"Coney Island is the best place to play handball and the worst place to lose your money" is how the story of “The life of Mecca” begins.
I arrived at Coney Island beach promenade, on 1.1, the first day of 2020, long before the Covid-19 erupted in New York.
My work method in New York was to get into the subway, pick a different line each day and continue with it until its final stop. I imagined it would be the last place people would want to go or live, away from the tourist center, and where I could find interesting and colorful people.
My work method in New York was to get into the subway, pick a different line each day and continue with it until its final stop. I imagined it would be the last place people would want to go or live, away from the tourist center, and where I could find interesting and colorful people.
As expected, I was advised not to go to some specific places, and certainly not to walk there alone at night. So I took extra care and made sure to start my way back to my apartment when the light began to set down.
While wandering along the coastline and behind the famous Coney Island amusement park, I was drawn to a concrete court with geometric shapes and a background of gray and large buildings that carried my imagination to the Soviet Union of the 1950's.
As I approached the court's entrance I saw a number of people playing handball, as Americans call it. They seemed to me a tough group with a bit of a hostile gaze, exactly the crowd I was looking for.
Approaching hesitantly, I started taking pictures. For some reason, the people there seemed to have seen quite a number of photographers throughout their lives and didn't pay much attention to me. I lowered my camera and looked for a pair of eyes, looking to get closer and try to make some conversation or interact with the people. When this does not happening, I usually sit down on one of the benches, and spend some time letting the people around get used to my presence so it might become easier.
The problem was that while I was taking pictures of people getting into the water an hour earlier, in the peak of winter, my legs got completely wet. Without socks and replacement shoes, I began to feel my legs freeze and become numb.
Approaching hesitantly, I started taking pictures. For some reason, the people there seemed to have seen quite a number of photographers throughout their lives and didn't pay much attention to me. I lowered my camera and looked for a pair of eyes, looking to get closer and try to make some conversation or interact with the people. When this does not happening, I usually sit down on one of the benches, and spend some time letting the people around get used to my presence so it might become easier.
The problem was that while I was taking pictures of people getting into the water an hour earlier, in the peak of winter, my legs got completely wet. Without socks and replacement shoes, I began to feel my legs freeze and become numb.
While trying to warm my legs I saw a man sitting on the bench, like me, and staring in the air. I approached and began a conversation with him.
He looked a bit confused and disheveled. He seemed to spend most of his time on the street.
He looked a bit confused and disheveled. He seemed to spend most of his time on the street.
To my surprise, the questions he was asking me were a little different from the impression he had initially left on me. They were poignant and practical. After realising that he was talking to a professional photographer in the television and film industry, he pulled out a crumpled sheet of paper with a print of a screenshot from the Internet, and told me about a film he had participated and starred in, a film that won awards around the world.
"Yeah right, you participated in an award-winning movie. Marlon Brando, no less…" Anyway, the conversation was becoming more and more intimate, but as time went by, I began to feel my legs were already in a difficult state. I no longer had any sensation of them.
I photographed the crumpled page and assured him that I would watch the film, thinking that the man was sending me to someone else's movie or that he was hallucinated.
I ran in the direction of the subway, under hysterical stress, certain that this would be the last day I would ever walk on my feet. It was a sure amputation, or high-grade cold burns, with nothing to do…
I photographed the crumpled page and assured him that I would watch the film, thinking that the man was sending me to someone else's movie or that he was hallucinated.
I ran in the direction of the subway, under hysterical stress, certain that this would be the last day I would ever walk on my feet. It was a sure amputation, or high-grade cold burns, with nothing to do…
Finally, I got to the subway and searched for the name of the movie he gave me. To my utter amazement I saw the movie on the court where I had met him. I felt a slap to the face: Why didn't I believe him in the first place? Why this suspicion? I drive up all the way to the final train station in search of something, and yet I don't let the situation penetrate me as much as I had wished?
Thinking back to that particular moment when he unfolded the crumpled page to show me, as if holding a real treasure in his pocket, I thought of the human need to feel one belonged to a particular place or community. I realized there was something aesthetically appealing in that court that attracted me and others. As revealed in the movie, people with a difficult life may find a sense of community, home and belonging there. The Handball game seems to become a remedy that allows people to feel as a normative functioning part of society…almost...
I guess that coney island is really the best place to play hand ball in the world, Too bad I have no idea how to play this game...
Thinking back to that particular moment when he unfolded the crumpled page to show me, as if holding a real treasure in his pocket, I thought of the human need to feel one belonged to a particular place or community. I realized there was something aesthetically appealing in that court that attracted me and others. As revealed in the movie, people with a difficult life may find a sense of community, home and belonging there. The Handball game seems to become a remedy that allows people to feel as a normative functioning part of society…almost...
I guess that coney island is really the best place to play hand ball in the world, Too bad I have no idea how to play this game...