阳光灿烂的午后
楼下家门前快破得烂掉的风车
还是如此艳丽 转得依然潇洒
sunny day
sunny side...

How Citi CEO Vikram Pandit finally reached the top— just in time to see the financial system, Citigroup, and all his dreams come crashing down.

• By Joe Hagan

For a few seconds, the question hangs in the air.

“Would you just raise your hand?”

The congresswoman from California peers down through her spectacles at the eight men in front of her, their faces as dour as war criminals at a tribunal. It’s the congressional Finance Committee hearing in February, and Maxine Waters has demanded to know who among America’s investment-bank CEOs had the gall to take billions in federal bailout money and then raise credit-card rates on the very taxpayers who’d helped prop up their sorry companies.

Heads crane to look. Then the long, thin arm of Vikram Pandit, the chief executive of global banking conglomerate Citigroup, goes up in the air like a flag of surrender. When it drops back down again, Pandit’s shoulders slump, a weak smile of acquiescence on his face. Behind him, the Reverend Jesse Jackson glowers with righteous anger.

“Thank you,” Waters says curtly.

It’s a moment of withering humiliation for Pandit, but it’s only the latest disgrace: In the preceding months, he has barely clung to his job, as Citigroup’s board considered replacing him with a former media CEO and offered the government his head in exchange for the billions in bailout money. President Obama himself publicly rebuked him for ordering a new $50 million jet. Forced to break up Citigroup against his own strategic aims, he’s taken so much government aid that one i-banker jokes that Citi has become “the Wall Street version of the DMV.” The rank and file at Citi, their net worth destroyed, accuse him of cronyism and absentee leadership. He’s become a virtual corporate eunuch, his options narrowed to nil, making a $1 salary as a public display of humility.

Pandit is trying to keep his chin up. “Look, I don’t want to leave until the job is done,” he tells me late last week. “I don’t want to lose the opportunity to put this company in the right place, because I believe I can do it.” Not everyone agrees, of course, and the consensus is that he might already have been replaced at Citi if the government could find anyone willing to take the thankless job. (“The funniest blog was e-mailed to me by a friend,” he jokes wanly. “ ‘Pandit Gets to Keep His Crappy Job.’ ”)

It wasn’t supposed to be this way. When he arrived at Citi in late 2007, Vikram Pandit was the definition of the fabled “smartest guy in the room,” the kind of brainy financial engineer Wall Street invented—and rewarded richly—over the past twenty years, as complex instruments like derivatives fueled wealth creation. He saw hidden folds in complicated problems that others didn’t see, and when he spoke, which was not often and always quietly, people listened. But for all his brains, he never quite seemed to be in control of his own destiny. Fourteen months later, Pandit is the latest to be blamed for everything that is wrong with Wall Street, the smartest guy in a room full of idiots.

In the 1976 Columbia University yearbook, Vikram Pandit appears with the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers: He’s a slight young man with huge black-framed glasses perched over a thin, aquiline nose and a sparse mustache, his thin neck poking out of a too-big plaid lumberjack shirt. He looks cheerful among the academic elite. Pandit had moved to Queens from a town in central India when he was 16, the son of a middle-class pharmaceutical executive. His family was of the Maharashtrian Brahmin caste, traditionally known as priests and scholars (Pandit, in fact, means “priest” or “learned person”), who frequently enter the business class in Indian society. When Pandit was born, an astrologer told his family that “whatever this boy touches will turn to gold.”

A spectacular student, Pandit studied summers and earned an undergraduate degree in electrical engineering in only three years. He then turned to finance and earned a doctorate after publishing a dissertation involving a crushingly complex financial puzzle. After teaching economics at Columbia, he moved to Bloomington to take a job as a professor of finance at Indiana University. This was a time when lowly professors at midwestern schools were suddenly being offered entry into the world of high finance. Wall Street needed so-called quants who could understand sophisticated investment structures like derivatives. Pandit saw an opportunity. He started as an associate at Morgan Stanley in 1983, among the first Indians to be employed at the firm.

Almost immediately, his colleagues recognized his sharp mind. “Whenever we had a tough problem, whatever the complex structuring was, we’d send Vikram to do that job,” recalls Anson Beard, an advisory director at Morgan Stanley and a veteran of the company’s seventies vanguard.

Why he wasn't a natural-born leader.

“There were probably only five or six people who really understood the balance sheets and the trading positions,” says Barton Biggs, a former colleague at Morgan who now runs Traxis Partners. “And none of those people were members of the executive committee. Vikram did understand it and could explain it.”

He was consistently prescient on sophisticated trends in financial theory. “He was talking about fat-tailed risks fifteen years ago,” says a former colleague from Morgan, referring to the concept eventually popularized in Chris Anderson’s 2007 book, The Long Tail. Others described Pandit’s uncanny ability to “see around corners,” predicting, for instance, the rise of hedge funds in the late nineties.

Pandit may have been Morgan Stanley’s resident genius, but he was nobody’s idea of a natural-born leader. He lacked charisma, detested glad-handing, avoided confrontation, and generally struck people as awkward and uncomfortable. The guy who seemed to have everything he didn’t, Pandit couldn’t have helped but notice, was John Havens.

Born to wealth and married to an heiress of the Doubleday book-publishing fortune, Havens hunted birds, played golf, smoked cigars, and knew his way around private clubs and charity dinners. His unusual looks—he was hairless owing to the rare skin disease alopecia universalis—were offset by his flashy ties, suspenders, and meticulous tailoring, “a walking advertisement for a bespoke clothing store,” according to one of his former colleagues at Morgan. His status among the elite members of the firm, old-line executives like Anson Beard and Parker Gilbert, was high. He played the part to the hilt, carrying himself with a martial bearing and once standing on a desk in the trading floor and exulting: “I bleed Morgan Stanley blue!”

Havens and Pandit had an unlikely but natural affinity. As a sales trader in the equity division, Havens sold clients the complex securities Pandit crafted. When Pandit came up with a new investment instrument, Havens wasn’t afraid to say “this is a shitty product you’re coming up with,” says a mutual colleague of the men. “[Pandit] came to appreciate Havens’s abilities not only to sell things but to help with the creation of the product.”

But Havens wasn’t just a business partner; he was also a kind of social prosthetic for Pandit. In exchange, Havens found Pandit’s brainpower useful in attaining higher corporate ground. By the late nineties, they had risen through the ranks of the equity division. When Neal Garonzik, the head of equities, left in 1997, both were up for the job. “There are two kinds of generals,” says Beard. “Some generals who can fire up the troops and take any hill, and some generals who sit in a tent and figure out which hill. Vikram is a terrific strategist. John is a leader.” In this instance, the strategist won out. Pandit was named Garonzik’s replacement, and Havens became Pandit’s No. 2. “I know John was disappointed, but he never let it affect his relationship,” says a colleague of the two men. “In fact, it grew stronger.”

His closest friends describe Pandit as quietly backing into power, too meek to grab for it directly, never ambitious in the pejorative sense of the word. To them, Wall Street was a meritocracy and the best and brightest mind, however passive and un-Gekkolike, had simply risen to the top in an orderly and natural fashion. After all, for every hard-charging trader who broke phones and kicked in doors, you needed a Vikram Pandit who could hedge against overzealousness. “Many people wanted to see him get his chance in the sun,” says Paul Kimball, a former Morgan colleague.

