March 27, 2023: A selection of three essential articles read aloud from the latest issue of The Economist. This week, we explore the world according to XI. Also, we look at the excruciating trade-off central bankers face (09:56) and why editing Roald Dahl for sensitivity was silly (17:28).
Even if China’s transactional diplomacy brings some gains, it contains real perils
The volcano hummingbird (Selasphorus flammula ) is a very small hummingbird, native to the Talamancan montane forests of Costa Rica and western Panama.
This tiny endemic bird inhabits open brushy areas, paramo, and edges of elfin forest at altitudes from 1850 m to the highest peaks. It is only 7.5 cm long. The male weighs 2.5 g and the female 2.8 g. The black bill is short and straight.
The adult male volcano hummingbird has bronze-green upperparts and rufous-edged black outer tail feathers. The throat is grey-purple in the Talamanca range, red in the Poas-Barva mountains and pink-purple in the Irazú-Turrialba area, the rest of the underparts being white. The female is similar, but her throat is white with dusky spots. Young birds resemble the female but have buff fringes to the upperpart plumage.
The female volcano hummingbird is entirely responsible for nest building and incubation. She lays two white eggs in her tiny plant-down cup nest 1–5 m high in a scrub or on a root below a south or east facing bank. Incubation takes 15–19 days, and fledging another 20–26.
March 26, 2023: The Grand Bazaar (Kapalıçarşı) in Istanbul is one of the world’s most famous shopping destinations and, at 30,700 square meters, the world’s biggest enclosed bazaar. Once inside, the Bazaar’s 64 streets and smaller alleyways house roughly 4,000 stores and the mosque, post office, cafes, banks, and police station, making it a little central city.
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March 27, 2023: Taiwan’s former president Ma Ying-jeou visits China. Plus: the latest on the civil unrest in France with Agnès Poirier, Josh Cowls on the Tiktok controversy and a look ahead to Monocle’s April issue.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Protests broke out shortly after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu fired the defense minister, who had called for a halt to efforts to weaken the judiciary.
Illegal mines have fueled a humanitarian crisis for the Yanomami Indigenous group. Brazil’s new president is trying to fight back.
As thousands of ex-prisoners fight and die in Ukraine, honoring their memory is becoming a patriotic imperative in Russia. But some committed crimes their old neighbors cannot forget.
After battles with previous governors, New York’s Native American leaders were hopeful for a reset with the new administration. Instead, the tensions have increased.
Program:
Uploaded March 26, 2023 – A walking tour in Jamilah market in Aleppo, the first day of the holy month of Ramadan, on Thursday, March 23, 2023.
Aleppo, Arabic Ḥalab, Turkish Halep, principal city of northern Syria. It is situated in the northwestern part of the country, about 30 miles (50 km) south of the Turkish border. Aleppo is located at the crossroads of great commercial routes and lies some 60 miles (100 km) from both the Mediterranean Sea (west) and the Euphrates River (east).
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December 17, 2022–April 2, 2023
The renowned German artists Bernd and Hilla Becher (1931–2007; 1934–2015) changed the course of late twentieth-century photography. Working as a rare artist couple, they focused on a single subject: the disappearing industrial architecture of Western Europe and North America that fueled the modern era.
Their seemingly objective style recalled nineteenth- and early twentieth-century precedents but also resonated with the serial approach of contemporary Minimalism and Conceptual art. Equally significant, it challenged the perceived gap between documentary and fine art photography.
Bernd and Hilla Becher, Framework House, Auf der Hütte 45, Gosenbach, Siegen, Germany, 1961; The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, purchase, Vital Projects Fund Inc. gift, through Joyce and Robert Menschel, Denise and Andrew Saul Fund, Louis V. Bell, Harris Brisbane Dick, Fletcher, and Rogers Funds and Joseph Pulitzer bequest, and Jade Lau gift, 2018 (2018.463); © Estate Bernd & Hilla Becher, represented by Max Becher
Bernd and Hilla Becher, Fördertürme, Belgien, Frankreich (Winding Towers, Belgium, France), 1967-1988; The Doris and Donald Fisher Collection at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art; © Estate of Bernd and Hilla Becher; photo: Don Ross
Bernd and Hilla Becher, Water Towers (Germany, France, Belgium, United States, and Great Britain), 1963–80; The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, Warner Communications Inc. Purchase Fund, 1980 (1980.1074a–p); © Estate Bernd & Hilla Becher, represented by Max Becher
Bernd and Hilla Becher, Zeche Hannover, Bochum-Hordel, Ruhr Region, Germany, 1973; The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, purchase, Vital Projects Fund Inc. gift, through Joyce and Robert Menschel, 2011 (2011.67); © Estate Bernd & Hilla Becher, represented by Max Becher
March 26, 2023: Emma Nelson, Isabel Hilton and Lynne O’Donnell on the weekend’s biggest talking points. We also speak to our editorial director, Tyler Brûlé, in Dubai and Monocle’s Asia editor, James Chambers, in Bangkok.
Boomers Daily 