Hi everybody, my name is Yaa Jamali Dean. I'm the coordinator of Advanced 4 Studio, the architecture program. I would like to welcome both the urban design and the advanced 4 architecture students, as well as, you know, other G-sub students and faculty who've decided to join our lecture this afternoon. The lecture, the title of the lecture is Designing for Resilience. It will be delivered by Adriana Chaffais and Rico, sorry, Victor Rico, who is actually joining us from his office, from their office in Mexico City if I'm not mistaken. Adriana is a faculty at the Urban Design Program here at the school, together with her partners, Victor Rico and Elena Tudela. She is co-founded ORU, Office for Urban Resilience in 2014, a design think-tank that focuses on implementing innovative solutions for cities through urban design and landscape infrastructure with a water-sensitive approach. Among many exciting projects, the work includes the contribution to build the urban resilience agenda in the city of Mexico in collaboration with CDMX, Public Space Authority. Adriana holds a master degree in urbanism, landscape and ecology and a master in architecture from GSD, where she graduated from in 2014, Victor Rico also graduated from GSD in 2014 with a master in urban design. Together they bring more than 10 years of experience working with public, private and academic institutions and NGOs. So on behalf of all of us, I would like to welcome Adriana and Victor, because I think the floor is yours at this point and you can unmute. Hello everybody. So I'm very happy to be able to be here and that this lecture can be delivered. We are also exploring this new format soon, so we hope that even if we are located in a virtual environment, maybe we can have some interaction. So I was going to ask everybody to shake their hands, but everybody has a camera off, so my strategy is not possible, but we just wanted to say hi at the beginning. And to start the lecture, I'm also going to share my screen. And in the meanwhile, I'm going to, this is, I'm looking now some of you shaking hands. Yeah. Okay, that was the objective. Hi, and hello, everybody. So I'm very happy to see you all. I'm going to share Victor, the award to Victor so that he can present himself as well. Okay. All right, I think I'm muted now. Hi everyone. Thanks for joining us. And I think we've been properly introduced. So I think we can start with the presentation that we have prepared for all of you. Thanks for joining. Do you hear me now. Yes. But we can, we cannot hear Victor. Do you hear Victor? No, you can. Okay, everybody is on the line. We're good to go. Excellent. Thank you so much. Okay. So this is Oro. This is big. Well, we have co-founded Oro between Victor and Lena Tulela who can't join us today and myself, Adriana. Our practice is based in Mexico City. We are a firm that specializes in urban resilience, a true urban design and landscape infrastructure projects. When we were starting at the Harvard GSC, back in 2013, while we were studying, we put together the application for Mexico City for to be part of the 100 Resilient Initiative from the Rockefeller Foundation. And that was our first, we can say that was our first official collaboration, which was very successful because the city was selected. Thereafter, since that time, since 2014 to 2018, we have acquired experience in the academic, public, private and development back centers. We can see the image on the left. It's the Resilient Strategy for Mexico City in which I participated. And on the right, we can see some projects in which Victor and Lena have also participated, such as towards a water-sensitive Mexico City, which is a water management strategy through public space, developed with the government of Mexico City with the Public Space Authority, which is an entity that developed public space projects within the government. So it was basically having an urban design studio within the city government, which was a very exciting moment for the city. Unfortunately, that disappeared. And then we have the Quebradora Park, which is another project with which Elena participated. And that also won a World Medal Halsima Award last year. So within the three of us, we got a different experience, but we established our practice in 2018. And now we have other five red members that are joining us. I think they joined this link. Carolina, Néstor, Bernal, Alibán and Laurelín. So we are a very small team, but we are going to show the first a little introduction of what we think and how we are working. And then we're going to present you four projects that we think might be relevant to start a conversation with you. So resilience has become our mantra. Resilience is a mindset, it's a lens, a framework that cuts across the scales, ecosystems, socio-political and economic context. In other words, for us to be resilient is to be able to adapt in a world that desperately needs to change. Resilience has allowed us to find new domains for design investment, finding utility to serve the world. As we can see, the world is not on track. We are facing enormous pressures and challenges. Previously, very recently, we have seen the loss of biodiversity in Australia regarding the wildfires, heat waves in India, wildfires in the Amazon, floods in Jakarta, and even right now the crisis that we are going through. Therefore, our practice questions the role of designers in light of the most pressing issues of the 21st century. The challenges are so complex that we are required to lure the boundaries of design with those from other fields of knowledge in order to seek solutions. This means that we think that the solutions need to be collaborative and we need to expand the agency of design and collaborate with other disciplines because no possible change can happen if we don't have an ecosystem, not only of designers but also of technicians and politicians and other decision makers that want to make these changes. And so we believe we need to shape an alternative future and we can do that by inventing new technologies, prototypes and models of design that can allow us to review the past, the present, but also to better imagine and communicate the possibility of alternative future worlds. This is a call for action because we need a paradigm shift. We see an urgency for a social and environmental equilibrium. There's an immense amount of ecosystem degradation and exacerbating social inequalities. For example, in the left here we see the picture from Chapultepec Park with the presidential house of Mexico was located. This is also one of the wealthiest areas of Mexico City. And on the right, we see urban sprawl occupying territories that are not suitable for urbanization. And these are in conflicts. So in this context, we think we could embrace these challenges through adaptability strategies need to pay solution and green infrastructure integrated to the green infrastructure that already exists in our cities. As we had mentioned before, we have mostly worked in Mexico City, but we have also expanded our vision to other countries similar to other similar countries in Latin America. This has made us realize that there is no other choice than to experiment. We need to take risk. And also we need to evaluate and learn from the experimentation. We need to learn from what works and what is not working in order to don't replicate the errors of the past, but also to learn from failure. Our approach. It's a transformative that transformative projects are processes and not objects. So the design itself. It's not only the design of a good drawing, let's say great representations and amazing presentations that we are doing are not enough. We are not sure that the projects become a successful reality. And we believe this is the real challenge for designers. We need to transcend the paper into a tangible solutions with lasting effects in the world. How do we do that? We think that extending the agency of design and creating the process is designing the process for this change to happen. We believe in territorial advocacy and not just isolated projects. And the process is fundamental for a long term vision. What we see here is the project design. But we envision that there's a larger process and there's a before and an after. That happens. So working within academia and government and the development banks has told us that the urban scale can never escape the socio political dimension. And Well, we are here right now we live in a crisis we are going to a crisis right now. And so maybe people can't total again the cameras but who has experience maybe you can shake hands. Who has experienced an accurate acute crisis before. Maybe not a pandemic of course with an earthquake water scarcity, some kind of crisis. Someone has experience. I think many people would have experience crisis before it's not. It's nothing new. Right. So we think we take we need to address the crisis, but we need to embrace meant and we will leave we come from a permanent place of crisis, which is Mexico City. So we live in a context of water scarcity, earthquakes, subsidence, recently extreme violence against women, air pollution, floods, mobility issues, social inequality. So these are very, very challenging projects. And because of this, this is our context so we have to say that we have no solutions what we have is more and more questions every day. So now, we are going to present some of our projects. This is just an image from our website. So you can see a different types of projects in which we work, which are divided in these categories research installations or exhibitions, urban design visions and strategy, landscape projects and we have also academia as now I'm teaching here and Elena and Victor are also professors at faculty of architecture. So within these range of projects now we are going to start the presentation with the first one, which is a project located in Bogota is called the Bogota environmental circuit. And the projects that I'm going to present are located within research, urban visions and public space projects so they are, they explore different scales and also different types of collaborations because none of these projects have been made by ourselves. I think we collaborate a lot. So, for example, in this project, specifically in Bogota, we collaborated with an office in Bogota, Contaller, Manuela Guzman, architects and other friends, Monica sauce and our friend from Mexico City, and we collaborated directly with the, the aqueduct of Bogota, which is which is the water community, and together with the mayor's office. So, the former mayor, Enrique Peñalosa, he envisioned that a good city, it's a city where people wants to be outside and not inside. So, he wanted to connect the people to Bogota as natural assets, but what ties a city, a very, very rich in bio diversity, we are going to see that in a few slides. And the environmental secret of both that the project, it's the city's commitment to position itself as a city that plants the territory by integrating urban development with its natural environment. So, water, it's a main unifier, water, it's a unifier for all of these ecosystems and it's what makes possible for these ecosystems to exist. In the glimpse, we present a city vision that integrates strategic projects for recuperating Bogota's natural capital. It includes reservoirs, 140 kilometer path across the Andes, several wetlands. And the recuperation of the Bogota River and its tributaries. So, it's a strategy that compiled diverse range and scales of projects, all of them correspond to a systemic vision. So, the biodiversity context of Bogota, it's very important. First of all, it's located in the savannah that borders the eastern and the unmounted, so it's a very, very rich country. The second most diverse country in the world, and it's a main ecological corridor for South America. Here we see a historic map where you can see the wetlands and the Bogota River, you can also see the tributaries and the mountains, all of them in relationship. The city itself started by locating near the Bogota River, but more and more the city has expanded towards the Andes. And we have seen with this urban expansion is that Bogota