A village on steroids

A grim observance of my home city. * WORK IN PROGRESS

The gray socialist architecture stretches as long as the eye can see. The dormitories cover most of the city’s flat landscape. Everything is uniform. Even the height of the buildings is confined to a limited spectrum. However they are not all exactly the same. There is a sort of individuality to them, an individuality which one pair of socks has to the other. Only a handful of them are aesthetically pleasing. However this “beauty” is derived from a negative assumption - they are not as ugly as the others, therefor they must be beautiful. Not a very comforting thought I must admit.

 

Only a few houses remain from the past. Those that are still there are standing in death row. They are waiting for someone to demolish and replace them with buildings not suited for poultry, let alone humans. Urban development has been rampant and untamed. The quest for profit has blown the chance for nicer and better organized city into the wind.

 

The only colored spots in the rather monochrome scenery are the Old Town in the city center and the Fortress. The Old Town's structure is fashioned in the classical central European style " a large main street leads down to the central square. There stand a church and the city hall. The architecture is luxurious but subtle. There is a strong sense of former wealth and of Germanic "Ordnung."  Adjacent to main street are alleys and passageways which create a dizzying labyrinth for the unassuming wanderer. In days of snow or fog, walking through them one easily finds himself lost in the illusion of stumbling through one of Kafka's pieces. The old town carries a melancholy of times gone by, blended with the pettiness of all the provincial towns from the Habsburg Empire. They eternally hated Vienna yet they looked up to it. They always pretended to be it and aspired to become it. Sadly they could never escape their peasant nature.

Not far away from the center lies the Fortress. Situated on the opposite bank of the river it towers the city, overlooking it as a guardian. In its confines lies all the symbolism of the city, the countries it served and the whole continent. Lurking between its walls are chronicles of war, imprisonment, greed, anger and death. It stands as a testament to grandiose delusions of power thirsty monarchs and religious zealots. By all accounts it should be a detestable place of mourning and sorrow... but it isn't. There is something healing in the ephemeral memory of the masses. By blanking out the misery and pain it creates space for new context and uses. This is how the Fortress transformed. It became a sanctuary, an escapist gateway from daily trivialities and an oasis of bohemian opulence. Positioned across the river, so close but out of the city's reach, it serves as a everlasting memorial of the city's shortcomings. In its glory it reminds the city what it could have become but is too small to reach.

 

The nature in the city is scarce and tainted. The parks are small and intranquil while the anxieties of urban living spew inside them. They don't offer a proper refuge from the tensions of the increasingly bustling city. Even in spring when the nature reappears in its full beauty, walking into a park, one never quite feels that he has wandered into a spiritual or environmental safe haven. The racket and smog from the nearby traffic arteries are there as constant reminders. The parks are, quite appropriately, deemed suitable for those on the social margins " homeless, drug addicts and seniors.

 

Those building the city, on what was once swamp ground, never took the time to look a few decades ahead or they never quite understood the importance of plants and animals for human life. Now the populous is living on substance enriched air and metropolis level noises without any of the benefits of a metropolis… or a swamp for that matter. Shortsightedness is a chronic disease in these parts.

 

A dirty river flows through the city. Like a hobo spruces himself with a piece of a dirty, smelly cloth, so does the city with its river. Industrialization and neglect made it a chemical waste pipeline. Still it plays a central role in the city’s mythology. People idealize it and adore it, even sing songs about it. Yet few are ready to take a swim in it.

 

One might ask what kind of people live in such a place? What kind of city does a mixture of deviant ideological progress, "Kleinbürgerlichkeit", pollution and a false sense of worth produce? The result is obvious albeit not simple. One gets a city full of smug underachievers, inert robots living in a hermetic environment, daydreaming of a better tomorrow that never comes; a city full of voyeurs whose lives pass while they observe others concealed behind their window drapes; a city full of passive-aggressive cowards, living in a misunderstanding with their own identity, who preach progress, yet whose efforts are strongest when it comes to conserving their comfortable and bleak lifestyle; a city where people sit all day in cafes, discharging their proverbial hate towards life, pretending they are enjoying themselves, while covertly appraising those around them, just in order to massage their little egos; a city where people stay indoors because “it might rain;” a city where cynicism is religion, a silent overlord whom nobody ever mentions, but who is always implied and whose laws are unconditionally obeyed; a city which is the paradigm of the crab bucket mentality. 

 

I apologize for my mistake. One should try to name the things one talks about by their corresponding noun. It is not a city. It’s a village on steroids.

 

That is where I live.

Author's Note

A work in progress. I plan to work on the existing paragraphs and add several more. It is emotionally exhausting and time consuming to write this essay. I have to be in a "special" mood to write it. As I am not a native speaker and my writing of English was limited to more practical and less artistic language any pointers regarding the language would be welcome. My sentence construction can probably be weird sometimes.