a dozen students. Similar bombings have been perpetrated by Somalis raised in Europe and the United States.

In Somalia, and increasingly in Canada, community leaders view such attacks as war on their own futures. The refugee communities that fled the civil strife 20 years ago had hoped that generations raised in the West would break the cycle of bloodshed, poverty and anarchy. The cruel twist is that a handful of youth within the Somali diaspora are being pulled back to their homeland to perpetuate it.

[. . .]

Last month, U.S. prosecutors charged a group of American Somalis with recruiting at least 20 of their own kinsmen from the Minneapolis area to join the al-Shabab, including some who have become suicide bombers. Until recently, no one in Canada thought Toronto would be the next target.

“We used to argue with our American friends. We would say, ‘We will never have this extremism in Canada because we are a tolerant society.' … None of our mosques were known for spreading an extremist message,” said Abdurahman Jibril, head of the Somali Canadian National Council, a group that lobbies to improve social services for Somali immigrants.

Of note is the fact of the young men's new invented community, related not to the region of their origins or to their clan allegiances or to Canada (in whatever degree), but to al-Shahab's particular blend of religious extremism and pan-Somali nationalism.

What's most troubling for Somali-Canadian leaders is that these are not young men who struggled to adjust to life in the West. At least two were born in Canada. The others were educated here from primary school onwards. They are the children of respected families who have found work and integrated into the broader community, leaders say. They attended either college or university. Most of the missing men can't even speak Somali, the community leaders add.

[. . .]

A further contradiction is that they may have joined a movement based primarily in Somalia's south, in the city of Kismayo, even though four of the five men are descended from families from the relatively stable northern province of Somaliland.

Somaliland was overseen by the British during the colonial era, while the south was run by the Italians. Somalis generalize by describing northerners as more reserved, and southerners as more outgoing. Northerners live primarily in the Scarborough area, while southerners dominate the area known as Little Mogadishu, around Kipling Avenue and Dixon Road. The bulk of Toronto's 50,000 Somalis live in the apartment towers and public-housing projects that dot that corner of Etobicoke.

Omar Kireh, administrator of the Abu Huraira mosque, where the men prayed, said it's strange that northerners would join a southern insurgency. But nothing is predictable with the younger generation, he added, who know little of the country's fractious tribal politics.

The classic sort of diaspora extremism is evidenced here, I think.

[BRIEF NOTE] Three notes on Canada's reactionary position at Copenhagen

It has been noted that George Monbiot is unhappy with Canada.

[H]ere I am [in Toronto], watching the astonishing spectacle of a beautiful, cultured nation turning itself into a corrupt petro-state. Canada is slipping down the development ladder, retreating from a complex, diverse economy towards dependence on a single primary resource, which happens to be the dirtiest commodity known to man. The price of this transition is the brutalisation of the country, and a government campaign against multilateralism as savage as any waged by George Bush.

Until now I believed that the nation that has done most to sabotage a new climate change agreement was the United States. I was wrong. The real villain is Canada. Unless we can stop it, the harm done by Canada in December 2009 will outweigh a century of good works.

In 2006 the new Canadian government announced it was abandoning its targets to cut greenhouse gases under the Kyoto protocol. No other country that had ratified the treaty has done this. Canada was meant to have cut emissions by 6% between 1990 and 2012. Instead they have already risen by 26%.

It is now clear that Canada will refuse to be sanctioned for abandoning its legal obligations. The Kyoto protocol can be enforced only through goodwill: countries must agree to accept punitive future obligations if they miss their current targets. But the future cut Canada has volunteered is smaller than that of any other rich nation. Never mind special measures; it won't accept even an equal share. The Canadian government is testing the international process to destruction and finding that it breaks all too easily. By demonstrating that climate sanctions aren't worth the paper they're written on, it threatens to render any treaty struck at Copenhagen void.

