Author: edwinsetiadi

When reading any last-minute news about the election tonight, just remember that despite the claim of free press since 1998 Indonesia is ranked 132 out of 180 countries in World Press Freedom Index 2014, with limited news selections from either biased tycoon-owned media, or conspiracy theorists on their social media accounts / Kompasiana.

There’s often no distinction between facts, opinions and interpretation of facts (which is an opinion), where we often ended up reading viral info that are almost impossible to verify the authenticity. Black campaign, especially tonight, is spreading like wildfire.

Don’t buy into it, be much smarter than that. Instead, here’s what some of the most respected media from around the world have to say about tomorrow’s election, to help us have a better judgement:

The Guardian

Al Jazeera English (video report)

Bloomberg

The Economist

Mother Jones

WikiLeaks Cable

The New York Times

South China Morning Post

Australian Broadcasting Corporation

Time Magazine

The Wall Street Journal

Financial Times

Foreign Policy

And concluded by the ever brilliant

New Mandala

The first method for estimating the intelligence of a ruler is to look at the men he has around him – Niccolo Machiavelli

Remember that by voting for 👆Prabowo or ✌️Jokowi, we’re not only voting for the presidential candidate but also their coalition. Here’s 10 pointers to consider for tomorrow:

1. Among those behind Prabowo there’s the likes of Hatta Rajasa, Aburizal Bakrie and PKS. So for example if you want Ical to be the main minister (as per their coalition arrangement) and PKS’ Tifatul Sembiring to potentially remains as Menkominfo, vote for Prabowo.

2. Among those behind Jokowi there’s the likes of JK, Anies Baswedan and Alwi Shihab. So for example if you want Anies Baswedan to potentially becomes education minister and Alwi Shihab potentially back as a minister, vote for Jokowi.

3. Despite their carefully-crafted populist image, both candidates still have an unavoidable list of “rent-seeking” businessmen’s interests behind them. It’s how democracy really works in the past 30 years, from Koch brothers in the US to Roman Abramovich in Russia, where they “purchase” national regulations that benefit their businesses and tend to win projects without tenders. Just look at the current richest person in Indonesia right now, and you’ll see why he jumped the wealth ladder during SBY’s presidency and was chosen to fill a strategic ministerial position.

4. Although both coalitions have Islamic party backing, their interpretation of Islam are slightly different. In Jokowi’s side there’s the slightly more liberal PKB with their Nahdlatul Ulama base. While in Prabowo’s side there’s PAN which inclined to a more conservative Muhammadiyah and PKS with its more hardline Wahhabi ideology, with PPP as the complicated exception.

5. Jokowi may be a proxy, or even a puppet, for Megawati. But the worse political godfather is arguably in Prabowo’s camp, in the name of Amien “poros tengah” Rais. Conversely, Prabowo is accused of being a human rights violator based on what happened in 1998, but if the accusation ever to be proven then his superior Wiranto (in Jokowi’s camp) should be prosecuted too due to his position during the “operasi mawar” and his role in Timor 1999. On that last note, if Jokowi wins, the riot 1998 case (on Wiranto) would likely to remain silenced. If Prabowo wins, the following cases would likely to remain untouched: riot 1998 (on Prabowo), Hajj fund corruption (Suryadharma Ali), beef import scandal (PKS), Lapindo brantas (Aburizal Bakrie), Oil Mafia (Hatta Rajasa), Bank Century (Demokrat).

6. When reading any news about the election, just remember that despite the claim of free press since 1998 Indonesia is ranked 132 out of 180 countries in World Press Freedom Index 2014, with limited news selections from either biased tycoon-owned media, or conspiracy theorists on their social media accounts / Kompasiana. Remember that opinions are not facts. An interpretation of facts is also an opinion, not a fact. And remember that even facts can be manipulated, e.g. All of these polling numbers that rarely disclose the data number of respondents and their demographic compositions that could reveal their bias.

7. Prabowo declares his commitment to continuing the programs of SBY’s government, which prompted the late official support from the Demokrat. This coincidentally includes how the ministerial positions are distributed among the coalition partners, while conversely Jokowi declares that he will appoint professionals in each posts. Hence, in short, if you like the way things are under SBY’s presidency, vote for Prabowo. If you want change, whether for the better or worse, vote for Jokowi.

8. As they say in Uganda, the flies may change but the shit remains the same. Remember that both coalitions still have some New Order regime people in it, a hint that Indonesia might not have a regime chance after all, only a “change of clothing.” This may explains why Suharto was never really prosecuted and why the truth about the dark history of our nation during the New Order (1965 coup, 1998 riot, etc) never truly revealed. For a comparison, there’s no Saddam’s people in the current Iraqi government and we wouldn’t dream of having Gaddafi’s people in the new Libyan government, both of whom were ousted and didn’t step down like Suharto or Mubarak.

9. Whoever you vote for, and whoever wins, the new president will inherit a tough budget and would likely to have a hard time in fully implementing his plans due to no majority seats in the parliament (353 seats for Prabowo camp, 207 seats for Jokowi camp), which would ensure another DPR freak shows. So this election outcome would probably not be the “quick fix our country urgently need”, but instead it’s another one step forward on a long and complicated journey.

10. But most importantly for me, for die hard supporters out there please win with humility and lose with dignity. And keep calm. There’s nothing more effective for a ruthless/incompetent leader, and nothing more disastrous for the majority of the people, than fiery blind followers. Be it Al Qaeda militants, Nazi soldiers, North Korean citizens or presidential supporters who worship their candidate as some kind of god who can do no wrong. Switch-on your bullshit alarm, always be critical to every candidate and for the love of our nation please don’t get easily provoked. With election outcome likely to be won in the tiniest of margins, high tension and clashes amid election result are highly possible.

He may not be a philosopher-king, but when 9 July comes I’ll vote for Jokowi. It’s not that I blindly adore him and got carried away by all of the PR-engineered hype of him, but because to me he’s a better option than the other candidate: a coalition of hardliners led by 3 psychopaths.

