Ruptured and Free — A City Like Our Broken Selves #1

Georgi Bigea
Sep 9, 2018 · 4 min read

The tour starts with a promenade through an empty city. Empty supermarkets with their ghostly parking lots, street repairing sites that seem abandoned, a children’s park where a man sits still on the bench. Maybe he forgot something.

You see another person walking on the other side of the road, but any attempt to catch their eyes is futile. Are they coming from somewhere? Are they going elsewhere?

You have to continue walking. Try to see the beauty, in spite of signs that say things like “no future.”

As you advance, the landscape becomes somewhat more welcoming. A board telling the history of a building is reassuring. It acknowledges you. They must have meant for you to go through here if they put up a board.

After you walked for the better part of an hour in the cringing sound of troller wheels on cubic stone, you arrive. You order some coffee and wait for the city to awaken.

It won’t rise for a while longer but soon enough, a second table gets occupied: four young men and their guitars, likely after a white night. They speak loudly in English, they sing, and discuss deep topics. One wants the other to save his soul, another wants to quit his job.

You’d assume that they’ve known each other long, but they’re asking one another what they do for a living and where.

They are in this ghost town too but they don’t seem to care. They have guitars and each other’s company and that’s enough to keep them safe.

You finish the coffee and head to the accommodation. Your path goes through some apartment buildings which are so graphed up, they seem cartoonish. A child spits on the street while you snap a picture and hides quickly inside behind a curtain. Free the streets of rape.

Whoever said that modern man gave up religious symbols, should come see this part of the city, with its corners decorated in pagan New-Orleans-style beads and tweaks, under the watch of mysterious activist flags.

There is something comforting about this. These drawings are aggressive, but they have to fight against something even more aggressive than them.

This is where the tour takes a break. Rest.


In the afternoon, you take the metro. Yes, wondering if you're going in the right direction is part of it. The Providence takes care of you and you don't get lost this time.

You get out the other end in an immense square, with sharp buildings and signs.

You walk towards an immense church. The sun shines brighter than ever. Youngsters sit on the grass carelessly.

It’s 6PM, the time where most churches have their Sunday service. As they unite in prayer, the world is blessed with a brief second of joyous peace. Next to a fountain, the nomad singer engages an audience of three running children and a sleeping girl.

He sings with the spirit of hope and makes us all want to listen. (to be continued)

Georgi Bigea

Written by

An unexamined life is not worth living. Questioning everything. Optimal living. Polymath. Storytelling & strategy 📮iamgeorgiabee@gmail.com

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