Tile-wrought E.T's

Could the fact that the sidewalks of both Bangkok and Pittsburgh feature tile mosaics of space aliens be a coincidence? That they are the exact same size, with the exception of one small tile? What was each artists' source of inspiration? There are a few cultural insights that can be gleaned here, perhaps some "tile-alien norms" if you will. Bangkok's distinctively more Space Invaders-like alien lives on the sidewalk just outside of Sukhumwit Soi 21, near a  trendy new retail experience designed to mimic an airport terminal. All sorts of good stuff there - impressive attempt to package the burgeoning desire for Thais to join the ranks of the global cosmopolitan jet set, or rather give the Thais who already claim membership a greater sense of validity in their ability to critique shortcomings in accuracy ("In real airports that I've been in, the models of the Golden Gate Bridge were not this large."). Thankfully, Thai airport-like malls have more reasonable food prices (and far more food and retail options) than the Thai airports I've visited. This mall may augur well for global airports whose designers would take notes and adopt a more customer-centric approach towards airport design/refurbishing.

The Steel City alien was spotted in the up-and-coming East Liberty neighborhood, whose moderately-paced gentrification has been kicked into overdrive with the opening of a Google campus. This character appears to be an homage to the classic American Area-51/Roswell style of space aliens. 

Note what becomes accented about each alien once the mosaic medium is adopted: Thai alien gets more expressive, less threatening eyes than the American, while the American alien's gesture would most likely be interpreted as a friendly wave ("I come in peace/pieces").

There may also be some relevant insights to pull out of the fact that they are almost-but-not-quite-identically sized, though placed at different heights. The Thai Space Invader clocks in at 143 tiles (142 tiles if you count that missing one above its antenna there) and sized 11x13 tiles, and is doing its thing right at ground level on a fairly high-pedestiran trafficked area. The American, waving hello farther up at eye level, is tucked discreetly into a sidewalk alcove on a relatively less crowded street. At 12x12 tiles, this more symmetrical work clocks in at 144 tiles.

Linemen

Pairs of men equipped with 15-foot toothless rakes wait at the main entrances to Sagaing's Industrial Zone, their employment made possible by the under-designed/too-hastily constructed electrical grid infrastructure. 

Truckdrivers must pay these duos to allow them to pass safely through the miles of powerlines that transect the industrial zone's primary road at too low of a height - a salient example of the sort of misstep possible on a headlong rush towards development. What would the solution in your local context be to this particular problem? Or would it never even have occurred in the first place? I can imagine were this to happen in China that before the line-lifter market even had the chance to properly develop all of the power poles in the industrial zone would be lifted up an additional 20 feet in the dead of night by an unseen team of hundreds. Your mileage (and context) may vary.

Bonus feature from Steel City, America of what may eventually happen in the Sagaing Industrial zone: The updating of the electrical grid. Merely sink a new and improved pole into the ground, move over every wire, streetlight, etc., and then hack apart the old pole in strategic chunks so as not to have it fall down on the new one.