has lost approximately 90% of the wetlands, so today there are only 700 hectares from the 50,000 hectares that we had before. And this symmetry represents the natural state of Bogota and then how the urban fabric expanded across this landscape. And we have seen how the city started here in the Rio Bogota, and then it went towards the modern city going towards the Andes. And this that we see here, the Andes, it's the most important part for the city. This is the ecological system that we need to preserve. This is a section and we can see the different range of ecological patches and systems that occur. So this is where Bogota is located. It's at 2,600 meters above the sea level. And where water comes from, it's located at 3,600 and 4,000 meters above the sea level. So it's a region where we could think that there's abundance of water and there is, but yet the urban development is disconnected from the natural world and its assets. So if the current model of urbanization continues to expand, they are threatening the water sources of Bogota. So the convenience of having clean water coming out of the tub does not make visible the magnitude and the fragility of the water supply infrastructure. Eighty percent, 83% of the water that is consumed in Bogota come from this region. It's called Paramochingasa. Paramo is a specific type of ecosystem that is located in the altitudes of the mountains. I tried to look for a translation but I couldn't find one. So for explaining this, this diagram is very helpful because we can see the section. It was developed by a Dutch biologist and paleontologist that studied Bogota. And we can see how the territory works by attitudinal stripes. So all of the ecosystem are linked by the passage of water through these different levels until they reach the wetland and river. And in this diagram, we can see the relationship within the mountains that receive the most amount of rain and water and house as water goes down. So this is the high area water coming down here into the lower area to feed the wetland. So this is the co-systemic vision that we need to know. And when we created this vision and we placed different types of strategic projects, we realized that we need to follow the same logic. So from going from the high areas to the low areas. So we defined the project in terms of altitude also it's more strategic to start here because the projects here will preserve in the high area near the mountains. We'll preserve the natural water sources. So we can find the natural paths, we can find the aqueousyandes, we can find the reservoir, and also we identified other strategic projects in order to improve the quality of life in some of the most marginal neighborhoods, especially in the south, which is here. And towards the west near the river, the water river. And this was a part of the research we got the city gave us a lot of data and we developed the research it was divided within environmental aspects, urban aspect quality of life and riskability, but what we presented to them. It's a map of opportunities. So the first opportunity is that we can recuperate the ecosystem, the darker green are the paramus, the water sources. Then we have the river, the water river with the wetland and with the river at the tributaries. So then we identify other nine strategic zones for interventions where you can find most of the floods and the marginal population, population that has not access to urban services, mobility, etc. And then we went into each zone and developed as also some kind of guidance or a strategic projects, identifying certain strategies for the nine areas. Well, I'm not going to show all of the detail but if you want or someone is interested, these was compiled in a book, and we have all of the information and more than what I presented here. And if someone is interested, I can share the link here in the chat and maybe you can go through more detail. Now I'm going to give the word to Victor who's going to present the research project we have right now. Okay. Thanks, Adriana. Now we would like to present to you are an ongoing research. It's called medium scale redevelopment districts as a model for sustainable water management in Mexico City, the case of Takubaya and we want you to think about the medium scale because it's the key it's a key element of this whole research. First of all, this research is being funded by the Mexico Innovation Fund, within the grants program of David Rockefeller for Latin American Studies. And we are being guided by Anita, who is a professor of landscape architecture and chair of the department of. Yeah, she's the chair of the landscape department at the Harvard Graduate School of Design. So, and we go to the next slide. We are going to copy and paste a couple of links that you guys can have a go at if you have a phone it's a link to our Instagram address and you will basically be able to see the dramatic transformations of Mexico City across 500 years. So it's a city that has had an incredible confrontation with its geography over the past 500 years. But this transformation has been especially violent from the second half of the 20th century to the present. It's the city that was able to establish itself on top of a lake by way of expelling all all the water so basically dehydrating a gigantic, gigantic basin. And so today the water crisis in Mexico City is more than urgent and the city continues to face enormous pressures to redevelop in a more compact and sustainable way. The current water management model is no longer sufficient for providing the most basic water services for both existing and new developments. So, at the same time, water management policy is becoming increasingly central to the negotiation between new urban developments and water sustainability in the city. This means that since there's no more water, it's been very hard for entrepreneurs and developers that want to build in central areas of the city because there's no more water. So now they've been forced in a way to be creative in the way that they are managing water. So they themselves have approached different organizations such as WRI, the World Resources Institute. And together with them, we began this exploration of redeveloping districts and the notion of hydric districts as a potential new model for new models of decentralized water management. We wanted to also mention that while architecture has acquired a lot of popularity in an elite world, that has been proportionally inverse to its disempowerment, cultural disenchantment and inability to deliver design alternatives with the required urgency. So this research questions the role of architects, as Adri mentioned at the very beginning, in light of the most pressing issues of the 21st century. Under the lenses of history, data science, ecology and geography, this study is reviewing new design tools that can allow us to better understand multi-scalar issues. It has to more effectively imagine and communicate new spatial imaginations that can crystallize into alternative forms of transforming Mexico City. The research also reflects upon the role of design as an agent to construct multi-sectoral participation frameworks, which in other words is the process that Adriana was mentioning earlier, that can guide future water-related public policies and decision-making. But it is also exploring something very interesting, which is the elasticity of the urban and landscape design disciplines at the mid-scale. In order to blur the boundaries between the urban and the natural domains, quite similar to the above of that research. And so in many ways we are uncovering and resurfacing Mexico City's hydric task. So if we go to the next slide. So medium-scale development projects present us with an adequate scale to address some of the most pressing issues of the regional scale, and also allow us to solve the issues that are unique and specific to a more local scale. It is at the mid-scale that architecture and urban artifacts can function as triggers. The architectural artifact can recalibrate its position within the city, and a new centrality can be created, as we will mention in a while, in the case of Takubaya. So in this, in a large sense, this idea of the mid-scale is tapping into the notion of the quasi-object that Michel Serre proposes, which is very interesting to us as a design practice, the quasi-object is still an object and maintains its value as an object but incorporates new dimensions that enable the participation of other actors. So as opposed to large-scale and mono-functional infrastructure and piecemeal green infrastructure, which is how the city is working right now. The medium-scale redevelopment districts, if we go to the next slide, present us with an adequate scale to address some of the most pressing issues at the regional scale, but also allow us to solve us particularities of the more local scale. So the hypothesis is that medium-scale redevelopment districts have a greater potential to deploy multiple water-sensitive strategies. So the hope is that the mid-scale interventions can more effectively tap into diverse water sources, and then explore more decentralized water infrastructures. The hydric district as we are analyzing is a highly implementable urban framework that can serve to test alternative physical models of decentralized urban water management. The project is currently contributing to raise public awareness, inform multi-sectoral participation, and promote the sharing of responsibilities among multiple stakeholders. So by contrast to conventional large-scale infrastructure and piecemeal small-scale green infrastructure, the hydric districts offer a perhaps more grounded and coordinated framework to address the water crisis in Mexico City. We are researching Tacubaya for many reasons. Historically, Tacubaya has had a strategic location within the geography of Mexico City's watershed. Its privileged location between the slopes of the western ravines, as you can see in the greener areas, and the former borders of the ancient lake, granted this area with advantages in terms of security and stability against floods and earthquakes in the past. Also, water abundance and climate made it a perfect site for agricultural activity during the colonial time, and later on the preferred site for summer estates for rich families, which made it really attractive also for other people as there were new sources of employment. But in the end, Tacubaya's history has been marked by repeated cycles that move from attractiveness to settlement, to growth, to scarcity, and then to crisis, and then to the expansion of water infrastructures to begin the cycle again. You can see here how Tacubaya is right outside the areas where a lot of multiple risks are colliding. And also, Tacubaya's proximity to Mexico City's downtown, which is the white spot in the center, this would be the size of Mexico City in the early, before the 20th century, 19th century. And Tacubaya is in pink, that's just showing how close they were. So this proximity was key. There were a lot of, there was a lot of experimentation in Tacubaya from transport systems to water management to even the exploration of new dwelling models. And that has shaped Tacubaya in a very, very different way, being a historic district from other historic areas in Mexico City like Boyoacan. It has made it very unique, but also it has fragmented Tacubaya, and it has in a way hidden a lot of its history and its natural background. Well, also Tacubaya's future development could be guided by an existing land management instrument called SAC. Well, sorry, this is a historic image of Tacubaya. And we go then to the next, to the next image. So, yeah, Tacubaya's future development could be guided by an existing and current land management instrument called Sistema de actuación por cooperación, which it's not possible to translate, but it's basically a framework that allows, it's a legal framework of land management that allows city authorities and development promoters to agree on certain interventions in both the private and the public domain with the public focus. So, in many ways it would be a kind of a collaborative governance framework where private, there are private roles that have public goals, let's say. And recently, Tacubaya was announced as part of the urban regeneration and inclusive housing program by the current mayor. But they have presented, unfortunately, a series of isolated projects that could coalesce into a new urban model that can serve to test alternative modes of decentralized water management solutions. So we think that water is the one element that can really articulate all these projects. Tacubaya, within its mid-scale, can become a pilot project to test alternative models of urbanism, where water is at the very center. So, it is, in many, many ways, a collaborative process. Our team is working with authorities and with water specialists as a bridge between all of them. And we think that this pilot project will help to demonstrate how Mexico City can advance towards a more sustainable, informed and responsible water management. These are the most pressing issues of water stress and also climate change. Maybe we can show you a video of a workshop that was carried out in January. I'm not sure if there's going to be, yeah, it's inaudible, but we just wanted to show you that we organized this event. Anita Perez-Veta came to Mexico City along with four GSD students. We invited students as well. And there was a very rich discussion among Tacubaya specialists, architects, people from the World Resources Institute, and politicians as well, discussing what it means for Mexico City to learn from the mid-scale and the Tacubaya case study. And after this panel discussion, we organized four groups. And we asked these four groups to explore three different models of water management. The first one is how to deal with residual water of the new buildings. 