But with his newfound power came critics and rivals who saw Pandit’s dry, quiet ways as hubris and political cunning rather than shyness and humility. When he became president of investment banking at Morgan Stanley in 2000, “that’s when he said, ‘I am a king,’ ” says a former Morgan executive who is critical of Pandit.

Pandit was exceedingly cautious in his leadership role, always looking for ways to make money with a minimum of risk. When hedge funds came along, his idea was not to invest directly but to sell brokerage services to them. He would often avoid acting on a problem until he felt he’d perceived every possible risk involved—and the delays would frustrate his subordinates (“analysis paralysis,” they called it). He rarely expressed strong opinions in meetings, instead chiming in with a single Socratic question. “A lot of people were a little afraid of him,” recounts one former colleague. “He was so smart, and they didn’t want to look dumb.”

While Pandit observed and listened, Havens would execute Pandit’s strategies while another close aide, an outgoing and socially connected marketing man named Don Callahan, would sound out underlings and keep tabs on political machinations. To critics, it seemed that Pandit was merely trying to avoid risk to his career. “His attitude was all about, ‘I am not going to do anything, decide anything, that’s going to get in the way of an upwardly mobile career trajectory,’ ” says one of his Morgan Stanley antagonists. But his critics couldn’t deny the power of his intellect, and his superiors were beguiled by it.

The subtle cultural bias he encountered at Morgan Stanley.

Pandit made gestures toward the trappings of Wall Street success, buying a house in Greenwich, Connecticut, next to former Lehman Brothers CEO Dick Fuld and sending his children, Maya and Rahul, to Trinity School on West 91st Street (Pandit eventually joined its board of trustees). In most ways, however, Pandit remained a cultural outsider: While he paid dues to the exclusive Country Club of Purchase, part of Morgan Stanley’s unofficial social agenda for managing directors, a friend says Pandit never actually saw the inside of the club. His parents lived with him for part of the year in his Manhattan apartment, and Pandit drove the extended family around in a minivan. A fellow executive who once saw him at a movie theater was shocked to see Pandit out of his usual C-suite suit and tie, wearing an oversize anorak, stonewashed jeans, and white sneakers. He looked like “a nerd in the computer faculty,” says the onlooker.

Pandit was of two worlds, and the subtle cultural bias at Morgan Stanley didn’t make it easy to fit in. His wife, Swati, was frequently invited to Morgan Stanley events in which wives were expected to appear, but she never did. “Nobody has seen her at one work function,” says a former colleague at Morgan Stanley. Her absence didn’t help with the perception among some at Morgan that Pandit had a bias against women. A female executive who once worked for Pandit says he was uncomfortable having women in anything other than supporting roles. In 1998, one of Pandit’s female underlings filed a legal complaint against Morgan Stanley that resulted in a $54 million sex-discrimination settlement.

Pandit also took heat over his alliance with an Indian equities trader named Guru Ramakrishnan. Pandit and Ramakrishnan had come from the same Brahmin caste in India and had both gone to Columbia before seeking their fortunes on Wall Street. But that’s where the similarities ended. Ramakrishnan was outwardly confident and even arrogant—he once bragged that an astrologer told him he was going to be the head of sales and trading at Lehman Brothers. Many at Morgan considered him unpleasant and prickly. When he lost money, he had a habit of insisting “why he was right and the market was wrong,” says a person who worked with him. Some suspect that Pandit abided Ramakrishnan because he was a useful henchman for the conflict-averse president. “When Vikram wanted to browbeat somebody, he didn’t want to do it himself. He’d send Guru to do it,” says another former Morgan Stanley executive. It also didn’t hurt that Ramakrishnan was worshipful of Pandit: He once cried when he thought he would be unable to fulfill an order Pandit gave him. “Guru was very well protected by Vikram,” says a former colleague. Non-Indians at the company privately referred to Pandit and Ramakrishnan, along with two other Indian executives, as the “Indian Mafia.”

In 2001, John Mack, Morgan Stanley’s charismatic CEO, was edged out by Phil Purcell, the Dean Witter CEO who had merged his company with Morgan. Pandit was not bothered by the change at the top. Former colleagues say he told a group of people that it wasn’t a big loss because Mack wasn’t that smart. (Pandit denies saying this.)

In principle, Pandit and Purcell were aligned on the crucial subject of how much risk to take—neither was entirely comfortable with excessive leverage. By contrast, Zoe Cruz, the president of the fixed-income division, felt the credit markets were ripe for bigger bets and more leverage—and she was bringing in more money than Pandit. Pandit and Cruz jousted for influence with the CEO.

Meanwhile, in 2005, eight veteran former Morgan Stanley executives, known as the Group of Eight, made a run at Purcell’s power, co-opting disgruntled senior executives—including Pandit’s No. 2, Havens—to plot against him. To recruit Pandit, the G8 dangled before him the CEO job at Morgan Stanley—if Purcell was driven out, Pandit would eventually take over. It was a risky move: There was no guarantee that the coup would work. But when Purcell asked Pandit for his loyalty, Pandit refused, betting his chips on Havens and the G8. “He does not like conflict and does everything to avoid it,” says a person involved in the Morgan Stanley battle. “But this was an irreconcilable conflict and he acceded to Havens as he almost always does.”

Given Pandit’s coy style, Purcell was shocked when he learned Pandit had turned against him. “I don’t understand. Vikram was my guy,” he told a friend. “I saved his job three times.” When he learned of the betrayal, Purcell promoted Cruz, ousting Havens and Pandit.

On his way out, Havens walked through the trading floor to standing ovations, but Pandit left the building alone, taking only his raincoat into a cold March drizzle. “It was the most upsetting thing that ever happened to him,” says a friend and former colleague. Morgan Stanley, says another, “was his soul, his identity—home.”

Pandit forms his own boutique hedge fund.The year that followed was difficult for Pandit. He was out of a job. And his mother, Shailaja, died of breast cancer, a blow that cracked his otherwise cool façade. He nearly broke down while telling a fellow executive the details, pausing to collect himself before he could speak again. In her memory, Pandit started the Maina Foundation for Raising Breast Cancer Awareness.

That same year, 2006, Pandit regrouped by forming a boutique hedge fund called Old Lane Partners with John Havens, Guru Ramakrishnan, and several other Morgan Stanley refugees. The name gave it the air of a Waspy clubhouse, but during a charity roast for Pandit in 2007, an Indian colleague joked that it should be called “Brown Brothers and Havens” because of all the Indians working there. Ramakrishnan, the only one with hedge-fund experience, was named CEO. He spearheaded $500 million in infrastructure projects in India.

Early on, Pandit and Havens went looking for investors and arrived at the door of Citigroup. Pandit had a friend in Robert Rubin, the company’s director. Rubin first saw Pandit at a private panel discussion in 1999 that was hosted by former SEC chairman Arthur Levitt. He was so impressed by Pandit’s intellect he asked to meet him. The two men struck many as kindred spirits. Like Pandit, Rubin favored intelligence over less quantifiable assets like charisma. In their views, such retail-business talents were secondary to cool analysis. “Vikram,” says Barton Biggs, “is an Indian version of Bob Rubin.”

