Bigger Brother. Matthew Vandenberg
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against their will. And then there is the question of law enforcement within the SEZs, whose light regulation can be as attractive to criminals as to legitimate businesses. In 2018 American authorities declared that the Golden Triangle SEZ was a hotbed of “drug trafficking, human trafficking, money laundering, bribery and wildlife trafficking”."]
5 What a digital government looks like | Anna Piperal, https://youtu.be/kaU7IPlg9PA
6 The Economist | Muay too young, https://www.economist.com/node/21779138?frsc=dg%7Ce
7 Australia election: Fines, donkey votes and democracy sausages - BBC News, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3y_xXZ7paVI, ["...because it's one of the few countries to have compulsory voting."]
Basic
Aria places a finger into her mouth behind the mask as she licks off the tamarind paste. Then her finger's clean, clean like eating and like we can assume the smell and taste of the tamarind is: unmistakable, profound, like that of a durian if we take this healthy fruit word salad a step on produce further, crushing it.
'The tastes and smells hit you in Singapore,' Aria says. 'They hit you like locusts whom - mind you - are actually in Africa, seeking millet [1.], maize [1.], and sorghum [1.] in Kenya [1.], Ethiopia [1.], Somalia [1.], Uganda [1.], and Sudan [1.]. But the food in Singapore is so much better than basic. Processed, yes, but basic, no. But they still need the basic foods in Africa, where people are too far removed from Singaporeans to know what's hitting them.'
'Locusts?' Matt asks.
'Yes,' Aria says, hesitantly, now tapping her chin with the figurative fallen finger of hers, had it flattened a locust. 'But boiling them alive is wrong, I can see that. What if instead they were killed with an inert gas so that they literally won't know what hits them?: oh the unknowns now, for good.'
'Would locusts taste strange if they'd died by inhalation of helium, nitrogen, methane or argon?' Matt asks.
'Can you taste ignorance and bliss?' Aria asks. 'Actually, methane has the rotten egg smell if it mixes with hydrogen sulfide, much like Singaporean salted egg crisps.'
'In South Africa, stadiums lie abandoned after the World Cup [3.],' Matt says. 'They smell of desertion rather than dessert. But what if they were built to be moved? Imagine at least a relatively light and portable retractable roof, used to trap swarms of locusts. Then fill the stadium with an inert gas: of course, now, it's imperative that the stadium is deserted when dangerous Singaporean and African occupations (cooperation) are thoughtfully considered on their merits. Preventing a swarm of locusts from forming may not actually be as necessary as containing the swarm, the larger it is the better. I dare say that stadiums could smartly be constructed in Yemen and Somalia, if they're basically more form than for people. You can wait for the locusts outside the areas where it's too dangerous [1.] to go after them in: food first still when you're ready. And maybe fighters could find it fine to man a stadium for locusts in deserting, hopefully without being deserted like streets leading to it. If locusts fly in a pack then they're pre-packaged, standing out like a crisp package on a Singaporean street.'
'Meanwhile, people in the Philippines [2.], Tanzania [2.], and Ghana [2.] are tricked into repaying others' loans [2.] or taking out loans they won't be able to repay [2.] themselves,' Aria says. 'If they're given locusts instead of money, along with good food from Singapore, then they won't have to worry about fraud and cyber security. Being on a healthy diet can boost prestige, so the new Africans won't know what's hit them. Suddenly, everything that may have been promised by a scammer in terms of fulfillment can be realized, albeit without the money. That's life without pain, like the locusts' death sans suffering. Sure, not everyone will get the locusts, but mainly community leaders. They can share them among their people. Locusts can go with everything from ice cream to meat if need be. Fill stadiums with an alternative to cash: put your phone down and watch what's happening.'
'Basic understandings of public national consumption are necessary,' Matt says. 'The more basic foods are, the less need there is for money: just barter. That's basic common humanity. Everyone sees the locusts right before their eyes. (See locusts and humans and bodies are analogues, so their phones are on the table now and they're coming together to eat). There's change, sure, but still health is the ultimate goal. That should never be forgotten, and seats should never be too big to move to ensure that circumstances are ideal for persistent better consumption (drive of sorts, ground flights of bands of locusts even when you don't know where they're from. Then find out the source of the food. I guess we'd recommend Singaporean). Heads of locusts and human analogues can be important when needed to promote an alternative to standard consumption, but kept basic.'
'Ignorance is bliss, but if you're in the know about highly tasty food then Singapore's your stop,' Aria says.
'But basic breath is just fine,' Matt says.
Aria rolls her eyes like they're caught in a draft, like you only get one draft to perform a move.
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References
1 The Economist | Severe swarms https://www.economist.com/node/21779171?frsc=dg%7Ce, ["One enormous swarm, recently over north-eastern Kenya, contains nearly 200bn of the creatures and occupies a space in the sky three times the size of New York City. There are dozens of swarms in Kenya alone. And the UN's Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) warns that the number of locusts could increase 500-fold by June, when it is hoped that drier weather will check their spread. The insects eat a lot. A swarm the size of Paris consumes the same amount of food in one day as half the population of France. Crops such as millet, sorghum and maize are a big part of their diet, making life even harder for the 12m or so people in Ethiopia, Kenya and Somalia who are already hungry...Northern Uganda and South Sudan are also at risk; swarms are just 200km away and moving fast."; "...prevention does not attract much funding...“Donors are interested in funding big emergencies, big problems.” And governments, unlike locusts, move slowly."; "Preventive measures have also been hindered by conflict in Yemen and Somalia, where gaining access to some areas for spraying was deemed too dangerous."]
2 The Economist | Hidden costs https://www.economist.com/node/21779079?frsc=dg%7Ce, ["in the Philippines 83% of people surveyed had been targets of mobile-phone scams, with 17% losing money. In Tanzania, 27% had been targeted and 17% fleeced; in Ghana, 56% and 12%. For the most basic deceptions, a thief needs only a phone number. A text message might offer congratulations on winning a prize, requiring only a small contribution to unlock it. Your identity might be stolen to make you responsible for repaying a loan disbursed to somebody else."; "Predatory lenders and vendors might learn when a costly loan or product would be hard to refuse. Or an algorithm might (by design or accident) be biased against certain borrowers because, say, of their race or creed."]
3 SAYS, Here's What Happened To Football Stadiums After Hosting World Cup Matches, https://says.com/my/sports/here-s-what-happened-to-stadiums-after-world-cup-matches, [""Essentially, every economic study shows that stadiums are a terrible economic investment,"..."]
Maide
'Big Brother is a maid,' Aria says, reading a sign atop a bed that's made.
Matt nods: 'That makes sense. The greater the number of people in the house, the greater the need for a maid [1.], and given we're older than kids the maid needs to be all the more powerful and omnipotent.'
'That's a wish,' Aria says. 'Maids in Singapore do not have the time to become powerful. They work long hours and must sneak out of a house at night if they ever want a taste of freedom.'
'That's true,' says someone other than the housemates, remaining unseen. 'And now I reside outside the house. Now I am powerful. Today, and this week, you will all be maids too. You will begin the day weak and end the week powerful. You will learn to eat well, and one of you will leave the house for good. That will mean more or less power? For now, you have nowhere to go. Your families are counting on you to perform standard household duties to earn enough money to send to them, and you dream only of hopelessness, waking only to find that your legs are like the wings of butterflies (or, worse yet, honeybees missing the gut bacteria for properly functioning