Sixty Hours

I'm back in the US, and man, is it weird. Reverse culture shock all over the place. It's not that it's been a problem readjusting to American culture, so much as it's been a problem readjusting to my mom's house. She cooks for me and buys me things, which is a change from the self-made lifestyle I had in Denmark. Plus, she lives in DC, and I was wandering around today only to be asked for money by three of the fine (poor/homeless) citizens of our nation's capital and offered cheap DVDs out of the back of a car trunk by three different people. I was only out for about 45 minutes. Welcome home, Eli. To the land of "Screw you, you probably deserve to be poor." I miss social welfare already.

So, we'll see what I end up doing with this blog. I may keep updating this winter, or I may just abandon it as a testament to my trip. It is called "2009 adventures" after all, and soon it won't be 2009 anymore. But, that remains to be seen. This may be the last post, or it may not be. It'll be left up to fate, and my personal whims. You, my six readers, will be left in such great suspense, I don't know how you'll possibly handle it. Sitting there, biting your nails, holding your breath, wondering if the blog will continue. This is, after all, a piece of work that will revolutionize the very concept of literature.

But what I really want to talk about is my last two-and-a-half days in Denmark.

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Friday morning, I woke up late and headed to our pre-show rehearsal for the DIS closing ceremony. I've been in a singing group with other American DIS students all semester, cleverly titled DISchord (yes, it was my idea, and no, nobody else thought it was as funny as I did, but they humored me). For the final show we would be singing "Don't Stop Believing" by Journey. Because it's not a closing ceremony if it doesn't include the tackiest song ever written. Then again, maybe that's unfair; it certainly could have been worse.

So, the closing ceremony happened, we sang nicely. We were rewarded for our efforts with Christmasy tea light holders, which are a big deal in Denmark. As are candles in general. We heard a few student speakers who were pretty typical in their student speeches; "we'll all return home a newfound sense of self and trying to figure out what to do with our experiences but I'm sure we'll all be juuuuuuuuust fine, etc. etc." The president of DIS showed a slideshow of things relating to our stay, and Denmark in recent months. His one slide representing recent environmental stuff was of protesters getting arrested. He did it so that he could make a joke, but it kinda pissed me off. The reason why violent protesters are so detrimental is that the media, and subsequently the populace, latch on to these images of jerks getting arrested, so we never really learn about the cause. And he just reinforced that for the umpteenth time. But I had to let that slide to enjoy the rest of the show.


(A relatively tame example of what I'm talking about. The woman says flat-out that it was a peaceful protest with only a small pocket of violent people who were largely ignored by the rest of the protesters. And yet, a full minute of the 1:45 video is focused on them, and the title of the video implies that the whole protest went sour.)

After the ceremony, we were given free cookies. Standing around munching, I realized how few people I knew or cared about at DIS. My handful of friends left, and suddenly I had no reason to be there. I ended up chatting with a couple professors, which I always seem to find more exciting than the college kids. I'm weird like that. Besides, all the goodbyes were awkward, in part because we all knew we'd be around for another 2-3 days. We weren't really sure what to say to each other, I think.

So, I left that party and had the difficult (read: easy) choice to make between the DIS post-close party at some club downtown, and the final party for Klimaforum. The Klimaforum party included a couple guest speakers, then two different klezmer-rock bands (your guess is as good as mine). I danced a lot, and got hit on quite a bit more than I'm used to. I guess activist parties are the kind of parties where I'm considered good-looking/fashionable (beards are the new black). Or could have been my awesome dance moves. Regardless, it was a fun time.

Just as it was ending, I ran into a guy from DIS named Tim, who I only considered an acquaintance at the time, though I now consider him a friend. We had spoken a couple times about environmental stuff and living in Maryland, but we were really only at "Facebook friend" levels of knowing each other. However, after we left the party around 11:30, we started looking for a place to catch the end of the COP15 proceedings on TV, and chatted quite a bit on the way. It turns out that we have a hell of a lot in common, and the things we don't have in common are things that make us interested in hearing about each other. So, we pretty much didn't stop talking for the next three hours as we searched for a screening. We found one, but it was for journalists and NGO people only. So, we left, and just kept talking.

