Stephan vs. *

Fluency - project personality - fragments

2008-12-25T04:21:00.000-08:00

There is a way in which everything seems to transfer; not only processes, the way in which is dealt with things or the way people deal with eachother.
Also the way in which one views upon himself and the way this brings you in relation to the outside, the way you view upon the outside and the way the outside seems to respond to you. How is it possible in these kinds of dynamics, often disturbed by emotional whims, to respond in a way ruled by principles? Or even to have principles; as they also are possible to be established by youreself, though being in a context. Is it really possible to stear opinion?

Who would I be, born in a radically diffrent context. Would I be fighting for ideas which are alien or even opposing what I become? What is the relation of you're being (undefined and diffuse) to you're principles and the way those relate to you're actions?
When do you forgive someone, as it it the same as giving up hope, a defence almost against disappointment.
When do you forgive you'reself for 'who you are' and what you think? When can you be satisfied with what you become? Why is there such a pressing need to become and such a neglect on being?

What is the distance between thought and action when it comes to being? How can you judge someone, moreover, how can you judge youreself?

Dharavi 03 - getting aquaintant

2008-03-27T06:43:00.000-07:00

Shivar guesthouse, after some searching our hotel was found, and after two hours of waiting (09.00 PM) the rest of the crew got up. It's the first day every one can go to Dharavi, and we will go accompanied by an Indian student from JJ college of Architecture. After a few hours(!) of breakfast, preparation and formation, we are sent out to go around the area, joined by not one but two very nice Indian girls; Sonam and Daksha, who would prove to be an essential part of our group -group love- .

Walking around, Slicing Through

Dharavi is one of the largest slums in the world, it layes in the middle of the financial capital of India; Mumbai. The social differences between the inside and the outside must be enourmous. How does this area effect our sences?

Our first encounter with this urban fabric was one of recording senses; smelling, listening, feeling, looking. As my part was 'feeling', I concentrated on temperature, texture (pavement) and the feel of space (do you feel welcome?).

Walking around, it becomes clear that Dharavi is as an island in the city; every street going into the slum has some sort of informal sphere because of the pavement and the few people standing inside. This informal sphere makes the space like a private one, makes one feel like an intruder, an alien quite an unwelcome feeling. Even walking down the borders of it, consisting of four-lane distributor of traffic and two major train lines, we are looked at with great interest; people are not used to our kind of foreigners. Even though we are moving though an area with over 1 million inhabitants with a density of more than 2 times that of Manhattan, which in other cases would imply a much higher publicness of the space.
Inside the urban fabric of Dharavi, one noticess a great diffrence between areas. The slum is not one; it consists of various little communities, which are formed by profesional, social, religious, and sometimes even family based bands, which are directly translated in the morphological structure .
Dharavi is a massive caved community for communities, with fortification walls made of train tracks and asphalt.

Dharavi 02 - Arrival

2008-03-27T04:03:00.000-07:00

After 14 hours, two aiplanes and lots of fun and exitement, we arrive in Mumbai. I try to smell the difference, after been told that this is a feature of India... not much difference, just a clear absence of ventillation.

An airport at 04.00 PM always has this strange feeling of unrootedness; a large space with little people awake in the middle of the night, as if it is outside all normal buisines to be here, silent, as if speaking is forbidden, separation by windows and fences, doors garded, only one way to go, as if we are criminals. Than; visa controle, somehow I get this nervous feeling something might be wrong (again), after a few moments of critical examination, I'm finally approved to enter the country; my Curry adventure can begin!

Dharavi 01

2008-03-08T06:40:00.000-08:00

Beste achterblijvers,

Eindelijk, na een hele week mijn eerste bericht uit India. We hebben inmiddels de nodige opnames van sloppenwijk Dharavi gedaan en een beginnetje gemaakt aan het in kaart brengen ervan.

Alles hier is intens; geur, geluid, mensen, verkeer, verschil tussen arm en rijk, noem maar op. De armoede die mensen hier hebben is ongelooflijk; alles heeft hier waarde, van oude autoband tot gebruikte snoepverpakking. Er wordt echt keihard gewerkt om geld bijeen te krijgen om naar het geboortedorp te sturen en de stad lijkt daardoor meer 24h/7 dan New York. Enorm indrukwekkend.

Overal mensen; vandaag gingen we voor het eerst met de trein en voor degene die het spel lemmings kennen; vermenigvuldig het met 4 en doe daar het kwadraat van en je hebt een idee wat het is om hier in en uit de trein te stappen.

Voordeel van een arm land; alles is goedkoop, mijn duurste maaltijd was rond de 100 rupees, 1,70 EUR, taxi, voor 2 euro kan je zowat de hele stad zien (=gigantisch).
tot slot..'t weer mag er ook zijn ;-)

Helaas heb ik hier overal maar weinig tijd voor, volgende week willen we naar Taj Mahal, dus dat moet geregeld worden, ik probeer zo snel mogelijk weer iets te laten horen!!

Groeten aan iedereen,

x Stephan

Cold, waking up, stiff, tired, sleeping, cold, waking up.

2008-02-16T05:34:00.000-08:00

The night, off course, was one without much sleep, not too bad, it was just one night. The cold did not allow any periods of sleep lasting longer than about an hour. It’s presance was painfully emphasised by the lack of insulation of our hovel and the size of my blanket.

