Mega-Iqbal with love, forever,
never end! Yes, a manifestation of graffiti sign pledges of a couple stuck on
bridge concrete steel of Pasupati, which connecting Pasteur main road (Dr. Junjunan
area) with Surapati road. This phenomenon is just one of the hundreds, maybe
thousands of graffiti on the new icon of Bandung that extends above the valley
Cikapundung, with a length of 2.8 kilometers and width of 30 to 60 meters.
Social phenomena in prohibited public space can be a marker of not
unaccommodated society's aspirations in the official media nor channels.
A lot of living space extends
both above and below the bridge built on this foreign aid. At night, usually
for the couple in heavy romance, they used a motorcycle or vehicle then parked
right amid the bridge just for free 'night eyewash.' However, they are often
deliberately dangerous vehicles parked right in the middle lane bridge back and
forth between cars. The threat does come from the riders but motorcycle gang
often becomes another threat when midnight arrives. If in its tragic moments, it
usually occurs robbery, mugging, and murder.
The new iconic bridge of
this Bandungnese is also a bitter witness for the pedestrian hit-run victim or
the driver. Desperate persons also take their part to committed suicide and
also occurred here. Just below the bridge, we could see a variety of life
lessons: there is a pedicab driver with a steering wheel paddle for survival,
illegal parking fields, the garbage collectors, the bluesy transgender singers
in the daytime, tanjidor monkeys (beggar with a traditional instrument as a medium
to gather pennies from drivers compassion) in the hot sun, a medium for murals
artists, vandals, and criminal action, hawkers who fight with clouds of carbon
monoxide, and various other stories.
Bridge construction of
Pasupati Bandung adopted a cable-stayed model, namely the bridge model that
relies on steel wires hung from one or several main pillars. Besides
providing aesthetic value, this construction is considered a compromise
solution to minimize land acquisition in dense settlements under the bridge.
Another bridge with cable-stayed construction is The Millau Viaduct in France, the world's highest bridge.
At first glance, this new
icon provides fresh views in the middle of density residential and messes urban
governance development with contaminated watersheds. Although trapped between
the irony, though, there is still love signage like 'Mega-Iqbal with love,
forever never end!' who pinned their graffiti. Public space graffitied it's
more than a personal statement; moreover, it's the cultural symptoms of a particular
area upon a time and sphere.
The signified of watersheds
under the Pasupati's bridge with concentrated colored water, super tight
shelter and home, storefront mall, hotels, and other urban
socio-visual-signages become markers and signifiers 200th years the Bandung
city. From Bandung with love (and irony).
Photo and words by Aokhi.
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