Abandoned
Upper Secondary
JUDGE’S
CHOICE
‘A story with a message: a place that is unforgettable, but more importantly, one that should never be forgotten because of what it means. It
is strongly expressed and strongly structured, firmly directed towards its moral conclusion. It is a description of a place that will expand and
endure in the mind of the reader.’
Home
Global Classroom Creative Writing Anthology 2015
It was a city devoid of life, devoid of purpose. Its inhabitants had long since fled, the entire area had been sealed off, and everything had fallen into a state of disrepair - from
the flaking paint on once white facades, to the rusted wrecks of cars scattered through the streets, everything had the feeling of neglect about it. The smell of sewage and
decay, mingling with the metallic odour of rust, gave the industrial district a choking, unpleasant atmosphere. The buildings had been transformed by the winds of time into
ghoulish masks, smashed windows becoming staring eye-sockets, unhinged doors becoming gaping maws. The asphalt was cracked, pitted with holes and indentations,
making any sort of driving unthinkable - not that the cars were in any state to drive, or that there was anyone to drive them. The walls were disfigured with cracks and graffiti,
and some of the roofs had begun to cave in, though for most buildings, the weathered concrete still held. But even that would, sooner or later, be withered away by the
constant battering of the wind and rain, until eventually there would be nothing left save a mound of rubble.
The factories and industrial plants that had once hummed with activity now stood silent and empty. Chimneys stretched towards the sky like crooked fingers, and pipes crisscrossed the walls like red-brown snakes. Most of the machinery had been dismantled and taken away, but here and there you could glimpse a cracked boiler, or an unhinged
piston. These mechanisms that had once worked to a steady rhythm, providing electricity, grinding materials, or packaging goods, now stood eerily silent - forgotten,
abandoned, destined to wither away under the elements’ relentless assault, and spend the rest of their meaningless existence in these desolate halls.
If someone were to walk past these empty shells that had once housed life, past the hauntingly empty expanses of concrete and asphalt, they would