July 19, Urban Planning

“and then you realize that you’re riding on a para-success of a heavy handed metaphor and a feeling like you’ve been here before, cause you’ve been here before, and you’ve been here before,” Sovay, Andrew Bird

One of the best parts about this program is how it’s designed. Having nearly two weeks in 3 cities, and of course the 3 days in Killarney, makes me think about our time here differently. Unlike a vacation, there is time to explore and get to know what each city has to offer. However, this program is also unlike long-term study abroad sessions that house students for months in a different country. Instead of getting comfortable and complacent, I am constantly trying to do as much as possible before we move onto our next destination. The design is genius, if you ask me.

My approach to these cities has been slightly rattled, though. On a day trip to the Irish Museum of Modern Art, there was a beautiful exhibit by Carlos Garaicoa, a Cuban artist who happened to be inspired by, in fact almost obsessed with, urban planning and cities. The first room had three Plexiglass cases only about 6 inches deep, but sat on table legs that came chest-high. Bright red pieces of construction paper cut, folded, and layered to imitate shapes and structures found in cities laid in neat rows in these cases. On the floor of the next room sat an entire city made out of paper (not unlike those Chinese lanterns) internally illuminated, light glowing through the transparent material. Through the next door, huge prints of photographs of different urban settings lined the walls. On top of the prints were pins that strung geometric lines of thread an inch away from the photos, creating supplemental designs overtop of the printed images. Each room seemed to have something completely different, yet completely related. Exquisitely executed, each piece felt like an entire collection, capable of standing alone.

For Garaicoa, though, studying cities has brought him to the conclusion that they are slowly losing the characteristics that differentiate one from another and are gradually becoming “a single endless city.” In his words, “we continually move from one airport to another, to enjoy a life that is almost identical no matter what city you find yourself in.” At first, this concept was hard for me to agree with. My time in Ireland has proved to me that each place we go is indeed different from the next. I am constantly watching how people interact differently in each city: how restaurants treat their customers, how cab drivers talk to their passengers, how strangers pass each other on sidewalks. My thoughts up until this point have been more focused on how, despite these differences, there are major underlying similarities in every place we’ve visited that have brought out different strengths in me. I have really liked feeling connected and confident that I can find some sense of commonality in almost any city I visit, not just in Ireland. But reading Garaicoa’s ideas made me question if I’ve been paying attention to the right things. Hasn’t the majority of my trip been graded on how well Ireland can fit my needs and fulfill my expectations? I’m not sure if I have been taking the time to understand each city’s personality individually.

Should I be trying to string each of these places together, tacking bits and pieces into a giant collage of “how we are the same”? Maybe I should be taking more time to appreciate what makes Dublin different from Cork and Galway different from Killarney and Ireland different from America. I’m not sure if we lose or gain more by blending cultures and practices. I’m not sure if cities becoming alike is a good or a bad thing, but I’m fairly certain that now that I’m more aware of the question, I'll be spending more time paying attention to the subtle differences.