Saturday was spent uneventfully cleaning my room. We can just skip that part, I think. Although I do have some photos.


(Before and after cleaning my room. Cleaning even helps with hue correction!)


(Just before leaving the room for the last time)

Sunday morning I put the finishing touches on my room, kissed my key goodbye, and headed to DIS to handle some final business. I dropped off some books, recycled a huge pile of paper, and got ready to meet up with Tim. DIS housing ended on the 20th, but I was staying until the 21st, and I had a few ideas for how I was going to deal with that. However, Tim offered his air mattress, and I gladly took him up on the offer. We had a late lunch with a third friend at Riz Raz, a place downtown with an awesome vegetarian buffet. They specialize in Mediterranean food, so I had a ridiculous amount of chickpeas (in their original form, as well as in the form of hummus and falafel). I was careful about not eating out all semester so that I didn't waste money, and as a result I didn't feel too bad about having a $14 meal, especially given that it was my last lunch in Copenhagen. Good place to do it, too.


(Riz Raz, with buffet pictured on the left. It's a hell of a lot of food, and reminded me that being a vegan wouldn't really be that hard; I'd just need to learn a couple more recipes.)

We went back to his place where he immediately fell asleep. I wrote that last blog post over the next few hours while he napped. I didn't realize quite how long it was until I finished. About 2000 words, it turns out. Hope you guys enjoy my writing.

That evening, we went to Christiania to check out the last night of their Julemarked (Christmas market), but arrived to find that it was being taken down. For no logical reason, we decided to wander around the warehouse which was full of people carrying things and power tools. Not the smartest or safest move, but we ended up running into three guys in the corner playing hackeysack, which was the best thing that could have possibly happened. I hadn't played since high school except maybe once or twice, and we hacked for a good hour. Everyone was better than me by enough for me to be impressed, but they didn't have the high school "look what I can do" attitude that makes the game annoying. They didn't hog the bag, and they joked and spoke in English for our benefit. I can't think of a better way to have spent my last night in Copenhagen. We also went to one of Christiania's eateries just before it closed for the night and got some good food. It was a great time.


(What the Julemarked would have looked like, if I'd been there)

Upon returning to Tim's place, I had to blow up the air mattress manually, which was the perfect thing for making sure I passed out as soon as I was done. The thing took 20 minutes to inflate, and I've never been good at even blowing up balloons. It was satisfying, though. There's something very self-made and independent about knowing that I blew it up myself. Or maybe there's some kind of metaphor in there, with me literally sleeping on my own breath. Don't know what that means, but it at least sounds philosophical.

The next morning, Tim headed to the airport before me; there was a four-hour gap between our flights, and I didn't want to sit around for that long. So, I went to DIS and sat around there. At least I had internet. I also got my last slice of Istanbul Pizza, the local college eatery in DIS's part of town. It's that area's Antonio's, basically. Though not quite as delicious. But what is, really?

The flight was uneventful, except for running into a couple other DIS kids. I saw a few movies, listened to music, and slept. As one does on nine-hour flights. Coming back to the US, I could tell things were different right away. First of all, in Copenhagen airport and around town, there were all sorts of climate-awareness billboards and advertisements. Nothing of the sort in Chicago O'Haire or Dulles. However, two funny things did happen in Chicago worth sharing:

1) We had a 25-minute taxi from where we landed to the gate. The main theory going around was that only certain runways were cleared off after the recent snowstorm, and they were all the ones farthest away. As a result, we actually taxied across a highway. Apparently there's a highway cutting across the airport, and we literally took a plane over it (well, over a bridge over it). It was something I'd never seen before, and it cracked me up.

