Filed under: Economics
a cat named Euler.
(in addition to sons, daughters, grandchildren, dogs, and ex-wife–according to obituary)
That’s funny.
Filed under: Travel
From this hour I ordain myself loos’d of limits and imaginary lines, Going where I list, my own master total and absolute, Listening to others, considering well what they say, Pausing, searching, receiving, contemplating, Gently, but with undeniable will divesting myself of the holds that would hold me.
— Walt Whitman, “Song of the Open Road”
Filed under: Economics
David Cass, Economics Professor at UPenn, passed away on April 15. I only first learned of this giant in modern economics last year, when I read the “Inside the Economist’s Mind” (edited by Samuelson), which devoted a chapter talking about how he came to sunspot theory with Karl Shell. Then, when I took Professor Star Wars’ class on growth, I wondered why the professor did not use the term “neoclassical growth model” and instead said “Cass model”. (Later I found out that Professor Star War’s de facto wife also uses the term “Cass model” to refer to neoclassical growth model). Because David Cass was the father of the neoclassical growth model, which all macro econ grad students are familiar with.
Then in Winter, from Prof. Connossieur’s class, I learned about sunspot equlibrium, which was also proposed by David Cass. He wrote a short and elegant paper with Karl Shell (forgot the title of the paper), showing how in a case of incomplete market (due to mortality or retriction on trades for younger people before they are born in over lapping generation model) there can exist a sunspot equilibrium that pareto dominates the nonmonetary nonsunspot competitive equilibrium.
Sunspots shocks are random shocks that have no relations with the fundamentals yet can get you a different equilibrium. The idea is that even though economic agents might have perfect foresight, they face an additional source of uncertainty when they have to take account of what other people will do. That source of uncertainty is precisely what affect the outcome. A good example of this idea is self-fulfilling crises in financial markets.
Here’s a quote from the paper,
The first work on sunspot equilibrium was reported in Shell (1977), which is based on our joint research efforts on the infinite-horizon, OLG economy. In this unpublished paper, it was assumed that there is no intrinsic uncertainty. The only randomness is in the level of sunspot activity, which has no effect on the economic fundamentals. We showed that there is an equilibrium in which rational individuals believe that the general price level is affected by the level of sunspot activity and that these beliefs are self justifying. It was assumed that the economy is “shocked” by sunspots in each period. In this first example of sunspot equilibrium, economic fluctuations are generated within the private sector, and the stabilizing (contrasunspot) fiscal policy muts be perpetually active. This is contrary to the notion that erratic behavior in rational expectations economies is solely the fault of the erratic behavior of the government.”
The sad thing is that when I went to Prof. Cass’ UPenn website, there is still a “contact” button linking to his email, dcass@upenn.edu. But where does one contact one who has left the earth already?
I guess this is the reason why all of a sudden I don’t have classes next week. Professors here leave for the funeral.
Filed under: American Idol
So Kristy Lee Cook was eliminated. But I could not help but be quite suspicous about this result. According to dialidol, Kristy Lee Cook should be within a safe distance from bottom three. Rickey’s poll also somehow matches that prediction.
Although her presence at this stage of the competition is deemed undeserved by many, she has been improving while some of her competitors faltered. I thought her performance last week with Martina McBride’s “Anyway” and this week with Mariah Carey’s “Forever” was actually decent. In fact, “Forever” was delivered very well indeed.
Anyway, I am now devoting an entry to Kristy Lee Cook’s elimination because I thought her exit clip was quite touching. It began only with the sound of rapid horse hooves hitting the ground. Then we see a Kristy on her horse, she leaning far forward on the horse’ back, galloping fast across the plain.
I thought that scene was shot beautifully and it sent some chills down my spine.
Filed under: Music
Lyrics to my new song — the Seagull on the Tree
As I walked along the street,
I saw a seagull sittin’ on a tree,
And it said, “What goin’ on anew?
What’s the way to live?
So I thought about that question
all the way back home
Til the sky turned black and still
I’m still, looking all confused.
I thought I knew just the way to live
But now I don’t remember how it feels
to be climbing mountains with
beautiful views
Not knowing what’s at reach
But walk and walk on still, and
the orchestra is playing
notes that go up and up
Now the top is reached
the air is fresh and clear
Look, the view is new
And I feel so new
So I thought long and hard
Til’ I found the answer now
It’s all thundering and lightening out
But not waiting is my answer
Now it’s raining hard outside
And I went out running high
Cuz I have an answer for
the bird with the strange question
Now the birdy sat on the tree
still asking me, “What’s goin’ on anew
What’s the way to live
Now the sky is spraying
Hard on me
But the answer is not waiting
The bird is waiting
The answer is not waiting
That’s when I said
“To live to see what’s new!”
