I love paintings, especially if there are inspiring stories behind it. I have said so earlier and I do not mind saying it again. And below is one of those paintings.
Painted by Cesare Maccari, the painting is entitled Cicero Denouncing Catiline.
Here, Cicero, standing in the middle of the forum, is exposing a plot to overthrow the Roman Republic to the Senate. Sitting alone in the far right is Catiline, the leader of the conspiracy; it would be sucked to be him.
According to Wikipedia, oxygen was officially discovered on August 1 1774. I wonder what humanity was breathing before that day…
Oxygen was first described by MichaÅ‚ SÄ™dziwój, a Polish alchemist and philosopher in the late 16th century. SÄ™dziwój thought of the gas given off by warm niter (saltpeter) as “the elixir of life”.
Oxygen was more quantitatively discovered by the Swedish pharmacist Carl Wilhelm Scheele some time before 1773, but the discovery was not published until after the independent discovery by Joseph Priestley on August 1, 1774, who called the gas dephlogisticated air (see phlogiston theory). Priestley published discoveries in 1775 and Scheele in 1777; consequently Priestley is usually given the credit. Both Scheele and Priestley produced oxygen by heating mercuric oxide.
Scheele called the gas ‘fire air’ because it was the only known supporter of combustion. It was later called ‘vital air’ because it was and is vital for the existence of animal life.
The gas was named by Antoine Laurent Lavoisier, after Priestley’s publication in 1775, from Greek roots meaning “acid-former”. As noted, the name reflects the then-common incorrect belief that all acids contain oxygen. This is also the origin of the Japanese name of oxygen “sanso” (san=acid, so=element). [Oxygen. Wikipedia. August 1 2007]
Possibly pot.
Rue Montorgueil by Claude Monet.
A nation is not a state and vice versa, unless a nation-state is in the equation. Many however do not comprehend the difference between the two concepts. The comprehension of the difference is crucial in understanding why Malaysia as a state and a nation is not 50 years old come this August 31.
There can be no confusion that on a federated state — Malaysia — was formed on September 16 1963. The accumulation of thousands of years of history converged at that one point to allow us to live in Malaysia. It is true that the new state that is Malaysia inherits the institutions of the previous states but just as Russia is not Soviet Union, the state of Malaysia is not the state of Malaya. This historical fact alone insists that Malaysia is almost 44 years old when history remembers the 50th anniversary of a free Malaya.
The idea of state is very straight forward, unlike the concept of nation. The term nation is so vague that its beginning is open to interpretation. So, when an UMNO member from Tambun says that Malaysia as a nation is older than 50 years, he is not at all wrong. His opinion is of course dependent on an assumption that the Malaysian nation is really a Malay nation. This is not new. During a recent debate on Bangsa Malaysia, the chief minister of Johor believes that a Malaysian nation is a nation spearheaded by the Malays.
Throw away the political explosive and the emotional debate, rationally under this assumption a Malay nation would originate as far back as between the second and the sixth century of the common era, when possibly, the first recorded Malay nation was established as Srivijaya.
Even if one disagrees with idea, a Malaysian nation that is neutral of ethnicity exists before the formation of Malaysia and the day Malaya achieved its independence from the United Kingdom. Within the context of this entry, the question that needs to be asked is this: when actually is the birth of this nation? Was the beginning point 1963? Or 1957? Or 1948? 1946? 1824? When?
If the favored idea is the potpourri of nations, then this nation was born some time after the mass migration of Chinese and Indian into pre-existing nations living in Malaya, Sarawak and North Borneo. That would be in the 19th century. It is this nation — no state — that we now call Malaysia. The name may be different then but in essence, those names, refer to the same nation.
August 31 1957 signifies only one thing: a free Malaya. That however does not mean there was no Malaya on August 30 1957. Malaya as a state was established on January 31 1948, after the Malayan Union was disbanded. If Malaya is the reference point for the supporters of “50 years”, then really, logically — throw away the meanings of nation and states for a moment — 59 should be the magic number.