2) Since I've been gone, I apparently came into the possession of a chain of Chicago dessert shops. Who knew? Alas, my name did not earn me free cake, but they didn't refuse when I asked to take a picture of their stall. And I think that picture is a fitting end to my Copenhagen adventure. Partly because it has nothing to do with Copenhagen. Welcome home, me.

Klimaforum Abridged

So, I went to a LOT of talks over the past week and a half, and I'm going to list all of them, but only discuss the highlights in detail or else this post will drag on forever. In fact, it's already pretty long, so you can always do what I did to choose which presentations to go to: look up and down this post at the topic headings, and read the details on the ones that sound interesting. Worked for me. There was a lot more info than I'm posting here, of course, so feel free to ask me about anything I went to.



(Map of the DGI-Byen, Copenhagen's massive community center and venue for Klimaforum09. All the colored rooms contained events. The largest, the orange hall, was a full basketball court plus bleachers, so it probably seated about 700 people with plenty of moving around room. The red room could hold about 100-150. I only mention this so you can get a sense of how many people were there during peak hours).

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"The Inner Dimensions of Climate Change." A panel of spiritual leaders discussing the connection between our thoughts and the outer world. The main points were that the more we have respect for all people and for all living things, the more we are likely to make change in our outside world. Getting rid of our own greed is part of that. It was also noted that this was a rare occasion where highly respected people of varying religions were in unanimous agreement.

"Survival Pact, not Suicide Pact." Bill McKibben, the founder of 350.org, spoke for about an hour about the success of the movement. 350.org is a campaign about spreading the word on emissions. 350 parts per million is the maximum allowable concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere if we want to live in a world that looks like it did before we industrialized (i.e. relatively cool). He credits the success of the campaign and its ability to spread worldwide to a few factors:

1) They created a 90-second video that did not require language skills to understand. Even in the poorest developing countries, someone usually has a cell phone with internet access, and word was able to spread worldwide without a language barrier.

2) They trained leaders who trained other leaders and got people mobilized through local campaigns

3) Perhaps most importantly, they had a rallying cry that rose above individual organizations. Every organization has its own focus (preserving the rainforest, reducing emissions, saving whales, funding research, etc.) but all those things somehow come back to the principles of the 350 campaign; these groups are all connected by a common environmentalist thread. So, when it came time for a global day of action, thousands of individuals and organizations did their own, decentralized actions under the 350 banner. We also got to see a lot of photos from recent 350 events.

Bill told a few personal stories about the photos, then introduced Mohammad Nasheed, the president of the Maldives. Nasheed came to speak to us before going to COP15 because in his eyes, the Klimaforum folks are the ones actually accomplishing something for the environment and for his country.

The Maldives are worth reading about. They're going to be one of the first countries to get completely screwed by global warming because the whole country is a series of low islands, and the place is disappearing underwater fast. When I say "going to be" I really mean that it's already begun. They've already lost their coral reefs, which provide some protection against natural disasters. I didn't actually know that coral reefs did that, but apparently they do. Well, they did, anyway. Not so much anymore.



"Eventually We'll All Be Middle Class." A pointless art film I wish I hadn't wasted my time seeing. The artists decided the night before that they would sign out the room to show it because nobody else was using it. Their justification for showing it there was that it's about "the world" and "saving people" but it had nothing to do with climate change, and more to do with saving the poets and artists. Even the really, really bad ones, apparently. It's only notable because it reminded me why I hated my Workshop in Experimental Theatre freshman year. It's "art for art's sake," which is an invention of the privileged. The "art of the masses," if we want to call it that, doesn't come from a sense of "this would be a fun diversion," it comes from a deep need to get something out there. If it does not feel soul-burningly necessary to make whatever it is you're making, then you're not really making art, so much as goofing off. Which is fine, I guess. Except in this sort of context, when people who could have been learning about climate change were tricked into coming by a misleading description in the Klimaforum program. But now I'm getting ranty about this. Moving on...