Let me explain what I meant by psychopaths. Psychopathy is defined as “a personality disorder characterised by enduring antisocial behavior, diminished empathy and remorse, and disinhibited or bold behaviour”, and each one of the main individuals in Prabowo’s camp, with their own problems, show these tendencies. First there’s Prabowo himself, an alleged human rights violator with mafia-esque short temper. Then there’s Hatta Rajasa as his VP, who’s involved in oil mafia (one of the biggest corruption acts in the fuel-subsidised country) and Aburizal Bakrie, who’s responsible for Lapindo mudflow disaster and who has a bad reputation in business, including that famous case where he duped Nat Rothschild.

Behind them lies 3 Muslim hardliner parties, where PPP’s chief Suryadharma Ali is involved in Hajj fund corruption scandal, PKS (a Wahhabi hardliner) is guilty of beef import corruption scandal that made beef prices expensive in Indonesia, and PAN with godfather Amien “poros tengah” Rais arguably the most backstabbing politician in the republic. Speaking of hardliners, the religious thugs FPI and “former” Jakarta gangster Hercules also declares their support for Prabowo, with the latter even runs Prabowo’s campaign operations on the street levels together with other network of gangsters. It seems that all the crooks and the thugs somehow found each others in this coalition.

Furthermore, Prabowo’s coalition is fundamentally based on money politics and political contract that ensures ministerial and province-level jobs are distributed among the parties (with Golkar party reportedly will get 7 ministerial positions). This is the same kind of disaster occurring right now in the incumbent Yudhoyono’s cabinet, where the majority of ministerial positions are not filled by professionals but rather controlled by coalition party members, which as a result our internet is among the slowest in the world and our once mighty sports national teams now’s a joke, to name just two cases out of many. And FYI the absolute majority of Yudhoyono’s current coalition members are all in Prabowo camp, with Jokowi’s PDI-P serves as an opposition party.

By contrast, Jokowi promises that if he gets elected all of the ministerial positions will be filled by professionals only (though some degree of ministerial post distribution among his coalition partners is still highly expected). Moreover, I like the people in his campaign team, with the likes of Anies Baswedan (an education reformer) and Alwi Shihab (a brilliant ex minister). His coalition’s economic plans is also more realistic compared with the unrealistically ambitious plan by Prabowo’s coalition who will increase the country’s debt-to-GDP level from around 28% right now to 50% to pay for all of their plans, but then at the same time vow to pay-off all of Indonesia’s debts (down to 0% of debt-to-GDP) by 2019, exactly the time his potential 1st term would have ended.

Moreover, Jokowi’s nomination of Jusuf Kalla (JK) as his running mate helps, just look at the incumbent Yudhoyono’s presidency when JK was his VP: his 1st term was highlighted with great reforms, swift decisions and conflict solutions; which granted Yudhoyono with high approval ratings and re-election. But then he dumped JK as his no 2, and his 2nd term has since regarded as a national joke with all the religious violence, damn slow decisions and the worse bunch of ministers.

Just like the way Jokowi runs his governorship of Jakarta – where his no 2 man Basuki Tjahaja Purnama runs the city while Jokowi tours around and meet the people (the well-known “blusukan” style) – as far as I’m concern Jokowi can do blusukan for 5 years if he needs to, while JK and the professional ministers run the country.

Indeed, if we’re talking solely about the individual, I have doubts with Jokowi. His rise to power was too damn quick: he hasn’t finished his term as the mayor of Solo before PDI-P party endorse him to run for Jakarta governorship, and he’s only 1 1/2 years on the job as Jakarta’s governor before PDI-P took his momentum and hype and endorse him as a presidential candidate. He may be fresh and idealistic but he hasn’t really been tested yet, he might be out of depths in high politics, while it is still remains unknown how big of an influence the grande dame Megawati has over her alleged puppet. And of course, Jokowi is not that clean either. Behind him, just like behind Prabowo, still lies the interests of “rent-seeking” businessmen, 3 of whom even allegedly pay for all of Jokowi’s top notch PR campaign.

Nevertheless, when 9 July election day comes the choice is pretty obvious for me: voting for Jokowi is indeed a gamble, but I’d rather vote for a coalition of a puppet backed by professionals than a coalition led by 3 psychopaths backed by troubled hardliners.

“Asian Godfathers: Money and Power in Hong Kong and Southeast Asia” by Joe Studwell

What makes a billionaire? When I was a teenager I voraciously read endless business and personal finance books from ‘Rich Dad Poor Dad’ Series and ‘Think and Grow Rich’, to the psychology of millionaires, to the big-ass reference ‘Business: the ultimate resource’, while closely following Forbes billionaire list. I was obsessed on learning what they’re doing to earn a place in that list, read their biographies extensively and dreamt that someday somehow I too could make it into the list.

Among those on the list, at one hand there’s a group of billionaires that Donald Trump called “the lucky sperm club”, those who were born into an already wealthy dynasty like the billionaire children of Wall-Mart founder Sam Walton. On the other hand there are those extra ordinary people who build their businesses from their dorm room or garage like Bill Gates and Michael Dell, or stories of ordinary professionals that left their day job to build Coffee Republic and The Body Shop, among others, or those who started their business only after they got fired from their job like Michael Bloomberg.

And of course there’s the ultimate entrepreneur Richard Branson, who has built around 350 diverse companies under one brand name Virgin. Branson and others got me convinced that getting the right idea at the right time and place, combined with all the right entrepreneurial zest are the only recipe for success. But what these business books didn’t tell us is what the book ‘Fooled by Randomness’ describe as “survivorship bias”, where numerous failed attempts in the same narrow field by many other people are left unexposed, hence these stories only biased towards the survivors of the game.