Citi executives vetting Old Lane refused to stake client money on the investment, feeling Pandit’s team didn’t have enough experience. If they wanted Citi to invest, then Citi’s top executive, chairman and CEO Chuck Prince, would have to personally approve the deal. And Prince did: Citi invested $100 million in Old Lane.

Old Lane was performing poorly, earning only a net 3 percent return in 2007, worse than a money-market account. It was clear to everyone who knew him that Pandit was unhappy managing a hedge fund. He was restless and dissatisfied. “He wanted his shot at running something really big,” says Biggs.

Rubin and Citigroup were eyeing Old Lane as an acquisition—not for high-yield returns, but for Pandit, a potential candidate to one day run Citi. In April 2007, Pandit sold Old Lane to Citi for $800 million, a price tag that boggled the minds of Wall Street observers. Pandit personally reaped a huge bounty, what amounted to $165 million in cash. With his windfall, he bought a ten-room, $17.9 million co-op apartment on Central Park West, the former home of the late actor Tony Randall. Rubin made little pretense about why Citi had spent so much money: He publicly called Pandit “a genius.”

Pandit was made chief executive of Citi Alternative Investments (CAI), the hedge-fund arm of the company under which Old Lane now resided. At a company town-hall meeting, Rubin stood by him beaming, as Pandit announced that he would double the company’s hedge-fund business over the next few years. Havens, Pandit’s de facto No. 2, explained to their new underlings at CAI that “we need good DNA in here”—which meant, says one former Citi staffer, purging their colleagues and bringing in “a bunch of rejected Morgan Stanley guys.” Citi executives bristled at what they considered Havens’s swaggering leadership style. “He made it very clear he thought they were all morons,” says the former Citi executive. Pandit rarely showed up at CAI, instead spending time in Citi’s corporate suite near the top brass on Park Avenue. The hedge-fund wing was just a place to park until the real opportunity presented itself.

Six months later, Pandit was asked to investigate the bank’s books and discovered what would turn out to be billions in subprime losses—leading Chuck Prince to step down as CEO. Rubin immediately lobbied to have Pandit replace him, but there was unexpected resistance from a number of board members, including Alain Belda, chairman of Alcoa, and C. Michael Armstrong, the former AT&T CEO, who did not believe Pandit was ready to lead and thought Citi had overpaid to get him in the first place. Meanwhile, Citigroup founder Sandy Weill was advocating for Tim Geithner, a former protégé of Rubin’s then working for the New York Federal Reserve (and now, of course, Treasury secretary). Rubin began telling board members that Pandit might leave if they didn’t give it to him, making a mockery of the $800 million they’d paid for his hedge fund—a claim that detractors took as explicit arm-bending.

Rubin sold Pandit as the consummate problem-solver and a man who could see around corners—the sorts of descriptors that were often applied to him. Pandit’s pedantic style and reputation for risk-aversion dovetailed with the going mood, a balm for the go-go era of high risk that was battering the investment banks. After all, hadn’t Pandit resisted the leveraged risk favored by Mack and Cruz at Morgan Stanley? He becomes Citi's leader.

Rubin ultimately prevailed, and the board of directors at Citi agreed to make Pandit CEO in December 2007. A confidant warned Pandit that he should think twice about taking the job. Citigroup was an unwieldy monster: A so-called financial supermarket built by Sandy Weill out of the merger of Travelers Group and Citicorp in 1998, Citi had a global reach that, in theory, was supposed to give it extraordinary leverage. But with the credit markets collapsing, the bad parts could start bringing the good parts down with them. The conversation over whether the business model was still relevant was reaching a fever pitch.

“Vikram, this is impossible,” the confidant said. Pandit replied, “No, this is a terrific opportunity.”

Pandit would be the leader of the biggest bank in the world, what amounted to a small country, population 350,000, and he would have at his disposal four airplanes, a helicopter, cars and drivers, chefs, dozens of aides, and the ear of the White House. Better still, running Citi would be his chance for redemption after missing his shot at Morgan Stanley. Once the deal was done, Rubin personally went from division to division praising Pandit to staffers.

Pandit laid out an ambitious three-year plan for Citigroup’s future: centralizing management, restructuring, selling billions in assets, and raising capital as a buffer against further credit collapse. (Rubin personally cruised a golf course with Prince Alwaleed bin Talal in Abu Dhabi to procure a $7.5 billion investment.) Pandit studiously read books on Citibank history, hoping to divine a common thread running from the company’s roots as City Bank of New York in 1812 to its present incarnation and perhaps gain an inkling of the pride he’d felt for Morgan Stanley. He brought in long-retired Citi executives to talk about the old days and reanimated the company’s seventies ad campaign, Citi Never Sleeps, to try to recapture its past glory.

“The funniest blog was e-mailed to me by a friend,” jokes the Citi CEO. “ ‘Pandit Gets to Keep His Crappy Job.’ ”

The main issue on the table was whether the “supermarket” model could be maintained. One trusted associate advised Pandit that he had to break up the company to make it work. Consultants from McKinsey & Co. offered the same suggestion in a report. Pandit rebuffed those suggestions. Some say that breaking up Citigroup was never truly an option. A senior executive at the company suggests Pandit had an implicit directive from the board of directors, especially Rubin, to keep Citigroup together, thereby preserving the legacies of founder Sandy Weill and Rubin himself. Rubin and Weill had been friends since the late nineties, when Rubin served in the Clinton administration. It was Rubin who helped push through the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act that effectively allowed the merger of Travelers and Citicorp. A year later, Weill made Rubin a board member at the company he helped create, paying him a salary of $17 million a year.

Pandit chose to embrace the challenge of Citi in the only way he knew how: He elevated his Old Lane team to positions of power, bringing in Don Callahan, who had been working in marketing at Credit Suisse, to be his chief administrative officer and promoting Havens to head of investment banking. (Ramakrishnan opted to remain in the offices of Old Lane.) Perhaps the most powerful member of Pandit’s circle of lieutenants—which became known as the “Gang of Five”—however, wasn’t a Morgan Stanley alum but Lewis Kaden, a loyal Rubin associate. Kaden, a lawyer who’d worked for the powerful DC firm Davis Polk & Wardwell, had been friends with Rubin since the eighties, when Rubin was head of Goldman Sachs. Now he was involved in everything from the $400 million Citi Field naming project to negotiating with government officials, in addition to penning Rubin’s correspondence. A common internal joke at Citi was, “If Bob Rubin turns a corner too fast, Kaden breaks his nose.”

Pandit often stayed in his corner office on Park Avenue for hours, Kaden and Callahan serving as his links to the outside world. When one senior executive finally met with Pandit, both Kaden and Callahan afterward gave opposing takes on what Pandit had meant. At a time of duress, Pandit appeared disconnected from his staff. On Pandit’s trip to Baltimore last year with the head of Citi’s investor relations, there was a third passenger onboard the company helicopter to whom Pandit didn’t say a word. When the investor-relations man finally asked which division of Citi he worked in, they learned that he was a stranger who had accidentally boarded the wrong helicopter.

