The Learned Pig

Art – Thinking – Nature – Writing

Tag: urbanism

  • We Were Strangers

    We Were Strangers

    A friend of mine passed away a few months ago and, although we were never especially close, his death affected me deeply. For a time afterwards I found myself impelled, on my lunch breaks, to leave the office block in central Manchester where I work and spend an hour walking – briskly yet purposelessly –…

  • Ghost Town Luxury

    Ghost Town Luxury

    Jing Jin City is a luxurious not-quite ghost town in the north of China. By 2004, some 3,000 luxury villas had been constructed about an hour’s drive from Beijing, along with golf courses, entertainment complexes, a museum, a temple, two colleges, and an 800-room Hyatt Regency hotel. By 2020, 300,000 people are expected to live…

  • When It Breaks

    When It Breaks

    When the side of the building falls, it is a spring morning, April, not yet dawn. And there is no warning. The crack was there for a long time, all up the side, visible on every floor. Everything’s broken, all broken. You can’t worry about these things. What Sondra’s mother told her: You stop worrying….