70% of the water that is discharged from new buildings is soapy waters. So instead of channeling this water to the sewage, what if we can make space for this water and reuse it in other spaces, whether it's for irrigation or other purposes. The second one is rainwater. So all the rainwater that is falling on the surfaces of the Hydric District. What can we do with this water? Can we reutilize it? Can we store it? Can we channel it to other green infrastructure or sustain them? Yeah, green infrastructure. And then finally, run-offs. What can we do with the water that is falling on the streets? These were the questions that were asked in this workshop. And we are going to integrate all the findings of this research, of this workshop from January. The projects that have been publicly announced by the city authorities and also by the projects that were identified by the World Resources Institute in the compilation of all the projects articulated by water is what we believe can become the Hydric District. So yeah, this is still an ongoing research, but we will be happy to share with all of you the publication that has to be finished this year. And we think it's a great opportunity to test the abilities or the elasticity of the design disciplines within the very, very tight fabric of Mexico City. And I think with this we can move on to the following project. Hello. Is everybody still there? Yeah, I hope so. So the following project, it's called Chinampa Refugee. It's an incremental strategy that it's located in Sochimilco, which is a world heritage site by UNESCO. It's where Chinampa, which is an ancestral agricultural technology, still remain protecting wildlife and native species in this area has become increasingly difficult because of the many urban pressures. This is located inside the urban fabric of Mexico City. So we work in this project together with the Institute of Biology of PUNAM, so has been great, a great collaboration between science and design. They have been taking measures of water quality, also analyzing the habitats of the species, and we have been routing on-site strategies for this project to be implemented. Right now, the Chinampa Refugee already exists. They are 15 farmers that are taking this pilot project and the vision, and this is what I'm going to show you, the vision is to scale it up. So, the Chinampa Refugee, it's a conservation model to rescue the Ajalot, which is this little guy that you see here. And as well as the traditional Chinampa system. This model favors participation, the exchange of knowledge and permanent construction of a long-term restoration proposal, where the aim is to integrate the Chinamperos or the farmers, individually or in an organized manner to be the subject of change and positive impact. So, this model, this is a Chinampa. This is a picture we taken ourselves last year. This is the process. This is a series of steps that a farmer can deploy. So, the process consists on opening a canal. So, the Chinampas, the farmers have expanded Chinampas and they have blocked the original canal. So, we open a new canal to restore the habitat. And then, we also restore the, this is a very much, so this is a canal. Then, we refer a state around the canal so that the soil stabilizes, then you place it by filters and gates. This helps to create a new, to improve the water quality inside the canal. And this allows to introduce new species that are able to recreate the habitat in order for the Ajalot to exist. Then, the farmers need to use organic fertilizer for compost, but they can also use clean water from the channel in order to crop. They also are based on the traditional farming techniques and they use traditional crops. So, this system is able to maintain and monitor within time. We see here pictures of the little canal. These are the gates, the biofilters, and actually the research shows that the water quality inside these canals is better. The Ajalotes have a new habitat. Farmers are producing more. Therefore, this is a very good model. But this is a very small scale strategy. So, we envision how we can replicate this. Some ideas to replicate it is that, and that it's already working. So, some ideas are that the farmers receive a chin and pear stamp, which is a quality certification that allows a farmer to position itself and be able to sell the products in different markets and restaurants, higher value. And this also allows the farmer to have financial sustainability so that they can continue developing the system. And this avoids the chinampa to be transferred into an urban area or to avoid the increasing rate of greenhouses that this area is looking at. So, at the end of the day, we envision that the system can be replicated in within the short, medium, and long term to be replicated across the area and reactivate Sochi Milk as our production hop. So, besides having this small scale prototype, then we also help the Institute of Biology to specialize the chinampas that can grow in the medium and long term and the area. So, we can start to create some chinampa clusters that are already recuperated. And then, and therefore this, this can provide a new vision. And this is the last project, because I see that we're already going to the end of the presentation, but we wanted to share also this project is one of the latest one that we have developed is called garden of shadows. And it's a landscape infrastructure for cities in the northern desert of Mexico. This is a competition that was organized by sedato, which is a ministry of agriculture territory and urban development in Mexico. And as this competition to bear with them, this project is for the urban improvement program that the federal government is now running. So, the end of the project on the program itself is to work on the 10 of the most marginalized cities in Mexico. They located 10 cities that are the most vulnerable populations, and these areas are going to receive an investment in infrastructure, which can be from streets, parks, schools, hospitals, etc. So, the Ministry of Development allocated this competition and made a call for architects and designers. We were selected to participate on the public space area of the project. And at the beginning, we were assigned the site and the city, but they actually said that they didn't know where actually the project was going to be, but that it was, we knew the cities and the cities were located in the northern part of Mexico actually very close to the border of Mexico and the US. And our strategy was like to think what is that unified the city, what brings them together and what brings them together is climate. All of them are located mostly, most all of them are located in the desert, that their temperature ranges from 98 to 100 or 104 Fahrenheit, which is a very, very hot climate. So how can a public space work in a hot climate and how can people really choose this space? We think that the concept of shadow was very important. We begin. These are the two, the two boards that we submitted for the competition. And the good news is that we won. So we are very happy, you know, because we had the idea that this is it. This is the part when we start to realize how to ground ideas and take the ideas from the mind to the paper and then into the real world. So, at this stage, our project had three pillars, which is to create a microclimate through, this is to create shadow through vegetation and also to different infrastructure so that as this building that we see here or this structure is actually a structure, then how can we can integrate this into the most vulnerable best so that this provides quality space for these people and also its resilience because realize the city, which is Los Cabos. It's a city that receives the most amount of hurricanes every year in Mexico. So, when we look at our plan, we saw that the city has floods, but they also have high winds and hurricanes, and that the this area, which is the one and pointing out the shelters were not in place. So we believe that the public space can be adapted to a shelter and that's what we propose so that this structure can be also converted in a shelter in terms of emergency. There could be a cistern in place. It could ensure access to water, to electricity. We propose also to have Wi-Fi in order to ensure communications. And then it was a series, it was this, this structure together with a series of classes and of course endemic vegetation that will be suitable for the place. And this is an image of the, of that site and competition site. But then when we, when we won, there were several discussions and the site change, but luckily not the city that allows to continue choosing the information we have developed before. And this is where the previous site was. And now the site that actually the site that we designed is this one. The site was very complex because was located besides an old landfill. So actually the city wanted to, to develop a park in the landfill, but that was a very complex project because first you have to remediate the land and there were no all resources that were available. We told that we're available for the park will go into the site for mediation. So after doing some studies on the quality of the soil, this is based actually that looks as a vacant space. Mostly as a, mostly as a leftover of space. It's the one that we end up utilizing. This is a space where if you see here in the map, you can see that there's a stream going, but this is not a permanent stream. It's a stream that only appears every time it's flooded. So the, the site will, the downstream will get flooded. And it's also very secure area, but people use it as a path to go from this low area to this higher point. And this is the proposal that we have the, the, we were locally, we could remain the, the shelter with a multi sports court below and an auditorium. And we also have here is sports area and they know the landscape infrastructure. This is a diagram in the water authority of the city wanted to build a canal here. So our project it's located besides this canal and we are using the idea we created this some terraces so that they can we manage to let them filter some water from the canal to the terraces. So we can have different activities. And these are some of the renderings that we have. We are using a stone for the place that actually this is stone was located in the other side of the landfill and we are placing them in order to create the series of steps. We have