That might partly explain why these billionaires are so extra ordinary. But what makes them really different from the rest of the herd? Given the same time, space, education and opportunity would anyone be as successful as them? Could anyone copy what these billionaires do in another countries? As I grew older the answer became clearer: not really.

And then reality check kicks in. As an Asian, watching the news about the “untouchable” moguls-turn-politicians and reading about the insanely rich conglomerates with a relatively unknown company(ies) before they became wealthy, are all just an everyday routine. It doesn’t add up, it doesn’t make sense. Until I read ‘Asian Godfathers.’

So what makes a billionaire? The book explains how far political and economic landscape of a country can be pushed to the limit, to play a highly significant factor in shaping a “friendly business environment”, though “friendly” is subject to whom enjoy it the most.

This is the ugly truth of most of the so-called Godfathers’ wealth in South East Asia. Most get a monopoly in certain business fields by their close and personal links in political power, some even get a position in politics, and it’s not uncommon for these Godfathers to pay for certain regulations to be designed for their huge benefit.

The book exquisitely describes the socio-political landscape of the South East Asian countries, through a detailed historical account. How these countries operate during colonial times, the political and economic structures during their independence and how it is gradually changed and shaped into the countries we know now, one regulation change at a time.

The book also briefly describes the socio-political landscape of Europe and the US for a relative comparison, which rings a bell to my ear with the book ‘Death of the Banker’ – the stories of the wealthy financial dynasties of the Morgans, the Rothschilds, and the like, who are wealthy beyond measure at their time – with a conclusion that they, just like the Asian Godfathers, also generate their wealth through their political and economic leverage.

In the end, having the right idea at the right time and place, with the right entrepreneurial zest are still crucially important. But the business environment in which we conduct business in plays a huge factor on becoming a billionaire, especially when the rules, regulations, taxes and tariffs are all in favour to boost your business and/or kill your competitions.

Read this book if you want to know the history of South East Asian countries in a more practical way, the complicated political stories, the ugly truth about its business environment and why these countries developed to become the way they are now. Simply impressive.

“Averroes: On the Harmony of Religion and Philosophy” by George F. Hourani

Averroes, also known as Ibn Rushd, was a legal scholar of the Maliki school of Islamic law. He inspired St Thomas Aquinas and many Muslim, Catholic and Jewish scholars alike, while at the same time regarded as the “founding father of secular thought in Europe.” He is the only Muslim painted in the Sistine Chapel (the guy with the turban in the “Scuola di Atene” painting), and grouped by Dante in his 14th century masterpiece “Divine Comedy” among great philosophers such as Plato and Aristotle.

Famous for bringing back the almost vanished teachings of Aristotle through his commentary work, he was trained in law, medicine and philosophy, and became the chief judge of Cordoba during the Golden Age of inventions in the Muslim world in the 12th century (that brought us al-gebra, al-chemy, al-gorithm among many others).

His life story alone reveals so much about the lost Islamic history and the rich culture Muslims had way before the Renaissance (which started to civilise the West 2 centuries later). And his resulting thinkings are the product of the advanced knowledge during that Islamic Golden Age, which would make today’s Islamic culture (with de-facto caliphate of the descendants of Muhhamad bin Saud and Abdul-Wahhab) looks medieval and simplistic by comparison. But yet, just like Ibn Al-Haytam who wrote the theory of gravity 600 years before Isaac Newton, and Al-Tusi and Al-Gazali whose work on free-market economy were copied by Adam Smith, the work of Averroes remains unknown in our modern world.

This well-researched book (written in 1960) is the attempt to bring back the stories of the complex theological debates between Muslim scholars during the Golden Age of Islam. The book is divided into 3 parts: 1.) The fascinating introduction that sets the intellectual scene of c. 10-12th century Muslim world. 2.) the translation on Averroes’ own writings. 3.) the brilliant elaborating notes on the translation. And central to all of this is Averroes’ superb thoughts on the question of the era – the harmony of religion and philosophy – that may have already settled the age-old debate between religion and philosophy around 900 years ago.

“Life in Year One: What the World Was Like in First-Century Palestine” by Scott Korb

Life in year one provides the historical context on what daily life was like in the 1st century Palestine under the Roman Empire control, from 5 BC (which is believed to be the year Jesus was born) until 70 AD (the year the Romans destroyed Jerusalem’s Second Temple).

This isn’t a book about Jesus though, instead it’s more about his neighbours, his fellow Bethlehemite and Nazarene, the politics and economics in his area, the origin of the language he uses (a form of Greek known as Koine), the food, the health, the local customs, the traditions, the war and the death, even the way people flirt back then. I’m absolutely hooked, a really good read.

You have a whole pan of pizza, and you’re going to eat it. But then a stranger suddenly comes and claim that your pizza is his pizza, and take them all.

You naturally gets angry and start fighting back and managed to get only 2 slice out of the bunch, when other people arrived at the scene and mediate both of you. These people claim to be neutral but they are in fact that guy’s cousin and his friends.

And so a discussion takes place to determine who’s the rightful owner of the pizza. But while the conversation is ongoing that guy is starting to eat your pizzas slowly, while still clinging on the rest of the pan.

When confronted, he shouts back and claim his right to eat your pizza because he owns the rest of the pan, and he demands recognition from others that the pan that he holds is rightfully his.

Meanwhile, his cousin happens to be the biggest bully in the neighbourhood and he and his friends declare their undying support for this guy and his “right” to hang on to the whole pizza pan, ignoring the simple fact that the pizza is originally yours.

That is Israel-Palestine peace process in a nutshell.

Did you know? There are 550,000 polling stations today and a whopping 4.5 million election officials (that’s equal to the entire population of Ireland and New Zealand), which will accommodate our voting rights in what Financial Times refer as the world’s most complex 1-day election.

Just to put things in perspective, as we speak there are millions of people in 71 countries who cannot enjoy what we can easily take for granted: those in North Korea who can only vote for 1 candidate, those in Egypt who are fighting their lives to get rid of a fake democracy with unelected government, and even those in Somaliland and Jubaland who can vote but their vote aren’t recognised by anyone in the international community.

