{"id":2585,"date":"2024-02-12T16:35:39","date_gmt":"2024-02-12T15:35:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.andreacalestani.it\/urban-stories\/trip-to-the-east\/numb\/"},"modified":"2024-02-17T17:05:20","modified_gmt":"2024-02-17T16:05:20","slug":"numb","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/www.andreacalestani.it\/en\/urban-stories\/trip-to-the-east\/numb\/","title":{"rendered":"Numb"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"wpb-content-wrapper\">[vc_row][vc_column width=&#8221;1\/4&#8243;][vc_column_text css=&#8221;.vc_custom_1707818017106{margin-right: 50px !important;}&#8221;]Why did that child, waiting in line, patiently, reading a book (made of paper!) strike me so much? A subtle perception: the ordinary transcended into the exceptional, as sometimes often happens without realizing it. But photography is a stubborn witness of our visual sequences, often fleeting and soon declassified. I looked around and took photographs, and in fact normality was something else. A virtual <em>social<\/em> alienation that permeates every aspect of daily life: communication, sociality, public health, faith according to the widespread principles of Confucianism and Taoism.<\/p>\n<p>Masks on the face; the compulsive obsessive obstinacy attracted to individual electronic devices; the pretence inside the temples and in front of the altars wedged in the most hidden corners of the streets asking for indulgences. A general conduct of people that soon convinced me to think about a kind of collective &#8220;<em>anesthesia<\/em>&#8220;. No verbal relationship: no one used their cell phone to talk to someone. On the underground, curious, I craned my neck to find out what they were doing glued to those phones: they <em>chatted,<\/em> played games, watched TV series and sporting events. Resembling real-life relationships moved to the intangible \u201c<em>clouds\u201d<\/em> of the web.<\/p>\n<p>When I took these photographs, the thirtieth anniversary of the Tiananmen Square events was a month and a half away. I remember well the images that the media spread around at the time of the events: of a proud population, who expressed with all their strength an inalienable desire for freedom and self-determination. Well, the people I was meeting and observing now was not the same people as back then, I told myself. And the concern was confirmed when our tour guide in Beijing, to get to the &#8220;<em>Forbidden City<\/em>&#8220;, bypassed Tiananmen Square; instilling the perception that, after thirty years, it was a taboo place.[\/vc_column_text][vc_empty_space height=&#8221;16px&#8221;][vc_btn title=&#8221;Back&#8221; color=&#8221;black&#8221; size=&#8221;sm&#8221; i_icon_fontawesome=&#8221;fas fa-arrow-alt-circle-left&#8221; add_icon=&#8221;true&#8221; link=&#8221;url:https%3A%2F%2Fwww.andreacalestani.it%2Fen%2Furban-stories%2Ftrip-to-the-east%2F|title:Trip%20to%20the%20East|&#8221;][\/vc_column][vc_column width=&#8221;3\/4&#8243;][vc_masonry_media_grid grid_id=&#8221;vc_gid:1707832207769-17e52e98ff693b6d79de3d74d9b5c6e1-1&#8243; css=&#8221;.vc_custom_1707818644060{border-top-width: 3px !important;border-right-width: 3px !important;border-bottom-width: 3px !important;border-left-width: 3px !important;border-left-color: #ffffff !important;border-left-style: initial !important;border-right-color: #ffffff !important;border-right-style: initial !important;border-top-color: #ffffff !important;border-top-style: initial !important;border-bottom-color: #ffffff !important;border-bottom-style: initial !important;}&#8221; include=&#8221;2558,2560,2562,2564,2566,2568,2570,2572,2574,2576,2578,2580,2582,2532,2544,2534,2536,2538,2540,2542,2546,2548,2550,2552,2554,2556&#8243;][\/vc_column][\/vc_row]\n<\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>[vc_row][vc_column width=&#8221;1\/4&#8243;][vc_column_text css=&#8221;.vc_custom_1707818017106{margin-right: 50px !important;}&#8221;]Why did that child, waiting in line, patiently, reading a book&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2472,"parent":2530,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-2585","page","type-page","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.andreacalestani.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/2585","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.andreacalestani.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.andreacalestani.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.andreacalestani.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.andreacalestani.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2585"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.andreacalestani.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/2585\/revisions"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.andreacalestani.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/2530"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.andreacalestani.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2472"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.andreacalestani.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2585"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}