here the structure with the auditorium. And this is all our images. And now we have the actually it's getting construct very, very fast. We have received, we receive these images when once in a while. As this is rapidly under construction, they started at the end of last year. And this is the most the only the newest pictures that we have from the site. So we are very happy that some of the ideas from the competition are actually being realized. Others we couldn't but but at the end, we are looking forward to see the results of this. And this is the end of the presentation. I want to thank you everybody for being here and being patient and listen to us. And I believe that now we have an opportunity to to open up for questions and to have a conversation. Yes, thank you so much, Adriana Victor, I think like Laila had mentioned at the very beginning would like the student to type their questions in the chat feature. And then we will read it for you guys. Thank you. Okay, I think I received the first question from an apologize for mispronouncing any name from at the end. She's asking if you can please explain the competition the competition process. I'm not sure which competition she's mentioned. Is it the last project? Yeah. This, this one at the beginning. The competition process, it was organized by the government by the federal government. And they had different categories. So they have public infrastructure, where you had markets, hospitals, schools, they have another category for public space and landscape. That's where we were invited. And the competition was organized together with the Faculty of Architecture, which is the National University of Mexico. They coordinated the competition. And they also invited the architects and firms to participate. So we were invited and it was a very fast competition because we received the invitation and more or less two weeks later we had to deliver an idea. So everything has been happening really fast in this project. Almost we haven't realized what what happened. Great. Thank you. I have another question from Nika Teper. In your project working within an ESCO site, are there specific protocols you must follow in terms of historic cultural preservation? Well, actually, the project was tackling the historic preservation methodology because what is protected is the agricultural technique, the Chinamp itself. It's an ancient technique that was developed by the Aztecs. So these were floating islands. So these areas in danger because urbanization is strengthening the model. So by recuperating the Chinampas, we are working hand in hand with preservation. Great. Thank you. The next question from Candelaria. Do you see the Mexican takubaya strategy being applied and implemented, adapted for other regions? How could this vision work for Arab cities? Yeah, we think it's a highly implementable model. Not just because it's technically feasible, but also because there's no more waters. So developers are now, as we mentioned in the presentation, forced in a way to be creative and they are actually very open to study and to understand what new techniques and what they have to offer to the city in order to implement circular models of water management. So technically, it's possible and there are, well, now takubaya is an interesting case because there's the interest of both the developers and also the city has announced it as a strategic area. So it's a great opportunity, but I think the case of takubaya can be presented to other city authorities and let them know that there's no need to wait for water to be completely scarce. And why wait for that moment? Let's try this model in other places that are not yet with this level of stress. But in the end, well, the ways that we can manage water are very similar here in takubaya and in other parts in other cities. So we think it's very, very feasible. Thank you. The next question is from Jamie Anaya. What has been the most challenging aspect for ORU in implementing long-term sustainable urban design approaches in a country like Mexico, which stands to work around short-term formal results? So how do you sustain kind of a long-term approach in the case where short-term is the way to go, let's say? So far, our practice is very young. We only have two years of existence, but we have worked previously with city authorities and in the Latin American case or in the case of Mexico, the biggest challenge is to skip, let's say, the interests that different parties have on a particular spot or a particular area. In many ways, even though you have a great vision and even though you have all the technical solutions, there will be always interests that are colliding with these proposals, right? So to us, I think this is the hardest part, to make sure that everybody understands the purpose of the project and the best available solutions, but unfortunately sometimes we just get on the way of these visions. But I think the other challenges, just to be open to collaborate with financial specialists, we're not used to collaborate with financial specialists. We're not used to sitting on a table with other disciplines that are looking onto maintenance mechanisms. So it's just a question of being able to create the framework in which other people can also contribute to the lasting vision of the project. Yeah, maybe as a follow-up, is there a kind of financial model that they would have to follow that you put in motion, let's say, in order to make sure some of those long-faced elements are still built or achieved? Well, I think each project has its own articularities and I think each project or each case needs to be reviewed one by one. But it's both operation, maintenance and finding solutions are necessary strategies and it's just something that is not at the very top of our minds while designing something. A lot of the times we think that the design will stand for itself but that's not necessarily true. We need to be able to spend time working out with financial specialists and with people that are able to activate the project because we can't do it all. This is something important. We don't have the control of the project, especially at these scales. Thank you. Anushai Eliorabi, I think the question is, this question pertains to sustainability and maintenance. For example, the agricultural projects, again to last, how do you assure the infrastructure is maintained? Are the farmers trained? For example, do you need to design their training into the phasing of the project? Yeah, that was part of the project. This allows the farmer to have a financial sustainability because the problem is that right now the farmers, they have the land, but even if they produce, they have no access to the market to sell their products. And if they want to compete with the industrial agriculture, they can do so. They can compete with the large industrial producers. So this is why the level, the certificate that is given to them allows them to sell their products as a fair rate, as they have high revenues, and this is an incentive for them to continue developing the system. So this is included into the design. This is the last part. Thank you. Matt Brubacher asks, working with large public entity, i.e. the government as the mutation, but also offers a certain amount of motive power, funding, structure, etc. Can you imagine a way that we as architects could start to bring this vision process or benefits to a more community, grassroots or small scale group working semi privately with limited resources? So how can you link the government into kind of the smaller scale grassroots approach? Yeah, I think that the process that we mentioned, we want to tackle that so that we can connect the community needs with the opportunity that the government has to invest in some areas. But sometimes the communities, they don't have a voice. So for us has been really important to connect with them and learn from what they need, and then bring that into the design. And then if I integrated them into the conversation, I think it's, we don't create proposals that come from our mind and imagination, rather we like to integrate different voices. So actually in the Takubaya project, for example, right now we have found an amazing partner, which is called Graciela, and she's a lady that lives in Takubaya and she's actually super connected. She knows everybody and she has a lot. She even shared more information that what we were able to find. She had all the government plans that the city has developed for many years. She knows all the problems and she has told us, we even had it right now that we are going through this crisis. We had a meeting with her by Zoom and she told us like we were discussing our proposal with her. So I think we have to reimagine how can we can find these key players into the communities. Right. And I just want to add something else that in, I'm sure this happens in other parts of the world, but here communities are very powerful. Communities can both promote a project or can stop big projects. I think our role as designers is to connect as we already mentioned and as Adriana illustrated is to be able to bridge the needs of everyone basically into a strategy that is catering to everybody's interest in a way. But this is of course this is this is one of the hardest parts in the design discipline. Oh, if I ask Victor actually and through what channels or and what venues would you say the community is able to express itself. As you mentioned, they have the power to do so. Yeah. So one, one thing that we that we did is for example, the video that we showed you in in Takubaya. This was a, this was an event where we invited everyone, the neighbors of Takubaya water specialists politicians, professors, and it was a since it's a neutral ground. Everybody has a voice and everybody is able to express their preoccupations and what they think is good for for the area. It's just a space. It's just being able to open these spaces so that so as to so that everyone can be heard. And, and then this of course has consequences right so a, this is just one one one example of how you can do it. But, but it's something that that we need to make sure that that is carried out through the whole process. We need to make sure that that everyone is taken into account in every step in every step of the process. Thank you. One more question that I have from Antonia about she says you mentioned the relationship between the Garden of Shadows and the channel next to it. Was that the main influence in your choice of vegetation for the project and what else did you take into account.  