And the seagull says,
(chorus)
It’s new…
It’s new…
It’s new….
As you travel (especially alone), you meet people along the road. You share your atrocious travel stories, you exclaim over certain common experiences, you exchange information about what to do. At that moment, you feel like destiny has brought you guys together just for this.
But you don’t really think that these people will reappear again in your real life.
So imagine my amazement when a friend sent a gmail chat message over saying she has a student in her university wanting to get in touch with me.
My friend said that the girl specifically asked her whether she knows someone who went to Maryknoll, Berkeley, and then to Chicago. My friend thought, she could only mean Wendy (me).
I knew immediately who this girl is. I met her on my last day in Vienna, as I was returning the key to the reception. In line in front of me was this girl with a gigantic backpack. She was also returning her key as well. The receptionist handed back her ID (which is used as a collateral). I caught a glimpse of the ID and observed that it is a Hong Kong ID.
After that I spoke Cantonese to her. She is a law student in a Hong Kong university where my friend currently works. More amazingly, I found out that she also graduated from Berkeley, where I did my undergrad.
We never exchanged our own names or contact during our extended conversation, during which both of us had our huge backpacks on (my is relatively smaller) and on the verge of leaving Vienna.
The only contact that came up during our conversation was my friend’s name. I asked her if she knew my friend HXXX who is working at her university in Hong Kong. She said no. (What happened afterwards was then, we are both back in the reality world, she back to her law school, me back to my econ school. My friend was suddenly assigned to notify the JD students via email that their grades are available. So this girl saw my friend’s name in her email box. It rang a bell. Then she sent my friend an email asking about me)
But my friend’s name has turned out to be the key.
The world works in strange ways.
Here is my respond letter to the stranger I met in the strange land:
Hi XXX,
I am amazed by the small world, and also by your memory of the name XXXX!
Five days later I did go to Salzburg, but before that I stopped each
night in the towns along the way. The most amazing thing that
happened during was that I accidently went to Czech Republic (not
Prague, but a town call Krumlov).
The following story is how it came about: so it happened that I was
having lunch by myself in this totally empty restaurant in this small
and remote lakeside town call Hallstatt (don’t know whether I
mentioned to you, but Hallstatt was the picture on my calendar and the
major reason why I visited to Austria), where everything was close due
to the low-season, when I met two Spanish speaking men (one is a
Spanish Professor at Linz, and the other is a Biology professor from
Spain visiting Austria), the biology professor’s son who is a 13-year
old kid, plus a 25-year old Chinese student at Linz) , and their dog.
To cut the story short, they invited me to their table for lunch,
making it a long lunch, and then invited me to stay at their house,
which is located at the border of Austria and Czech Republic. At
first I was hesistant because afterall they were strangers, but after
hanging out with them for awhile and sightseeing with them I found
them to be good people. So I said yes! And I sat in their car for 2
hours driving from Hallstatt to their home. All the while chatting –
in Spanish! (which I had never used since the last lesson in 2000)
The next day, we drove to Czech republic (which reallly was just next
to the house) and did some sightseeing at Krumlov and then lunch.
Then they drove me to Linz, where I took the train to Salzburg,
arriving at 9pm.
Salzburg is also great. I spent 2 days and 3 nights there, staying at
first at YOHO then at this church hostel call St. Sebastian (where
Mozart’s wift laid in the mausoleum next door). Joined the sound of
music tour and pretended I am Maria and retraced her steps from
NonnBerg abbey to the von trapp house.
But the sad part is that I arrived at Salzburg on the weekend — all
the bike shops are closed! (these austrians don’t work enough). The
small towns where I spend the 5 weekdays between Salzburg and Vienna
are also pretty much closed during low season. I was at Vienna, of
course, during the 3-day Eastern weekend. In sum, this means that the
places I went to in the 10 days at Austria are usually closed and not
in business.
What did you do before you catch the flight? Did you take any pictures?
Wendy
************
Yes, I know. This would all be so much more romantic had she been a guy. 
Music is dear to my heart; yet similar to some instances in economics, there are many things about music I yearned yearned yearned to understand and improve my knowledge on but only met with frustration. It is music improvisation, which is the cornerstone of playing jazz and woogie-boogie.
Another thorn in my music journey is that I have been trying forever to understand the contemporary appreciation of Mozart’s music. What had they found genius about it? There had been so many now obscure classical music composers whose music did not receive the kind of recognition that Mozart’s received, yet their music is more melodious to the ear.
You won’t find many Mozart in my library of classical music.
My spring break in Austria, which included extended stops at Vienna and Salzburg, forced me to confront Mozart’s music. Vienna was the city that Mozart tried to make his career in. Salzburg was the city where he was born and ran away from. Both cities opportunistically showcased his music whenever it has the chance.