After giving the finger to Kyoto, Canada then set out to prevent the other nations striking a successor agreement. At the end of 2007, it singlehandedly blocked a Commonwealth resolution to support binding targets for industrialised nations. After the climate talks in Poland in December 2008, it won the Fossil of the Year award, presented by environmental groups to the country that had done most to disrupt the talks. The climate change performance index, which assesses the efforts of the world's 60 richest nations, was published in the same month. Saudi Arabia came 60th. Canada came 59th.

In June this year the media obtained Canadian briefing documents which showed the government was scheming to divide the Europeans. During the meeting in Bangkok in October, almost the entire developing world bloc walked out when the Canadian delegate was speaking, as they were so revolted by his bullying. Last week the Commonwealth heads of government battled for hours (and eventually won) against Canada's obstructions. A concerted campaign has now begun to expel Canada from the Commonwealth.

He's being harsh. The Harper government's policies don't reflect Canadian public opinion.

64 per cent of respondents to a Canadian Press Harris-Decima survey said rich nations have a responsibility to commit to higher and harder targets than developing countries.

Most also want to see a binding agreement come out of Copenhagen, and 81 per cent said Canada should act independently of the United States.

The Conservatives insist Canada must tie its policy to that of the U.S. because of the countries' extensive economic relationship.

The Harper government says it's waiting for the Obama administration to come out with a suite of policies to which Canada can synchronize its own.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency took a big step Monday toward regulating greenhouses gases, concluding that pollution from burning fossil fuels should be regulated.

The action, which lets the U.S. government control greenhouse gases without having to push legislation through Congress, appears timed to give a boost to the Copenhagen talks.

"This is a clear message to Copenhagen of the Obama administration's commitments to address global climate change," said Sen. John Kerry, a Democrat and lead author of a climate bill before the Senate. "The message to Congress is crystal clear: get moving."

Canadians had a similar message for the Harper government. The Harris-Decima survey shows that 46 per cent of respondents would like to see Canada play a lead role in Copenhagen.

"The number of people in society who feel like this is something that requires action is high," said Doug Anderson, senior vice-president of Harris-Decima.

"But most Canadians are still not at that emotional, 'I'm willing to step out of my house and go to a protest' kind of a situation on this. Yet that's not to say that they are not interested in seeing a pragmatic solution.

"It's no longer a situation where people say for the most part that this isn't something that's a concern, or this isn't something that requires action. It's both of those for most Canadians."

The telephone poll of just over 1,000 Canadians was conducted Nov. 26-29 and is considered accurate to within plus or minus 3.1 percentage points 19 times out of 20.

So what's going on? It's no coincidence that the current Conservative government draws much of its support from Alberta, the province that has the oil exports, that gives Canada the reputation of being a corrupt petro-state, the province that as journalist Andrew Nikiforuk has saidhas suffered badly distorted politics (most Albertans are critical of government policies re: the oil sands) to the extent that the provincial Progressive Conservative Party has governed since 1973. I don't want to bash Alberta, certainly not Albertans, but that province has not helped.

[LINK] "RCMP to review parliamentary security after rooftop protest"

Harper's policies haven't been popular, as I've noticed. Yesterday, Greenpeace did a piece of political theatre that incidentally demonstrated serious security issues, as described in Heather Scofield's Canadian Press article.

19 Greenpeace protesters managed to climb two of the Parliament buildings and unfurl huge banners in broad daylight.

The activists, dressed in blue coveralls and white hard hats, scaled the West Block and the entrance to the Senate in the Centre Block - below the iconic Peace Tower - at about 7:30 a.m. Monday.

Some of them then rappelled off the steep roof of the West Block and hung massive banners in English and French reading: Harper/Ignatieff Climate Inaction Costs Lives.

It was a message to the prime minister and the Liberal leader to support tougher greenhouse-gas emission cuts, timed to coincide with the start of the big UN climate-change conference in Copenhagen.

[. . .]

Officers eventually escorted the activists from the roof and used an aerial ladder to remove others dangling on the side of the West Block.

The 19 protesters and an organizer were arrested without incident and turned over to Ottawa police. They will likely face charges of mischief, a police spokesman said.

The mischief did serve a purpose beyond the environmental awareness bit.

"How did they get in?" asked security expert Bertram Cowan of Competitive Insights Inc.

"There was definitely a lapse, no doubt about it. It may be even as embarrassing as the people who crashed the president's dinner party. That's supposed to be a pretty secure area."

Cowan, a former officer with the RCMP and CSIS, was referring to a Virginia couple who slipped past security to attend U.S. President Barack Obama's first state dinner last month, even though they weren't on the guest list.

"Somebody is probably right now on the carpet, trying to explain what happened," Cowan said.

Security on Parliament Hill has been beefed up since the September 2001 terrorist attacks in the United States.

RCMP cars guard the entrances to Parliament Hill and patrol the grounds. Anyone entering the Parliament buildings must go through at least one metal detector. Surveillance cameras cover most areas. Only authorized vehicles are allowed on the Hill, and parking in the nearby lots is restricted.

Remember the badly organized if serious Toronto terrorist cell? I'd prefer not to have Parliament destroyed; personal preference, I suppose.

[LINK] "PQ's road to separation leads to Copenhagen"

In my final Canada/Copenhagen-related post of the day, I'd like to note that Harper's policies may well help out Québec separatists.

Quebec sovereigntists have wasted no time pouncing on the climate change issue as the latest argument to break up Canada, making their case at the very outset of a major UN summit.

The Parti Québécois issued the sovereigntist call to arms on the hot-button issue Monday as Prime Minister Stephen Harper prepared to attend the environmental conference at Copenhagen.

The PQ argued in an open letter that if international sanctions are eventually imposed on environmental laggards, "Canada's irrresponsible position" could wind up hurting Quebec industry.

That opening salvo underscored the national-unity minefield Harper will be wading through in Denmark as he searches for safe ground among the competing interests of Canada's provinces.

In her letter Monday, PQ international affairs critic Louise Beaudoin said "the non-sovereignty of Quebec has a price" — and that the cost of staying in Canada will grow with time.

"Quebec must get out of this regrettable position as quickly as possible," Beaudoin wrote in Montreal newspaper La Presse. "And to do this there's only one solution, getting complete independence."

[. . .]

The Bloc Québécois has already accused Harper of being soft on Alberta, whose economy is based on fossil fuels, at the expense of less-polluting provinces.

One political scientist said the climate-change issue may have presented sovereigntists with an ideal wedge to drive between Quebec and Canada.

"There is a distinct disconnect here between the Quebec position and the federal position based on interests that are very easy to identify and understand," said Pierre Martin of the Université de Montréal.

While it's still possible to turn things around, Martin said the issue could be useful to sovereigntists if it festers because it's a new angle and it's easy to understand.

Although the environment hasn't proven pivotal with voters before, he said the game-changer would be any sanctions on poor performers.

Because it would be included in Canada's tally, Quebec could still get nailed even though it has achieved major emissions reductions in recent years, Martin noted.

"Quebec's exports would be taxed just as if the greenhouse gas emitting operations were taking place on our own territory," Martin said. "There is a potential for a potent economic issue that people can easily understand and that makes sense."

Martin said Premier Jean Charest could fend off the sovereigntists in Quebec by being tougher on the federal government, entrenching himself as the best defender of Quebec's interests.

Québec draws most of its power from hydroelectric projects, the successful development of these projects being one of the key achievements of modern Québec.. You could argue that the province was pre-prepared. Vive le Québec libre et vert?

[BRIEF NOTE] On the possibility of MPP Glen Murray

Former Winnipeg mayor Glen Murray, who mysteriously relocated to Toronto several years ago, is running for Ontario's legislative assembly.

Urban affairs activist Glen Murray, who had been mulling a run for mayor of Toronto next year, plans to seek the Liberal nomination to replace Toronto Centre MPP George Smitherman, who is preparing his own run for the top political job in the city.

“This seemed to be the right match,” said Mr. Murray, 52, who aims to succeed the former deputy premier who is expected by late February to join the race to replace Mayor David Miller next fall.Mr. Murray, who will take a leave of absence from his post as president of the Canadian Urban Institute, says he has the endorsement of Mr. Smitherman. Both are openly gay politicians.

Mr. Murray, the former mayor of Winnipeg who ran unsuccessfully for a federal Liberal seat before moving here in 2004, had been seriously contemplating a mayoral bid.

But the certain arrival of Mr. Smitherman as a major contender for mayor and the likely, but still not confirmed, entry of former Ontario Conservative John Tory as a big-name rival appears to sucked political oxygen out of the air for other aspirants.

Mr. Murray is not the only Liberal seeking the nomination, setting the stage for a competitive battle to replace Mr. Smitherman for the plum downtown seat.

During his tenure as Winnipeg mayor, Glen Murray was well-known for his arguments that cities had to be recognized as the engines of Canada, deserving of greater representation at the federal level, on pretty much the Jane Jacobs model. See below for an example of his thought.

[C]ity governments have to take an intergenerational perspective. By that I mean every decision a local government makes should be focused on what impact it will on the environment, economy, health and culture of the city for the next generation.

Livability is one of the biggest factors in where people decide to live and where creative people decide to live is where investors look to put their money.

Cities have to have activist city governments that can invest in innovation, design, art, sports, entertainment and support local culture.

Let’s take Winnipeg where you and I lived. The redevelopment of the exchange district and Corydon in Winnipeg are examples. They are places with a vibe or buzz. Rezoning the district to a mixed use lie-work precinct, introducing tax credits equivalent to the difference between the market rents generated by a heritage building and the cost of restoration and maintenance triggered the redevelopment of 36 properties.

Free transit in the district, major increases in arts and cultural funding, theatre and festival programs and a strong commitment to public safety with defensible space design initiatives and 21 new dedicated police offices in the downtown all helped begin to restore the historic heart of the city.

The relocation of Red River College's creative and design programs to the Exchange and the support given to the local special effects and multimedia cluster and nascent film industry all contributed to the formation of a creative media cluster in the Exchange and the return of construction cranes and shops to the streets.

Public works as public art are also important to place-making and projects like the inhabited pedestrian bridge or new downtown library are examples of this concept.

Collaborative governance was also critical and the success of Centre Venture, a development agency that facilitated private and public sector collaboration, was an essential ingredient. Unfortunately, the city government disengaged from this approach four years ago.

City leaders need to facilitate research and development by supporting a strong university and business network to accelerate the movement of ideas to market. This is important to a city’s capacity to generate innovative and interesting employment.

Economic development initiatives in biomaterials and aerospace were example of this approach in the Peg. The success of RIM (BlackBerrys) in Waterloo is an excellent example of the dynamic of innovation at work in a mid-sized city.

Activist government partnerships to mobilize capital from the private sector and co-ordinate government investment are also essential. In Winnipeg, the Hydro building, MTS Centre, library, baseball park, Thunderbird House, the residential district on Waterfront Drive, the Forks and the Human Rights Museum are examples of how quickly these things can happen with a partnership approach.

Fairly conventional stuff, right?

Local queer weekly Xtra! featured an article (Kaj Hasselriis, "A queer's-eye view of Glen Murray") saying that the man's passionnate if flaky.

Take it from a Winnipegger: The man who wants to replace George Smitherman as MPP for Toronto-Centre, the riding that includes the country's biggest gay village, is a charismatic, commitment-phobic, power-hungry, eager-to-please crybaby who can't be trusted.

But he deserves every vote he gets.

[. . .]

As an NDP city councillor, Murray fought passionately, often to the point of tears, for official recognition of Pride and Pink Triangle Day events. He adopted a teenaged street kid and starred in a National Film Board documentary about their relationship.

In 1998, I moved into a house down the street from Murray, and a few months later, he was elected mayor. When I went to his inauguration with my lesbian roommate, he proudly showed off his big, shiny chain of office and we swooned, "That's our mayor!" To which he responded, "Now I just need earrings to match!"