"Progress - A New Millenium." A film about how we need to stop defining "progress" as "the accumulation of more things. Plenty of famous people interviewed on this, including the Dalai Lama, Gorbachev, and a bunch of scientists and writers. Interesting film, and I'd recommend it to others, though it didn't tell me anything I didn't personally already know.

"Political Salon: Reflections on Gender, Climate and Change" A pure discussion, in a fishbowl format. It was opened up by a group of Latino women dressed as panthers doing a performance about climate justice. The theme of the discussion was about how the rich, and mostly rich men, benefit from fossil fuels, and the poor, mostly women in developing nations, are harmed by the effects of climate change. Excellent discussion that highlighted the multifaceted nature of the issue.

"Moving Towards Zero Carbon and Beyond." A panel of speakers, including one of the main people from zerocarbonbritain.com. Their proposal is not perfect and includes a carbon-trading scheme that most people at Klimaforum are against. But other that, they've created it's a completely feasible way for the UK to go carbon neutral in only ten years (or at least most of the way). It needs fixing, but it's the best and most detailed proposal of its kind that I've seen. Worth checking out their material. The whole proposal is on the web, as are summaries for those of you who don't have hours of free time (read: all of you)

Also presenting was a member of the Australian parliament, who was talking about the hidden challenges involved in most green proposals. For example, we absolutely need to have a plan that says "we're going to install X number of wind turbines and solar panels" but those proposals also need to say "we're going to set Y amount of money aside to train people on how to install them." The infrastructure to support a green advancement has to appear at the same time as the advancement itself. When that doesn't happen, you have 100 qualified contractors trying to do the work of 1000, and things don't get done on time, or done well. The speakers were great, and among my favorites at Klimaforum.

"Growth is Good!" A presentation of the cradle to cradle concept. Look it up.

Basically, everything we make has organic components and inorganic components, and if we could separate those out, and use the right materials, we could always bury/biodegrade the organic and reuse or reprocess the inorganic, preventing us from ever needing new raw materials ever again. The presenter explained the concept well, and it's a great concept, but the guy was also a bit of an ass, and pissed off half the audience by making jokes in poor taste and saying that the environmental movement has missed the boat, and that he, in fact, has the answers. He also used the examples of carpet squares, because a company called Desso is making 97% cradle-to-cradle carpet squares. He got called out during the question period on picking the most bourgeois example possible, and that saying we should all buy carpets from Desso doesn't really fit with the anti-consumerist vibe of Klimaforum.

My conclusion was that most of us took the good parts of his presentation (C2C) and left the bad (shameless capitalism), so no real harm done. He undermined his own point a bit, but nobody actually disagrees with cradle-to-cradle at its core. So yes, he used the pretty mainstream example ofcarpet squares (in the words of one angry activist, "nobody gives a shit about carpet squares"). But he COULD have used shoes or diapers or a few other items which will probably still be necessary after The Revolution (unlike carpet squares).

"Breakthrough Advanced Free Energy Technology." I tried to be open minded about this one, but basically, it was two conspiracy theory groups talking about how the government has a secret thing that makes electricity out of nothing, but the oil lobbies don't want it to go public. One of the groups believed that we had this technology because aliens have landed with it. I buy the underlying concept, that the government and oil lobbies have stifled progress. But... seriously? Aliens?

I'm not even ruling out the possibility that aliens exist. The truth is, I just don't care whether they exist or not. If they landed and are talking to the president, or have been flying around secretly for eons, or any of the other theories people have come up with... it doesn't change anything. Even if this guy is right, and they're here and the government is hiding technology... so what? I'm already protesting the government's refusal to go green. I'm going to keep doing that, and weaken the oil lobbies how I can, and if that eventually leads to the revelation of an environmental Magic Bullet, then yay. If it leads to incremental improvements in renewable capacity, then also yay. It really doesn't change a thing. Except, possibly, for how crazy people think I am.

"Climate Broadcasters: How to Communicate Climate Change." A presentation of ideas for how weathermen could be used to present climate issues to a large audience. Especially in places like the US where there are millions of people who still Don't Quite Get It. The panel consisted of weathermen, who liked the ideas, but would have a hard time getting more airtime.