By contrast, there are 186 million eligible voters in today’s election in Indonesia, 21.8 million of which are 1st-timer, with 235,000 candidates to choose for, all of whom are competing for 19,000 seats. Regardless of who you vote for (or against), today is really a “pesta demokrasi.” And we should be damn proud to be Indonesians who are able to freely exercise our rights as a citizen.

Not a single sentence in this article mentions that Hun Sen himself is a former member of the brutal Khmer Rouge. And it also fails to point out that Sam Rainsy of the CNRP did not just gain most of the seats in parliament but also won the July 2013 election in a landslide, despite Hun Sen’s attempt to prevent a large number of citizens to vote and instead grant the voting rights to non-Cambodian citizens to vote for Sen’s party.

And then, just like the Myanmar junta that ignored the election won by Aung San Suu Kyi in 1990, Hun Sen being the dictator that he is chose to ignore the election result and thus remains in power. Of course CNRP then protested and regards Sen as cheating the election, but the way this article construct the paragraphs (and without the vital info of landslide victory by Sam Rainsy) makes it as if CNRP are just a bunch of crybabies, while in reality Sam Rainsy more resembles Cambodia’s Aung San Suu Kyi.

Moreover, for protests on land-grabbing this article never mentions who the grabbed lands were for. Hun Sen not only implements land grabs by developers that left many homeless, but also frequently got rid of land-owning farmers by force, to give foreign corporations an “economic land concessions” for plantations or factory building. One example is the demolition of a rice field in an village of Chouk on 19 May 2006, by a Thai corporation Khon Kaen Sugar Industry PLC.

Dozens of farmers tried to stop the bulldozers, but the police then quickly open fire at them, in which a female protester was injured. A barbed wire fence now surrounds the fields, which have since became a sugar plantation, while 200 hundred families in Chouk lost their livelihood. Cambodian NGOs estimated that since 2003 around 400,000 people have been driven out from their own land in the same manner.

Sure, foreign garment makers such as Levy-Strauss, Puma and GAP are now reviewing their options, but it is more on the basis of the risk of violence among the workers, not as a protest of Hun Sen’s brutal land-grabbing and oppression on its people, which provide them with the land and labour in the first place. And on the shooting of garment workers, yes the unions together are pushing to double the minimum wage from $80 to $160 a month, but the protest by the garment factory workers was demanding $120 a month, that’s $4 per day. Currently they have to live with just $2.67 per day, while Hun Sen and his cronies live in luxury. And you wonder why Cambodia stagnates as a poor country?

Considering that these important facts are being overlooked, it raise some questions on why the article is almost as if being apologetic towards Hun Sen’s crimes? With decades of abusive power isn’t he deserve to be treated like Gaddafi or Mugabe? Or is he more of a Somoza, he may be a son of a bitch but he’s their son of a bitch? They of course being those who greatly benefit from the crimes impose on Sen’s own countrymen, those who championed privatisation – even in Sen’s brutal way – to grant them cheap land and cheap labour wrapped nicely under the banner of comparative advantage in a free-market world.