To Pandit’s mind, traditional morale-building leadership had always been an ephemeral concern. He knew he was no inspirational leader, instead seeing his mission as keeping the troops at bay while he spent his time making sense of what was happening to the banking industry. Messy human affairs were best outsourced to his trusted soldiers. But the perception that Pandit was hunkering down with select lieutenants gave way to accusations of cronyism by people who felt he was not taking advice from longtime Citi executives, including Michael Klein, Citi’s vice-chairman, and Sallie Krawcheck, the head of wealth management.

Citigroup's foundation begins to crumble.

Pandit’s problems with Krawcheck—onetime CEO candidate and, incidentally, the top female executive at Citigroup—came to a head over how to handle Smith Barney, the brokerage arm of the company. There was a major fire to put out. Clients were suffering extraordinary losses on Citi’s alternative investments and so-called auction-rate securities, causing brokers to exit Citi in big numbers. E-mails from Smith Barney staffers poured in expressing dismay that Pandit wouldn’t reimburse clients who had lost money under Citi’s management. By this time, Krawcheck was already considered a thorn in Pandit’s side for continually arguing that the risk to clients had been higher than advertised and giving back a portion of the proceeds would protect the franchise. She was met with resistance from Pandit’s team: Havens was against reimbursing and yelled about it in a telephone conference. But the board sided with Krawcheck, asking that Citi take action with clients.

By September, Havens told Krawcheck that two major components of her division, research and the private bank, would now be under Havens’s management in the banking division, ostensibly part of overall restructuring. Krawcheck felt they were stripping her of power and essentially forcing her out. She announced her departure in September, leaving the company without an exit package.

During all this, Sandy Weill, who had originally hired Krawcheck, was breathing down Pandit’s neck. Concerned about the company’s stock price, Weill personally asked Pandit to buy back shares along with him, in a show of public confidence. Pandit agreed, according to a person close to Weill. But when Weill started buying back stock and Pandit didn’t do it right away, Weill complained loudly to friends. Pandit stopped returning Weill’s calls altogether, referring him to Callahan. (According to two people close to the situation, Pandit and Weill have spoken exactly twice since Pandit took over Citigroup; Pandit has since bought $8.4 million in Citi shares, although at a lower price than Weill did.)

Even within the ranks of his own lieutenants, there was infighting. Old Lane Partners was on the skids, and Ramakrishnan rushed to Pandit to secure a large capital infusion to keep it from going under. Pandit promised him $2 billion. When Havens found out about Pandit’s promise, he was furious, demanding to know how Pandit could have done such a thing without consulting him. Caught between two old friends, Pandit listened to Havens, as he usually did in the end. The Wall Street Journal published a story about the end of Old Lane, featuring Pandit’s stippled headshot and calling the event a “blow to CEO.” Feeling betrayed, Ramakrishnan threatened to sue Pandit for a better exit deal. The men reportedly no longer speak. “I think Vikram is more upset about it than Guru,” says a mutual acquaintance. “He’s disappointed in Guru.”

In September, the markets plunged along with the collapsing credit markets, and the foundation of Citigroup began to crumble. While Pandit had managed to accrue $60 billion in capital to shore up finances, it wasn’t near enough. Pandit was smart enough to know what needed to be done: He had to secure more access to cash, lots of it. As banks began to fail, he bid $1 a share for the commercial bank Wachovia, which the government was hoping to quickly marry off and save from dissolution. It was a cheap way to get access to cash deposits that could shore up Citi’s credit problems. As a deal drew near a close, Pandit appeared confident that he had achieved a much-needed victory.

Perhaps a little too confident. Pandit and Citi had relied on what amounted to the legal version of a handshake to secure the deal with Wachovia. And they dragged out the process while trying to separate Wachovia’s wealth-management division from the rest of the company, feeling it had too much overlap with Smith Barney. (Lew Kaden told a private group, “We’ve got 15,000 complainers, we don’t need 15,000 more.”) Pandit left just enough room for Wells Fargo to swoop in with a bid for $7 a share and snatch the bank out from under Citi.

Pandit was beyond infuriated. After learning of the coup during a middle-of-the night phone call, he angrily demanded to senior executives at Citi that they pull Wells Fargo’s credit lines. “Pull their fucking lines!” he screamed. “Pull their fucking lines!” A senior executive in the room calmly explained that Citigroup had no business with Wells Fargo. There was nothing they could do. Ultimately, Citi filed a lawsuit against Wells Fargo for breaching what Citi considered an exclusive deal.

What no one had realized at the time was that this was effectively Pandit’s last stand before the markets would lay all previously made plans to waste. The failed bid for Wachovia was a major blow to investor confidence, and Citi’s stock tumbled as the markets buckled and Lehman Brothers folded. Within a week, Pandit was lined up with the other banking CEOs to meet with then–Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson. With the government fearing massive bank failures and a wider financial meltdown, Citi accepted $25 billion in federal bailout money in exchange for issues of preferred Citi stock.

How had Citigroup come to this?

Increasingly, Pandit was acting out of character, barking profanities in the hallways. One former Citi executive says that the head of human resources expressed concern about Pandit’s expletive-laced outbursts he’d had in the C-suite. (Pandit denies any such outbursts.) The Wachovia incident, says one longtime friend, “was the first time I have ever seen him go nuts.”

Citi’s stock declined week after week. During a town-hall webcast meant to quell concern on November 17, Pandit forecast massive layoffs and felt the need to explain in his usual academic fashion what exactly a bank did (“A bank takes deposits and puts them to work”), which baffled the closed-circuit audience of veteran bankers. As Pandit flailed, the stock declined nearly 50 percent in four days, dipping below $5 a share, the trigger price at which pension funds would sell en masse and the bank would collapse completely. When Pandit took over, the stock had been at $52.

That Friday, November 21, reports surfaced that Pandit’s job was in the balance. According to a person familiar with the discussions, the name of former Time Warner chief Dick Parsons, a Citi board member and onetime head of Dime Savings Bank, was floated as a possible replacement. News of Pandit’s possible ouster furthered the stock’s fall. A team of Citi executives led by Ned Kelly, a seasoned negotiator who had been friends with Havens for many years, began talks with then–New York Federal Reserve chairman Tim Geithner’s team to ask for more money. Kelly’s first question to Geithner’s people was whether they wanted Pandit out. Federal officials reportedly concluded that the number of candidates willing and able to replace him was now next to zero.

Instead, federal officials encouraged Citi to start off-loading more properties and consider breaking up the company—even as the separate pieces were clearly worth less than they had been a year ago. The following Monday, Citi announced that it was receiving another bailout, this time $20 billion. (A month and a half later, Citi would merge Smith Barney with Morgan Stanley, giving Morgan a majority stake.)

Meanwhile, colleagues told Pandit he had a problem with morale at Citi, but he insisted his problems were bigger than that. “Pandit said, ‘I can give all the internal motivational speeches to the troops; it won’t matter if I don’t deliver,’ ” recounts the friend. “Rightly or wrongly, he was very dismissive of his traditional leader role, the ‘Hey, you’re a statesman’ role. The problem is much more serious, and fixing the problem will change everybody’s mind both inside and outside.”

