Thomas Brag Instagram – About 6 weeks ago we flew to the country of Cyprus to learn about and document the tragic ghost town of Varosha, an abandoned city 3 times the size of Chernobyl. Once considered the “jewel of the Mediterranean” now left abandoned for 47 years after a tragic conflict erupted on the island.
The picture here is from the previously international airport, also abandoned for 47 years, now located inside of a UN guarded buffer zone between the northern and southern sides of the island.
This was an overwhelming experience to both document and figure out how to create a complete film about, it really challenged me as a story-teller. Jumping into an experience honestly quite ignorant about the emotional charge still existing within this conflict, only to have my eyes opened to a completely different reality.
Yet in many other ways, it was heartbreaking to hear the same story I’ve heard in so many other places: Groups that were once one, pinned against each other into a conflict that benefited neither side.
The main lesson I got from this I mentioned in my outro voice over, is that remembering that as humans we really are on the same team. Larger forces are driving us apart and with the increase of the tunnel vision social media feeds we now have it’s becoming increasingly harder to understand the other side.
I hope that stories like this can outweigh some of the divisive rhetoric seen everywhere else and plant a seed of open-mindedness into those who watch it ✌️
Thank you to @johnny.harris for initiating this trip and taking me along on this experience and thanks to @nathanieldrew_ for, well, nothing really he just showed up so 🤷♂️
📸 by our very own @brycepery | Posted on 19/Oct/2021 16:29:36
