Rebirth

I remember my youth. So well, in fact, that my memory exagerates events exponentially, as any frequent and astute reader will be aware of. But even my over-active memories of my own experienced civil war are no match for the history lessons available by walking the streets of Mostar.

Sure, a number of buildings have been full repaired, no visible damage whatsoever. But a number of inhabited buildings still show the bullet holes and shell damage of recent history. And peppered between both of these, the empty husks of buildings, glass shattered, walls appearing as a strange war-time stucco.

Ah, life.

Is there an architecture school that teaches to build for civil war? To consider not just what the building will look like immediately upon completion, but upon destruction too? All my life i have been shown the end result, the death toll of countless buildings. Did the Colliseum architect, Pompeii's legions, the Mayans, the Khmer, consider what their structures would look like, covered with lava, dirt, trees, time?