- Joined
- Feb 12, 2014
- Messages
- 67
- Reaction score
- 0
- Points
- 6
Lately I've been reading Bradely Garrett's book
"Explore Everything". I am sort of halfway through.
I don't pretend to be a cultural snob or elitist, and most
of the overdetailed analysis of the philosophy behind Urban Exploration with so
much reference to figures like Nietzsche is not something that makes me nod my
head in recognition of a higher purpose in what I do. Still, I totally agree
that if you scrape off all the obvious layers of why people say they are or
really are urban explorers, there is a subconscious truth to all of that.
What I really seem to understand, acknowledge and,
unfortunately, agree with, is the talk about the ruthless competitiveness
behind it in the UE community.
I am a newbie in UE. Did my first two explores in July 2013,
when the term "Urban Exploration" was not known to me. The how I got
involved is one of those blurry memories of our life, where it's hard to
actually put the "historical facts" in order and can't really tell if
"A" came first or "B". But here I am 4 months in UE and
have already gone through huge transformations.
Every day is a constant lesson, the learning process is
sometimes fast, other times is tedious. It's a weird mixture of feelings and
realities involved with it, but one thing has never changed, the realization
that I was meant to do this. It's not an arrogant claim, it's just me
acknowledging my own shortcoming and strengths and being able to trace back my
own personal history and personal growth to see that it was meant to come to
this.
Through Garrett's book, I come not to learn, but validate
the hearsay and the stories picked up from here and there about how difficult
it is to be an urban explorer in recent time. And quick note, I don't know how
it was 15 years ago, or 10 years, but I know and learning how it is now.
People love clubs. People love belonging and above all they
love ownership. They also love rules, as long as nobody else breaks them but
themselves.
Few people are true to their own code without giving false
signals as to what that code is, or if they have any. With the dependency of
modern day man and woman in social media and sharing in order to claim a higher
place in the ladder of whatever it is they are involved with, urban exploration
fell victim to its own fundamental truth.
That truth is simple. Urban exploration has in more ways
than one a single starting point for all, but it's the journey that separates
the individuals. That journey is the make or break factor and it only has to do
with the end-game as each person sees it.
There is no contract one signs that states what you have to
do or not. Unwritten rules such as not breaking in, not vandalizing (whatever
that means) are of course necessary, mostly to preserve the integrity of the
spaces. Yet by hearing and reading explorers talk about their experience, their
needs, what they like and dislike, it is clear that most create their own truth
in the pretense of a universal UE truth.
A broken window or dislodged board from a door that leads
you in a building is always a delinquent's action. We blame them for trashing
the places we adore, yet at the same time we need them to get in in the first
place.
Explorers will visit a place, find it all boarded up, call
it a failure yet deep down will wish next week some drunken youth will find his
way there, pick up a brick and just for kicks remove that obstacle. And with
that, allow the willing explorer entry to the paradise he/she craves to be
immersed in. Of course, such actions cause problems that lead for instance to
either heightened security, or even worse, increasing the rate of decay of a
building.
Same way as there are explorers who love a highly decayed
place, while others want it in mint condition, some find a place boring if
there are no chairs, personal items, nice stained glass windows behind, while
others just want to gaze upon the holes on the floor the old chimney left as it
fell through, and some like to picture the place when it was still alive with
its previous owners and workers walking around, while others just try to
visualize that moment the roof collapsed and try to put the pieces back
together.
These are all amazing, valid quests and desires, and some
will fall into all of the above categories. But it is a paradox, it is
hypocritical in a way, to claim a place your own, when the way in was not
provided by your own set of skills (skills that range from locating to
entering), but also to still call for those codes of honor when your very
presence in that space is 9 out of 10 times a gift from the ones you blame for
creating problems, or those who know how and when to bend the rules, without
feeling the need to glorify their actions through HDR shots and hashtags.
I have a huge admiration for the explorers I come across
that are as humble as they can get, not because they hide their mark in
UE-history, but because they don't pretend to be something they are not.