"Are You Getting the Deal You Came For?" An excellently moderated three-hour discussion with hundreds of people to answer the important questions, including "What would a good deal look like?" and "What do we do now that the deal is clearly not going to happen this year?" Most effective group discussion I've ever seen with 600 people in a room. It wasn't perfect, and some people had to be cut off due to rambly or off-topic mic-hogging, but it worked very well, largely thanks to the guy running it. He was very focused on keeping things democratic, and we got to hear a lot of perspectives and ideas. The general consensus is that the deal needs to be stronger, and the "what we do" is "keep building the movement." It's vital that those in power hear that there is a large (and quickly growing) number of people who want the temperature to stay put where it is.

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The last thing I went to was the Klimaforum closing ceremony/party, but I'll wait until my "What I did the last couple days in Copenhagen" post to talk about that. Kickin' party. Klimaforum was a great time, and I learned a lot. I'm ready to go home and be much more involved in the various organizations in and around Baltimore. I'm not typically one to care about arbitrary calendar designations, but I'm specifically excited about 2010 for some reason. Should be good. And now, it's time to get some sleep, as I fly back to the US tomorrow afternoon. Yay for home.

Woah there, slow down

Note: sorry about the wonky font-changing in this post; I copied some of it from a word doc, and that seemed to mess everything up.

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Okay, so many things have happened this week. I'm going to try to put my thoughts together, but it will require spreading it out over several posts.

As I finished my last couple assignments for school, I was able to start going to all the Klimaforum events I talked about earlier. I haven't spent as much time wandering the city and seeing the exhibits because there's about eight things going on at any one time at Klimaforum alone. I'm glad I got to see the other stuff around town earlier on, because it feels like there's just not enough time to do everything. Which there isn't. There are literally seven presentations going on at the same time in the same gigantic building all throughout the day, every day. So, I've picked the ones that seem the most interesting, and accepted myself as a finite being. I may have stolen that phrase from Ailish, one of my mentors at Goucher. I think I'll spend next post creating a list with descriptions of all the Klimaforum things I've been to. Some of them have been great. In the meantime, I want to talk about Saturday.

I went to a massive climate demonstration. We marched from Christiansborg (parliament building) to the Bella Center (site of COP15). There were between 25,000 and 100,000 people there, depending on who you ask. There were at least a hundred different organizations represented, many of which made banners, floats, etc.

I’ve heard it said in the past that protest movements died in the 70’s, and that may have been true to some extent. Images of thousands of people marching with signs and yelling stopped being a new and exciting phenomenon, and the news stopped covering these protests. It became harder and harder to get publicity. Those times are over. The protest is back. I have a theory as to why, and it starts with that idea of media images.

Organizers have come up with new and creative ways of getting their message out there. There’s no longer just a bunch of people. There are a bunch of people coordinating their dress, making human formations, creating floats, whatever they have to do to present a single, clear message. A sound bite, a photograph, whatever gets the message across.

(Photo of Saturday's crowd)

Protests get a bad rap when it appears to be just a mob of angry people yelling, especially when they seem unsure as to what they’re yelling about. Back in 2004, I was at the massive anti-RNC protest in New York City. The only lingering memory I have from the march was the pro-Gore and pro-Nader people screaming at each other. That’s the sort of crap we don’t need, and the kind of crap that has been blessedly absent here in Copenhagen.

A single unifying message is incredibly important. While the various groups present were at the protest focusing on different aspects of climate legislation, everyone more or less agreed with each other. While some focused on indigenous peoples' rights, some focused on wildlife conservation, some focused on emissions reduction, and some focused on keeping the world anti-nuclear. Nevertheless, all these groups understood that these issues were related, and that a truly fair deal at COP15 could not ignore any of them. As such, folks got along just fine across movements, and it was a great event.

