Communist retro-chic: East-bloc icons win new status
The News Review:
- Communist retro-chic: East-bloc icons win new status
- Australia’s economy Hawks in the outback
- The difference between value and worth
- Food for thought – Food & Wine – Activities & Interests -…
- ‘Small and green’ cars steel the show
- Economist.com | Country Briefings: Saudi Arabia
- Leisure travel — with the kids left at home
Communist retro-chic: East-bloc icons win new status
Christian Science Monitor – Mar 6, 2008
At Budapest’s WestEnd shopping mall, trendy young Hungarians snap up boldly colored Tisza sneakers at the brand’s upscale store. Under Communism, Tiszas were cheap, poorly made sneakers for the masses, meant to quench young Hungarians’ appetite for Nike and Adidas athletic shoes from the capitalist side of the Iron Curtain. Now the shoes are not only back in production, they’ve become the retro-chic footwear of choice for Hungary’s trendy youths, who eschew global brands in favor of a home-grown icon of an economic and political system few of them can remember. Older people buy the products for nostalgic reasons, according to Kofola spokesman Martin Klofanda in Prague. “People remember Kofola from the old times, when we were very popular,” he says. “Parents teach their children about it, which is why we’re able to compete with the big brands from the West. In Slovakia’s capital, Bratislava, young people keep tabs on which hangouts provide the best Kofola on tap, which is a matter of freshness and maintaining the proper level of carbonated water in the mix… Not all decades are missed The nostalgic feelings are also confined to the 1970s and ’80s, a time when most East European regimes were liberalizing, allowing citizens greater freedom to acquire consumer goods, travel, and even voice mild criticism of the state. “You could say and read what you wanted in the last four or five years of the dictatorship,” says historian Maria Schmidt, director of the House of Terror Museum in Budapest, which documents the abuses of the Stalinist period, when life was grim and citizens lived in constant fear of the secret police. “There’s nostalgia for the ’70s and ’80s, and it’s not bad to have good memories and look back at the movies and music of one’s youth,” says Ms. Schmidt, an outspoken critic of the Soviet-era regime. “Nobody in Hungary is nostalgic for the period from 1944 to the end of the 60s. Those were the darkest days.
Australia’s economy Hawks in the outback
economist.com – Mar 6, 2008
(On the same day, Canada, a fellow resource producer, cut rates by half a percentage point, partly because of the American slowdown. ) Australia’s rate rise came just weeks after a pledge by Wayne Swan, its new finance minister, to ratchet up the fiscal surplus. In much of the world, rising food and energy bills are driving up imported inflation, but in Australia, the price pressures are mostly home grown as the economy booms. Figures released on March 5th showed that GDP expanded by 3. 9% in the year to the fourth quarter. In the same period, non-tradable inflation, which measures price growth influenced by domestic pressures, was 4.
The difference between value and worth
Sunday Herald – Mar 6, 2008
When the City snarls, the Treasury forgets about
fair taxation. And the rest, the median, conclude that this is how the world
works. Last week we saw a notable act of home-grown philanthropy. It made all the
papers. Anthony d’Offay, a London picture dealer, handed over his collection
of 725 works of post-war and contemporary art to the National Galleries of
Scotland and the Tate. The d’Offay collection is “worth” £125
million. The benefactor has instead accepted the prices he first paid,
amounting to £26.
Food for thought – Food & Wine – Activities & Interests -…
The Age – Mar 6, 2008
It produces asparagus, gherkins,radishes, rhubarb, celery, zucchini, lettuce, tomatoes, beans,spinach and herbs and a thriving orchard with apples, quince, pruneplums, macadamia, figs, apricots, pears and almonds. Meanwhile, back at the lunch table, Allies winemakers DavidChapman and Barney Flanders of Merricks North are pouring wines toaccompany a seafood soup with local mussels and flathead pieces -first a crisp viognier and then a delicate chardonnay. Bowls of heritage tomato salad arrive, along with steamed beansand toasted almonds, and cracked wheat with banana peppers andharissa and a surprise dish of slow-poached (”at 65 degrees for 65minutes”) home-grown free-range eggs with salsa verde and warrigalgreens. More wines, including an excellent shiraz, are poured, allmatching splendidly with the main course of snapper fillets withzucchini, tempura calamari and a reduced Allies pinot noir jus. The meal concludes with a tangy sorbet of rhubarb and gingerbeer on slices of plum, a prune plum frangipane and tea made fromherbs plucked from the garden – lemon verbena, mint and freshginger. FAST FACTSFor more Shared Table regional lunches and events contactMarieke Brugman (pictured with Andrew McConnell) at Marieke’s Artof Living, phone 0419 580 381 or see. mariekesartofliving.
‘Small and green’ cars steel the show
Economic Times – Mar 6, 2008
New
Delhi:
Automobile companies took the
excise duty cuts with a positive mood and announced huge price reduction in tune
of Rs 6,000 to Rs 20,000 for different models. Maruti Suzuki India, the market
leader of passenger cars reduced prices in the range of Rs 6,000 (for Maruti800)
to Rs 18,000 (for Swift diesel). Home-grown car maker Tata
Motors reduced prices of its hatchback Indica and Sedan Indigo by up to Rs
15,300 to pass on the benefit of excise duty cut to its customer. The prices of
Indica range has come down in a range of Rs 8,500 to Rs 14,600 while prices of
the recently launched Indigo CS has been reduced in a range of Rs 12,700 to Rs
15,300. Hyundai also followed
the price cut race and reduced prices by Rs 11,000 to Rs 16,000 for its
different variants, while luxury car maker Skoda has also announced a cut of up
to Rs 18,000 on its hatchback Fabia’s diesel variants. Fiat Motor India also
announced a reduction on its prices up to Rs 12,000 on its flagship model Palio
Stile 1. 1 litre with immediate
effect.
Economist.com | Country Briefings: Saudi Arabia
economist.com – Mar 6, 2008
As the antipathy of militant Islamists towards foreign interests in the country deepened, the scope of their targets widened and they were responsible for a spate of small-scale bomb attacks between 2000 and 2003 that killed and injured individual Westerners working in the kingdom. The Saudi authorities initially blamed most of the attacks on disputes among expatriates over the illegal trade in alcohol, and convicted five Westerners for the bombings. However, following the September 11th 2001 attacks on the US, in which the majority of perpetrators were found to be Saudi nationals, the regime finally started to acknowledge that they were facing a serious home-grown problem. As crown prince, King Abdullah attempted to draw upon his personal good standing among the ulema by appealing to them to restrain extremist messages from outspoken young clerics who were threatening the wider interests of the religious establishment. However, extreme militancy had already taken hold among more radical Islamist figures, who, in 2003, began a concerted bombing campaign of expatriate residential compounds. The government responded forcefully to the continued Islamist-inspired violence, which has gradually waned, with the security forces having seemingly gained the upper hand. A wide-ranging ideological campaign by the authorities has also played a role in reducing public support for Islamist violence within the kingdom.
Leisure travel — with the kids left at home
BusinessWeek – Mar 6, 2008
Thanks to my energetic and very patient mother, we were able to leave our three kids at home. The thought of subjecting our young trio to such a… But a few of our friends didn’t see it that way. “You have such little vacation,” said one. “Don’t you feel guilty using it up on your own? They’ll be grown up before you know it. ” She echoed a similar sentiment when we went to Key West for a few days two years ago. Quality time with the family is a precious commodity. But I think it’s also important for mom and dad to reconnect as a couple now and then, too.