Bishkek (Kyrgyzstan) is one of the most unique cities I've walked. Almost zero tourist, because very few people even know it exists.

I wouldn't recommend it for someone looking for a relaxing vacation, but if you want to really feel your in a different place, a bit detached from the rest of the world, it's safe, inexpensive, and interesting

About ten miles outside of Bishkek is a 3 square mile market, built, lego like, from shipping containers.

Almost entirely self-regulated, it started after fall of USSR as a place to swap goods -- where they came from, and how, nobody asked, or cared

Slapped down in the middle of an otherwise bland neighborhood of mud roads and single homes it's now Central Asia’s largest marketplace.

A complex of stores inside freight containers selling anything and everything you want: Toys, TVs, Jeans, Bras, Bikes, Spices, Trinkets, X-mas decorations, Tools, Gas Masks, Hijabs, Watches, Wall clocks, Slippers, Shampoo, Stuffed Animals, and on and on.

All of it imported from China, Russia, Afghanistan, Uzbekistan, South Korea, India, Iran, etc. Carrying on, in a very modern way, Kyrgyzstan’s Silk Road tradition.

It’s a microcosm of our very material global supply chain world. A visceral picture of how our world of stuff works. How the clothes we wear, the food we eat, the things that fill our homes, come from all over, shipped across the globe in rectangular metal boxes.

It has it's own restaurants, a mosque, and keeps expanding.

Traveling to places like Bishkek has helped me understand history better. Not from going to museums, or historical sites, but from seeing how people physically live, especially those without a lot of money.

The marketplaces of Bishkek, or Istanbul, are not that removed from the marketplaces of ancient Rome, or Paris in the middle ages. They are crowded, loud, busy, colorful, communal, and self-organized. Or to put it simply, messy.

When you go to a historical monument, like the ruins of an ancient building, or a preserved cathedral or mosque, you get the entirely wrong image of the past. You see quiet, dignified, empty, sterile spaces. Places where you are scared to touch something. Places where people walk around in hushed voices.

That’s nothing like what the past was, and you can see that in the present in places like the shipping container market.

Update on this: I went to eye-doctor, & no I don't have cataracts. The doctor did mention, almost all her customers now complain about same thing, to extent some have completely stopped driving at night.

The primary offender is newer cars with very bright headlights -- Tesla's are particularly bad, & with them, it's not about the height, but only strength of beam.

There's also less awareness on when to use high beams, especially with younger drivers.

The combo of it all is, driving at night, especially in rural areas, has gotten dangerous. It's not some silly annoyance thing, but a real problem.

https://twitter.com/Chris_arnade/status/1725711921775616391

Limiting beam intensity, is an example of what competent Government regulation is supposed to be about -- curtailing selfish individual behavior, with limited benefit, that's directly dangerous and harmful, in a clear physical way, to the larger community.

Even hard core libertarians can get behind this one.

we'll be up against the Big-Beam-Industrial Complex. But think of bugs life. We can overcome!

Living his best life #Mongolia

Living his best life #Amman

Living his best life #Hanoi

'These deaths are caused by external causes — overdoses, gun violence, dangerous driving & such'

All of these are "reckless behaviors", simply forms of slow suicide

Thing you more likely to do if you feel your life is without hope & is meaningless

ft.com/content/653bbb…

Why is this happening? Spend more than one week, not visiting, but residing, in any big city poor neighborhood, or in a depopulating mid sized city anywhere in US, and you will get it.

Unless you have the strongest ideological blinders on

Pundits need to add Anomie to their list of buzzwords.

This was the best Odd Lots & if you want to know what happened with SVB, you have to listen.

Two points
1) Lev was too polite to say it, but SVB specific regulators failed. As he said, an older generation of Regulators would have been shocked by SVBs balance sheet

https://twitter.com/TheStalwart/status/1636280657600028674

2) Everyone kinda thinks of high tech as sophisticated investors. Well, in finance, they are anything but sophisticated

One customer (Roku) had 500mm sitting in a bank account earning almost nothing. Lol.

3) that lack of sophistication is partly why SVB thrived, until it didn’t

I thought the bigger issue (they briefly touched on) is that as banks got more complicated (in 90s), banking regulation changed, and in trying to keep up, switched to a more quantitative style. Which resulted in regulators not really knowing their bank.

My fortune (?) from the temple of Mazu

Which google translate says is this

(Ps. Google translate app is pretty amazing. Although this is a tough ask)

Speaking of google translate. You wonder how long until majority of language differences will be mitigated by technology.

Doesn’t seem very far off.