How had Citigroup come to this? Blame began to circulate, with Rubin targeted as the alleged architect of the company’s high-risk investments. Before the spotlight could find him, Pandit, under pressure to defend Citigroup and give investors confidence that he was running the company, finally agreed to come out of hiding and appear on Charlie Rose. The performance was a slightly uncomfortable tap dance. The message: No one could have predicted this, no one is to blame, and there would be no further need for government bailouts. “We moved really fast,” Pandit told Rose. “What this market tells you is one should have moved even faster. And I keep thinking about it, is there something else I could have done sooner than what I did … But the most important thing, Charlie, is that it’s very, very important to look forward from where we are … We need to do a lot of hard work to figure out how to get from here to there.”

“And you are confident that we can get there?” asked Rose.

Pandit tried on his best inspirational-leader voice: “We, as a country, have no choice. We, at Citi, will get there.”

Last week, Citi was back before the government with its hat in its hands. After $45 billion in federal aid, the company was desperate for more. The negotiations went on for over a week—although the word negotiation might be overstating it. “You don’t negotiate with the government,” says a Citi executive involved in the talks. “It’s not like there’s a give and take.”

In the end, the Treasury Department agreed to convert up to $25 billion in preferred shares to common stock, shoring up Citi’s capital base. The deal is expected to give the government up to a 40 percent stake in the company—and influence within the board of directors. Pandit’s position, according to an internal memo to Citi staffers, is that this is “not a nationalization by any definition.” But while the Citi deal may not be nationalization in the strictest sense, it is a stunning turn of events for the U.S. government to own nearly half of one of the world’s largest banks. What that means in terms of the operations of Citi is anyone’s guess at this point. Federal officials seem reluctant to issue directives to Pandit, hoping to avoid the appearance of a true government takeover of the company. On the other hand, the consensus among Citi’s newest shareholders is that the “supermarket” model is untenable and the company needs to be broken up into smaller, more manageable entities. It’s a move Pandit has resisted from the beginning.

Does he have time to turn things around?

But Pandit isn’t calling the shots anymore. The Wall Street Journal, which has been particularly harsh in its depiction of the CEO, had him literally begging the government for his job last week: “Don’t give up on us,” he reportedly pleaded. “Give us a chance to execute.”

“He’s playing defense all the time,” says a longtime friend from his Morgan Stanley days. “This is just grinding these people down to nothing.” Another friend calls him “tragic,” a government “charity case.” Says another, “Would I have advised him to take the job? Yeah. Would I feel bad in retrospect? Yeah.”

Pandit has very little time to use whatever power he has left to try to turn things around at Citi—news of the Treasury deal sent the stock plunging to a historic low. A friend jokes that the CEO is the “MacGyver of the private sector banking system,” out to “save Citi before the timing device runs to zero.” But Pandit has never seen himself as the hero type. He looks at the problem with the eyes of an engineer: “My job is to figure out which pipes go where and which pipes have to be cut off, which pipes have to be unclogged,” he told a close associate. “It’s going to take me a year and a half to two years and then the water will flow, and when the water will flow, the stock price goes up. The stock price goes up, everybody will come around.”

The night before the government deal is sealed, Pandit finally comes to the phone, after weeks of resisting an interview, to put rumors of his demise to rest. He seems amused, slightly giddy. He has survived, for now.

He brushes off Journal reports that depicted him as powerless, running Citi under the heel of his “federal masters.” “We all have a master,” he says. “It’s not about that … It’s a tough time. There is adversity out there. If I don’t step up and do what I’m doing, take what is thrown at me and get this company going, I would have been the wrong choice of CEO.”

In conversation, he comes across as assertive, even a little cocky—bold in a way his critics don’t believe he can be. “I have complete confidence in my plan,” he says. “That’s what gets me here every morning.” Then again, what choice does he have?

hmm...挺有意思的一天.
窗外雨后的夕阳, 让我又走神了.




昨天是彩虹日, 从Office望出去, 仔细看有两道彩虹. 请忽略那脏兮兮的玻璃...
 

降了一场暴雨
湿漉漉地完成了徒步
雨过天晴后的空气和景色 没让白淋了一场雨
感谢伙伴们
 

动荡的08本命年 游荡了很多地方 世界之精彩 用镜头感叹
09年经济放缓 旅行的脚步也放慢下来 取消了柬埔寨之行 假期安排完全放空

去年年末的北海道+东京的日本之行 疲惫多过激情
总是怀念飘雪的季节 真正来到了北海道 包裹在一片白色的雪颜中 又开始怀念夏日的暖阳...
撇开我那份郁闷的思乡情不谈 圣诞日里的北海道还是到处充满浓郁的生活气息的
雪景 温泉 海鲜美食 天寒地冻下温馨无比
刺激的夜间雪道 300大刀的螃蟹 浪漫的童话般精致的小樽小镇 冻死人的冰雪世界

来看一下300刀的螃蟹的腿




白色的世界






洞爷湖边景








清晨的洞爷湖景






骑着摩托上山看雪


我撞雪堆里了


眼迷离...


看这雪下的...


唯一一张滑雪留影 (出自iPhone). 在我武装不足快被冻僵的时候, 我的450D在暖气房里睡觉呢


小樽运河边




飘雪的小镇 音乐处处回绕


音乐房子


一览无遗


札幌的大通公园上灯

圣诞夜的北海道没有雪，于是我们深更半夜走去地狱谷祈雪，果然昨夜冷空气从日本海吹来，清早起来就是白茫茫的一片了。去昭和新山的一路上，感叹不已北海道的冬景果然没有令人失望！温泉酒店的房间临洞爷湖，据说是北海道唯二之一天寒地冻下不会结冰的湖泊，湖面广阔，大雪之下雾气迷蒙，湖中群岛若隐若现。
现在窗外鹅毛大雪铺天盖地，捧上一杯热牛奶，寒冬里取暖。iPhone写博也很方便...有些不知好歹，竟然想家想工作了...

虽然不是经常见面
在这孤单的小岛上有这样一群女孩子 七年的友谊 很温馨 很感动
我们就这样每年聚上两次 毕业了 工作了 恋爱了 结婚了...
八卦着每个小甜蜜 祝福着每段幸福

Love u girls~~
qiqi, 小孩, xinxin, cuicui, 雅星, 红红, lvxin, lina

Merry X'mas & Happy New Year!

跑上高原, 享受了十足的农田生活.

这次的出游度假性质多过旅游.
两天懒散悠哉的"弯弯"生活, 吃/喝/厕/走/睡, 外加咔嚓咔嚓.

爱死了我的新宝贝, 阴天下光线不够可是成色还是很饱满.



卷毛红, 哈哈~~


红透了的晶


大眼春春


臭美


某茶园


某某花


某猪手


音符般线条的植物


某植物特写


落英缤纷的后花园


Mossy Forest...这里有"猴子"出没


注意看, 这是魔术! Mossy变露水~

我爱草莓~


红毛, "久时候"和大眼春


啊, 美丽的茶园


金毛狮王登顶! 超级喜欢这张的颜色.


铁杆驴友在山顶哆嗦着...真得很冷, 可怜穿了全是洞的毛毛衣的"久时候"啊...