1. I absolutely enjoy being a parent!
2. Scottish Kilt was originally invented in France, while French Croissant came from Romania.
3. Scientists estimate that currently there are approximately 400 billion stars and up to 50 billion planets in the Milky Way galaxy. If just 1% of those are in the system’s Goldilocks zone (region around a star whose temperature is “just right” for water to be present), then there would be 500 million planets in our galaxy alone that are capable of supporting life.
4. This year I did 2 things from my bucket list, and both are in Japan: picnicking in a Sakura garden and visiting Tokyo Stock Exchange.
5. When gentlemen in medieval Japan wished to seal an agreement, they urinated together, crisscrossing their streams of urine. How noble.
6. The global trade in banana is more regulated than the global trade in weapons.
7. 1st of January became the 1st day of the year in 153 BC. Previously, the 1st day of the year was 15th of March, however according to Theodor Mommsen in his book The History of Rome, Volume IV, this was changed due to disasters in the Lusitanian War, a war of resistance fought by the Lusitanian tribes of Hispania Ulterior against the advancing legions of the Roman Republic.
8. So one day a Lusitanian chief named Punicus managed to invade the Roman territory, slew troops and defeat 2 Roman governors. The Romans then responded by sending a consul to Spain, where in order to accelerate the dispatch of aid the Romans made the new consuls enter to office two-and-a-half months earlier before the first official day of the year 15th March, thus effectively changed 1st January to become the 1st day of the year.
9. There’s a bottomless river in the Philippines called the Enchanted. Many people, including scuba divers, have tried to reach for the bottom but failed. The locals also claim that nobody has ever successful in catching the fish in the river. Challenge accepted!
10. In 1898 Andrew Carnegie tried to buy the Philippines, but failed.
11. The 315 kph winds hitting Philippines on November was probably the strongest cyclone to hit land anywhere in the world in history. And some scientists began to question whether climate change is to blame for typhoon Haiyan.
12. Muhammad Ali has a star in Hollywood. But it’s the only star not written on the floor, for the respect of the name Muhammad.
13. The United States Treasury’s gold reserves are kept at Fort Knox. However, the Federal Reserve’s gold reserves, and those belonged to more than one hundred other central banks, governments and organizations are stored in a vault under the Federal Reserve Bank of New York’s building at 33 Liberty Street in Manhattan. They are stored 8 feet below street level and fifty feet below sea level.
14. The theory of gravity was first written by Ibn Al-Haytham in the 1000s in some of his 200 published books, or 600 years before Isaac Newton discovered his theory of gravity in the 1600s.
15. Algebra is also invented by a Muslim scholar, Muhammad al-Khawarizmi, a great scientist and mathematician who lived in Persia and Iraq from 780 to 850AD. His story is amazing.
16. The board game Monopoly was originally intended to teach the players of the injustice nature of capitalism. The game was first called the Landlord’s Game, and was patented in 1903 by Lizzie Maggie, who believes in the theories of political economist Henry George who despised landlords and advocated a “single tax” on landlords to replace all other taxes altogether.
17. In 1890s Gerard Philips stole Thomas Alva Edison’s design for lamps, and founded Europe’s most successful electronics company, Philips. It wasn’t an illegal thing to do as the Netherlands at that time didn’t have laws for intellectual property rights.
18. In a 52-card deck, the four standard international symbols of diamond heart spade and club were first used on the French Deck made in 15th century in Lyon and Rouen. It’s largely believed that the Queen of Hearts is a representation of Elizabeth of York (the Queen consort of King Henry VII of England), the King of Hearts was Charlemagne, the King of Diamonds was Julius Caesar, the King of Clubs was Alexander the Great and the King of Spades was the biblical King David.
19. In 1913 Hitler, Trotsky, Tito, Freud and Stalin all lived in the same city of Vienna.
20. The polygraph machine (lie detector) was invented by a police officer John Larson in 1921 in Berkeley, California, to substitute police method of the third degree, I.e. Getting information from people by beating them up. John Larson based his invention on the systolic blood pressure test pioneered by psychologist William Moulton Marston, who would later become a comic book writer and spectacularly create, wait for it, Wonder Woman.
21. The Inca civilisation has a bisexual god, Viracocha.
22. Religious traditions actually change over time: In the 10th century most rural Christian priests were married (the Catholic Church cracked down on this in the 12th century). In the 14th century, in both Ottoman and Persian art the figurative miniatures of the Prophet Muhammad existed, while 100 years ago radio, loudspeaker and telephones were haram (and therefore forbidden) for Muslims. In ancient times, animal sacrifice was a core part of Hinduism tradition, as described in Vedas and the Mahabharata (it is now widely abhorred).
23. My favourite religious scholar Karen Armstrong then commented that “Medieval thinkers such as St Thomas Aquinas or Maimonides would be astonished at the way we read, preach and pray today.” She then elaborates “we’ve tended to lose older, sometimes more intuitive patterns of thought, [and thus] they would see some of the ways we talk about God as remarkably simplistic. We are reading our scriptures with a literalness which is without parallel in the history of religion, largely because of this rational bias of ours.”
24. Hindu’s epic Mahabharata is 15 times the length of the Christian bible.
25. Plastic surgery have existed since 600 BC, with Sushruta Samhita, India’s first surgeon, considered as the father of ancient plastic surgery.
26. Hong Kong became a British colony up until 1997, believe it or not, was due to British people’s love of tea. Britain import their tea from several places and one of them was from China, and in the 19th century a growing British love for tea made its imports from China to surge, and consequently created a huge trade deficit with the country. In a desperate attempt to reduce the trade deficit, the British government then started to sell Opium – produced in their Indian colony – to China, which was of course illegal in China. Then in 1841 a Chinese official finally caught and seized an illicit cargo of this opium smuggling, and in an exagerrated response the British declared war. The Qing Dynasty of China was heavily defeated in what to be known as the First Opium War, and was forced to sign the Treaty of Nanking on 29 August 1842, which required China to ‘lease’ Hong Kong to Britain until 1997.
27. This might come in handy: The green stripe in a bottom-end of a tube bottle means the ingredients are all natural. Red means some natural but mostly chemicals. And black means only chemical are used to make the contents.
28. Bulls are colour blind. Hence, contrary to popular belief, they aren’t enraged by the colour red used in caps by matadors, but instead enraged by the perceived threat by the matador that incites them to charge.