I've heard that a violent group tried to infiltrate the protest, but they more or less got cut off in the back, and didn't really manage to cause serious trouble. Arrests were made, though. Meanwhile, as you'd expect with a protest that size, those of us in the middle and the front didn't hear a thing until after the fact. We were too busy being positive.

Anyway, while our action was going on in Copenhagen, folks around the world were holding candlelight vigils in solidarity. Some great photos and beautiful displays of global unity, much like the 350.org event back in October (when I got to be a Mr. Green). I'll talk about 350.org more in my next post, and show some more photos as well.

(This vigil photo was captioned "Amherst, USA," but I have no idea who or where it is)

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Quick updates from recent posts:
1) The polar bear took about as long to melt as expected. Unfortunate, really. I was hoping for some irony. Or is it double irony? (Hint: no, it's not irony at all)
2) The weird temporary glass buildings on City Hall Square house various climate solutions. The overall exhibit is called "the future city.

COPing with Climate Change (hah hah hah)

COP15 is here, and yesterday, the city went nuts.

Okay, not nuts, but there's a noticeable excitement around the place. Every large public area in Copenhagen has some kind of display, tent, booth, or exhibit on climate change.

• Greenpeace has docked their ship in Copenhagen's harbor. Y'know, the ship they use to run off giant Japanese whaling tankers. That one.
  
• The World Wildlife Fund (perhaps most famous for metaphorically beating the crap out of a wrestling organization) has a huge tent a block away from DIS where they're showing films, holding lectures, and so on.
• Just outside the tent, there is a massive polar bear statue made out of ice (pictured below). Inside is a bronze skeleton, which will be all that is left when the statue melts, representing the endangered nature of the animal. It's supposed to take about ten days to melt, but it's only the end of day 3, and this afternoon the skull was already poking out of the ice quite a bit. Maybe it was (ironically) warmer than they expected this week, leading to a faster melt. That would be a pretty great message, in my opinion. Also, in case you were wondering, the baby is about three-quarters melted at this point, we'll see how it's doing in the morning.
  
• 
• In Rådhuspladsen, a.k.a City Hall Square, there is a giant bicycle-powered globe and several temporary glass buildings which I haven't quite figured out the purpose of. Something green, I'm sure. It's on my list of things to investigate further.
• In Kongens Nytorv (The King's New Square), has been showing a photo display of "100 places to remember before they disappear." The exhibit has been there since late September, actually, but it was all in anticipation of the next couple weeks. There is a website here, which contains photos of all 100 places, as well as a description of the climate-related problems they are facing. Many of them are "naturey" landmarks, which are certainly worth protecting for the sake of biodiversity and natural beauty, but the more striking ones to me are the "human" landmarks. Pretty much every coastal city in the world is going to be flooded if the oceans rise as much as predicted. Chicago, Caracas (Venezuela), Beijing, New York, Amman (Jordan), and the entire country of The Maldives are featured in the exhibit, but that list is certainly not extensive.

Over the next two days, I'm going to have a lot of homework, but then I'm more or less done for the semester. I plan on spending my last week and a half monitoring the news closely, and attending as many lectures and exhibits as I can. In addition to the above, there is also an event called Klimaforum, which is sort of "the people's COP15." It's a series of events and lectures for those of us who can't actually attend COP15 (which is everyone). Plus Christiania is putting on their own event to celebrate visions of hope for the future. My favorite bit is that each day at 2:00PM, they're "burying" an abstract concept which hinders progress. Unfortunately, I was in class yesterday and missed out on burying The American Dream, but I'll be sure to catch a couple of the other funerals before I leave. It's looking like it's going to be an awesome couple of weeks.

A Week Lost, A Week Gained

When I got back from my travel break, I was a little bummed out.

