Enron Bankruptcy - Reflection

We watched the movie of Enron Scandal on Tuesday during Global Ethics class. I have to say, humans, indeed, can have really nasty minds. It is quite incredible to see how Lay, Skilling, Fastow, and other shareholders can be so smart at manipulating the truth; however, they used their smartness in the wrong way. This is also why they were destined to fail, sooner or later.

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I still remember what Ishmael said about Takers being greedy and their ultimate goal is to control the whole universe. In Enron's case, the company itself is a huge Taker. The ultimate reasons of why they bankrupted are because of pride, arrogance, intolerance, and greed. They will do whatever they need to do to make profits. The part of Enron shutting down electric power in California struck me the most. Enron shut down the electric power in California to make profits while many Californians suffered because of Enron. Also, and the conversation between two investors is simply nasty! Despite all the swear words in their conversation, I felt very disgusted by their attitude... How can people say such things like that? How can people make profits out of people's suffrage without feeling guilty or ashamed? They must know their actions are unethical, however, they did not stop it. There was no way for them to stop the actions because of greed.
I believe the Enron Scandal put businesses in the US and around the world on alert. Under free trade marketing, there is only agreements but not laws. It is easier to manipulate details under those agreements. Those agreements are like the Law of Aerodynamics. It is important for businesses to follow the Law of Aerodynamics to have a fair play in trade markets. Or else, the business will crash like a plane that is not made according to the Law of Aerodynamics.


So, how did the trail go in 2006? What are some effects of this bankruptcy?
- Ken Lay guilty of all six counts against him; Judge Sim Lake finds Lay guilty of four counts in separate personal banking fraud trial. The jury finds Jeff Skilling guilty 19 of the 28 counts against him. Ken Lay died of a sudden heart attack on July 5, 2006 before the final sentence was made. (source)
- Enron sold its last business, Prisma Energy, in 2006. In early 2007, it changed its name to Enron Creditors Recovery Corporation. Its goal is to pay off the old Enron's remaining creditors and wind up Enron's affairs. (source)
- Both Wall Street Journal and Business Week calculated the direct loss of Enron bankruptcy: about 40billion and 90 billion USD. The loss is equal to nine times the loss of 911 Terrorist Attack (about 10 billion). The impact is not only limited to economical aspect, but also damaged US investor's confidence.

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Just another thought of my own: the Enron case made me think of the Lehman Brothers bankruptcy. Although the Lehman Brothers bankrupted because of mortgage crises; however, it still has huge impact on the economy around the world. Over 25,000 employees of Lehman Brothers became unemployed. I felt unbelievable that a leading company like Lehman and Enron can collapse in only a short period of time! Both of them are indeed human tragedies.

DongMen Mall Choreography Reflection

1. How did the site of DongMen alter the choreography that you created in the classroom?
- Originally, our group was going to do movements under the cloth line because we thought we could hang some clothes there. Unfortunately, the cloth line is unreachable, therefore we just did our movements on the flat ground. We also made some changes to our movements. We did the whole choreography without clothes hanging, and we changed the jumping-around to crawling on the ground because it would look better.

2. Now that you know this site better; If you were to go back to Dongmen what would you add or subtract from your choreography to make it stronger?
- I actually liked our movements. If possible, I would change the background to another wall that was at the rooftop. The wall we used as background was gray, but the other wall has some creepy rusty effects that might make our choreography stronger.

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In response to Ms. Amy's Comment:

- The Mall gave me a abandoned, isolated, and creepy feeling. I was scared by a passing cat while walking on the corridor. It was quite surprising to see many people are still living in it. Perhaps it's because those people don't have money to move to a new house or simply because it's their home. If I were the mayor of Hsinchu, I would allow people open shops and live inside. I would fix the whole building, or at least clean up the building so people living inside can have a better living environment.

The Silence of Silicon Lambs - Choreohraphy Ideas

The article mentioned two different rivers in Hsinchu --Kerya and Kaoping River.

Kerya River: The water was found to be polluted and had pungent smell. Some Unnatural sex changes occurred to the Ke-Ying conches, and repetitive dead fishes. Dramatic expansion of Science Park resulted in HSIP alone added 185,000 CMD water to the river that contributes 63.6% of the water body.
Kaoping River: A study showed that the river was polluted because of dumped toxic wastes in July 18, 2000.

From the two short introduction above, I think the students can come with gestures such as kneeling on the river bank and weeping. Students can even personify the fish and other organisms living in the river. What I mean by personification is that students can act as those river creatures which died at the end of the choreography because of human-made pollutions. Overall, I am expecting this choreography to have a kind of sad atmosphere.

I also think that water is a symbol of purification, therefore the class can also create another piece that is totally opposite than the other piece I mentioned above. We can come up with ritual gestures that are more holy.

The ideas I have is quite abstract and hard to describe in words. However, the main idea is to present two different themes-- one is positive, one is negative.