It is one thing to try and preserve those places, to being
cautious with information and at the end of the day, to just try and have the
level of experience you are entitled to, through the power of personal selection.
It is a whole different ballgame to call for ownership in a field where the
last thing we are is the owners.
As I recently wrote, my visit to a place I forever longed to
see inside was made possible through the help and good will of its own
caretaker. Not going about with information about the what, where and who, is
not me trying to stand a higher moral ground and gain points as a man of code
or a person with the ability to talk my way into a building, but actually it
comes from a)respect for the building itself, b)respect for the trust handed to
me by that individual. Do I wish to talk to people about it? Yes. And I will to
those I have so far learnt to trust. And this is not something I read somewhere
or pretend to be in the unwritten bible of UE, but it is something called
common sense, it is sense and sensibility.
Urban Exploration is a tremendously multi-faceted
"hobby" if I may call it that. And it is so because each person
involved is different. One can be a part of one crew, or ten crews, but it is
essentially a very private experience, one that can become extremely satisfying
if shared. Competitiveness in UE society can only hurt UE, as it has done
already. There is a difference between filtering out, and just being arrogant
and cocky.
As long as social media, facebook, instagram, forums,
provide the "voice" for people to share, it is naive to come back and
start playing the "you suck" game. You can't go to a free-for-all
party and start bitching about the presence of geeks or jocks or bimbos or rich
kids showing up. Nor can you drink the alcohol others brought at that party and
then pretend you magically saw the glass appear in your hand, but take credit
for being a heavy drinker. Just enjoy the fucking drink and next time either
choose a party that suits you better, or send out private invitations. But
whatever you do, stop expecting people to applaud you for enjoying what you do.
That is what kills the game and distorts the actual truth.
I am open for discussion and actually would love it if people would share their thoughts.
ps. I would like to make it clear, and I know that most of the time my writing is a bit confusing, that I don't endorse vandalizing a place and even though a broken glass is sometimes an interesting subject to shoot, I hate it when they are the result of idiots who know no better. I can be clearer in private.
"Explore Everything". I am sort of halfway through.
I don't pretend to be a cultural snob or elitist, and most
of the overdetailed analysis of the philosophy behind Urban Exploration with so
much reference to figures like Nietzsche is not something that makes me nod my
head in recognition of a higher purpose in what I do. Still, I totally agree
that if you scrape off all the obvious layers of why people say they are or
really are urban explorers, there is a subconscious truth to all of that.
What I really seem to understand, acknowledge and,
unfortunately, agree with, is the talk about the ruthless competitiveness
behind it in the UE community.
I am a newbie in UE. Did my first two explores in July 2013,
when the term "Urban Exploration" was not known to me. The how I got
involved is one of those blurry memories of our life, where it's hard to
actually put the "historical facts" in order and can't really tell if
"A" came first or "B". But here I am 4 months in UE and
have already gone through huge transformations.
Every day is a constant lesson, the learning process is
sometimes fast, other times is tedious. It's a weird mixture of feelings and
realities involved with it, but one thing has never changed, the realization
that I was meant to do this. It's not an arrogant claim, it's just me
acknowledging my own shortcoming and strengths and being able to trace back my
own personal history and personal growth to see that it was meant to come to
this.
Through Garrett's book, I come not to learn, but validate
the hearsay and the stories picked up from here and there about how difficult
it is to be an urban explorer in recent time. And quick note, I don't know how
it was 15 years ago, or 10 years, but I know and learning how it is now.
People love clubs. People love belonging and above all they
love ownership. They also love rules, as long as nobody else breaks them but
themselves.
Few people are true to their own code without giving false
signals as to what that code is, or if they have any. With the dependency of
modern day man and woman in social media and sharing in order to claim a higher
place in the ladder of whatever it is they are involved with, urban exploration
fell victim to its own fundamental truth.
That truth is simple. Urban exploration has in more ways
than one a single starting point for all, but it's the journey that separates
the individuals. That journey is the make or break factor and it only has to do
with the end-game as each person sees it.