29. Samsung is a Korean word for “3 stars.” The company was founded in 1938 and started out as an exporter of fish, vegetable and fruit. Look how far they have come.
30. While Dutch East Indies company was the 1st ever listed company in the world, it wasn’t the oldest. The oldest surviving company in the world is Kongo Gumi, a building company who was founded by a prince in South Japan more than 1400 years ago. The company is now run by direct descendants of that prince.
31. The world’s oldest high-rise settlement, with a history going back 1800 years, is the walled city of Shibam, in Southern Yemen’s isolated area Wadi Hadramut. Consists of mud-brick high rises, this stunning place is often referred as the Manhattan of the desert. This is the google image of that place.
32. Pizza Margherita was invented in June 1889 by Neapolitan pizzamaker Raffaele Esposito, to honour the Queen consort of Italy, Queen Margherita of Savoy. The pizza, which consist of tomatoes, mozzarella cheese and basil, represent the colours of the Italian flag.
33. Book of the year: I was pretty sure that I’ve read the best economic book when I read Bad Samaritans by Ha-Joon Chang. But then when I further research professor Chang’s ideas I stumbled upon How rich countries got rich and why poor countries stay poor by Erik Reinert. Hideous title, but it’s by far the best economic book I’ve ever read! What Edward Chancellor did on speculation in ‘Devil take the Hindmost’ and what David Graeber did on debt in ‘Debt: the first 5000 years’ Erik Reinert did ever brilliantly on economics with this book. Austerity by Mark Blyth is also brilliant.
34. History’s shortest reign was Portugal’s King Luis II, whom in 1908 ruled for only 20 minutes, before succumbing to the head wound he sustained in the assassination that killed his father outright.
35. The basis of Coca-Cola was arguably invented in Aielo de Malferit, Spain, by a firm called Aielo’s Fabrica de Licores in 1880. The factory was founded by 3 entrepreneurs Bautista Aparici, Ricardo Sanz and Enrique Ortiz, who manufactures quality products including liquors. Aparici, who was in charge of sales, was soon travelling to trade fairs in Paris, Rome, London and Chicago, and in 1885 he went to Philadelphia with a new beverage in his luggage called Nuez de Kola Coca. Before he left, Aparici gave few samples to American sales representatives, and “coincidentally” one year later US pharmacist John Pemberton invented Coca-Cola.
36. In the West when someone sneezes the exclamation by other people is: bless you. In Mongolia it’s: may your moustache grow like brushwood. Classy.
37. During the time of Peter the Great, any Russian man who wore a beard was required to pay a special tax. So, if they have Movember back then, the month of November would be their best performing month for tax revenue!
38. The Movember movement, aka the no shave November movement, was started by 4 people to raise awareness of male-related diseases such as prostate cancer by no shaving for the whole month. I participated Movember this year, but can’t stand the itches after 2 weeks. The beard came in handy though, to tickle the hell out of my son.
39. 2013 is really the year for Bitcoin. Crashed on April from $266 down to $105 (a -61% crash, the biggest in history), only to rebound up to $1237.96 by 4 November, before crashing -21% to $877.46 two days later. Some got rich and earned the nickname of Bitcoin Jesus, some fanatically support it like Max Keiser, while others like former Dutch central banker sees Bitcoin hype worse than Tulip Mania in the 1630s. Meanwhile, several stores started to accept Bitcoin as a legitimate payment method, some began to receive their salaries in Bitcoin and there’s even a person who beg for money by posting a flier with a QR code asking for Bitcoin. This virtual currency is either going to be great or disaster.
40. As far as the people of Laos are concerned, they live in Lao (without the s), a proud heir to the kingdom of Lan Xang. During the colonial time the French split the country into 3 parts, and the country was called: les Laos. After the French left, however, no one has ever got round to updating the name, and so the name remains Laos.
41. The real meaning of celebrating thanksgiving: celebrating the genocide of Native Americans.
42. Fart travels approximately at an average of 10.97km/hour. Of course, unless you had a curry the night before. Sneeze, meanwhile, travels at an average of 160 km/hour.
43. According to Saxo the Learned’s Deeds of the Danes, Denmark and England have the same ancestral root. Denmark was founded by brothers Dan and Angul. But Angul then left, leaving Dan to rule as a king alone, in which the people and the country adopted his name for their country Denmark. Meanwhile, Angul formed his own tribe, the Angles, and then migrated and invaded the southern part of Britain and renamed the conquered land “England.”
44. Modern English language was actually not spoken until the 16th century.
45. Our son is 1 year and 9 month by December, and so like any other loving parent, me and my missus are now well-versed with Sesame Street, Mickey Mouse Club, Timmy Time, Thomas and Friends, etc. Apparently, the fictional island of Sodor in the Thomas and Friends got its name from a historical kingdom.
46. So the story goes, when the vikings settled in the islands off northern Britain they divided the islands into 2 kingdoms Nordr (the northern Isles) or present-day Shetland and Orkney, and Sodor (the southern Isles) or present-day Hebridges and the Isle of Man. The name Sodor was preserved by the Church in its Diocese of Sodor and Man, and 7 centuries later when Reverend Wilbert Awdrey visited the Church he was struck that while there was an Isle of Man, the island of Sodor did not exist. He then decided on the spot to use the name of this ancient Viking kingdom as the fictional land where his cartoon characters live.
47. There is no evidence that Vikings wore horns on their helmets. The earliest image of Vikings wearing horned helmets was found in 1876 production of the “Der Ring des Nibelungen” opera cycle by Richard Wagner.
48. Christopher Colombus was not the first European to discover the American continent. The first one was a viking named Leif Ericsson, who discovered America 500 years before Columbus. Interestingly, Leif’s father Erik the Red was the founder of Greenland. Conversations at their family dinner table must be very interesting.
49. The story of Easter and the mainstream definition for Christianity are shaped by the Nicene Creed, which was produced in the First Council of Nicaea, a council of Christian bishops convened in Nicaea, Bithynia, in 325 AD by the Roman Emperor Constantine I.
50. The Dominican Republic is the only country in the world to display the Bible on its flag.
51. Armenia was the first nation in the world to adopt Christianity, converting in 301 AD (36 years before the Roman Empire).
52. The world’s first church was St. Peter’s Church, built in Antioch (Antakya), present-day Turkey.
53. Turkey produce 70% of the world’s hazelnut. Meanwhile, Bolivia is the biggest exporter of Brazilian nuts. Somewhere in that last sentence lies a very funny joke.