香浓的草莓奶茶, 泛着草莓色


"久时候"跷跷板


超酷广告片


最后亮相我的宝贝

自从换了Macbook用了Firefox之后一直琢磨着怎么在斯贝思上加音乐
之前的POWERTOY好像都不好使了 只能感叹苹果和微软的东西实在没有兼容可言
于是讨巧地嵌了一段YOUTUBE的音乐作为BLOG ENTRY (就是之前一登博客就自动播放的Auld Lang Syne)
现在那段ENTRY被挤下主页 音乐也没了
GOOGLE了半天也没个头绪 只得深更半夜把晶拖起来请教如何加音乐
终于加上了这只超级无敌可爱还会摇头晃脑的音乐小熊 给她改头换面的换上了粉装 - 音乐小粉熊!
太可爱了 而且可以随意加PLAYLIST 也没有兼容问题 (因为是FLASH嵌入)!!!

孟买的清扫终于结束了 整整三天 DEATH TOLL上到195人
昨晚去看了BODY OF LIES - 一部反恐片 - 在恐怖活动进行中的时候去看...
持续地跟踪印度时报的及时报道 文字和画面都让我有些恐惧后遗症...
最可笑的一段报道是:
According to a Mumbai crime branch official, the ten terrorists had not come to Mumbai before this to conduct any 'recce' and they had learnt about the locations with the help of Google Earth...
鬼知道Taj Hotel一千多房间的复杂地形 连后来进行逐间清扫的Commando们都摸不清头脑...除非Google Earth有透视功能...

好啦 加了首What a wonderful world
I think to myself....oh what a wonderful world

昨天还在关注泰国局势会不会再次发生政变,
今天孟买的恐怖事件完全盖过了泰国那里力量党民盟的窝里斗...
从小打小闹的放置炸弹  到现在公然封锁高级酒店以AK-47火力和警方正面交火 更是有计划地设局把曾经屡立战功的反恐特种兵司令KNOCK DOWN... 新闻看得我毛骨悚然...
复杂的民族宗教问题 要用如此血淋淋的方式公然叫嚣...
DIWALI刚过一个月 可怜已经放缓的印度经济和卢比雪上加霜...

我们不过感恩节 火鸡也不好吃 今年收成也不好
希望世界和平

从上周三开始心脏就没有平稳跳动过
先是股价, 接着整个周末盘算着我的PLAN B, 边寄希望于奇迹出现, 边小算盘打着我那点小银子够打包游荡到哪里混多久...
好吧, 奇迹果然出现...这是题外话, 研究一下FDIC/FED/TREASURY做的那些DEAL, 从FANNIE/FREDDIE到AIG到WAMU到半路夭折的WACHOVIA, 这个DEAL真得是WELL DESIGN的, 政府BAILOUT, LOSS SHARING, SHAREHOLDER也没有被WIPED OUT...在WHITE DOMINATED的华尔街, 能跟政府谈下这样的DEAL, 潘伟迪还是有能耐的...细节不谈, 回到正题...
这边局势稳定了, 老板下令明天打包去曼谷出差, 好吧...可是最近好像又是泰国的PAD发动反政府抗议示威...回家仔细查查新闻, 这下好了, 26日晚的飞机, CNN报26日0时22分由于大规模示威活动泰国关闭曼谷国际机场 (应该是Somchai在26日从秘鲁APEC返泰), 最近曼谷还断断续续发生街头榴弹爆炸流血事件... @#$@#$%@$$ ... 这种局面可是事关小命一条的大事... 看明早起来局势如何再做计划.
都是什么事儿哪~~现在深刻体会和谐社会多么重要

今晚是老丁的寿宴, 大早妈妈来短信说我订的花送上了门, 老爸亲自接收的, 感动得热泪盈眶. 我在被窝里收的短信, 鼻子一酸竟然不知道该回什么, 在老爸花甲之年的生日, 能送上的只能是简单的花束和想了许久的祝福卡片...父爱如山, 老丁生日快乐, 健康长寿! (插上六根蜡烛, 虽然长短不一, 给老丁)


昨天收到最晚的礼物, 在距离生日的第21天, 梦寐以求的第一部单反. 这下全齐了, 一架相机, 一本时光机, 一簿相册, 环游世界去.
做个乐观有追求的人, 希望tough time赶快过去.

拜一回来的. 这周忙得不行. 等下下还要去公司. 银行业的人士都知道现在是什么日景, 天知道为什么我还是那么忙碌. 从入行半年后Subprime展露头角到现在, 目睹经历了整个crisis, 何时是最糟, 现在还是未知. 那天跟老爸老妈MSN, 从来不过问我工作问题的老妈竟然担心地试探询问工作还好吧 - 权因她老人家好友在华尔街工作的儿子失业了, 于是乎从来不愁女儿学业工作不关心国际金融业的她开始每天紧盯金融板块动荡, 可见这次金融海啸来得何等猛烈了...

等下, 走题了... 本博是想记录下这次的澳洲行, 真的有很多新鲜有趣的经历,  my best trip ever =)

第一次完全的free & easy地驾车读着地图游转, 走走停停, 时间完全是自己的. 路痴的我终于学会了读地图 (惭愧...算来04'拿到驾照到现在, 总共没开过几十公里, 地图也没怎么读过). 澳洲的确是个美丽的地方, 诺大的国土, 就两三千万的人口, 大多数还集中在悉尼墨尔本, 西部就是个人口稀疏自然风景独特的地方. 沙滩, 沙漠, 酒庄, 葡萄园, 还有原住民传承下来的土著风情ABORIGINAL...生日那天许愿在南半球最长的海上JETTY上, Cape Naturaliste的灯塔当做生日蜡烛, 又一年快乐平安地度过...

留着这篇贴, 慢慢填补上点滴细节.

Day 1: Perth/Fremantle

五个多小时的飞行由于过于兴奋一分钟也不能入睡, 昨晚十点多到了酒店后就睡死过去.
大早醒来, 窗外天气大好, 天蓝得让人精神抖擞. 酒店在CBD的中心, 由于是周日, 街道上空荡荡行人无几.
租的车要等到12点才能拿, 于是剩下来有两个小时的时间可以四处逛. 决定走去bell tower, 可以沿着swan river晒晒太阳, 顺便解决早餐.
 
市区的街道, 天蓝蓝

途经一不知名小公园, 看见澳洲之行的第一只袋鼠 (雕塑)

这就是Perth最著名的钟楼, 侧看像天鹅, 座落于美丽的天鹅河畔

悠闲地在天鹅河畔解决了早餐, 凉风习习, 还有不停飞过的海鸟作伴, 狼吞虎咽的扒完丰盛的食物, 美好的假期阿

继续沿着天鹅河畔行走, 大片绿草地, 无数的海鸥, 稀疏有些人躺着晒太阳

不经意地转进一条步行街, 终于看见了人群, 惊奇的是狭窄的步行街内一派欧式风情.
听说Fremantle market只有拜五到拜日开, 立马开车上路奔向Fremantle. 从地图上看Perth有很长的海岸线, 出名的海滩更是数不胜数, 从Perth到Fremantle的路上就可以stop by. Fremantle是历史名镇, 也是Perth的重要港口. 寻找集市的路上, 真正领略了小镇风情. 高雅的殖民建筑, 古色古香的小巷, 无数的露天咖啡座和街头艺人的表演. 美丽的Round House可以眺望印度洋, 就是那条细细的铁轨出片的色调都是那么迷人.
回Perth一路上沿着海岸线寻找美丽的海滩, 却发现几乎每一处都是风景如画.
D1结束.

