Word: localism
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...Clifford Pier (circa 1933; named after then governor Sir Hugh Clifford) - a building that had not been in use since ferry operations to Singapore's Southern Islands relocated in 2006. The installation has been sensitively done: when building the restaurant, the 45-year-old Yeung was required by local authorities to avoid tampering with the beloved colonial structure - especially the arched trusses that span almost the entire length of the building. (See 10 things to do in Singapore...
...demand their jobs back - the workers turned to desperate measures. On June 2, they staged a strike along a major highway linking the city of Vologda to St. Petersburg, blocking the route for hours. Finally Moscow took notice, and Prime Minister Vladimir Putin flew in by helicopter to force local politicians and factory owners to pay the town's workers the money owed them. Now Pikalyovo's shops, cafés and banks are doing good business again, but as the recession sweeps across Russia, small single-industry towns all over the country are just one factory closure away from...
...forced to eat wild plants, while the city's hot water was shut off after residents couldn't pay their bills. When Putin came in to save the day, he saw p.r. potential in Pikalyovo's distress. During a nationally televised meeting in the town, the Prime Minister scolded local officials and factory owners, including billionaire tycoon Oleg Deripaska, a onetime Kremlin favorite whose investment company Basic Element owns the town's BaselCement factory. "You have made thousands of people hostage to your ambitions, your lack of professionalism - or maybe simply your trivial greed," Putin said...
...Putin's harsh words and the disbursal of pay have not put an end to the feeling here that the crisis will continue. "It's unlikely the situation will change. Receiving our pay was a small gesture, a short-term solution," says Denis Yershov, a former employee at the local electricity plant who helped block the road last week. "I'll be happy when we have work again. I'll be happy when we have stability and I'm able to feed my family...
...Others are taking note. Last week, Gavrilova's cousin called from the Siberian city of Irkutsk to ask if Pikalyovo was "leading a civil war" and to say that the situation was similar in her city, where workers were holding a hunger strike over unpaid wages at the local pulp mill, also owned by Basic Element. This time it took no prodding from Putin for Deripaska to announce plans to pay out some $2.8 million in back wages to about 2,000 workers. (See pictures of Russia celebrating Victory...