Reflection on readings for Secrete Hsinchu (draft)

Reading #1: Why Psychogeography?

It's said in the reading that "Guy Debord, called for an investigation into the effects of the environment (both constructed and natural) on emotions and behavior. He called this area of study psychogeography.".
I personally find psychogreography an interesting field of study because the kind of places we live in do influence our emotions and behavior. For example, a lot of people like to to places near the sea or in the mountains, because people can feel relaxed by looking at those scenery. People living in the city usually have "fast living paste" and often feel stressed because of the traffic, noises, air pollution, and even the pressure from work. Thus, the environment, indeed, effects our minds and body.
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Reading #2: Site-Specific performance

In the reading, it says "Sites have habits and rules: people who use the space implicitly agree to a set of acceptable behaviour.". This sentence made me think of the ritual choreography I did with my partners. We performed a short skit that involves many mundane rituals. For instance, going to KTV to celebrate birthday is a ritual for young people. Drinking and cheering in the KTV and blowing candles are mundane rituals that we can see quite often.
I think that a site can have different meaning for different people. What I mean by different meaning is that people has different memories of the site. A site has its story and history, therefore, I think artists can be very creative and be really inspired by different sites.

It's All About Design!!!

I see a connection in McDonough's TED talk and the book "The Ecology of Commerce" about the competition between businesses. McDonough pointed out that competition is "together-strive": a way of cooperating in order to fit together. The sixth principle in the book also pointed out how the competition in human culture works. Both support the idea that competition helps growth, but the book addressed on that invasive competitions do not necessarily bring improvements. We are suppose to compete against each other to help each other to grow, like McDonough said, not to try to beat each other. The best way to help human culture to grow and develop is to educate people, not through endless advertisements and invasive competitions!

Another big part mentioned in the book, which is the second principle "Sustainable businesses take responsibility for the effects they have on the natural world" talks about how and what we can do to really help this world to become more sustainable.
The book pointed out a very important point that the little things we are doing to save energy is not enough. The demands we put on nature already exceed what we, as individuals or small groups can do to help. Therefore, the real changes need to be made in the ones that have the real power, such as the corporations.

So, what can businesses do to make a difference? The key is re-think and re-design the whole business process! Starting from the materials and resources, then to employment, this whole process needs to be in a cycle. It is also said in the first principle: "If changing from linear to cyclical processes is a key to re-creating business in an ecological manner, then an important component of that redesign will be feedback, accountability, and responsibility.".

The book also mentioned about William McDonough's design. McDonough's designs are build in a cycle so that every part of the product can go back to the the most original form.
McDonough's designs and what the book talks about fit exactly into what Roxanne and I are doing in our internship. We are currently helping Sir Speedy, a print and design company, to research information about how to make its business green. Since paper is a huge part of a print and design company, we are trying to find out all the papers that are made from recycled paper or post-consumer wastes, and see whether they are chlorine free, or has certifications from organizations like Forest Stewardship Council (FSC), etc. We'll then move on to find out more information about less toxic inks and more eco-friendly printing process later on. The main reason for doing this is to educate not only the people in print and design industries, but also the clients and customers. Only if we start from the most basic, we can do the best to re-design the whole print and design industry, and then to share our knowledge with others!

On the whole, Like McDonough said, it's all about sustainable designs!

Waste Not vs. Senior Project

After reading an excerpt from the book Waste Not, I found out that the commercial industry had wasted many things. Many commercials and ads have images showing exposed women body parts and sexuality. I think women are being regarded as objects. Those images waste the beauty of women in many ways.

For instance, A woman's body and self-confidence is lowered because the way media portrays women. It's mentioned in the reading that overuse of energies and resources lower living quality. Overuse of resources does not necessary boom the economy but drag the economy down. I see parallel of how advertisement overuse the image of women and therefore distorted woman's natural beauty and lowered woman's self-confidence.
Furthermore, many girls and women worship those "distorted beauty" as role model, as result, many business are build for helping women to achieve the idealized beauty. Beauty industry creates huge amount of profits by promoting make ups, clothes, medicine and equipments for loosing-weight, etc. The making of more clothes, make ups, medicines, and machines create wastes that pollute environment and harm the right of labors; dieting or also waste health.

Ms. Gruber reminded me that I need to do more than creating awareness. The reading also says:"each of the three types of waste is presented as interlocking symptoms of one problem: using too many resources to make too few people more productive. This increasingly expensive industrial formula is a relic of a past that no longer serves a present or a future.". This shows that people had done as much as they can to create awareness of how women are portrayed in the media, unfortunately it is still not working. I'm not saying that people used too much energy to create awareness. However, there is certain process that does not work out because of the societal trend.
Like Ms. Gruber said, it is difficult to work against Mother Culture. I personally will think more about how to do more than creating awareness as my senior project goes.