And I think the question was also about the water channel, which was built by the water authority and since the channel was located besides our project, we tried to integrate it to these platforms where you can access the fault plane so that water is not only channelized but if the water is flowing we can just here and maybe the water will create a garden. Yeah, so just to compliment that the canal was built just to make sure that the water that is flowing in this in this area is channeled into a series of infiltration gardens. So rather than water just flowing through the space and then ending up accumulating in the lower areas, we are using the infiltration gardens to keep the water in this spot as much as as much as possible. Yeah, it was a way of hacking the create massive infrastructure that they wanted to implement. We couldn't get rid of it, it was a fight that we didn't, we couldn't but we're starting to find grounds of how to hack these infrastructures. So this infrastructure was kind of imposed on you, do you say more than in collaboration, I guess in terms of that edge. Well, yeah, I would say a water authority had its own project and we had to align. So we have to make a way that we can integrate both both desires, I guess. Yeah, that's great. I don't see any other questions that maybe I have one follow up question based on some of the thoughts that were brought up. You had mentioned at many points I think in your presentation few operating word that I thought were very interesting like you, the mid scale, for example you came back to it. Over and over you describe something called as the quasi object, which I think it's very interesting. What about the incremental strategy and how to replicate that. And all of those kind of strategies are a pushback against let's say the top down approach that the government usually is driven towards or also push back against the more say bottom up piecemeal approach that one would see happening, but not having the incremental scale that you desire. So I suspect that the mid scale is not really a proportional. It doesn't have, let's say specific dimensional criteria for you it has some other criteria with which you define what it is, whether it was a social or ecological or, or other so I would like to hear maybe from you more about how do you define that operating mid scale that you are interested in. Right. So, yeah, exactly the mid scale has doesn't necessarily have a fixed dimension. In the case of Takubaya it's something that we are still defining. The, the land management instrument that we mentioned for Takubaya has is basically a polygon is a defined polygon. But in our research we are discovering that interventions at that scale are not necessarily need to be confined within the limits of that polygon, but it's kind of a mix between good limits, also large scale infrastructure such as urban highways, the path of run offs that used to be rivers in the past. So it's basically an overlaying different kinds of information so as to have an idea of what the area of the mid scale in this case would be. But yeah, the idea of the quasi object is very near to the idea of the process where you can actually incorporate new dimensions that enable multiple participations. And then you have architectural interventions that trigger the, you know, the process of the construction of the new, let's say the new model of the city. This was interesting to us because we know that if we are thinking of Mexico City in terms of water sensitivity one cannot deploy strategies at the scale of Mexico City that's impossible. But, but the mid scale we think offers a more grounded opportunity to test multiple solutions and engaging with multiple partners. But it's a new concept even to us and we are also very interested in exploring the solutions that the landscape disciplines have to offer within the very, very tight urban fabric. A lot of landscape projects that we have seen occur in open areas or in areas that are really outside these tight fabric of the city. So it was it was interesting to see and to explore the limits of the landscape disciplines in this kind of urban fabrics. And maybe to complement that we, we are also looking at the mid scale because we have water has no, I'm putting here any match of water has no different boundaries usually we have the boundary the political boundaries, the municipal boundaries, and it shows what water does not reflect the reflects that so we had a done an analysis of the different scales of the watersheds in Mexico City. And what we found is actually that even if the area where the body on where the government was going to work. It's, it's kind of here, it actually corresponds to this micro watershed because it's still immense, which goes from the stream that will flow into into this area. So it's also the understanding of the territory of in which we are trying to develop the approach of the we call it the mid scale right, but it's also a concept of how the large the different scales are related to each other. Yeah, thank you. Now that was great. I think it's really interesting to kind of think about it, especially in the way you elaborated now like the quasi objects object. It doesn't imply a full object, but it's not the field or it's not the landscape only it's it's not only architecture it's not only landscape I guess it sits between these disciplines the way we understand them as separate. So it's kind of intersect both and I like this kind of the way you describe it it is. It's not it's there's a lack of boundary especially when you think about water very clearly but you also have about social boundaries like social boundaries and economic boundaries etc because a site doesn't tend to be so autonomous right as we operate on it. And which I think is a really kind of exciting way to think about form, let's say form making an intervention, intervention, physical intervention that doesn't lend itself either an architecture or a landscape. Yes, and also it doesn't talk about one entity right so you talk about multiple partners coming together so it's I think it's almost like you're locating yourself in between all of those with a kind of quasi position. Yes, that's correct. We, this is why we've been very insistent in the notion of blurring boundaries. And I think that the quasi object is that is precisely that it's the blurring of the boundaries between many, many elements from political social water, urban landscape. It's been an interesting and exciting research for us. No, that's great and I'm glad you expand on it because I want also to get the impression that from the students working on their project I'm thinking from their studio point of view now that you're not talking about moving from the lot to the block right to the urban you talk about another form of defining the site or a project or an insightful intervention that doesn't belong to the way we kind of used to think about scales, let's say. Yeah, I don't think that's great. Thank you so much. I mean, if you, unless you have more things to share with us. I think it's been like a really good an hour and a half now, our 20 minutes with very interesting questions. So I would like to, again, thank you for making yourself available from two different locations. Thank you. And it's been really fun and great. Kind of, I don't want to say it's a distraction from where we are today is actually very much engaged with it but it's also kind of an open imagination between the future. Thank you. Thank you so much. Thank you really appreciate it. So thank you also for being here. Yes, Victor, please. And just to finish, if anybody wants, we can share with you several links of the of the work and the research that we're carrying out. And perhaps just one final message for all the students is that what transformative projects are actually the result of a collective effort. There are various links between advocates, designers, policymakers, communities and politicians. So don't be afraid to go out there and engage all these parties.


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Okay, welcome back. So we are looking at the nature of God's covenant with man number one. The first point we talked about was God is the initiator of the covenant. So God makes the covenant. Let's look at the second one. When God makes a covenant, right? For you and I, there are either blessings or curses. It means sound stern, but there are either blessings or curses. When we obey the instructions of the covenant, what do we do? We position ourselves to receive the blessings of God. Everyone say position, right? The word position means we are placing ourselves, right? So for example, just an example, right? The sun is out, right? And it's hot, right? But you see a tree, right? Now under the tree, there's some shade, yes? So what do we do? We go under the tree and we try to stand under the tree. Okay, I have some shade. What am I doing? I'm positioning myself to be in a place of rest or shade. Just a simple example. When you and I obey God's commandments, obey His covenant, obey His word, we are positioning ourselves to receive from God.  So automatically the blessings come upon us, right? Because I obey and I'm positioning myself in terms of the covenant. Now what is the flip side of this? If I'm breaking the covenant or violating the rules of the covenant, right? Then what happens? Curses will follow. Now when I'm saying purses, it is just that God's protection over us is removed. God removes His hand. He says, okay, I've done my best. Now this person is continually breaking my covenant. He's breaking my laws. He's not obeying my word.  Now he, this person will be open to the works of the devil, right? So whatever happens to him is not because of God. It's because of what he has done. Get what I'm saying, right? Whatever the person has done. If I say I don't want God, I don't want to believe in God, then what am I saying? I am positioning myself to be away from the blessings of God. It's like saying, ah, it's so hot. Oh, but you see a tree, but you don't want to go there to the tree to sit in the shade. You expect the tree to come here. This is an example, right? But what am I trying to say? When we obey, we position ourselves for God to bless us. When we disobey, we position ourselves for the enemy to take control over our lives. So if there are problems in our life or continual situations in our life, it's not always because we have been disobedient.  No. We must also remember that when God speaks to us, when God works in our life, He takes us through difficult seasons, right? He took Joseph, Daniel, David, Apostle Paul, many of them. Who He wants to use, He will take them through seasons. But even through that seasons, we will see His blessings. But we may intentionally say, I don't want to obey God. I don't want it like the people of Israel did, right? They intentionally said, no. So God said, I'm releasing my hand. If there's anything happening to you, it is not because of me. You have opened the door for the devil to come and work. As far as I'm concerned, I have made my covenant. You follow it, the blessings will come upon you. Now in Deuteronomy chapter 28, in Deuteronomy, the writer is writing to remind the people of Israel. See, God made a covenant with you.  He brought you out in the desert. You saw all the miracles. In the night, there was a pillar of fire that was going. Imagine in the desert, a pillar of fire is going. You're just following that pillar of fire in a picture there. Imagine there's a red sea there. The sea is divided. They are walking. Every morning food is coming from heaven. Then there's a rock wherever they're going, water is flowing from that place. All they need to do is go drink water and they're satisfied. You remember all that. God is telling in Deuteronomy, the writer is saying, the people of Israel forgot all the miracles that I did. You forgot who I was. You forgot the covenant I made with you. I kept my covenant, but you haven't kept your covenant. So in Deuteronomy 28, maybe one of us can open Deuteronomy 28. The word Deuto means a reminder. So they're reminding the people of Israel. You didn't obey. And so destruction came upon you. Verses came upon you. But when you obey, you saw the blessings of God. Read Deuteronomy 28. Just read a few verses. Just keep reading and I'll stop you. Let's go ahead. Deuteronomy 28 verse one. And if you faithfully obey the voice of the Lord, your God. Hold on. So he's telling the people of Israel. If you faithfully obey the word of God, continue. Be careful to do all his commandments. Be careful to do all his commandments that I command you to do. The Lord, your God will set you high above all the nations of the earth. Keep reading.  All these blessings shall come upon you and overtake you. What are the, what is the clause in the beginning? If you faithfully obey my commandments, all these blessings will fall upon you. Read the blessings. Blessed shall you be in the city and blessed shall you be in the field. Blessed shall be the fruit of your womb and the fruit of your ground and the fruit of your cattle. The increase of your heads and the young of your flow. Blessed shall be your basket and your kneading ball. Blessed shall you be when you come in and blessed shall you be when you go out. Now you see those blessings. If you fully obey, you'll be blessed in the city. You'll be blessed in the country. Your fruit, the fruit of your womb will be blessed. That means what? I would bless you with children. Children are from me. I bless people with children. So I would bless the fruit of your womb. I would bless the livestock.  