[UPDATED ON NOV-10-08 10:50PM]原打算每周过来更新一些, 算下来发现实在等不到那么久, 十二月初promise了姐妹们的short trip, 十二月底是圣诞新年的日本行...好不容易下定决心贴上游记, 不想让这贴又没头没尾地沉了. 所以...继续努力.

Day 2: Rottnest Island / King's Park

前面说了这次的旅行基本上毫无Plan, 纯粹想到哪里走到哪里看到哪里...昨晚睡前翻着拿来的DAY TOUR BROCHURE, 盯上了Rottnest Island, 也就定了第二天的目的地... 睡了个小懒觉来到Perth的港口准备搭乘渡轮去小岛, 那是已经十点了, 发现直搭的只有一班八点半渡轮, 我们明显错过了, 接下来从Perth启航的都要起绕八拐地颠上近两个小时, 于是决定驾车飞奔Fremantle去赶十一点的直达班. 暗喜时间掐得刚刚好, 还可以在海滨渡口吃上早餐. 船程大约半个钟头, 比想象中的要颠簸许多. 刚下船, 就被眼前清澈的海水震撼了. 小岛实在不小, 决定踏单车游逛, 不会错过一路的风景. 风挺大, 阳光也很猛烈, 可是我实在兴致很高.
去租单车的路上还碰上了孔雀, 一点都不怕人. 顺着地图找到pinky beach, 一片很美的沙滩, 和白色的顶塔. 顶塔总给人浪漫的感觉, 特别是白色, 衬着那片蓝天碧海, 有些想像中希腊爱情海的感觉...应该穿上一袭白裙, 留下那种感觉.

海水清澈见底, 很想扎进去, 可是风大水凉, 不过光看也够惬意的了.

回酒店的路上经过Swan River, 想找地方停车去河边坐坐看日落, 没想竟然撞进了著名的King's Park, 这里据说有全程最美的View. 于是就顺着一条长长的山路爬上了Brigade Hill一览夕阳下的Perth全景. D2结束. 对D3还是没有计划...
 
Day 3: Swan Valley / Caversham / Gidgegannup

阴天. 原计划驾车去玛格丽特河, 可是起晚了, 发现车程太远, 约定选个近些的地方-天鹅谷. 天鹅谷位于Perth北郊, 应该是西澳最早的葡萄酒产区, 遍布酒庄和葡萄园, 可以随意参观试酒用餐. 选择去拜访Sandalford酒庄, 是这一带和Houghton齐名的历史最悠久的酒庄. 置身于一望无际的葡萄园中, 品尝着03年的Sandalford Margaret River Shiraz, such as life...漫步于广阔的葡萄园中, 天很阴沉, 远望有种朦胧的感觉, 有些梦幻, 让人不禁联想到'云中漫步'的片段.

来到澳洲, 怎能错过和这里的野生动物的亲密接触呢, 特别是我最爱的考拉-我叫它树懒 (姑且算它们是一类). 决定去Caversham Wildlife Park走一遭.
 
我最爱的考拉(们). 睡姿极其优美. 这些家伙们每天要睡足20个钟头, 难得见到醒着的. 我小心地摸了摸树懒的pp.
当然澳洲最多的还是袋鼠. 据说澳洲开车真得要小心撞上袋鼠 (虽然我还没碰上), 估计鼠口比这里的人口要多. 见到了白袋鼠, 可爱~~

这只和我亲密接触的小家伙真的是袋鼠, 不是羊!



接下来的去处是整个西澳行的亮点-GIDGEGANNUP...某人说我们花了更多的时间学会怎样pronounce这个拗口的地名, 多过我们在那里逗留的时间. 这是天鹅谷继续北上的一个不知名的小镇, 选择这里的原因实在是因为剩下的小半天没得打发, 在Tourism center的一本旧画册里看到一幅小瀑布图-F R Berry Reserve...莫名地决定去那里, 说不上到底是被图片打动了还是被这个奇怪的地名吸引了... 花了老半天问清除了路线, 一路上无数此地怀疑迷路了, 的确是个偏僻的小镇, 路标少, 路边的店家少, 前后能见度内的车辆几乎为0.  ps: 就算我后来Google这个小镇得到的信息最多也只是某著名澳洲赛车手由于撞上小镇路边的树干而酿成致命意外...>.<
说到路, 进入小镇的路真是美透了. 高低起伏的爬山路, 绿树成荫, 四野广阔, 一片静谧. 即使不是个天高云淡的天气, 还是能够一眼望去路边的农庄和牛羊群.


一番周折找到了传说中的RESERVE, 真的是个荒无人烟的'仙境'...探险似的顺个门边剥落的地图上标的指示去找画册中的瀑布, 一路野花遍地, 石头小路还有野生树木, 是不是有些见不着的动物的叫声...



没有最美的风景能让我停留, 因为最美的风景永远在路上.

D3结束.


Day 4: Whaling Tour/McCallum Park/Lilac Hill Park
九月到十二月是西澳赏鲸的季节, 正逢鲸鱼从印度洋温暖水域迁徙到南方较冷的海域中,在平静的印度洋海面上等候迁徙中路过的鲸鱼们, 捕捉它们喷水嬉戏, 听上去是件多么诱人的事情... 加之在巴厘岛有过难忘的海豚之旅, 永远难忘在日出之时乘着蚊子船追随着海豚群, 当一群群野生海豚在触手可及的海面上在眼前自由跳跃时, 无法不为大自然的生动真实而感动. 带着这番憧憬, 我们定了从Fremantle出发的两个小时的赏鲸游.
这次的追鲸之旅又是别一番体验. 海面出奇的不平静, 游船颠簸得让胃实在吃不消 (幸运是我们由于起晚没时间吃早餐带着空荡荡的胃上了船才幸免没有浪费粮食...). 鲸鱼很少成群出现, 加之海面太过广阔, 忍着波动的胃吹着海风等待着鲸鱼们崭露头角实在是一种煎熬...就是那一刹那的出现也是以秒来计算的, 而且蓝鲸最多只是羞涩的露出背鳍, 留下更多的只是从BLOW HOLE喷出的水柱. 清楚地闪到了两只家伙跃身的瞬间 (可上去极似海豚, 应该是虎鲸).

 
两个小时的Whaling Tour很伤元气...回到酒店休整了之后, 决定出门找个公园晒晒太阳.
顺着地图来到了Victoria Park, 此处不是公园, 而是位于Perth东南部的一个小镇, 顺着Albany大道行驶, 发现了位于天鹅河岸边的一个绿意盎然的公园-McCallum.
这个名不经传的公园比想象中要美的多.




接下来的一站估计是D4最唯美的ENDING-Lilac Hill Park...前一天去天鹅谷的路上有经过一处美丽的庄园, 由于赶路所以没停留. 现在离天黑还有两个小时, 决定去哪里弥补一下错过的美景. 可是一路驾到天鹅谷始终没能找到那个庄园, 有些遗憾, 于是我随口说下面的车程中看到第一个PARK的标示就作为今天游程的终点. 现在想来, 旅行的路上就是如此, 错过的风景可能永远也找不回来, 可是下一站可能是柳暗花明又一村 --- Lilac Hill Park就是那一村.
就在刚刚过了穿越Guildford town的白木桥时, 我看见了Lilac Hill Park. 后来回来GOOGLE也没找到什么重要的相关信息, 看来真是一个小镇的一个好普通的公园. 踏出车门, 当夕阳下的这番景色映入眼前, 我彻底迷惑了, 像进入了fairy-tale的世界.


