Dear People of Providence
Mission from a Chance Meeting
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Dear People of Providence,
We are two friends from the Johnston and Classical High schools. One of us, Alec Mustafayev (born 2002) is wrapping up his senior year, while the other, Jairson Ascencao (born 1999) is still in the experimental stage of his life. We met by chance, but we felt it was no chance to discover that we faced the same challenge in life.
Though we didn’t realize it when we were younger, now we saw that we invested a great deal of time and emotion into the relationships with our schoolmates. Why should we spend so much time in building these relationships when all of a sudden our loved ones could leave? Especially when we love them?
There exists within us all a need for company. We often wish we could have the connections other people appear to possess. But something stands in our way. Something we call the Black Mountain, one of the biggest and darkest problems in life. It’s highlighted by the fact that our magazine Coalmont is named after it. Have you ever felt that you lacked a group to fall back on in hard times? Maybe that you had no friends at all?
This is an all-too-common dilemma for today’s younger generations. Survey after survey shows that most youth feel completely isolated from others. We personally can’t help but look around and see a world overflowing with loneliness.
Starting with the city of Providence, we want to extend a helping hand to all who will take it. Our dream is to see as many people as possible join hands and unify as one community. We want to see you in the village we’re forming that we call HavenFestPVD. Its mission is to unfragment our local communities.
We understand why so often, many want to leave the state as soon as they can manage. It isn’t uncommon for residents to associate their problems with the tiny city they live in. It can feel as though abandoning this place will leave all the baggage associated with it behind as well, but the city isn’t the problem here. What’s wrong is the lack of connections among its people. Running away from that won’t fix anything.
Our ideal streets would be ones where strangers feel free to strike up conversations with each other, where people aren’t unfairly judged, and where we can mutually help each other to make things better for all of us. Truly, anywhere can be made into paradise. It’s time this city became one.
How? Coalmont is our offense on the great Black Mountain. HavenFestPVD is our experiment to win back the village for humanity, for the people of Providence, Rhode Island. Our attempt at the architecture for such a village is spelled out by the article What to Expect at HavenFestPVD. Hopefully, we’ll be able to see you there at the new village one day.
Sincerely yours,
Alec & Jairson
P. S.
If you are from Providence and want to see the village Alec and I are building, you should check out our Festival's Monday Program at Ri4CTV.com/Monday. — Jairson