I will bless, I will multiply it. Your basket and your kneading through will be blessed. You'll be blessed when you go in. You'll be blessed when you go out. The Lord will send a blessing on your barns and everything you put your hand on will be blessed. And the Lord will establish you as His holy people as He promised. And all the peoples of the earth will see that you are called by the name of the Lord. And they will fear you. The Lord will grant you abundant prosperity in the fruit of your womb. The young of your livestock and the crops of your ground in the land He swore to your ancestors to give you. Look at verse 12. The Lord will open up the heavens, the storehouse of the bounty, of His bounty to send rain on your land and to bless the work of your hands. You will lend it to many nations and you will not borrow. The Lord will make you the head and not the tail if you pay attention to my commandments. So all of this is there for you, for the people of Israel. All of this is there. But for that, you have to obey my commandments. Okay, God, if I don't obey, what will happen? You know, like children, no? If I don't do this, what will you do?  We can, we'll know what will happen. Verse 15. However, if you do not obey the Lord your God and do not carefully listen to His commandments and the decrees I give you, all these curses will come upon you and overtake you. What? You will be cursed in the city. Your basket in a netting blow will be cursed. The fruit of your womb will be cursed. The crops of your land, it goes on and on. Now, it's not like, now remember, remember what we said? When, when the Lord has made a covenant, His covenant is always to bless. He makes, His word is good. He's a good God. That's His nature. So He wants to bless. But when we step out of the covenant, we disobey all these other things happen. Now, does the enemy want to do good things for you? And for me, does he want to say, oh, you're very good? He doesn't care. The moment you and I step out of His covenant and say, I don't obey, He's ready to bring trouble and calamities upon you. Or He will make you feel that everything is all right. All of a sudden, He can bring, come down upon you. So it's so important that you and I as believers, we align ourselves, position ourselves into His covenant. What is another nature of God's covenant? No dual covenants. That means no two or three covenants. You can't be in two or three covenants at the same time. Have you heard of dual citizenship? Dual citizenship is something where you can be a citizen of India. You can be a citizen of Australia. Dual citizenship. Nowadays, some countries don't love it, but initially they loved it.  There are some countries that love it even now. God is not like that. You can't obey His covenant here and then be part of another covenant of another God. You can't be in covenant with God and be in covenant with the devil. Because God is one. So let's read that Exodus 34 and verse 14.  Protect, keep and maintain the covenant and the covenant partner. I am the covenant partner with God. So I need to protect my covenant. I need to maintain my covenant with God. Maintain it how? With preciousness. Meaning it's something very precious. You don't just throw it away just like that. What does Jesus say? Don't throw the pearls to the pigs. That means the gospel that I'm preaching, the message. It's pearls. Don't throw it to people who don't want it. The covenant that God is making is precious. Remember that. Keep it dear to you. God is faithful and he calls us to his faithfulness. Now, why was God so upset in the Old Testament? When we read Old Testament, we feel God is every time he's upset. I will do this. I'll bring this. I'll do this. Why is he so upset? He was not upset. It's God's love. It's God's mercy. Why did God have to send snakes to bite the people? They were disobeying. They opened their lives to the devil. And so remember that what do they do? They began to worship idols. God is saying, I made a covenant with you and you were singing and dancing and praising God while walking out of Egypt. They were very happy. Oh, the Lord is great and mighty. He brought us out of Egypt through the mighty hand of Pharaoh. He brought us out. We walked out of Egypt. They're singing songs of praise. A few days later, they are worshiping another idol. We made a golden calf. They're all banging the tamarind, singing and dancing around it. Now, how many covenants is that? And God is saying, hey, you made a covenant with me. I said, I brought you out. Now you're doing this. So God had to bring judgment upon them. You understand what I'm saying? So now you and I, how does it apply to us? You and I are in covenant with God.  I made a covenant with you. I will bless you. I will protect you. I will keep you. Now if I say, no, I don't want all of this. I want to drink alcohol. I want to smoke. I want to watch pornography. I want to do all the things wrong. Yet I also want to be in a safe place where God will protect me. God will provide for me. What is happening? Dual citizenship. Monday to Friday, we are citizens of the devil. Saturday and Sunday, citizens of God. Dual citizens. God does not approve of it. God doesn't approve of us sitting on the fence. And then we decide where to go when.   Why? Because he's merciful. But God won't approve of it. Get what I'm saying, right? So dual citizenship, meaning dual commitments. God is not for it. God, can I, you know, go to, can I drink alcohol? Can I do all of this Monday to Friday? Saturday, Sunday, I'll be there for church. I'll be there in the setup team, ushering team, board team, whatever team. And Sunday, I'm there. So, you know, ushering for communion, table, everything I'll take, because I know you're very important to me. You know, because of you, I've come this far. But Monday to Friday, you leave me alone. Let me just do this. That means what? God will not approve of it. He will, it's like you're breaking his covenant. You'll say, okay, I tried to correct you, but now I'm just going to let go, even though he's faithful to the covenant. The devil may, you know, bring things into our lives. Still God will work sometimes. He'll break off the yoke of the devil. Why? Because he's a covenant keeping God. So our responsibility is not dual commitments. What is the next one? God's absolute commitment to His covenant. In Exodus 2, 24, God remembered His covenant. Let's read Exodus 2, 24. Exodus 2 and verse 24. Exodus chapter 2 verse 24. And God heard their groaning, and God remembered His covenant with Abraham, with Isaac, and with Jacob. God heard their groaning. They're all crying, oh God, oh Lord, please save us. God heard their groaning, and remembered their covenant. Did they change? It's not like they all pleaded, Lord, forgive me, forgive me, no. They heard their groanings. God remembered His covenant. Oh, God, I am God, and I've made the covenant with Abraham. I promised Abraham, I told Abraham that I will make you a great nation. I'll bring your people. I will make your own nation. I will bless your nation. Now I'm taking these fellows to that nation which I promised Abraham. They're doing everything wrong, but God remembered His covenant with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. So true in our life. Sometimes we do so many things. We don't deserve, but God remembers the prayers of our fathers, or our parents, our grandfathers. God remembers those prayers. Before I became a believer, I didn't pray, please come save me, and all, nothing. It was the prayers of others who prayed for me, and God spoke in my life. I didn't want to become a joint full-time ministry and all of those things. It's a prayer of others. So the same way, God is absolute to His covenant. That means absolutely committed. He will not change. What is commitment? Commitment means even when things go up and down, stay true. Remember Jesus is in the boat, and He's sleeping. There's a storm. What does the disciple say? Hey, how can you sleep?  Now, it's easy to think about it, but remember the same disciples have seen God do so many miracles. They have seen Jesus do so many miracles. We're saying Jesus, wake up, how can you sleep? We're going to die. Sometimes very easy. Even with Jesus on the boat, the commitment was very loose. The commitment is to hold onto something without a wavering. I'm committed. I will do it. And God gives us the grace to do it. So for example, as believers, remember that God wants to see commitment in our life in whatever it is. So many of us are here studying. We want to do something for God, do something in ministry, just serve God. Be committed. It may look outwardly. It may look very different. You feel like giving up. You feel like tired. You're feeling very... You stay committed. God at prom. I'm keeping my side of the covenant. I want to be committed. Just like you are committed to me, I want to be committed to you. Don't look at the now. Look at what God can do ahead for you. That's the best part of a covenant. When He said it, it will happen. How and when you journey along with Him. Right? It's like this. When you're going on a train journey, it's wonderful to see the mountains and the beautiful valleys and the rivers. It's so gorgeous and beautiful to see it. But imagine that train is stopped in one place only. I'll be looking at that. The mountain looks beautiful, but keep looking at that mountain. What will happen? You'll get so bored. You don't want to look at that mountain anymore. It's common. So in the journey of life, when we journey along and let God take you and journey along with God, let Him take you. Take you through those seasons of learning and growing and developing. So you be faithful in your side. Be committed. We need to understand that God's covenant nature and His absolute commitment to the covenant, He does it from His side. Right? So let me give you an example. How many of you God has called you to be pastors? You already know you're going to be a pastor in one, okay? Daniel, Joseph. What's your name again? Komal. Anybody online? You know that God has called you to be a pastor. Yes, Shaker has raised His hand. Wonderful. Now, some of us may already, yes, few of them are raising your hands here. Yes. Now you know. Okay. For example, you know God has called you to be a pastor. Is becoming a pastor easy? Is it easy? Nowadays, maybe a little easy. Book one hall. Buy one, two speakers, one mixer, and then you have church. Right? But the calling of the pastors, church is okay. We can open a church. Right? We can start. But the calling of the pastor. Right? So there needs to be commitment. First year, nobody will come. Ten people will come. And after two, three years, nobody's coming. Very few people. Lord, three years of church, only 20 people are here. Stay committed. Stay committed. Right? Because that's your side of the commitment. God has said, I want you to do this.  Right? So you stay committed to the call.  We do all of that. We stay committed. Whether things go well, things don't go well. God, I want to stay committed. And what happens?  Never measure ministry or the success of a ministry by the number of people. Okay, ministry is not about the number of people. If you can have 100 people, you can have 1000 people. 100 strong leaders can do much more than 1000 people who just come sit and go. Yes or no? Right? Yet? See, we need to maintain a balance. God said, I will build my church. Right? It's good to have ministry is about people. So it's good to have strong churches, growing churches. That's good. But remember, ministry is about the people, what they do. Right? So even if you're doing a, God has called you to a church, to plant a church, pioneer a church, and there are 50 people in the church, be faithful and committed to those 50 people. Don't compare your ministry to somebody else's ministry. That's a covenant God has made with you. Maybe God has made a covenant with somebody else. Hey, I will build, I'll give you a church for 10,000 people. That's God's covenant with him. We are no one to question God. Why not for me? No, God is saying for you, this is correct. I want you to learn this way. So we be faithful to our side of the covenant. Okay? So we looked at the nature of God's covenant. Number one. Go ahead. Tell me, God is the initiator and keeper of the covenant. Second one. There are blessings and curses. Three. There's no dual commitments. That means you can't be in two covenants at the same time. No. Four. God is absolutely committed to his covenant. Okay. Let's go to the next portion. Any questions? Everyone understood about the covenant? Right? Let's go a little bit in detail here in five important covenants in the Bible. Right? We're going to look at five important covenants we find in the scripture. Number one is the covenant with Noah. Now we did touch upon this. But let's read Genesis 618. It's on your notes. Genesis 618. Anyone online or one of the students here can just read it please. The mic is here. Somebody can read. But I will establish my covenant with you and you shall go into the ark.  