Breaking News:

X


Skip to main content

Left to rot: the new global effort to preserve lost monuments

From a railway run by children in Ljubljana to brutalist monuments in the Balkans, the Nonument Group maps abandoned 20th-century architecture

When he was 14, Ljubljana resident Janko Vrhunc spent every Sunday training to drive a steam locomotive. “We had to sign in, then check all the wagons, check the train, then talk to all the workers,” recalls Vrhunc, now 84. “I asked the train driver: is the fire strong enough? I asked the conductor: did we sell enough tickets to depart? Are the uniforms in order?”

After three months Vrhunc and about 20 other schoolchildren were deemed ready to run the small-gauge Pioneer Railway under adult supervision. “We moved the train from Ljubljana main station,” says Vrhunc. “The train driver stepped aside and let us do it. This is how … one of us fell under the wheels and lost a leg.”

Continue reading...

from World news | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2SVgIBG

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Australia cast itself as the hero of East Timor. But it was US military might that got troops in | Paul Daley

Newly released diplomatic cables show the realpolitik behind the scenes as Indonesian militias prepared to torch Dili Australia’s precise role in bringing independence to Timor-Leste two decades ago continues to simmer as unsettled business at the heart of modern Australian diplomatic and military history. Twenty years is the blink of an eye, of course. And my memories of having a front-row seat on the Australian domestic politics, and the diplomatic and military movements preceding and following the East Timorese autonomy ballot, are vivid. Continue reading... from World news | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2HxB0Ni

Trump says Hispanic adviser 'looks more like a Wasp than I do'

President asks CNN commentator Steve Cortes whether he loves US or Hispanics more at New Mexico rally At a rally in New Mexico, Donald Trump implied that one of his supporters was too light-skinned to be Hispanic. The US president said of Steve Cortes, a member of his Hispanic advisory council: “He happens to be Hispanic, but I’ve never quite figured it out, because he looks more like a Wasp than I do.” Continue reading... from World news | The Guardian https://ift.tt/31qCz7G