Chapter IV

Moving On - The Crumbling Past

Our train moves slowly out of Iaso station in deference to the peace of the place and, creeping  onwards, we move into a once urban landscape with ivy covered crumbling walls on which children in their winter woollens, britches and stout boots sit and swing their legs whilst waving at us, or else pick their way along its precarious top keeping up with our train’s progress. 

Over the tannoy, someone tells us in a warm, convivial voice, to please not take photo’s during this stretch of our journey. 

We pass amongst the slowly degenerating ruins of what was once known for being a poor neighbourhood; now, its tall tower blocks with their tops knocked off are festooned with greenery, moss and ivy, roads and pavements are being taken over by trees and plants and grass with all kinds of animals living in amongst its people; a concrete jungle undergoing a slow, gentle reclamation by nature. We see birds for the first time in profusion taking off from the tops of trees and pecking amongst the cracks in pot-holed roads and broken pavements some almost completely overgrown with a variety of tall grasses. Tent like structures made from a mix of reclaimed materials; stone blocks, wooden planks, bent branches, tarpaulin, colourful cloth, knitted coverings, have been constructed within the ruins of old buildings and we steal glimpses of them through the gaps as we pass by onwards slowly to the inevitable Buddleia forest where someone just visible picks their way through to somewhere in the pale sunshine, clouds of butterflies billowing above

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I’m travelling in disguise, as we all are to some extent.

And moving through this landscape with its new generation who must be protected, we only see its surface. Though that has changed during the time between my travelling here before and this return is obvious, though the true changes must be subtle and hidden to us outsiders

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