But over the next few years, our love affair with Murray waned. He dumped his ties to the NDP, cozied up to the local business community and bulldozed the city's preeminent heritage building to make way for a dreary hockey arena.

In 2004, halfway through his second term, Murray joined the Liberal Party, ditched out of his job and made a kamikaze run for a federal seat in Winnipeg's suburbs — all because then-prime minister Paul Martin wined and dined him at 24 Sussex Dr and promised him a low-level cabinet position if he won. Murray's ambitious plans for a city consumption tax, fairer municipal funding and a long-awaited rapid transit system died the minute his political career crashed and burned at the hands of a neophyte Conservative candidate.

Despite my bitterness at Murray's hasty and horribly-timed departure, as well as the fact that he flew to Toronto midway through the campaign to smear Jack Layton and Olivia Chow in their home ridings, I can't help but admit that — on the whole — he was a fantastic mayor. He worked practically round-the-clock to inject new life into our downtown waterfront, invest heavily in the arts community and build a picture-perfect bridge over the Red River. He even managed to hold the line on property taxes while maintaining great relations with city unions.

Most importantly, though, Murray succeeded in inspiring Winnipeggers to think of our city as world-class. He was also a positive role model for young queers. After a local newspaper filed a Freedom of Information request for Murray's emails, it was revealed that gay and lesbian young people from across North America had written to him for advice — and received long, thoughtful responses.

That was one of Murray's greatest strengths as mayor — accessibility. He travelled everywhere in the city and tried to know everyone. When I needed to get my passport signed by a professional, I realized there was someone I knew better than any dentist or lawyer who could do the trick — my mayor. So I called Murray's office and the secretary told me to come on down.

I have a lot of good things to report about Glen Murray, but I have to end this column with a warning to the voters of Toronto-Centre: Don't believe that he won't dump you, too, if a hotter offer comes along. After Murray left Winnipeg, he landed a position with Toronto consulting firm Navigator for a couple of years, but quit so he could take charge of the Canadian Urban Institute. Now, less than two years into that job, he's hoping to become an MPP.

Toronto Centre isn't my riding. It is the riding of other people I know. So, I ask particularly you, what do you think about Mr. Murray?

[LINK] "Will Kwan's alternative world maps"

Interesting.

he art of cultural diaspora is a genre unto itself: a mainstay of curatorial-studies curriculum and art fairs alike. Spawning a motherlode of postcolonial dreck, the genre also includes the odd dazzler, such as the work of transnational superstar Yinka Shonibare (a British-Nigerian artist residing in London), or Zhang Huan (a Chinese émigré in New York) – artists who have made cross-cultural drift a reigning preoccupation of contemporary art.

It is into this context that the 31-year-old Toronto artist Will Kwan inserts himself. Kwan came to Canada from Hong Kong at age 4, but his work is still backward glancing. These days, he teaches sculpture and art theory at the University of Toronto's Scarborough campus, and his work is the subject of a concise exhibition at the Justina M. Barnicke Gallery at Hart House, curated by gallery curator-director Barbara Fischer. The show rounds up his major work to date, revealing an artist who articulates sharp cultural observations in the language of conceptual art. Occasionally, the work feels formulaic – his wall installation of ceremonial crimson hong bao gift envelopes emblazoned with the logos of various world banks, for example. Other works, though, are more inventive.

Clocks that do not tell the time (2008), for example, is a curious puzzle, seeming to be a bank of institutional clocks displaying the time around the world. But instead of the customary New York, Paris and Mumbai, we find place names like Alang, Punto Fijo and Bentonville. It's only upon reading Kwan's research (some of which he has pinned to the back of the display wall) that these locations are revealed to be hubs of international corporate commerce and industry. Why Wilmington? It's home to many U.S. head offices, Delaware serving as an onshore tax haven for corporate America. Sonapur? That's where the labour camp is for the 150,000 Asian workers who toil by day to build the glittering towers of Dubai.