Exit the Old Town by Can Berkol
the Urbanization and the Isolation
Where have you been traveled? Have you been, for example, in Turkiye? Have you seen the towns build in caves, have you been in Istanbul – a city that witnessed the turn of a new age in history?
Have you been in Italy – Rome, the capital of a nation for centuries? How about Venezia, the city blending in to water? What about the royal Vienna, Austria or the old town Zagreb, Croatia? Have you been in Rovinj, the ancient peninsula of the Christian history? Athens, Prieas or the Greek Islands, cities of Gods?
Once there was fear. Fear from something unknown, something powerful, and something very mystical. Once there was fear. Fear from the deadliest wars of humankind, the science, and the politics.
In the good old days when economics was the latter of the doubts, mankind used to live in the old town. There were communities. People used to talk to each other and help to each other. Whether ring-shaped or star-shaped the old town had the characteristics of the supporting family. Narrow streets, and strong buildings made of wood or stone standing shoulder to shoulder. They burned down with every fire; they revived from their ashes with every new hope, together all the time. The old town hosted mobile merchants and small shops.
The new era brought the new city in our lives. Finding the new soils of never-ending lands, power shifts from politics to economics, the cold war and the weapons of mass destruction caused new types of fear. Fear that was not know to mankind until recently when Hiroshima and Nagasaki of Japan was bombed. Fear that was not known to mankind until the word corporation was in debate.
Have you been in suburbs of Rome or Vienna? Have you been in the new town of Istanbul or Zagreb? Have you ever crossed the city limits of Athens?
The new city is where we live now. Single high rises made of cold steal; large luxury compounds, isolated neighbourhoods, division of races, cultures, languages, and gender specific moves. The new city hosts closed marketplaces also know as shopping malls, the “isms” such as humanism, racism, ethnicism, feminism, and terorrism... The old town did not need such post-modern nouns. There was understanding and coherence no matter what the new town sponsored history books tell. It is so easy to see thing; we just need to look at, to observe…
With new city communties are killed and replaced with smaller groups. Mankind destined to live a life all alone, away from children, away from animal, away from nature, away from each other. Yet human race is a social interconnected tissue. As the result the city brought a new solution of cyber communities backed up by networks of man-made electrical signals. The new city created the imitation of the feelings. It made us keep in touch only without the touch.
Once mankind was alone in a big undiscovered world. Now, every person is alone and depressed. Mankind loses common ground. Everyone is only interested in his or her own problems. Every day less and less people are able to build partnerships. Partnerships of the smallest size are also becoming impossible. Marriages are breaking up, families, neighborhoods, cities, states, countries, and the earth.
When do we realize that distinction does not necessarily mean extinction? When do we realize to accept others’ differences not only ours’? When do we decide to drop off the post-modern nouns and to be simple humans again? When are we going to befriend to each other and to the nature?
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Date Published: November 30, 2009
Date Taken: October 31, 2009
Aperture: f/5
Shutter Speed: 1/200
ISO: 160
Focal Length: 24 mm
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Notes
Winter after noon, narrow streets, orange sun light beautiful colors.
- Coming soon...
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