The Remembrance Train by haniehnavipour from iran

Life goes on. We never know when, where and how this journey ends… maybe in a beautiful morning in spring or maybe in a cold winter night in a battle of a war… who knows…. Who knows when something shows up in our lives which can change it forever…. become an inception of a new era in our lives or the final step of the life adventure. But one thing is for sure, the journey goes on…you don’t know when you saw the “train” and got on …and you will never know which station it’ll stop…

It was a regular day…just like the other days…woke up in the morning... got ready and headed to work… When I was walking in the street the sky was a little dark but sun rose lightening up the road)…the street was full of the people rushing into the street and headed to their destinations…their lives was going on and no one was thinking maybe it’s the day… maybe they needed a little pause…
Entered the subway station… I had to wait for a while for my train to come…observed the others who were waiting for the train like me; Some calm and patient, sitting peacefully; reading a book or staring to a point, thinking. Some were anxious and in a hurry, walking aimlessly they looked at their watch every other minute. Some were chatting and laughing loudly with each other. Some were dozing, their headphones in their ears’ could hear the train in tunnel and after a while I saw the light…everybody in the station moved and came to the line and got ready to get on the train…The train got closer and slowed down and stopped in front of us…In spite of all the time, when the train stopped no one moved…There was a train that no one had expected to see…instead of a regular train it was huge mirror in front of us and we just saw ourselves…the train was from the other world…it wasn’t like any train that I had seen before in my life…People in the station were shocked… standing quietly and watching themselves in the giant mirror….The doors of the train opened…No one got inside…”Train of Remembrance”, was written on the train…remembrance?....What should we remember?...There was no other sign on the train...I kind of felt that I had been chosen for an unexpected adventure…All I needed to do was stepping inside the train…so I did...

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Our general concept is to create an interactive place for approaching the phenomenon of death as a part of life. And design a space, in which every one may find a place for remembrance of a gone beloved, a position for looking at one's life and sharing these with others who have come to this place all by chance.

The design begins with adding an entirely different train to the underground transportation network of the city. This train goes among the other ordinary trains of the network but it has no routine plan. Only the network staff knows its daily plan. What we, the visitors know is that it moves randomly in all lines. Each day on a specific time you find it in a different place.
Its first distinguishable feature is the glossy reflective body, looking like a giant mirror it has no window and the doors are hardly recognizable. It does not stop at all the stations on its way. some times it just passes rapidly, showing you. Some times it stops but the doors do not open. The train doesn't let you in, it is not fated for you again, but gives you a closer stationary look of your self! Sometimes it stops and as the doors open, you can see inside the shiny body through seven openings, one for each of its wagons. Now you are chosen! But if you want to step inside you must know that you're going to spend a while isolated from your daily plans and usual works. You do not even know the next station in which the doors open again and you can come back to life! maybe the very next station or maybe the last one at the end of the line, so far from the destination for which you came here. So if you were on your way for a breakfast meeting with your boss or if you should get home early, please forget it. Wait a little more, the next train will definitely be an ordinary train. But if what you were going to do is not a matter of life and death, you'd better not miss it because no one knows when will be the next time that destiny lets you in this train.

The train is a museum consists of seven adjacent wagons. Each of them is a separate hall or gallery. You enter one of them from the station, no matter which one. There is no specified order for circulation. You are going to face a distinctive perspective toward the matter of death in each gallery but there is one goal considered in all of them: To recall you that you are still alive! and you should seize it. It is not going to be a place for grieves and mourning.in one of the wagons you can light a candle in remembrance of your gone beloved. Through a conjunctional door you'll find yourself in a different hall.in this one you can listen to unknown voices and see the life through another window (point of view). You can also share your own story.in the third (not necessarily in order) as you walk in the tile under your foot lights up…maybe death is inexistence.
In the four other wagons are: a place for you to live a note and maybe touch someone's life. You find different objects of passed-away- people, which have been left behind. And in another wagon every one has this opportunity to portrait death in the way he or she sees it. A huge 8 digits number in green is the whole concept of the last wagon.it changes crazy fast …people are dying and newborns are coming. You are one of these huge numbers. You had changed it once. When will be the next time? Maybe Entering that train would be one of the most shocking and alerting experience in your whole life…death could be very close and maybe in a very regular day just like this comes to you.
These wagons are some samples of different perspectives toward death. The artists and people of the city can redesign them all.