 
整座公园空旷静谧, 耳边是风吹树动的声音, 野鸭嬉戏的声音, 偶尔飞机划过的声音. 顺着河边, 踩着松软的草坪, 欣赏着夕阳照耀下的美景, 无论任何一个角度进入眼帘的都似一幅生动的园野图.




这片绿地在这一刻是属于我的, 这片温暖的色调也深深地印入我的脑中...




再次感叹旅行的惊喜, D4结束.


Day 5: Lancelin / The Pinnacles
你能想象视野之内一边是海洋另一边是沙漠的景象吗? 这一片世外桃源就在Perth北上的小镇Lancelin.

第五天的目的地是著名的尖峰石镇, 距离珀斯近三百公里. 亏得酒店一位好心的香港店员Mr Lee指路, 让我们经Lancelin去, 从高速路回, 这样来回六个多小时的车程不会太疲倦, 更不会错过美丽的Lancelin.
珀斯去兰斯林的路是宁静而美丽的.

兰斯林海滩长而白，海水清而蓝, 绝对是移民的好选择。

从这里到内陆有绵延不绝的沙丘, 很多人来这里的沙丘体验四驱车滑沙的刺激, 可惜我们的车不是4WD, 而且当天开进小镇天气刚刚转晴, 沙还不够干, 所以错过了滑沙. 可是单单远眺一望无际的金色沙漠, 头顶片片飘过的乌云飞奔在沙漠上, 还是兴奋而刺激的.
 

在兰斯林海边的小饭馆饱食了午餐后继续上路前往Pinnacles.
金色的尖峰石阵是沙漠上形状各异的奇石构成, 堪称西澳奇观.
尖峰石阵原为软石灰石构成, 被海贝沙丘所覆盖, 在数千年的形成过程中, 石灰石虽被雨水硬化, 但认为沙砾覆盖. 在其后的岁月中, 海风吹去覆盖的沙砾使得尖峰石阵得见天日.
我们到达的时候, 恰逢金色的阳光洒下, 在这片广阔巨大的石阵上泛出眩目的金色.

这是怎样一幅壮观奇景, 广袤的金色沙漠, 玉树临风的奇石阵, 更远处是深邃的印度洋.

回程的路上,不时为美好的风景停下脚步. 看这边刺眼的阳光下远望似雪山的白色沙丘.

还有这条囊括丰富动人的澳洲风情的大道, 和大道上兴奋的我.

夕阳西下, 赶路的我们急着在太阳落山前开进Swan Valley - 进镇以后的路上才有路灯.

D5的车程很辛苦. D6计划得轻松些, 因为D7的玛格丽特河又是单程三百多公里的旅途...

Day 6: Yanchep National Park/Two Rocks
实在是苦了亲爱的司机同志, 几天下来的舟车劳顿..
这天的行程比较轻松...
所以选择了Yanchep国家公园, 在去尖峰石阵的路上.
据说这里可以轻易地看到随处奔跑的野生动物, 还有著名的钟乳石洞穴.
公园不是很大, 走完之后还能去附近的TWO ROCKS转一转.


选择了园内的一个TOUR - 参观Crystal Cave.
踏了几十步阶梯到了地面下的洞穴. 水晶岩洞并不大, 相比之下也没有瑶琳仙境来得壮观. 洞穴内应该有湖的地方也因都市用水导致地下水层下降而干涸了.
不过洞内的灯光效果还是很不错的, 导游还拿手电给我们看钟乳石因矿物质结构不懂而透出的不同颜色的光线.
有几块在灯光下真得很像水晶!






出了洞穴重见光明. 在公园内四处转转. 天气很好, 身边不是有野鸭袋鼠经过.


选了一条2.7KM的丛林路. 茂盛的树木盛开的野花, 四处不见人.

丛林中很容易捕捉到袋鼠的身影. 它们旁若无人自顾自地结伴穿过.


我抓拍得更欢.


听说TWO ROCKS (两块石头)是个钓鱼的好地方. 可我们都没什么钓鱼的兴致. 只是寄希望于能碰上美丽的海滩.


一直寻思着这个可爱的地名. 来到海滩, 终于明白了.
看见那块大石头没? 右手边还有一块呢...一共两块...两块石头...^,^

D6结束.
D7生日篇.

=============================================================================
Birthday Girl on the way (Nov 1st, 2008) ...贴上老爸最喜欢的一张 (其实他的评语是石头的颜色很美...)

From 2008 Birthday Tour (Margaret River)

今天格外兴奋, 接到了使馆的电话签证办好了, 还是MULTI-ENTRY的...上周四去交申请时那个担心咯, 再度发扬一贯的LAST MINUTE精神, 这周六的飞机, 网上查的五个工作日的PROCESSING TIME, 倒霉的会超过两个礼拜...只有寄期望于自己的人品, 好在又一次平安过关~~touch wood touch wood!

从接到电话开始, 我的心又野了...周六快点到来吧, 我迫不及待地要踏出门去, 奔向南半球那个孤单的城市...

拷来了李米的猜想, 画皮把我看睡着了, 但愿这部里周迅的戏比较过瘾...周迅老咯...谁又不是呢...

满足是一种幸福,
tat would be very nice...
觉得有时候想得太多太聪明了是种罪过, 平静的日子里还是有很多小甜蜜和惊喜的.

减肥计划缓慢实行中, 由于最近的heavy dinner plan, 使得每周的project LT成效及其不够显著.
拜五坐进电影院,只有forgetting sarah marshall, 看到是kocked up的director, 想来不会太糟...果然没有失望, 非常entertaining的一部喜剧片, and the breakup was so real...特别是peter坐在面临大海的阳台上泣不成声的那一段.
发现最近的blog已经无图不博了...连游记都懒惰得被图片代替了...于是乎为了不让这里过于冷清, 给自己多些小期待,更重要的是在office憋了太久需要出去放风透气把快长霉的地方晒晒, 又开始活跃得plan trips了...
九月飞行之月行程大多已定, 十月的跨洲假期也book了, 还剩一个long holiday还在亚洲版图上悬着...

oh yeah...周三飞马尼拉, 即使工作行程安排很紧, 我也要钻空子出去晃荡晃荡~~

   

   

 

Should auld acquaintance be forgot,
and never brought to mind ?
Should auld acquaintance be forgot,
and auld lang syne ?

For auld lang syne, my dear,
for auld lang syne,
we’ll tak a cup o’ kindness yet,
for auld lang syne.

And surely ye’ll be your pint-stoup !
And surely I’ll be mine !
And we’ll tak a cup o’ kindness yet,
for auld lang syne.

We twa hae run about the braes,
and pou’d the gowans fine ;
But we’ve wander’d mony a weary fit,
sin’ auld lang syne.

We twa hae paidl’d in the burn,
frae morning sun till dine ;
But seas between us braid hae roar’d
sin’ auld lang syne.

And there’s a hand, my trusty fiere !
And gives a hand o’ thine !
And we’ll tak a right guid-willie-waught,
for auld lang syne.

梦幻巴厘

I 海之韵

II 绿之梦

III 蓝之灵

IV 山之眼