Photos from my various travels depicting global cultural variations of the fundamental person icon.

Bali, Indonesia. They’re some pretty small people, so why does that first person seem so hulking and Cro-Magnon-y?

Taipei, Taiwan. Note the hip chapeau the stroller is sporting, and the protective headgear (?) worn by the worker.

London, UK. This fellow toils as above, but without the benefit of a helmet. Less chance of sunburn, maybe?

Tokyo, Japan. The Japanese cute aesthetic shows up in the large head and even larger cigarette.

Bangkok, Thailand. Who takes care of children?

Providence, RI, USA. Not just walking, but actively moving forward, dancing, and exuding joie de vivre.

And Karrie Jacobs has a nice example here.

Recently I wrote about the importance of practicing our noticing and reflecting skills. A few weeks ago I read on MetaFilter about John Stilgoe “a professor at Harvard who teaches his students how to, among other things, mindfully observe the urban and suburban environments they inhabit.”

I bought his book Outside Lies Magic, and although the book itself is so-so, the introduction is passionately articulate about some of these same issues I’ve written about

It is a book about awareness in ordinary surroundings. It is a book about awareness that builds into mindfulness, into the enduring pleasures of noticing and thinking about what one notices.

I hope this book encourages each reader to widen his or her angle of vision, to step sideways and look at something seemingly familiar, to walk a few paces and see something utterly new.

In honor of the start of the school year, Core77 has put together the definitive set of tips, tricks, and lifehacks for design students: Hack2School. Divided into 5 groups–Classroom, Dorm Room, Represent, Crash Course, and Cheat Sheet–everything you need to survive a design education has been hunted down, written up, and offered to you on a blue foam platter. So to all the returning students, we say “welcome back.” And to all the new ones? Well, maybe you better read this first.

Super Bonus: Guest essays from: Ralph Caplan, Alissa Walker, Alice Twemlow, Steve Portigal, Jessica Helfand, Scott Klinker, Steven Heller, Sam Montague, and Jill Fehrenbacher.

My contribution is Practice noticing stuff and telling stories.

Like before, we’ve asked students in our Design Research class to regularly blog or post pictures to flickr as a way to exercise their noticing skills, as well as having a chance to tell stories to each other. You can check out their efforts
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