Tag: Europe

Values for survival: Vanishing homelands Bangladesh and Venice

I first became aware of the presence of climate refugees from Bangladesh in Venice, Italy, through a remark, Amitav Ghosh made in his book “The Great Derangement: Climate Change and the Unthinkable” from 2016. There the Indian-US-American novelist notes that Bengali was the second most heard langauge in Venice, due to the many merchants and shop clerks originally from Bangladesh and other Indian regions.

Why Venice? Ghosh suspects that “coastal people” seek refuge in other coastal towns, making the lagoon city Venice a preferable destination for Bangladeshis in Europe. While this seems like a convincing argument, and makes for a poetic story within the overall climate narrative of his book, I am a bit skeptical of this observation. While it is certainly true that the Bangladeshi community ranges among the ten largest migrant communities in Italy – with numbers anywhere between 146.000 and 400.000 – I have not found any indication that Bangladeshis were more likely to settle in Venice than other major cities like Rome or Milan. Venice has a long history of migration and currently an estimated 15% migrant citizens. Whether Ghosh’s observation is accurate or not, it is clear that the inhabitants of both places, Bangladesh and Venice, have a shared history and possibly understanding and knowledge of floodings.

image by H. Mamataz from “Vanishing Homelands”

The Oral History project “Vanishing Homelands”, that was realized by journalist and documentary film maker George Kurian, migration acitvist Hasna Hena Mamataz and architect Marco Moretto for the 17. Biennale di Venezia, brings the two communities together: native Venetians and migrated Bangladeshis. I find the project to be a great example of comparative urbanism and a very fine piece of climate journalism. The three authors practice the same approach, I am pursuing with this project: to connect communities challenged by climate change in different parts of the globe through shared experiences and biographical and cultural backgrounds. I am very thankful to their work, as it shows quite lively, how – to use George Kurian’s words – we can try to “meet each other respectfully as equals, and how can we interact meaningfully, to find values for survival?”

Image by V. Rossi and G. Moretto from “Vanishing Homelands”

Their text focuses on biographical reports and the immediate experience of flooding, economic hardship and flight, omiting any furtherer analysis or speculation, how this shared experience can create political solidarity and emancipation. This seems like the natural next step, to formulate a supra-national alliance of front line communities like the Bangladeshi and the Venetians based on and building on journalistic work like the one by Kurian, Mamataz and Moretto.

The full text of Vanishing Homelands is available here. All images are from the text.

Time and Tide Bells

Since 2008 artist and bell-maker Marcus Vergette has been developing the multi-site installation series Time and Tide Bells in various coastal spots across the UK. The installations consist of two bells, one upside down on top of the other, set up in tidal zones so that the waves ring the lower bell during high tide. The work references the many legends of sunken cities of which the church bells can allegedly be heard ringing on the coast on certain sundays. (see also the post here)

In 2010 the project installed also a bell in London. Meanwhile there are seven other “Time and Tide Bells”installed across the island. You can check for the locations here.

The first Bell on the coast of Devon, South England.

All images are from the project’s website.

The Bells of Aberdovey

A common theme in Northern European flood myths are the church bells of submerged cities. This motive can be found all along the ccoasts of Brittany, Wales, England, Germany and Poland. The popular folk song “Bells of Aberdovey” relates to the legend of the sunken kingdom Gwydneu (more commonly known as Cantr’er Gwaelod) off the coast of Wales. The song is most likely not an original folksong at all but a composition from 1785 for an English Opera with lyrics in English not Welsh. The today popular Welsh version was first printed in 1905.

About the motif of submerged bells see also the art installation by Marcus Vergette in this post.

“The sea has covered the plain of Gwydneu”

A Welsh legend tells the story of the sunken land Gwydneu (also known as “Gwydno” and later Cantre’r Gwaelod, “antref Gwaelod”, “Cantref y Gwaelod” and in English “: “The Lowland Hundred”) off the coast of Wales, UK.

It first appears in the Llyfr Du Caerfyrddin, considered to be the oldest book written in Welsh and dating from the middle of the 13. Century. Several later and differing versions of the legend exist. But as the BBC here writes:

“Whichever version of the legend you choose, it is said that if you listen closely you can hear the bells of the lost city ringing out from under the sea, especially on quiet Sunday mornings, and particularly if you’re in Aberdyfi [also known as Aberdovy], which is famous in Welsh folk legend as being the nearest place on dry land to Cantre’r Gwaelod.”

Here is the poem from the “Llyfr Du Caerfyrddin” in a modern English translation. The name “Seithenin” in the first line refers to one of two sons of the legendary ruler of Gwydneu, Gwyddno Garanhir. It was the princes’ duty to guard the floodgates that protected the low lying land:

Seithenhin, stand thou forth,
And behold hte billowy rows;
The sea has covered the plain of Gwydneu.

Accursed be the damsel,
Who, after the wailing,
Let loose the Fountain of Venus, the raging deep.

Accursed be the maiden,
Who, after the conflict, let loose
The fountain of Venus, the desolating sea.

A great cry from the roaring sea arises above the summit of the rampart,
To-day even to God does the supplication come!
Common after excess there ensues restraint.

A cry from the roaring sea overpowers me this night,
And it is not easy to relieve me;
Common after excess succeeds adversity.

A cry from the roaring sea comes upon the winds;
The mighty and beneficent God has caused it!
Common after excess is want.

A cry from the roaring sea
Impels me from my resting-place this night;
Common after excess is far-extending destruction.

The grave of Seithenhin the weak-minded
Between Caer Cenedir and the shore
Of the great sea and Cinran.

This is the online source. For the full book go here.

See also the posts on Marcus Vergette‘s art installation and the song The Bells of Aberdovey.

Similar legends from Northern Europe are the kingdom Ys in Brittany, the sunken palace Llys Helig in Wales or the land Lyoness in Cornwall.

Cohabitation and technical failure

Berlin once had the biggest, cylindric aquarium in the world, the Auqua Dome. In fact it was a hotel lobby dome, a modern cathedral with a giant tank filled with over 1.500 fish in the middle. The architectural concept is a twist on the submarine city, as we can find them in countless sci-fi ilustrations. (Or Jacques Cousteaus Conshelf habitat)

In December 2022 the tank ripped open and 250.000 gallons (1.000 m3) of well tempered salt water burst out into the – luckily then empty – lobby and through the doors into the street. The hotel is located right next to one of Berlin’s many canals, so countless fish probably found their way into the cold sweet water of the canal before dying.

Very few press photos show any of the unfortunate inhabitants of the aquarium. Never the less it’s a rare moment of unexpected human-animal interaction on a massive scale, a na-tech-disaster that did not really involve nature as we know it, but a domesticated, high-tech fantasy of nature.

all pictures are from: https://www.rbb24.de/panorama/beitrag/2022/12/aquarium-berlin-zerplatzt-schaden-wasser-hotel.html

The case for culture

In a very nice, comprehensive and extensive article, Dutch author Thijs Weststeijn, describes the role of culture in forming a climate conscience. The article not only describes the threats to cultural heritage the world over, particularly flooding, and the efforts to save it, but he also makes a case for using cultural heritage to create awareness and ultimately climate action. Here are two short quotes:

“Perhaps an awareness that the building blocks of one’s own civilisation are under threat might mobilise new groups, for whom the disappearing of coral reefs, say, remains too abstract or remote. Behavioural scientists point out that, when confronted with overwhelming amounts of scientific data, such as that continuously produced by climatologists, people actually become less likely to take action (see Kari Norgaard’s book Living in Denial: Climate Change, Emotions, and Everyday Life, 2011). Instead, people have to be affected on a deep emotional, psychological and spiritual level, which suggests that the layered sensations we experience in encounters with heritage – historical connection, aesthetic appreciation, and solastalgia – might motivate people in new ways.”

“A focus on cultural heritage also offers new perspectives on human agency in the face of the climate crisis. This heritage has, after all, been made by humans and so by human hands we should be able to save it. Besides, historic heritage, while transcending the lifespan of one or more human generations, is less intractable to us than the ‘deep time’ associated with the evolution and extinction of coral reefs and other endangered creatures.”

Weststeijn also sketches future scenarios for cities and cultural sites. Another excerpt:

“One can imagine the partially flooded centres of Venice, Hoi An or Miami becoming particularly attractive tourist destinations for the duration of their disappearing (in a state of ‘dark euphoria’ described by the futurist Bruce Sterling in 2009), before turning into a diver’s paradise. And perhaps from the perspective of ‘deep time’ the man-made polder landscape was never a feasible project to begin with, and Dutch hydrologists might eventually, with a sigh of relief, surrender their lands back to the sea. Such visions are not necessarily long-term scenarios since, now, even the possibility of handing our heritage to the next generation appears impossible.”

M-o-s-e

The flood protection system that was installed in 2021 to protect Venice from rising sea level effects is named MOSE (for Modulo Sperimentale Elettromeccanico). The name was chosen to allude to the story of Moses dividing the Red Sea to save the judaic tribe in the Jewish and Christian Old Testament. The plans for MOSE were already introduced in the 1980s but it’s completion took amlmost 40 years.

A flooded St Mark’s Square by St Mark’s Basilica in Venice, 15 November 2019. Photo by Filippo Monteforte/AFP/Getty
Venice during highwater. © Andrea Merola/dpa
The M-O-S-E Sea Barrier

In the same manner is the sea wall that is currently in planning for Jakarta named – and shaped – after an ancient myth: The giant bird Garuda.

Both projects show, that the municipalities believed in the role of cultural history in the political communication of climata adaptation measures.

Atlantis by Donovan

Saint Guénolé, abbé de Landévennec, sauvant le roi Gradlon lors de la submersion de la ville d’Ys

Stained glass window from 1917 representing “Saint Guénolé, abbé de Landévennec, sauvant le roi Gradlon lors de la submersion de la ville d’Ys” in the Church of Saint-Germain in Kerlaz.

Information about the legend of the sunken kingdom Ys and it’s assumed location.

Ar Roue Gralon ha kear Is

A bretonic folksong about the sinking of the City Ys on the Atlantic Coast of Brittany.
Original Lyrics
French Translation