54. Brazil is home to the largest Japanese population living outside Japan, with approximately 2.5 million Japanese Brazilian (1% of Brazil’s total population). The Japanese immigration to Brazil started in 1907 when the end of feudalism in Japan created poverty in rural areas, and thus many seek better living condition abroad. At that time, coffee was Brazil’s main export product, and due to the abolishment of slave trade there was a shortage of plantation workers, which the Japanese then filled the void. A lot of the Japanese immigrants settled in São Paulo, where most of the coffee plantations were located.
55. In the Napoleonic War era, from 1808 to 1821 the capital city of the whole Portuguese empire was moved to Rio de Janeiro, making it the only capital city for a European Empire that is located outside Europe.
56. The Pope used to be very powerful and politically active. In 800 AD Roman Emperor Charlemagne established the precedent that no man would be emperor without being crowned by a Pope. In 1511 Henry II of England had to ask for a permission first from an English Pope Adrian IV, before he proceeded with the invasion of Ireland. The Pope also acted as a mediator for European kingdoms, where in 1493, in the fight between Spain and Portugal on colonial territories, Pope Alexander VI “grant” the Americas to the Spanish and Africa to the Portuguese. The Pope remained powerful until a reform movement “Conciliarism” emerged and limit the Pope’s power.
57. The Vatican City was given to the Pope in 1929 by Benito Mussolini as a present. Previously, in 1870 Italian troops succesfully blasted through the city walls of Rome as the final act of Italian unification, and occupied the city. The unification of Italy left the Papal State without any physical territory for the first time in 1200 years, and the situation was made tricky when Pope Pius IX declared that he was a prisoner and locked himself in his palace. This protest was maintained by his successors for the next 59 years until Mussolini grant the Vatican City as a separate state.
58. This year Pope Gregory XVI resigned. The last time a Pope resign was Gregory XII in 1415, and last time a Pope resign voluntarily was Celestine V in 1294. Pope Gregory XVI’s successor, Pope Francis I, is without a doubt one of the kindest and most sincere people I’ve ever seen, loving this new Pope! He’s my person of the year.
59. Apparently Time magazine also loves Pope Francis and named him their Person of the Year 2013. Even The Advocate, a gay rights magazine, also named him their Person of the Year 2013 – now that’s big.
60. There’s a group of people in China who are allegedly alliens that are still living on earth. They are called the Dropa Tribe.
61. This year I turned 30, and so I’m opening a new chapter in life. Being twenty-something was awesome, I pushed myself to the many extremes, find my limits, find my strengths and weaknesses, discovered what I like dislike and cannot tolerate, and learned where I am most comfortable in society. And now as I have turned 30, I’m starting to read Der Spiegel more frequently. Uhm, is that normal?
62. The breakfast cereal business was created by accident.
63. There are 24 hours in a day because the first civilisation that divided the day into smaller parts, the Egyptians, didn’t count in base 10 like we do today, but in base 12 (duodecimal) using fingers and finger joints (excluding the thumb, which are used to point the fingers ans joints when counting) to count up to 6 in each hand.
64. In 1500 BC the Egyptians created a device that divide the interval between sunrise and sunset into 12 parts using sexagesimal numeral system (base 60), that’s why there’s 60 seconds in a minute and 60 minutes in an hour. And because there was no artificial light yet, people in that time period treat the daylight and the night as two separate realms instead of the same day, and they counted the night in breakdown of 12 using the observation of 24 stars. Combine the 12 parts during the day and 12 parts during the night, and eureka we have 24 hours!
65. The positions of the pyramids in Egypt are aligned with the star constalation Orion.
66. The story of the Egyptian pyramids is in Al Qur’an (28:38). In the verse, the holy Qur’an even specifically that the pyramids were made by baked bricks, long before archaeologists concluded that baked bricks were indeed the raw material used.
67. Massive demonstration erupted once again in Bangkok on November by the yellow shirt supporters, after Prime minister Yingluck Shinawatra tried to pass an amnesty bill that would effectively legalise her brother Thaksin’s return to the country. But who exactly are the yellow shirt supporters, and why do they hate Thaksin so much?
68. According to Joe Studwell in his book Asian Godfathers Thaksin Shinawatra crossed the line from businessman to politician with the backing of some of the most powerful fellow-Godfathers in the country, in the dream that with Thaksin as frontman they will control the nation politically, for their own benefit. Thaksin present himself as a populist, and once elected Prime Minister he kept his populist campaign promises, which is why the people love him, but then abandoned his fellow-Godfathers and leave them with nothing. At the same time, however, Thaksin’s own businesses got leniencies in regulations, easily won tenders, etc, making him richer all by himself in the process. This abuse of power is the basis of corruption allegations on Thaksin that made him a fugitive since the coup in 2006, which is legitimate. The yellow shirt movement, or officially People’s Alliance for Democracy (PAD), was then formed 2 days after the 2006 coup and was funded by the group of Godfathers that Thaksin lured and then ditch. That’s why the yellow vs red supporters can be seen as the elite vs the poor, while in reality it’s more of a battle between the Godfathers.
69. Orangutan has 96.7% human DNA. Too close, that’s way too close.
70. The myth of flat earth is actually a modern misconception. According to historian Jeffrey Burton Russell the myth about the dark age where people believed in flat-earth was developed between 1870 and 1920 as a result of ideological setting created by debates over evolution, and was popularised by historians Andrew Dickson White, John William Draper and Washington Irving. In reality since the 3rd century BC onwards no educated person in the history of Western Civilisation believed that the earth was flat, thanks to the spherical viewpoint expressed by the Ancient Greeks. In fact, all major medieval scholars accepted that the roundness of the earth is an established cosmological fact, and Christian scholars even know the earth’s approximate circumference.
71. As reported by John Pilger, The CIA actually has an ‘entertainment industry liaison office’ that “helps” Hollywood remake US image. The 2010 Oscar-winner Kathryn Bigelow’s Zero Dark Thirty, a torture-apology movie, was a recent example of movies licensed by the Pentagon.
72. Another example is Ben Affleck’s Oscar-winning Argo, where Pilger describes as “the first feature film so integrated into the propaganda system that its subliminal warning of Iran’s “threat” is offered as Obama is preparing, yet again, to attack Iran.” Pilger then elaborates that “Affleck’s “true story” of good-guys-[vs]-bad-Muslims is as much a fabrication as Obama’s justification for his war plans is lost in PR-managed plaudits.”
73. The movies Psycho, the Texas chain saw massacre, Deranged and the Silence of the Lambs all inspired by the story of a real-life serial killer Ed Gein.
