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They say they’re rebuilding it, which is a blessing. It is located in northern Armenia, on the edge of this endless, flat valley surrounded by mountains. So flat and endless that you can’t even see the mountains on the far side. If you drained all the water out of the Red Sea and found a city at the bottom of it, that would be like living in Gyumri. In 1988 it was destroyed in an earthquake. Seven years I ended up living there for two years. Nothing had been rebuilt. Whole city blocks lay in ruins — factories collapsed, streets with ripples in them, schools where classes of hundreds of children were killed in an instant. They’re finally rebuilding the city, I’m told, which is good, but it shall always be a ghost city to me, devastated yet beautiful, like our souls.
memories of my ghost sista 
Places that are of no interest to those except the residents go and stay gone. Too true. There are places in East Cleveland, the ghetto – another earth quake…the lights flickered a bit – thought I was done for the day – where the sidewalks are still smashed from armored vehicles that sealed the place off during the Glenville and Hough riots in 1968 and 1969. The foundations of burned houses still there…piles of rubble. Their constituency (sp.?) is not of much value, so their ghetto stays smashed 40 years later. No international aid organization interested. Loved it when Castro offered to help the U.S. after Katrina…too funny.
Later…
Yes, Detroit suffered in the same way as Cleveland. Isn’t it interesting that if one of our cities was destroyed in war or a terrorist attack it would be rebuilt as soon as possible but if we destroy it through apathy and refusing to spend any money on it then can sit there as a wasteland for generations before anything is done? Ah, progress!
Hadn’t thought of that. New Orleans is coming around slow – don’t know why rebuild a city there, but.. But, they’re putting some effort into the project. The natural decay doesn’t even receive incompetant attention.
Later…
Ah, poor New Orleans! Yes, it is a long slow process for that city to get back on its feet. Did you get the chance to see Beasts of the Southern Wild (film)? I won’t give away any plot twists except to say it was a novel idea to claim that the levees protecting the city broke due to an alligator stuffed with TNT. It was a good movie with one of the few children actors who can actually act.
Not another conspiracy theory from the deep South. Guess I had to expect another one…been a while. If another oil rig blows it will all go away, the filler for a news program that runs a bit fast and needs an odd fill story.
Later…
people’s ability to not only come up with bizarre and outlandish ideas and then convince themselves that it must be the truth is impressive. What was the conspiracy theory that you heard?
It started with Stone’s JFK, then all the wild accusations that New Orleans was allowed to be destroyed – especially the poorere wards. Bobby Jindal used to come up with one a day. And then there were the religous Jeremiads, saying New Orleans had it coming for…blah…blah, and blah.
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True, the whole “wrath of god” argument might work well in certain horror movies but just makes you come off sounding insane and heartless in any other context.
Happens every Sunday, and Saturdays, and sometimes five times a day.
Later…
too true! too true!