Let's read the next portion also. Now this is very important to read this portion because we'll understand the covenant with Noah in this versus Genesis 9, 8 through 17. Would you like to read?  And with every living creature that is with you, the birds, the cattle and every beast of the earth with you, of all that go out of the every beast of the earth. Thus, I establish my covenant with you. Never again shall all flesh be cut off by the waters of the cloud.  And God said, this is the sign of the covenant which I made between me and you and every living creature that is with you for perpetual generations. I set my rainbow in the cloud and it shall be for the sign of the covenant between me and the earth. And it shall be when I bring a cloud over the earth that the rainbow shall be seen in the cloud. And I will remember my covenant which is between me and you every living creature of all flesh.  The rainbow shall be in the cloud and I will put on it to remember the everlasting covenant between God and every living creature of all flesh that is on the earth. And God said to Noah, this is the sign of the covenant which I have established between me and all the flesh that is on the earth. Thank you so much Anushash. Right, so God is speaking to Noah and we just talked about it, right?  Never will I do this and I will establish my covenant with the rainbow. Now this is a very prominent covenant. The covenant of mercy.  It's like after destroying you're saying sorry. It looks like that but it's not so. God is making a covenant and he's saying this rainbow shall be in the cloud and when I look at it it will be an everlasting covenant. It's not a covenant for 100 years, 500 years, 2,000 years, 5,000 years, no it's an everlasting covenant. I will never again destroy or wipe out the people of the earth. Never will I do that again. It's a covenant. It is God's mercy. So you know, when we look at what's happening here on right now in the generation that we are living in so much of hatred, so much of you know, violence against Christianity, people mocking Christianity and all of this that's happening I always think why can't God just finish them off? He'll not. Why? Because God said I've made a covenant with you. Covenant of mercy. I will be merciful to these people. I will never again know so it's like this. God is saying I remember the covenant I made with Noah and I will not destroy the people. Right? Secondly, he makes a covenant with Abraham, a covenant of promise. A covenant of blessing. It says Genesis 15 18 on the same day the Lord made a covenant with Abraham saying to your descendants I have given this land from the river of Egypt to the great river, the river Euphrates. Again, Genesis 17 1 through 14 talks about the whole experience of how God made the covenant. I'll just read a few verses. When Abraham was 99 years old, the Lord appeared to Abraham and said to him, I am Almighty God. Walk before me and be blameless and I will make my covenant between you and me and will multiply you exceedingly.  Look at that portion there. My covenant is with you one person, Abraham. Now, what about you and I? God can say my covenant is with you. My covenant is with you. We can put your name there. God, you said my covenant is with you, right? No longer shall your name be called Abraham, but your name shall be called Abraham for I have made you the father of many nations. I will make you exceedingly fruitful.  Look at that. What a covenant. You know, when we read it, it sounds good. But just picture what Abraham will be thinking. Abraham is old. He hasn't had a child. His wife is barren. There's no hope. Probably Abraham is thinking maybe another 10, 15 years and I'm going over. My life is almost over. But almost towards the end of Abraham's life, God is saying, hey, I will make you exceed, not fruitful, exceedingly fruitful, right? I will make you make nations of you and things will come from you. Seven and I will establish my covenant between me and you and your descendants and their generations.  Remember God told Moses? What did God tell Moses? Listen, I made a covenant with my friend Abraham. He's no more. But I made a covenant with him saying what? When my own words I said, I will bless you with the land of Canaan as an everlasting possession and I will be their God. So I remember saying this to Abraham.  This is my covenant which you shall keep between me and you and your descendants after you. Every male child among you shall be circumcised and you shall be circumcised in the flesh of your four skins and it will be a sign of the covenant between you and me. Again, in the Noah covenant, what was it? What was the sign? Rainbow? Now, in the Abrahamic covenant, what is the sign? Circumcision says every male child is circumcised. When you circumcise them it's like you're they belong to you Abraham. They are from your descendants and because they are from your descendants I will bless them. Whether they do good, bad my hand of blessing will be upon them because I'm making that covenant with you. Look at Abraham God blessed him so much that next when Isaac came Isaac and Jacob sorry Isaac came God blessed Isaac almost double of what Abraham had. Wherever Isaac went God blessed him. Then came the twins, Jacob and Esau. Still there were a little bit of problems there but God says, hey, I've chosen one among you. Jacob the younger will serve the older. Jacob did many things wrong yet God kept his covenant. The story of Jacob and Esau is so beautiful so wonderful to if you have brothers we have two brothers. It's a beautiful story. Everyone blame Esau It's not Esau's fault. He was just smarter he was stronger he was more wise Jacob was only looking at the house he was like this you know person who was tampered at home oh Jacob you stay at home Esau was smart right if you look at it in the natural he was supposed to take the covenant it was better if he had taken it he was smart he was stronger he was elder God doesn't work that way look at David all the brothers are there all of them are in the army but God says no not these fellows let's choose a shepherd David is chosen as the next king but here God blessed Abraham God bless Isaac God bless Jacob and Joseph and the generations after that God kept his covenant remember Jacob Jacob and Esau Jacob was scared to meet Esau after many years oh my brother I'm meeting him after so many years what if he wants to destroy me so Jacob he got all his servants and livestock go and give it to Esau tell him I've come to make peace Esau sends them back and when Jacob when Esau meets he says God has blessed me abundantly so imagine Jacob is standing there all the blessings the livestock doing well Esau is coming and saying God has blessed me also I don't need anything of you of yours because God has blessed me even though the covenant was upon you God chose you but he did not forget me he didn't say okay you saw you go away somewhere only Jacob because I was the seed of Abraham God bless me also the Lord has been good to me Esau said did Esau do something wrong yes he sold his birthright but God didn't reject him because of that God blessed him he says God has blessed me go down next is Joseph God blessed him made him the second in command in Egypt made an Israelite become the second in command in a foreign nation where he was a slave covenant blessings and you and I are part of this covenant it's not like this covenant is closed after the cross this covenant is no more the covenant is still active it is still there we can still claim this God as a descendant of Abraham this is what I am praying for you can still pray nothing wrong after the cross the cross is the greatest covenant made for us the Abrahamic covenant it's still there look at verse 10 this is my covenant which I will keep with you verse 11 you will be circumcised in the flesh of your foreskins and it will be a sign of the covenant between you and me verse 12 he who is 8 days old among you shall be circumcised every male child in your generation he who is born in your house or brought with money bought with money from any foreigner who is not your descendant he who is born in your house and he who is bought with your money he who is circumcised and my covenant shall be on your flesh for an everlasting covenant and the uncircumcised male child who is not circumcised in the flesh of the foreskins that person shall be cut off from his people for he has broken his covenant you look at this it's interesting God is saying even if you have bought a child you don't have a child you bought a child you got to go back and understand the culture during that time so people could go and if they didn't have a child they could get another child but even if you get another child circumcise him and the moment you circumcise whoever he is you've made him part of the covenant and I will bless him if you don't listen if you don't circumcise he is cut off from his people and he has broken my covenant even now the Jews circumcise because they follow Abraham they circumcise they get circumcised in all of it it's a big festival even now they do it right yet they have not fallen they have not come into the covenant in the right way they have not understood the covenant in its entirety they are just looking at Abraham Abraham Abraham because of Abraham that's why Jesus said it so beautifully are you saying that you know Abraham you are not even 30 years old how do you know Abraham before Abraham was I am Abraham did great things but before he was I am the one who made Abraham I am the one who made the covenant with Abraham and you are behind Abraham and the initiative of the covenant is standing in front of you you are behind Abraham that's what Jesus said before Abraham was I am he got upset because they didn't understand here we can learn that this covenant of Abraham is a blessing for each one of us every time you know any time I feel weak and tired I go to Deuteronomy 28 I read it and we do these house visits when we pray for people we read Deuteronomy 28 powerful God as a descendant of Abraham as a covenant of the Abrahamic blessings I receive all of this I may not feel it but it's mine because it's part of the covenant if I obey these blessings will follow me or it will fall upon me and nobody can stop it because it's God who has kept the covenant God will fulfill the covenant right? okay so what we will do is we will stop here next week we will continue from the covenant with Moses and Israel and it will get more interesting we will talk about the Davidic covenant and get into covenant names as well right? thank you so much have a great weekend thank you those online have a great weekend I will see you next week God bless


Good morning traders, Patrick Munley here with another tickmail chart hit. Today I want to draw your attention to a potential developing opportunity in the Australian dollar. We're approaching the prior cycle highs at the 72.43 area. Look for a break here to actually test into the ascending trend line of what could potentially be an ending diagonal pattern here. We have the ascending trend line at 72.93, we have the weekly R3 at 72.82 and the monthly R1 at 72.84. So I'm looking for a pop-up into this area, bearish reversal patterns, set short positions, initially targeting back down into the ascending trend line support at 71.67 and then ultimately down to test the monthly pivot at 70.83. As always, traders plan the trade, trade the plan and most importantly, manage your risk. Until next time, thanks very much.


