Sunday 2 May 2010

ruins

An evening walk in the less walked streets can bring out a different world. What remains of old houses behind thick walls has become a paradise for doves. They even have their own garden with untouched trees nobody cares for. Those hated animals seem to take revenge on humans inhabiting their lodgings without any remorse. Those birds look at walkers with such a careless eye that one feels threatened. Are they sheltering from us or are they getting strong?

5 comments:

ivasil said...

I'm glad to see you post but what you wrote makes me a bıt sad. Doves are not hated in Bucharest because they are not a pest. I for one like them because my grandparents had a semı-domestıc paır that lıved for years near our kıtchen wındow. They were so unafraıd that they came as soon as ve knocked ın the wındowframe and went on eatıng even ıf we opened the window to watch closer.They were tender to each other the way bırds are and after my grandma dıed İ trıed to keep them comıng, but İ thınk they felt somethıng. After grandpa was ıll,I was so sad and angry I delıberately stopped our "relatıonshıp". Then I was sorry.
They are not evıl. Just ıratıonal, too many and tryıng to survıve. Don't be too hard on them, ok?

ivasil said...

Maybe this is a stupid comment. But I've been coming back to this post and I still cannot quite put in words what it makes me feel.
It's like the doves are our fears. Once the inhabitants leave and the empty walls are all that stays, the fears own the place. Because the empty house cannot protect itself. But a house can be brought back to life, and if people will live there again the birds will have to give up the place. It can happen any time, and some day it will.
I'm sorry if I "derailed" with my thoughts. :)

ivasil said...

In fact, I thought from the beginning that it was like an allegory, but I did not dare to say it. It was not a good moment. And I did not know what to say and how.

caluad said...

Doves are really a pest in town here.
They are much more than an allegory, they make buidings dirty and the stone gets damaged with the acid. much of the works done on ancient buidings have to do with cleaning and curing stone. Doves feel they don't have any natural predator in towns and they have got used to finding food among us, so they come back again and again. And they multiply making things much worse. You see, they are not our fears. Even so, sometimes, they can be cute.

ivasil said...

I know they do all that. I just associated your troubles with the post and saw it in a different way. Sorry. :(
Have I told you that I saw in Turkey some 100 old pigeons traps? Just some stone "chimneys" built on a hill that they found shelter in during the night. Each "chimney" had a small opening at the base, so the villagers used to come at night and "pick up" as many pigeons as they wanted. It went on for a century and the silly pigeons still came to spend the nights in those traps, daily. Bird brain! :)