In conclusion, on one hand, as a nation, it is an insult to say we have lived for such a short lifespan, as if all those events, all those interactions before that day in 1957 matter not. On the other hand, as a state, it is boosterism to say that we are older than we are. No nation or state was born on August 31 1957.
I personally do not subscribe to nationalism but if an organic Malaysian nation is a goal one seeks, then embracing unvarnished history is an important step one needs to take. Without understanding one’s past as well as the difference between nation and state, Bangsa Malaysia will be an unsolved riddle, interpreted differently by different community within Malaysia, the state.
Almost 30 years ago, the European Exchange Rate Mechanism (ERM) was established to promote monetary stability among 12 members of the European Commission (EC). All participating states agreed to limit the variability of respective currency to 2.25% band on either side of a central rate. Later members were allowed to have their exchange rate to gyrate within a 6.00% band from a central rate. The ERM was a tool to converge the monetary policy of the 12 states and eventually, the adoption of a monetary union. Between 1992 and 1993, the ERM suffered a crisis that in a way, is similar to the Asian Financial Crisis that began exactly a decade ago.
In 1989, an EC committee laid out a plan to realize the European Monetary Union (EMU). The EMU would have an European central bank to manage a unified monetary policy for the EC. This ultimate convergence of a myriad of independent monetary policies would abolish all national currencies and eventually create an EC-wide currency.
Before the EMU could be established, all 12 members of the EC (namely, Germany, France, United Kingdom, the Netherlands, Belgium, Italy, Spain, Denmark, Portugal, Ireland, Luxembourg and Greece) had to approve the plan. In 1992, the Danish people almost rejected the EMU in a referendum while opinion poll in France was unconvincing. This brought the EMU into question, hurting confidence in the EMU and the ERM.
Currency speculators started to short sell various European currencies, betting for currencies devaluation. Regardless whether it was a self-fulfilled prophecy or a natural outcome, massive devaluation occurred and that forced many countries to drop out of the ERM band. Many fought but all lost. The British pound was one of them. The Malaysian central bank, the Bank Negara tried to defend the pound but it proved to be a USD4 billion futile adventure. In my opinion however, none other fought more valiantly mad than Sweden.
In effort to stop devaluation of the krona dead on its track as well as to teach the speculators a lesson, the Sveriges Riksbank, the central bank of Sweden, raised interest rate up to an astronomical 500%. This shocked a lot of people, including the speculators. The crazy monetary policy worked for awhile until the economy started to so a sign of stress. With a long run rate like that, not too many economy would survive long and so Sweden relented, quit the battle and forced to float the krona.
The story repeated itself in other European countries. The central banks of Portugal and Italy initially tried to defend their currencies only later to admit defeat. About five years later, similar story struck Southeast Asia.
On July 2 1997, after sustained pressure of devaluation, the Bank of Thailand gave up the battle to defend the baht. As history has recorded, the baht lost more than half of its value, from 26 baht to a US dollar in late June 1992 to 55 baht per US dollar in January 1993.
A professor of mine told my class that in late 1997, he did not understand what was going on but he did watch everything slipped away. He continued by saying nobody knew what exactly caused the crisis. But ten years after Camdessus looked on Suharto, we might have learned a thing or two from the crisis.
For me, it offers a real life example of the unholy trinity. The unholy trinity is the desire to have a pegged currency, free flow of capital and independence in monetary policy. One can only have two of them, not all three. When there is a violation of the rule, trouble looms.
In case of Sweden, the Sveriges Riksbank wanted all three. Under intense pressure and eager to move forward, the peg had to go. For Malaysia, in order to move on, free flow of capital had to go. Or rather, was chosen to be expendable. The Southeast Asian country imposed capital control in at the peak of the crisis and pegged its currency to the US dollar in 1998.
Of course, that is not the only lesson that could be learned from the era of irrational exuberance. But if the next currency crisis strikes, would anybody remember the lessons learned in the past?