His music was played in the Sunday mass at the chapel of the Hofburg palace, at a much publicized “Mozart and Strauss” concert in the Beethovenhaus in Vienna, in a chamber music concert at the white castle in Salzburg, a piano recital at the St. Peters Church at Salzburg. So much so that on the fourth day of my trip, I found myself humming a rather obscure Mozart tune (which I could not name…it wasn’t a famous one) on my way walking to the train station, with the whole orchestra playing in my head.
There are a few signature Mozart pieces that were played in more than one of these occasions. Though I have heard them many times, each performance I really tried to listen to something new: listen to what made Mozart to be recognized as a genius. I listened to the cello’s part. I listened to the horn’s part. I listened to the bass’ part.
I repeated this excercise everytime. Listened to each instrument’s part in isolation.
Today, as I was driving to Lincoln Park, my car CD player was playing a Hong Kong pop song. It was the quintessential cantopop. Suddenly I found myself humming a second part to it. A harmony. Not only that, but a harmony a la Mozart style. As if I have a cello in my mouth.
I know now that it was Mozart’s influence.
Mozart, please continue to help me on jazz.
There was a man sitting by the window when I came into Cafe Hummel. The old-butler-like host, wearing a bow-tie with a tux (even though this is only a regular cafe with budget prices) enthusiastically took me to a table across from this man. Only an almost empty glass of beer on his table. It was one in the afternoon. He sat there, a cigarette in between his fingers, smoking, and staring out the window.
The interior of Cafe Hummel was now filled with smoke. In Austria, it is legal to smoke indoors, and many people do so. But it was exactly the smoke-filled quality that lent the place an ancient, immutable feel. On the wall hung a large drawing of the cafe at the turn of the 20th century. Sitting in this cafe of red-square table clothes, one could be tricked into thinking that the time was still 1909. As the tram passed by outside, the whole place vibrated a little.
My melange has arrived, but he was still gazing out of the window.
His gaze was fixated at something outside the casement. Meanwhile I gazed at him, wondering what he was gazing at.
Next to this middle-age man was an old man whose glasses was set way below his eyes. When I entered the cafe, I wanted to sit at his table but could not because a sign “reserved” already sat on it.
It was his reserved table. He entered the cafe, shortly after me. The host eagerly took him to his table. And the moment he sat down, the red hair and friendly young waitress (who clearly was in awe of the butler-like host) quickly produced three different German magazines/newspapers to him, along with a silver tray on which sat a bottle of mineral water. The host continued to chat with him, all the while placing his hand on his shoulder in a familiar fashion. (He also did this to several old ladies who entered subsequently). Unlike the man next to his table, this old man was not distracted by the scenes outside the window and only concentrated on his food, which was a place of sausages and fries.
Sitting next to me was an old lady in green, a string of pearls around her neck, smoking, after the host warmly welcomed her.
What did she order? Some ham. And a beer! In the middle of the day!
Note that the first man also had a beer.
They drink beer in the middle of the day?
Even the most tenacious drinker in my class does not drink beer in the middle of the day.
I sipped my melange.
My first taste of this highly recommended caffine product of Austria was that it tasted like a latte.
The host indeed was jovial. When a table of people rose from the table, the host appeared promptly and grabbed the jackets for the ladies.
It was clear to me that Cafe Hummel is a local’s cafe, as the host seemed to know everybody and the customers all were old men and ladies. (By the way, the ladies seemed to all wear pearls). I disagree with the Lonely Planet’s assessment that the waitresses here are “aloof”. Least of that.
But what was stranger — or rather, foreign–to me was the customers. There were several old customers, taking lunch with beer. You see young people with their laptops ordering only drinks. You also have slightly older man drinking beer. Most of them smoke.
Facts
Cafe Hummel (Josefstadt)
Kleines Gulasch 4.8 euro
Melange (which was served promisingly with a glass of water — for rinsing your mouth) 2.7 euro
Salzburg is white. It is not colored with the Vienna pastel or the Czech orange. It reminds me of Gondor from the Lord of the Ring.
The focal point of the city is a white castle, a fortress that spans from one side of the city to the other. You can imagine that in the old days, the archbiship atop the fortress could see his enemy approaching from miles and miles away.
But the castle is just hauntingly white. Especially at night.
White like a pale face.
It is easy to see the religious character of the city. The place is surrounded by churches.
Below the castle, there is the St. Peter’s Church, Franciscan Church, the Collegiate Church. And of course there is the center piece at the Residenplatz, the grand Dom Cathedral. Across the bank, there is the oldest St. Sebastian Church (Mozart’s wife was buried in its mausoleum; I stayed two nights in the hostel part of this church, which also hosts music students). Next to the Mirabell garden is St. Michael (I think).
The six churches to the four directions of the white castle mark the boundary of the city.
