Voted one of Shanghai’s best restaurant and bar,
Sasha’s is situated in the romantic former French Concession area of Shanghai.
Text & Photo © JE Nilsson, CM Cordeiro 2013
North of the Bund, Shanghai
Crowne Plaza Shanghai Fudan Hotel
Text & Photo © JE Nilsson, CM Cordeiro 2013
When looking at the facade of the Crowne Plaza Shanghai Fudan Hotel it is difficult to not read into the facets of its facade some influences from the constructivist art movement that grew out of Russian Futurism in the early years of the 20th century.
Constructivist architecture flourished in the Soviet Union in the 1920s and early 1930s. Its ideas were revolutionary at the time and combined advanced technology and engineering with social purposes.
This era was also a formative one for Shanghai, as it acted as an eastern melting pot between East and West in the Warlord epoque of China in the 1910s, around the years of the Russian revolution and the financial boom of WWI. As such one would not be too surprised to find traces of these ideas right here in the Yangpu district of Shanghai where much of China’s academia flourishes today.
It is even difficult not to draw references to Russian industrialism and earlier, the cubism of Picasso and Braque, in the facets of the facade looking like human beings standing on top of, lifting, carrying and supporting each other. Architecture depicting the human strive to higher and higher achievements.
The Russian bicyclist painting by Natalia Goncharova (Cyclist, 1913) comes to mind as another reference to the Russian futurism of the 1910’s. This can be seen in contrast to the slightly older painting by Ramon Casas, of himself and Pere Romeu on a Tandem, 1897. The two works of art illustrate a dramatic change in ideologies and thus realities, that had come by in a mere few decades. The latter was painted specifically for the interior of the Els Quatre Gats in Barcelona, a restaurant and bar that was pretty much the center of the early Modernisme art movement in Barcelona at the turn of the century, and also the very place where Picasso had his first exhibition.
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A Buddhistic view of markets – ‘there is no train …’ – at Maeklong, Bangkok, Thailand
Covered in gold leaves
Text & Photo © JE Nilsson, R Cordeiro, CM Cordeiro 2013
Temple visits
Fortune on a stick
When in Thailand on a short visit you have an endless number of options on how to spend your time. However, if you are not shopping, sunbathing, eating, drinking, boating or trying out any of the local spas or various massage options, you will eventually find that you are on your way into one or several temples.
For example, right next to the Maeklong Railway Market you will find the Wat Baan Laem temple with its important Buddha statue and just near that, another temple, and near that, another.
In one of these, I found the option of having my future read to me through a brush pot of fortune sticks. For those who have not done this, you shake a brush pot filled with numbered bamboo sticks until one of them somehow volunteers itself out of the holder. Eventually I got my stick and with the help of my guide Susie, I found the matching fortune explanation.
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Meeting by the Chao Phraya, Bangkok
Cheryl Cordeiro and Professor Joe A. Foley, standing at the bank of the Chao Phraya River, Shangri-La, Bangkok, Thailand.
Text & Photo © JE Nilsson, CM Cordeiro 2013
It had been quite some years, since 2007 thereabouts, that I last visited Bangkok. The early morning drive through the city from the airport lent an immediate update of impression of just how much and how fast the landscape was changing that left me wondering if I could, with some effort, find my favourite street hawkers at the places where I once knew where they stood.
I have thus far remembered my visits to Bangkok fondly, often in the sense that I’ve managed to acquire a curiosity of items that range from floor mats, cushions to kitchen utensils and a spattering of orphaned treasures.
While the city is ever modernising, I was happy to find, what to me was its signature rhythm of a heartbeat – its wet and soggy market streets – still around the corner from where I stayed.
More than street marketing this time around was the fact that I had the pleasant opportunity to meet again with a mentor, Professor Joseph A. Foley. Joe was previously my thesis writing supervisor through all my theses, beginning with my honours and master thesis writing back at the National University of Singapore, through to my doctoral thesis writing at the University of Gothenburg. He currently lectures at the Graduate School of English at the Assumption University in Bangkok, Thailand.
We met alongside the Chao Phraya River for dinner.
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Reverberations of Royal summer parties at a Swedish 14th century castle
A copper engraving of the castle.
Text & Photo © JE Nilsson, CM Cordeiro 2013
North of Stockholm sits a grand and picturesque castle that was the residence of Princess Sophia of Sweden from 1578-1611. It is today in fact the only privately owned Royal castle in Sweden. It has a rich history that is best associated with Sweden’s King Gustaf III and his young Danish consort Sophia Magdalena. They lived in the castle during the 1700s enjoying a mostly carefree and happy life. From the 1300s the castle belonged to a succession of Swedish royalty that included Gustav Vasa, John III, King Gustav II Adolf and HSH Hereditary Prince Frederick, who eventually became Frederick I of Sweden and reigned at the time of the foundation of the Swedish East India company (1731-1813) who had their first ship ever sailing to China named after him i.e. – Fredericus Rex Svecia.
In 1917 the castle was acquired by a Swedish industrialist who eventually took a great interest in Chinese porcelain collecting in a circle of friends that included the then reigning King Gustaf VI Adolf and the then young arts historian professor Bo Gyllensvärd. The castle and its substantial porcelain collection was subsequently inherited by his children in 1967. The family settled in the castle trying the best they could turning it into a home. Today, the castle has been passed on to new owners and theatrical performances, weddings and other large banquets continue to be held at the location.
