... we might want to take a leaf from the Bajan book. Here's a great post from gallimaufry.ws about the beautification of Bridgetown, with pictures of the results.Here's a sample:

I took a stroll through town today and took some photos, and in the process realised just how much the city has been transformed. Places I used to avoid because they were so ugly and unattractive have become far more appealing. It’s really great.

The photo above is of Independence Square. A few months ago it was a run-down car-park. Now it’s an open space that can serve as a theatre, and with a statue of the nation’s first Prime Minister as its focal point (you can see the base of the statue from this angle, but not the statue itself; I should have chosen a better angle). I think it will look even nicer once the landscaping is really established.

We talk a lot -- about monuments, about beautification, about what-have-you. But we are not yet truly committed to put money behind the talk; we still tend to have a sense of waste about the spending on money on things that don't have apparent practical benefits -- or things, from another perspective, that don't have short-term, tangible returns.As though the long-term benefits that contribute to national and personal pride are irrelevant.