The morning –finally, the night ends- silence broken by footsteps of employees of the faculty, starteled by our presence. “I do hope you will clean this all up” - a lady of the direction. After explanation there is more interest and understanding for the project, but the response to our somewhat dirty looks is obvious, even after one night, even being a student to the university; it is clear we don’t fit in. The evening before even more; security wants to know under who’s authority we are opperating (spending the night on faculty terrain) and advising that when the police may come, we sould leave the property.

After a short breafast in the cafeteria, I go home to clean up, before going to work. When I arrive in my room I suddenly stop; looking around, seeing a wide variety of books, scetches, all kinds of markers, a television, decorations. All seems só insignificant; all I needed extra last night was maybe an extra blanket and an extra pair of socks, nothing else. Suddenly, finaly I had the strongest awareness of the gigantic gap existing between our filthy rich society and de absolute pooreness other societies are faced with. The unimaginable creativity existing to be able to stay alive in this conditions and moreover; the disgusting reluctance I and many people with me have on our richness, always wanting more, worrieing about “if we will ever become happy”, “will we find the love of our life”, “will we go out or pas the exam”.

Imagine the people in Dharavi; seeing a bunch of students wandering around in their living area, wrighting and drawing what they see; such unimportant ways of spending time! Can we call this reaction a superficial one? The denial of usefullness of planning. Do we actually know better?

A preparation on a Dharavi workshop.

Ugly beautifull picture

2008-02-15T00:03:00.000-08:00

The slum - notes to the discussion

2008-02-14T03:47:00.000-08:00

Originate

A slum is a place which forms a cheap way to dwell, mostly for the large stream of people going from rural areas to the large cities to find a job.
This migration movement is triggered by the evolvement of a global network which triggers large companies, which generate all kinds of activity to transportation nodes (places where man can easily travel to, preferably by use of different flows of transportation). This global network draws attention to cities, which are often well connected to such a network (airports, large train- and bus stations), which can be noticed both in the explosive way cities are expanding and the enormous economic boost which urban areas are given. This process has been initiated by the development of technology and accordingly, society.
It is roughly what can be described as the process man refers to as globalisation.
This process creates the stream of people to cities, who are not able to afford regular dwelling, and therefore live in slums, where life is reasonably cheap. One should be aware of the fact the dwellers of the slum (in the case of the larger ones) are still of great political and economic importance. For example; there are NGOs which are located in areas marked as a slum.

Define

It is hard to give a clear definition of the Slum. Therefore it is good to identify some elements which can form entities which are understood to be one.
One of the most striking features of slums is a certain degree of randomness in the way the building is structured, next to this; it is related to an urban area which, for whatever reason, can be marked as being no slum. Further, elements like a certain degree of poverty and diminished governmental formality (both in building decree and social control) seem to be returning issues when the definition slum is used.
This does not mean that there are no governmental rules present in these urban agglomerations, nor that these can not be planned, even though in many cases building is done by the dwellers of the neighbourhood.

In most slums there are strong social networks which are hard to penetrate, with in many case some kind of hierargic structure. These structures do not overlap entirely with the morphological existence of the slum. Again, one should have an open mind towards the notion slum, whereas it can be seen both as a place where crime flourishes, creativity finds it’s ultimate climate, a place which is a city (village) in itself, part of a city and a loose element of the city having some sort of symbiotic relation with it. This, although the borders of the slum are in no way clearly definable (spatially, politically, socially, economically, etc…).

My first slum (2) - a night without cops..and sleep

2008-02-14T03:41:00.000-08:00

In advance, a few pictures, after this; the night, story. How did we (Geraldine, Jasper and Stephan) survive in the horror of the cold and dark slum night...

Cosey fire

small but nice...

Is that youre leg...or mine?

My first slum - a photo report

2008-02-11T12:23:00.000-08:00

Discussion, frustration

More discussion, even more frustration

Ultimate frustration (also still...discussion)

Finally! the plan!! Groups..1,2,3,4...?

Concept; No worrie, we got currie!

To work (what is that mouse doing there?)

Some hours, lots of sweat and an angry security guy later...

READY TO GET STARTED!

Lecture on Heidegger - Experimental Phenomena 01

2008-02-10T15:54:00.000-08:00

The lecture concerning phenomenology, for me was in many parts hard to get. But it did start me thinking; how actually do we experience space? Is it by sound, smell, memory? shurely by vision, but how is it actually received? For instance; the actually being inside a space against experiencing a space through a window from another one (which, in some cases can disappear in our perception; the space where we are is not significant, our attention is drawn), or seeing an image or movie and in that way experience a space.

The sence seems to be quite time-related; spaces do seem smaller when on crosses it fast. Then, how do we relate to the urban space as we travel along with it? It is interesting to see how a space seem to decline. I did a small experiment walking and taking a pictures every 20 seconds, afterwarts I did the same on my way back, this time by bicycle (visible in the images) It was striking to see how much less significance the surroundings seem to have, loose from the place one should turn or obejcts you should go around.

(open the images in order to see the experiment)

--to be continued --

2008-02-06T14:01:00.000-08:00