After a semester that was mostly devoted to exploration and discovery with fairly little academic BS (we had work, but it was manageable, interesting, and rewarding) I realized that I was going to have to do a chunk of typical, boring, academic writing, which I wasn't looking forward to. In addition, during the two weeks I was away, Copenhagen went from "gets dark early" to "gets dark really early," and the idea of wandering aimlessly around parts of the city stopped being so appealing. So, I spent a lot of time emotionally removed from Denmark during the last two weeks of November. I chatted with friends back home, stayed up ridiculously late, and didn't leave my hall except an occasional shopping trip, plus classes.

Part of my funk was because the darkness, but another part was being somewhat disillusioned by the Danes in my kollegium, and not really knowing where else to meet Danes. And of course, the DIS students were all busy doing work. I guess there was a sense that it was too close to the end to make new friends, and that I might as well do something else. Like play video games. I'm not saying that's true, simply that it's part of what I was thinking.

When we got back from Thanksgiving, I started to go to a whole bunch of get-togethers. Some DIS sponsored, some otherwise. I've been to several Christmas lunches, and also a final reception for my department. This definitely helped me out of it; I enjoy being around people more than being alone, and I think the first party reminded me of that. Also, at the Psychology reception, about 50 people showed me how much they appreciated my presence, which isn't something that happens every day. All of this just made me want to spend the last few weeks as involved as possible.

I felt a little silly this weekend because there was a setup for an environmental display that needed volunteers, and I chose to miss that in favor of a Danish Christmas lunch. It's one of the big DIS-sponsored events, and I'm glad I went, as I got to meet a few Danes, and I was part of a group that was performing. Even so, it felt very typical of me to come up with some excuse to miss out on doing something good for the world. I enjoyed myself, but I think the climate folks needed me more than the singing group did. Next time, I guess. There will be plenty of opportunities in the next two weeks, with COP15 starting tomorrow.

All that aside, I still have to write a paper about something I don't care about. It's an unfortunate thing that happens frequently. I tend to pick topics that I'm interested in, which seem to always be different from what academics are interested in. So, I can't find any evidence or research one way or another, and I change my topic to something more boring. This time it's for my Gender and Sexuality class. I'm on my third topic, and it's about Danish vs. US marriage norms. That's not inherently uninteresting, but there's so much more I'd rather be doing.

However, I'm determined to not let something as trite as homework get in the way of my education.

I got an idea a few days ago for a project I might start on when I get back to the States. We talked in one of the DIS-sponsored climate change seminars about how if we want to remain within the "safe zone" for CO2 emissions, we can only emit about 2 tons of CO2 per person per year. Right now, the average Dane is at about 6, and the average American is at about 22. So, I wondered what a ton of CO2 actually amounts to, and if those numbers could be more accessible to the public. I'd like to create a scorecard of some kind, that says "driving a car five miles = X lbs. of CO2, taking a bus = Y lbs. of CO2." I know there are millions of nuances, i.e. city driving vs. highway driving, the efficiency of your car, etc. But I still think there's a way to make those numbers at least somewhat more accessible to the average person.

I often hear two things on the topic of personal responsibility for climate change. 1) "I changed my light bulbs to the eco-friendly kind, so I've fulfilled my obligation." 2) "It's impossible to live a green lifestyle, so I'm not even going to bother." The first person has not, in fact, done everything possible, and the second person is being pessimistic without even having access to the numbers. I would like to be able to show people exactly what it takes to be "under the line" for CO2 emissions, and also show people that it's attainable.

By the way, if anyone has any resources offhand for this sort of thing, send them my way. The first thing I'll need to do is find dozens of sites that say how much CO2 is emitted by different activities and industries.

Miscellaneous Stories

It's been a pretty uneventful week here in Copenhagen, so I'm going to tell a few more short stories from my travel break.

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#1) In Barcelona, as in many cities, you can take busses, trains, and metros cheaper if you buy a T10, which is a ten-trip pass. In Barcelona, this is an especially good deal, because the T10 pass costs roughly the same as three train trips, or five bus trips. Usually these things are only a 10%-20% discount, at least in the cities I've been in. So, that's how I was getting around.