When the clock strikes the hour, the bells of these six churches would go off all at the same time. They ring and ring, answering one another, feeding on the answer of one another, supplementing the sound of one another, taking turns inserting its note in the symphony (some thinks cacophony) of bells.
The result is that the whole of Salzburg shakes at the hour.
My analogy of the bells in Salzburg is the barking of dogs. At first one barks, then eventually every dog barks and soon the city was filled with the howling of dogs.
Oh but the bells in Salzburg! (I wish I can still hear it now that I am back in Chicago)
The whole town shakes with the bells.
In fact, my room is next to the bell tower of St. Sebastian church. It used to the monastary / abbey associated with the church.
My roommate during my stay at St. Sebastian is from Northern Germany.
When I walked into the room the first day, she was out. Her things were efficiently placed in her section of the room. Three kleenex tidily stacked on the window pane; her large red backpacker’s backpag lied casually on the floor next to her bed. Her electronics occupying every socket in the room. On the center table of the cramped room lied a single bag of opened Mozart chocolate, a couple of which had rolled outside of the bag onto the table.
The first time we met was at night after I came back from a concert at the white castle. She handed me a Mozart chocolate.
The next morning when I woke up, she was already out. But on my Salzburg map on the center table, was another Mozart chocolate ball.
She has a low voice, a tatoo of a lizard on her left wrist, and short cropped bleached blond hair, which sticks out under her beanie. And her hands are always in the pockets of her jeans, which accentuated her long legs.
She is pale, but has a fresh sun-burned blush on her face.
Whenever she is in the room, she’d climb up onto the top of the bunk bed and read.
The last day, it turned out that we both went to Hellbrunn, 6 km South of the Old Town Salzburg. The difference is that she walked there and back, and obtained further sun burn on her already sun-burned face. She read for hours in the park, she said.
Meanwhile, I took a bus there (like Maria) and walked back, all the time staying in my own imaginary Sound of Music World (she has not heard of Sound of Music — ever!)
As she detachingly listened to my going on and on about the beautiful medieval town of Dustein (I felt like a kid in front of her), a small smile crept up to her mouth.
It barely registered an upward curl on her lip.
At that moment, she appeared nice.
She occupied the upperdeck of the bunk bed on the left side of the room. I occupied the uppdeck of the bunk bed on the right side of the room. Before I fell asleep, I turned my head to look at her. For some reasons it calmed me that she was sleeping there.
I was drifting in the clouds of the twilight zone when someone gently nudged me. A warm hand.
I opened my eyes. Bleached blonde hair. White face with sun-burned cheeks.
That same slight curl of the lip which was a smile.
I had asked her the night before to wake me up at 6am to catch an early train to Vienna, since she was to wake early too to catch her flight back to Germany.
And as I was sleepwalkingly brushing my teeth and wondering whether she had left without saying goodbye, there was a gentle knock on the door, so gentle the sound was almost covered by the sound of my brushing teethes.
She was in her full travelling equipments.
“I just want to say goodbye. Have a good trip.”
I didn’t even know her name. And she never asked for mine. It is strange how human beings could regard each other from short interactions. In such a short time, I’ve developed this quiet respect and sisterly regard toward this German girl who has a smile with that slightly curled lips.
She stayed in Salzburg for four days. Her whole soccer team was supposed to come but they cancelled at the last minute. She decided to continue as planned.
Her flight lasted only an hour. So this is really just a short solitary get away for her.
Imagine this — no running around the city with a camera to take snapshots of tourist sights. Just spend four days staying in a quiet church hostel, which is almost an abbey itself with its bare interior and juxtaposition to the church bell tower and mausoleum. Every morning the St. Sebastian bell would ring at each quarter of an hour. When you read on the upper deck of the bunk bed, you could hear the clicking of the heels of pedestians on the cobblestone Linzergasse below the window of your room. You could even see them.
You woke up by the St. Sebastian bells. You brushed your teeth and changed into your comfort clothes. Then you went downstairs for breakfasts, simply prepared by the nuns. Afterwards you walked out to Linzergasse, following the twists and turns of the cobblestone path until you hit the bridge over the Salzburg river. But you didn’t cross the bridge. You turned left, and continued along the Salzburg river with your book. Walked toward where the sun shined into your eyes.
Knowing that your backpack and belongings are safely ensconced next to your bunk bed in that small room at St. Sebastian.
You need not move anymore.
And then strolled 12 km to the Hofburg’s hunting palace.
Then took the book out from your light backpack.
You found a bench along the Hellbrunn Alee.
The Unterberg Mountain before you, and tree shades above your head, with birds lining up on its branches.
And you just read. Crossed your leg, leaned back on the bench.
The bells of the six churches in Salzburg so far away.