The corresponding eigenvalue is sum of the squares. And with this choice of eigenfunctions, once again, you will see very nice picture of zero set. Zero set of cosine in one direction, zero set of cosine in different direction will give you a very beautiful, simple tonalized picture. But the truth is that both on the sphere and on the torus, much more happens. We have eigenvalues of high multiplicity. You see here, there are many harmonic, homogeneous polynomials of degree n. So there are many functions that you can combine and look at their combinations. These beautiful pictures correspond to a very specific choice of a basis there. The same with the torus. Sorry, there's some of the squares. We know that there are many numbers that you can write as sum of the squares in many different ways. If you pick such eigenvalue, you will have lots of eigenfunctions. And instead of taking these nice products, you can try to take a linear combination of those and look at the corresponding picture of the zero set or nodal domains. I'll show you some of the examples, hopefully. This is an example of two nodal domains for torus or square. So you can combine eigenfunctions such that the number of your nodal domains is just two. The eigenvalue is high. You can do it for very high, for very large eigenvalues. The number of eigendomains is bounded by the number of this eigenvalue in the list by current nodal domain theorem. But on the other hand, it could be very small. It could be two. Same is true on the sphere. I don't have a nice picture, but it's a very old result that there are eigenfunctions of high-frequency, large eigenvalue on the sphere with just two nodal domains. If on the torus you go to really high frequency and look what happens there when you take random combination of these crosshines, you will see a picture like that. It's blue is where the function is negative, white is where it's positive. So there are lots of lines in between where the function is zero, and they're not like that at all. And finally, the last illustration, it's a very beautiful picture. There are many, yeah? You take these elementary eigenfunctions and you take a linear combination with random coefficients. So normalize it in L2, for example, so I think this is illustration when you try to do it on your computer with randomized coefficients. The last picture is nodal domains on the sphere. Many beautiful pictures if you go to this site, it's just one of them, and you see that the nodal set, the lines on the sphere are not so nice structured as before. And in this case, your sphere is divided into several nodal domains. So there is no precise current nodal domain theorem as we go to high dimensions. The eigenvalue doesn't control the number of nodal domains, but still you, looking at the picture, you can guess what your eigenvalue is. Looking at this picture, you can say that eigenvalue is quite large, but probably if you compare this one and that one, the eigenvalue here is smaller than eigenvalue there. How do we know that? There is the following statement, it's called, yeah, what is this? That tells you that if you take an eigenfunction on, and you look at the zero set in dimension D, it's D minus one dimensional thing, and three two-dimensional sphere, it's union of curves. High dimension, the dimension of the zero set is D minus one, so it tells you that this is bounded by square root of lambda with two constants that depend on the manifold. And the hypothesis was proved in the end of 80s by Donald and Fiferman for the case where when metric is real analytic, we'll discuss some of the ideas behind it. Tomorrow, hopefully, but it will give you that on the torus and the sphere with standard metric, looking at the picture, if you able to estimate the zero, going to the zero set, you know approximately what is your eigenvalue. What I'm going to prove is much more mild result, but it already tells you that looking at the picture, you should be able to say something about eigenvalue. What I want to show is that we know the density of the zero set. So we have our compact manifold and claim that there is a constant C such that if we take an eigenfunction corresponding to eigenvalue lambda, then the zero set of this eigenfunction is dense on scale one over square root of lambda. In other words, the distance from any point on the manifold to the zero set is larger than or equal to constant over square root of lambda. The larger is the frequency or the eigenvalue of your eigenfunction, the denser are the zero sets.  It's for any acts on the manifold. Sorry, thank you, sure. There is one classical result on elliptic PD that will need to prove this. It's Harnack inequality that probably should be called Moser inequality for elliptic PDs. It was known to Harnack for harmonic functions and it's the following. If I have solution to my elliptic PD that is positive in some ball, then in the half of this ball the minimum of the function is larger than the maximum of the function times some constant C. The constant depends only on the elliptic constant of the operator. For this result, you don't need elliptic coefficients. You need that you have uniformly elliptic equation and then the constant here depends only on the elliptic constant. It also tells you that you can use Harnack inequality on each scale, small one or large ones. If you control elliptic constant of your operator you have this inequality with the same constant for small and large balls. Excuse me? Let us put it this way because there is a constant function, right? But still for the constant function if I take this small it will be... You want this to be non... Okay. We have maximum principle as well for elliptic PDs so if it's non-negative it's positive in a slightly smaller ball. We will need one more useful trick to prove our density result. The truth is we like to work with harmonic functions or solutions to elliptic PDs. We know a lot about them. Eigenfunctions, they are almost there but you have this annoying term with coefficients that you don't have control on so you prefer to make an eigenfunction into a harmonic function in a sense and you can always do it by introducing a new variable and looking at a function that is now defined on your manifold or your domain times r in the following way you take the value of the eigenfunction at point x and multiply by exponential to the power squared of lambda t. Now for this function on the product manifold we have the Laplace operator that you get when you take the usual metric the product here this is zero. So h is... this function is a solution of standard second-order elliptic PD in divergence form with no lower-order coefficients and I want to explain how hardening quality together with this lifting argument give you the result on the density of the zero-set. Assume that my eigenfunction doesn't change sign for example it's positive on some ball of radius r another way of writing that the distance from x to the zero-set is larger than r my function has the same sign on this ball. Look at the function h that is the lift of the eigenfunction this is positive on the product of this ball times the whole real line it will take just a small part of it so I had a ball and I have a positive function here I'll just scribe a ball into this one and look at the half of the ball and try to look at minimum and maximum of this lifting function in the smaller ball there I will need one more blackboard but remember what lifting is it's written there so the maximum of h over this now d plus one dimensional ball let's write one half of... let me take one of those okay sorry so I had a ball b my initial one in there I constructed a large ball of dimension plus one that I called b prime and half of the ball is where we can apply the Harlequin equality the maximum of this function is larger than the maximum of the function h on this ball I'll write one fourth of the initial b take even smaller ball inside and the maximum of h is definitely larger than maximum of sorry phi lambda on the small one on this plane we multiply by one so the function h is equal to phi on this plane where t is equal to zero on the other hand the minimum of function h if I take a point in the small ball I can still go down and being in this one half of b prime I can go down to a distance that is comparable to r and when I go down I will multiply my function by e to the power square root of lambda times the distance I can travel so the minimum is less than or equal to the maximum over this ball phi lambda but now multiplied to e to minus square root of lambda cr if what the constant c is it's an absolute constant there but compared to the Harlequin equality we see that the ratio between maximum and minimum should be bounded under this term here so we know that e to minus square root of lambda cr is bounded by c lambda let me see this was the minimum this was the maximum so this ratio is bounded by the constant and it tells you that the exponent is bounded or r is bounded by constant over the square root of lambda so the zero set is one over square root of lambda dense there it's very far from the hypothesis it will not give you this result but at least it gives you some feeling that when you change the eigenvalue the nodal set changes and it becomes denser and denser when you increase the eigenvalue I have some more minutes to tell you about part of the truth about your hypothesis there was another very nice conjecture of Derashvili that was initially formulated for harmonic functions harmonic functions, say in R3 suppose that we have a harmonic function in the unit ball of Rd so that the value of the function is zero is zero look at the zero set of this function and the question was is it true that the length of the zero set in this ball is bounded from below by some constant that depends on dimension only in dimension two we're looking at unit circle and harmonic function that is zero in the center we know the maximal principle so it's not a lonely zero there should be a curve through the zero point and this curve doesn't bound anything here so this curve should leave the circle so the length of this curve is definitely at least two but in dimension three you're now looking at a surface that goes through this point and you can draw a surface of even a surface that is zero set of a harmonic function that is very narrow and the area of this surface is very small so now in dimension three you can touch the zero by a very small finger here and there is no simple argument showing that this inequality is true however this was open for many years