74. In Ancient Rome, all convicted rapist will have his balls crushed by a pair of rocks. Ouch. I bet if this we implement this today, rape cases will go down significantly.
75. The huge Irish emigration to places like the US was triggered by the Great Famine between 1845 and 1849 that caused hunger in Ireland. The British gov, though, instead of sending help they sent soldiers to suppress unrest, which prompted the emigration.
76. The Rwandan genocide 1994 and the more recent M23 rebel movement against Democratic Republic of Congo can be traced back to conflicts between etnics Tutsi and Hutu. But if we dig much deeper, we’d find out that Both Tutsi and Hutu are actually fake races created by the colonial ruler Belgium. Yes, in reality Tutsis and Hutus are both belong to the same race and ethicity.
77. Beer mat was invented by a German man robert Sputh in 1892. Today, Germans continue to dominate world beer mat production, with the Katz Group produce 12 million daily (that’s 75% of the world’s total).
78. Electric cars were actually common in the early 1900s. Two gentlemen in Cleveland, Ohio, named Jacob Rauch and Charles E.J. Lang started a car company named Rauch and Lang, and in 1905 began to sell electrically powered cars. They were quite popular that by 1908 the company was producing 500 cars per year, and electric cars were actually favoured by many over oil powered engines. But then in 1928 the company stopped producing due to lack of funds, and there were extreme advances in the internal combustion technology that made the electric models looks much slower and more expensive thanks to companies such as the Ford Motor Company that can mass-produce oil-powered cars, which electric models couldn’t.
79. The Three Wise Monkeys have names: Mizaru (See no evil), Mikazaru (Hear no evil), and Mazaru (Speak no evil).
80. Pakistan is an acronym for 5 Indian province which then occupied the territory: Punjab Afghan/North-west frontier, Kashmir, Sindh and BalochisTAN. Pakistan, felicitously, also means ‘land of the pure’ in Urdu.
81. The name India is derived from the Indus River. The majority of its flows is now in the territory of Pakistan.
82. In 2009 a Hindu nationalist group in India set out plans for “Cow Water”, a cow urine soft drink. Mixed with milk, ghee and cow poo, cow urine becomes known as “Five Cow Nectar”, a tonic believe to be able to soothe stomachache and heart burn. I think I just found my limit on my taste-almost-everything-at-least-once rule.
83. The US nickname “Uncle Sam” was derived from Uncle Sam Wilson, a meat inspector in Troy, New York. During the War of 1812 against Britain, the demand of military meat supply for the troops increased significantly, and Samuel Wilson was appointed as a meat inspector for the Northern Army. His duties included checking the freshness of the meat and properly package them according to the government’s specifications; where most of the meat he packaged was shipped to a camp of 6000 soldiers in Greenbush, New York. A lot of the soldiers stationed there were locals of Troy, and knew and/or acquainted with “Uncle Sam” and his meat packing business. And they began to associate the label in the meat packages of U.S (United States) that came from Troy as packages from U.S (Uncle Sam).
84. I believe we have arguably found the future model for NGOs: read the extraordinary story of Audette Exel, a banker who saves 20,000 people from Nepal to Uganda with her profits.
85. Spitzberger, in the island of Svalbard, Northern Norway, is the northernmost place on earth with human inhabitant.
86. During the month of Ramadan this year, Muslims in places like Spitzberger and Kiruna, Northern Sweden, followed the fasting time (when Muslims fast when the sun is up) in Saudi Arabia because the sun always up for 3 months in there.
87. New York’s Central Park is bigger than Vatican City and Monaco.
88. The Grimaldi family bought Monaco in 1419, from Genoa. And then they paid France 4.1 million francs for it in 1861. Yes, they bought it twice.
89. The Hanging Gardens of Babylon were actually built 300 miles north of Babylon, in neighbouring Nineveh, by the great Assyrian ruler Sennacherib, and not, as historians have always thought, by King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon. This revelation was concluded by Dr. Stephanie Dalley of Oxford University’s Oriental Institute, whom after more than 20 years of research has finally pieced together enough evidence to prove her conclusion beyond reasonable doubt.
90. Wanker of the year: Senator Ted Cruz, for holding the whole country in hostage during the debt ceiling debate in the US, which have ripple effects on the global markets. But Benjamin Netanyahu wins the lifetime achievement award, for the biggest wanker in history.
91. The biblical story of Onan, who was killed by God’s wrath after he masturbated, might not be accurate. According to Scott Korb in his brilliant book life in year one, a more accurate interpretation on the writing of the story suggest that Onan performed a coitus interruptus – a.k.a pulling out before he comes, to prevent Tamar, his sister in law, to get pregnant. I’m sorry, but that makes it more hilarious.
92. NASA satellite data shows that on August 2010 East Antarctica set the record for the coldest temperature ever measured with -135.8 degrees Fahrenheit (-93.22 Celcius) below zero. This July the temperature almost hit that low again, with -135.3 Fahrenheit (-92.94 Celcius). Scientists say it is painful to breathe at that temperature.
93. Racistly portraying Arabs or Muslims as terrorists is like stereotyping all American women solely from Paris Hilton, Kim Kardashians, Lindsay Lohan, Snooki. And as a matter of fact, Islamic law forbids terrorism.
94. According to Murtaza Hussain, the 1400 years of conflict between Sunni and Shia Muslim is a myth.
95. Currently Indonesia has 255,000 mosques, 13,000 Hindu temples, 2,000 Buddhist temples, 1,300 Confucianism temples and over 61,000 churches. With over 61,000 churches, Indonesia has relatively more churches than Great Britain and Germany, two Christian-majority countries. Hence, despite with what the media are portraying Indonesia is actually a tolerant nation.
96. According to investigative journalist Andre Vltcheck in his book Indonesia: the archipelago of fear, Indonesia didn’t experience a regime change when our dictator Soeharto stepped down (not ousted, but stepped down) in 1998. Instead, the regime only had, in Vltcheck’s words, a “change of clothing.” Actually this makes a lot of sense, and explains pretty much most of the things going on with the current politics.
97. The Indonesian slang word for money, duit, is actually comes from a copper coin named ‘duit’ that was introduced by VOC in 1724 during the Dutch colonial times in Indonesia.
98. The Aral Sea was once the size of Ireland, but since the 1960s the sea has shrunk into a string of salty puddles. Before the end of this century, the remaining of the Uzbek half of the sea will dry up altogether to be replaced by a poisonous dust-bowl desert.
99. Early next year we are expecting our 2nd child, so in 2014 I’ll definitely be a sleep-deprived father of two. Can’t wait! 🙂
100. And so, to wrap things up, I leave you in the good hands of the cool people at Twisted Sifter, which on August posted 40 fantastic maps that will help us make sense of the world. Have a great 2014 guys!