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1/ It's time for a thread on falling in love with places, losing them, and the current forest fire in Chernobyl. This is a really hard one for me, so I apologize in advance if it's a bit sloppy or some swears work their way in. I'm just really aching over it right now.
2/ A little background, I've been leading photo workshops in abandoned places for the last 7 years. Last year, I was really excited to start doing overseas workshops. I went on a bunch of recon trips, including to Chernobyl, where I was scheduled to have 3 trips this year.
3/ Well, we all know how travel is going this year so that didn't prove to be the best game plan. Groups were postponed, and I was managing that as best I could. It's a scary time for everyone, and one little slice of horror for me is the business I spent so long to build.
4/ Not sure if you're aware but within the last week an enormous forest fire started in the Chernobyl area. It's so big you can see it from space. Right now it hasn't hit Pripyat, to my knowledge, but it has picked off some of the outer sites. https://earther.gizmodo.com/this-is-what-the-chernobyl-wildfires-look-like-from-spa-1842793250
5/ Funny thing, how sadness works. In an absolutely selfish way, I am feeling like what was previously a situation I thought I could manage is now entirely out of control, and I have no idea WTF to do about it. But this is a lot larger than me or my personal worries
6/ The fire is a catastrophe on multiple levels: historically, because the site is a monument to a very important disaster and the lives of the people who endured it. It's also a disaster economically, because Ukraine thrives on people visiting. Think what you will, that matters.
7/ Most importantly, it has the potential to be an environmental disaster. The radiation that's been stored in the foliage is being released & if the fire reaches the power plant, that would be really, really bad. So far it's comparatively okay but the fires aren't under control
8/ A lot of people are writing about that part much better than I can, but what I do know is the absolute heartache of seeing something you love destroyed, and the helplessness in the face of more potential destruction to come.
9/ Here's what I can speak to: part of my visit last year included Emerald Camp, a beautiful summer camp for Soviet kids. The forest around Chernobyl is really gorgeous, and it was one of my favorite places on the trip. It's gone now.
10/ Many of the buildings had really wonderful paintings of 'cartoon heroes', as my guide Misha @ChernobylGuide put it. Side note, you should follow him, he's a fantastic guy. Anyway, the thing these paintings really conveyed to me was the love that was put into the place.
11/ If you don't go to places like this, the concept of loving them may seem strange, but I assure you, it is real. I would argue that you can't take a moving image without loving a place. You share a bond with it, for a brief time, and it becomes a part of your heart.
12/ I loved the forest (except the spider webs). I loved the sweet paintings. I loved the light, the echoes of the care in the places, the intimate glimpse into something you just don't hear about or see much. I loved experiencing it unfiltered. It was a magical place.
13/ I couldn't wait to go back! I had so little time there, and I am very slow and methodical. I would have found every painting and taken a photo of each one, just for the record. In case of a fire. I didn't get to. I just ran through it and did a (in my opinion) halfass job.
14/ I could have done better with more time and I didn't have it. I know that. But it makes me so, so angry at myself anyway. I still feel like I should have. And I'm angry at the person who started the fire. And just unendingly sad because it's such a stupid, senseless loss.
15/ It's not my place, I didn't own it - but in a way, nobody and everybody did. It was there for everyone to see and experience. I know it's so much worse for the people who knew it better like Misha, but it still physically hurts when I think about it.
16/ Places are a part of who we are. They help us form and retain memories - think of how revisiting a childhood haunt jars loose forgotten moments. When a place that meant something to you is erased, it erases a part of you. All you have now is a hole where they used to be.
17/ So anyway, if I seem more down than I normally am, this is partly why. I know there's a pandemic and people are losing loved ones, and this probably seems petty in comparison but it's something I'm going through in addition to that, not instead of it.
18/ It's part of my job. All of these places I visit are on the edge of the abyss and you just watch them slide in, one by one. I work in the palliative care unit for buildings. I should be used to it but I never get there and it makes me sick to lose them every goddamn time.
19/ I am not really looking for well-meaning advice, and I have been at a loss for how to respond to people about it so I apologize for that. I'm tired of pretending that grief is something that should be wiped out though. Sometimes you just have to live with it.
20/ We act like sorrow is a problem to be solved so we can go on our way having fixed it, but I don't think it works that way. Just like our joys, we carry it with us and it becomes part of who we are. You can't lose the sorrow without also losing the love for what is gone
21/ That's what I chose for myself, I guess: to be a collector of sorrows. Each photo is a little portal you can stare at them through, a window to a moment that was for me a joy because I feel at home in places where the hurt is out in the open.
22/ I hate to see them go. I'd hate for this fire to claim more than it has. I mourn the loss for the people of Ukraine, and I hope with all my heart that this doesn't visit another horror on an area that was in small ways healing. An enchanting area, despite our misconceptions
23/ Well, I don't know what to do with any of this, so I'm going to get back to my photo editing bc that's how I cope. I wish you all luck with your own struggles, there are a lot these days. If you want to see the gallery as it progresses, here's the link https://www.abandonedamerica.us/emerald-camp-chernobyl-ukraine
24/ Final note, people are just now reporting that one of the famous kindergardens thought to be lost & the DUGA array/surrounding buildings did survive and the fire is managed, so until all of this is confirmed, let's keep our fingers crossed https://www.facebook.com/groups/chernobylexplorationgroup
25/ Welp, the fire's out of control again and has jumped the river so I guess being hopeful was a bit premature
