A Picture Tells A Thousand Words

I don't even think a blog is necessary for this picture. It is so self explanatory.

It's 10:08 PM on a Tuesday night, under some trees on the Promenade, sitting four to a table, these men are playing cards, smoking, talking and interacting. There's no laptop, there's no cellular phone, no technology. Just personal time spent with good friends. Maybe even strangers that have many things in common. This is the essence of the city. The picture speaks of the city and the culture of the city so well. 

Lewis Mumford (1938), in his study The Culture of Cities, speaks about the city being the form and symbol of an integrated social relationship: it is the seat of the temple, the market, the hall of justice and the academy of writing. Here in the city, the goods of civilisation are multiplied and manifolded, here is where human experience is transformed into visible signs, symbols, patterns of conduct, system of order. 

This picture says "I'm home. I'm comfortable." Public Space seems to inspire virtue in several forms: civic pride, social contact, especially form people of diverse backgrounds; a sense of freedom and finally, common sense."

Sharon Zukin (1995, 42) says "the city remains a theatre for 'mingling with strangers.'" The effect is the evolution of a shared citizenship across the urban spectrum - class, gender, ethnic and sexual - constructed around the everyday social confidence that comes from individuals and communities making use of the right to access a public space shared with others." 

Public Spaces are "the primary sites of public culture: they are the window into a city's soul... Public spaces are important because they are places where strangers mingle feely... As both site and sight, meeting place and social staging ground, public spaces enable us to conceptualise and represent the city - to make an ideology of its receptivity to strangers, tolerance of difference and opportunities to enter a fully socialised life, both civic and commercial." 

Everyday street life, different, simple interactions like this one makes up the shared public culture. Places where people are free and places we all can enjoy. 

Whether we like playing cards, smoking, or just enjoying the ambiance; it's ours to enjoy.

Zukin, Sharon. The Culture of Cities.  Cambridge: Blackwell Publishers, 1995.