The castle and its grounds, having seen its fair share of social parties and crowds moving through its rooms, reverberated such energies that waxed and waned with time of day and seasons of the year. As with most castle grounds in Sweden, as night falls, the silence that encompasses those grounds become so deafening that the drop of a pin on a polished tabletop might come as a relief. But the castle grounds were seldom quiet, especially at night.
A while back when the castle was still a home and its grandeur silently lingering in private hands, after a long day and night of pleasant conversation on our common interest in Chinese porcelain, the topic eventually ventured over into the supernatural and the possibilities of this huge building housing some uninvited guests. “Well not really”, the hostess answered, “we don’t really think of any of it much. It is just kind of part of the house but incidentally, I hosted you all on our guest floor and was just curious if any of you experienced anything unusual this night?”
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Chokladkalaset 2013, Göteborg
At the annual Gothenburg chocolate festival.
Rule Forty-two.
Text & Photo © JE Nilsson, CM Cordeiro 2013
I didn’t think I would meet Douglas Adams’ thoughts in this context, but this was an event of forty-two. In Adams’ The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy (1979:181), in answer to the ultimate question of life, the super computer, Deep Thought, was adamant forty-two was the answer.
“Forty-two!… Is that all you’ve got to show for seven and a half million years’ work?”
“I checked it very thoroughly,” said the computer, “and that quite definitely is the answer. I think the problem, to be quite honest with you, is that you’ve never actually known what the question is.”
“But it was the Great Question! The Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe, and Everything.. .. ”
“Yes,” said Deep Thought with the air of one who suffers fools gladly, “but what actually is it?”
Thing is, Adams was not alone, for Lewis Carroll might have known the same.
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BARCELONA
Timelapse of Barcelona by Alexandr Kravtsov. Just beautiful.
As David Bickley wrote, of A.Kravtsov’s 480gb of images:
“What’s even more impressive is what Alexandr went through to make this piece. In his words it took “a broken camera, lost flash drive, near 100 subway rides, 24 000 photos, endless hours of post production and rendering and 480 gigabytes of material.” That’s insane!”
BARCELONA. MOTION TIMELAPSE from Alexandr Kravtsov on Vimeo.
Bok & Bibliotek, Göteborg Book Fair 2013
At the Göteborg Book Fair 2013.
Text & Photo © JE Nilsson, CM Cordeiro 2013
It’s been a few years, since 2008, that I’ve found myself at the annual Gothenburg Book Fair, one of the Nordic regions largest market place for the book trade that began as a trading platform for teachers and librarians. Since opening their doors in 1985 with just 5,000 visitors, the book fair has today, more than 101,000 visitors over four days, with three parallel running sessions of conferences, seminars and events, alongside sales stands and an International Rights Centre for agents and publishers. The book fair celebrates their 29th anniversary this year at the Swedish Exhibition and Congress Centre.
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Stora Känsö, Swedish west coast archipelago
Känsö’s ship observations tower at the island’s high point,
offers a splendid view over the neighbouring islands of Gothenburg’s southern archipelago
and is well worth the effort making it up there.
Text & Photo © JE Nilsson, CM Cordeiro 2013
Känsö synopsis
Känsö is a small island in the Southern Archipelago of Gothenburg. The name refers to its use by the people of the nearby island of Brannö, who let their cows grass on it over the summer.
In the early 19th century, science medical theories had made enough progress to suggest that becoming ill could be avoided by insulation. The island’s location immediately south of the Gothenburg port entry made it ideal to be used as a quarantine to try to protect Gothenburg and Sweden from any number of contagious deceases that at the time, plagued continental Europe and Asia.
The theories and practices developed here were advanced, though as time moved on, the progress and knowledge in hygiene standards that was made through the use of this facility eventually disseminated to the mainland hospitals. The consequence was that the island was gradually made available for other purposes and it is today, a military naval base and training camp.
The first quarantine manager, Jacob Forsell and chief surgeon of this facility had plenty of free time on his hands, some of which he devoted to developing the island’s meagre flora. Being mostly rocky and barren he created space for an apple orchard of 150 trees and planted the remaining island with more than 5,000 other trees of which quite a few appears to have been pine, considering what is still standing on this restricted access island.
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Summer perennials
Text & Photo © JE Nilsson, CM Cordeiro 2013
A noticeable feature of the houses found in the Swedish west coast archipelago are the picturesque gardens that look unkempt. Seemingly forgotten and left wild, it is this visual feature that I find gives the gardens their defining, core beauty.
Since settling in Sweden more than a decade ago, I have now had ample opportunity to admire these grounds whether it is via seasonal garden parties or from long evening strolls around the neighbourhood.
The garden closest to my heart, was once under the care of a professor in botany. To that extent, set in an undulating landscape, this garden has some interesting varieties of plants from Iceland Poppies (papaver nudicaule) that every year shed red petals after only a week of intense efforts of drawing attention to themselves from the local bee population, to sprawling crawlers such as the Grape Ivy (parthenocissus tricuspidata), that come autumn covers nearby branches and facades in a fiery red and green.
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