There is no contract one signs that states what you have to
do or not. Unwritten rules such as not breaking in, not vandalizing (whatever
that means) are of course necessary, mostly to preserve the integrity of the
spaces. Yet by hearing and reading explorers talk about their experience, their
needs, what they like and dislike, it is clear that most create their own truth
in the pretense of a universal UE truth.
A broken window or dislodged board from a door that leads
you in a building is always a delinquent's action. We blame them for trashing
the places we adore, yet at the same time we need them to get in in the first
place.
Explorers will visit a place, find it all boarded up, call
it a failure yet deep down will wish next week some drunken youth will find his
way there, pick up a brick and just for kicks remove that obstacle. And with
that, allow the willing explorer entry to the paradise he/she craves to be
immersed in. Of course, such actions cause problems that lead for instance to
either heightened security, or even worse, increasing the rate of decay of a
building.
Same way as there are explorers who love a highly decayed
place, while others want it in mint condition, some find a place boring if
there are no chairs, personal items, nice stained glass windows behind, while
others just want to gaze upon the holes on the floor the old chimney left as it
fell through, and some like to picture the place when it was still alive with
its previous owners and workers walking around, while others just try to
visualize that moment the roof collapsed and try to put the pieces back
together.
These are all amazing, valid quests and desires, and some
will fall into all of the above categories. But it is a paradox, it is
hypocritical in a way, to claim a place your own, when the way in was not
provided by your own set of skills (skills that range from locating to
entering), but also to still call for those codes of honor when your very
presence in that space is 9 out of 10 times a gift from the ones you blame for
creating problems, or those who know how and when to bend the rules, without
feeling the need to glorify their actions through HDR shots and hashtags.
I have a huge admiration for the explorers I come across
that are as humble as they can get, not because they hide their mark in
UE-history, but because they don't pretend to be something they are not.
It is one thing to try and preserve those places, to being
cautious with information and at the end of the day, to just try and have the
level of experience you are entitled to, through the power of personal selection.
It is a whole different ballgame to call for ownership in a field where the
last thing we are is the owners.
As I recently wrote, my visit to a place I forever longed to
see inside was made possible through the help and good will of its own
caretaker. Not going about with information about the what, where and who, is
not me trying to stand a higher moral ground and gain points as a man of code
or a person with the ability to talk my way into a building, but actually it
comes from a)respect for the building itself, b)respect for the trust handed to
me by that individual. Do I wish to talk to people about it? Yes. And I will to
those I have so far learnt to trust. And this is not something I read somewhere
or pretend to be in the unwritten bible of UE, but it is something called
common sense, it is sense and sensibility.
Urban Exploration is a tremendously multi-faceted
"hobby" if I may call it that. And it is so because each person
involved is different. One can be a part of one crew, or ten crews, but it is
essentially a very private experience, one that can become extremely satisfying
if shared. Competitiveness in UE society can only hurt UE, as it has done
already. There is a difference between filtering out, and just being arrogant
and cocky.
As long as social media, facebook, instagram, forums,
provide the "voice" for people to share, it is naive to come back and
start playing the "you suck" game. You can't go to a free-for-all
party and start bitching about the presence of geeks or jocks or bimbos or rich
kids showing up. Nor can you drink the alcohol others brought at that party and
then pretend you magically saw the glass appear in your hand, but take credit
for being a heavy drinker. Just enjoy the fucking drink and next time either
choose a party that suits you better, or send out private invitations. But
whatever you do, stop expecting people to applaud you for enjoying what you do.
That is what kills the game and distorts the actual truth.
I am open for discussion and actually would love it if people would share their thoughts.
ps. I would like to make it clear, and I know that most of the time my writing is a bit confusing, that I don't endorse vandalizing a place and even though a broken glass is sometimes an interesting subject to shoot, I hate it when they are the result of idiots who know no better. I can be clearer in private.
Last edited by a moderator:
