In the Empty Quarter…do I need to be told? Hydrate or die?
Landscape design, construction and maintenance under the sun on the world’s largest continuous sand desert–the Empty Quarter–the Rub al Khali. Is it like…just another day at the office?
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pEdiKZuwoGE&w=560&h=315]
I’ve been writing a landscape story titled, The 23 Club. Above, I have summarized it in a five minute clip.
In this story an American expatriate landscape architect confronts the strange multi-cultural realities of Arabian Peninsula work. Those social peculiarities layer with the powerful presence of the Empty Quarter landscape…the Empty Quarter, an enigmatic sand desert which, alone by its very presence, negates life.
The multi-media clip opens a window on the physical geography and cultural issues that swirl about the story–the construction of an iconic five star destination resort in that oil-rich, sand desert which, until recently, had been populated only by the transient Bedu.
If you are attracted to ethnobotany or plants, gardens and landscapes and have the wonder; but you do not have the time or money to travel to the Arabian Peninsula for these, then, just be glad to be here.
…Irish roots work magic in the forest…
I walked through the forest. Neither the date, nor the day mattered. It was in the north. It was in the mountains. Spruce forest. Densely packed, tall trees, more than 100 feet each.
I walked a ridge in that forest. The canopy sheltered. I wasn’t cold. Somewhere, way up there, was sun. Thin, narrow, fractured beams twinkled and sparkled near my feet.
Delicate cloud edges whisped. They came close…on the edges of forming or dissipating or both…here and there…from time to time.
I was tired from walking and climbing. I looked for a place to sit. My Irish roots have always worked magic for me in forests. So it was today when I was invited to sit down and take the shelter of a mushroom.
The ground was soft and the mushroom stem gently molded itself to my spine and rib cage. I was comfortable. My breathing became easy. It slowed. The rhythm eased my eyelids shut.
Try this.
The next time you step outdoors to take a walk, imagine you see indoors and outdoors according to these Landscape Architecture Corollaries:
Corollary 1. In the beginning there was one: landscape. Landscape harbored danger for humans.
Corollary 2. Humans constructed shelters. Then there were two: landscape, and, the shelters in the landscape.
Corollary 3. And today still, humans essentially move through the landscape from shelter to shelter.
Corollary 4. Architecture is shelter.
Corollary 5. Landscape is everything else in which the shelters sit.
Corollary 6. Landscape Architecture is the dramatic craft concerning the quality of experience, during the movement of humans from shelter to shelter through the landscape.
Then when you come back indoors, ask yourself about the quality of your walk, according to those Landscape Architecture Corollaries.
Might be fun?!
The various clouds appear, disappear, move and change at many different speeds simultaneously–and today they hid the giants of Jungfrau, Monch and Eiger–normally visible in this frame.
I am working on a story, The Orient Express, whose beginning and dénouement occur in the mountains surrounding Mürren in Switzerland.
This landscape inspires me because its very presence is mysterious–a consuming presence that forces me to interact with an elusive and overwhelming mystery…without beginning, without end…
Landscapes such as this are beyond my words.
Filled my lungs again and again until I became inside out dizzy with its sweetness…then I made a mistake.
I read a newspaper. In the article, I was warned that too many cow farts would doom life as I was enjoying it. Naw…ain’t gonna believe that am I? Spring is here. I’m going out for a walk before I miss it!
Then fruit–off the tree, taken by stealth, enjoyed to the fullest–oh those joys of youth…of anytime. And Johnny Appleseed–share the fruit, share the beauty, share the health. Look at that tree–walk over to it…
Mountain water–glacial rivers, snow melt–collects in the lowlands…bathes the farm lands, the feet of the plants. Look at the rich mixed forests. And look, if you will, at the gap between the two mountains in the background–it is the portal through which has emerged and withdrawn many times the Lower Grindelwald Glacier–massive ice flow–paintings by Caspar Wolf, 1735-1783.
All white. Is it purity or are my eyes influenced by my hopes and dreams?
I almost missed…Spring: the last snow…
We all have been busy in the northern hemisphere as winter expired into spring–I too, have been busy–so much so that I almost missed that winter into spring transition–so here begins a series of transition images from these Alpine slopes that capture that transition.
…too busy…almost missed Spring…1…next
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Czy0pXRRZcs?feature=player_embedded&w=640&h=360]
This recent hi-res video of Yves Rossy flying his jetpack around Dubai and into the Empty Quarter speaks for itself, Jetman Dubai, Young Feathers.
Erik Chalmers, American born and bred professional landscape architect, used all his skills to manage these very large, complex iconic projects in the Arabian Peninsula. He knew that the multi-cultural and technical complexities required not simply a left side of the brain number crunching iron will; but they also required what he called…performance art.
What is the magic–what are the skills required to succeed on these huge complex projects being designed and built in such challenging and downright dangerous environments? Erik Chalmers’ post project notes give insight into his successes.
But Erik Chalmers, for the first time in decades on an assignment without his wife Madge, was about to learn if he had done one project too many and lost his one true emotional certainty, his one true root.
Chalmers felt what he had missed over the past eight months–the fullness of the water, the plants, the soil, the wholeness–it was holistic, it was an existential comfort.
Following is a short narrative from Chapter 13: Pilgrimage, that imparts some of the landscape connections in The 23 Club.
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The 23 Club
Immersed in the contemporary culture of Dubai and Abu Dhabi, against the backdrop of the Empty Quarter, The 23 Club tells the inside story of how an iconic project gets built in the oil rich, Gulf region of the Arabian Peninsula.
Table of Contents
The Last Kilometer
Chalmers was returning after eight months on his own. Nobody in the UAE called him Erik. It had been eight months of Chalmers. Eight months of taking care of his own meals, his own shopping, his own laundry. It was the little stuff that informed his daily life culture. It was the little stuff that built up…big time.
As the train took Chalmers closer to his stop, his thoughts turned to Madge. He was returning to his shared spaces, his shared life. Chalmers was becoming Erik again. He missed Madge; but he was uncertain how this return would be. Long distance communications always filtered, always blurred emotions.
Chalmers recalled the worst of his time away…he had not been able to hide his week in the hospital from Madge. He was supposed to have gone to Singapore for silk; but her worst fear came true. He had been injured in an automobile accident and hospitalized. She suffered to hear about it from distance. Sorry just did not cover it…from either side.
He arrived at Lauterbrunnen and thought, it won’t be long now.
He transferred from the train to the funicular. It was late in the afternoon and the sky was overcast. This time of year there was little difference between the valley village and the small plateau up where he and Madge lived. Fall plants were already naked of leaves. The first big snow could come any day. The temperature 5ºC or below; frost threatened.
As the funicular rose, Chalmers recalled his excitement nearly nine months ago when he was asked to help fix the first five star resort destination deep in the Empty Quarter. It had been about the challenge. It had been about his joy in providing beautiful gardens for people.
Now the job was complete. The gardens were a success. The owner was satisfied, happy. That world was finished. Now he was home.
And he was worried. Had he traded off something of emotion and trust, something he had held closely with Madge, just to build a couple gardens?
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(to be continued)
© 2015 Edward Flaherty
**Blatant Plug: If you find this writing about humans and landscape intriguing, please share it with your like-minded friends. Thank you.**
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