When I arrived at the airport to go to Cork, I realized I had a half-used pass, which I was not going to be able to use. So, I quickly used my wits and a pocket Spanish-English dictionary to figure out how to say "I am going to fly, but I have a T10 with six trips left on it, and I would like to give it to you." My plan was to approach the first person who looked like s/he was about to walk up to the ticket machines and give it to that person. For some reason, though, I spent a long time just standing there, watching people buy tickets.

There's some part of me that is still nervous about approaching people and breaking up their routine, even when I'm trying to do nice things and be a generous person. I felt like the awkwardness of me trying to explain myself in broken Spanish would not be work the five euros I'd be saving them, and all these pointless fears and insecurities started cropping up. I had a full four hours before my flight, so I was in no rush. So I just stood there watching people buy tickets for about ten minutes. It was just a pointless thing to be scared stiff about. Again, this was me being insecure about approaching people with a gift.

Finally, a group of about four people stopped, and I know enough Spanish to be able to tell they were trying to figure out which pass they were supposed to buy. I decided that it was time to make my move. Me feeling ridiculous outweighed me being nervous about the conversation, so I went for it. I said my line. The guy paused, looked and at me, and said (with a Spanish accent) "You speak English?"

So, that's how badly I botched my line.

I explained myself in English, and he at first thought he was misunderstanding me, that maybe I was trying to sell it to him (which makes sense; how often do people give stuff away at a train station?) But I assured him that there were six passes left on this, and that it was his. I was flying to Ireland, and wouldn't be back in Barcelona for a long time, so I would have no need of the pass. He and the folks he was traveling with seemed happy, which was my goal in all this, so as soon as he took it and thanked me, I told him to have a nice day and went for my flight. It was every bit as awkward as I expected, but I consider it a worthwhile experience.

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#2) In Cork, on the way back from one of our day-trips, Scott and I ran into a crazy old drunk guy. I think I mentioned in a previous post that this happens to be on a regular basis. Our conversation started when we asked him, in Cork, if we were at the right stop. He nodded and mumbled something, then all of us got off. On the way out of the station (which, thankfully, was the right one), I thanked him for the directions, which was either polite, or a huge mistake, depending on how you view the next fifteen minutes of my life.

He opened his mouth, as if to say something relevant, like maybe "you're welcome," "no problem," or even "enjoy your trip." But no, after a moment of what looked like deep thought, the words that exited this man's lips were "I got drunk." I believe the next line out of his mouth was "...but god bless ye, yer still young yet." Apparently "young" is an antonym for "drunk." This guy had obviously not been around many college campuses.

He then proceeded to explain (drunkenly) that the large cruise ship out in the harbor was being repaired because it had scraped some rocks. The guy is the navigator, and as such, got an unexpected week off, which he was enjoying spending in a stupor. He explained that the crew could still come back to the ship, so he could go there to sleep and get food while it was in harbor. At first he made it sound like he was going back to the ship now because it was going to depart soon, which made me a little nervous (remember kids, friends don't let friends navigate cruise ships drunk).

He repeated the phrase "god bless you" several times during the conversation in a tone that made it sounds like a farewell, so we started walking away, at which point he kept talking. There were many opportunities for us to get out of there if we really wanted to (I'm sure we could have outran him) but my view was that this was all funny enough to make a good story, and we were in no rush. The highlight of it may have been a phrase I alluded to a few posts ago. He said "god bless you," I responded "yeah, you too, nice meeting you," and he responded "yeah... it's nice... to be nice... to *mumble mumble*." Yes, it's nice to be nice. God bless you too, drunk old navigator guy.

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#3) I mentioned in my last post that we had the 6-bed room in Belfast all to ourselves the first night. Well, the second night we were joined by a very international group of travelers. There was a Brazilian guy, a Slovenian girl, and an American girl who appeared to be dating the guy, although he kept referring to her as his "friend," much to our amusement.

When they arrived in the room, the guy asked us if we knew where any good nightclubs were. He was talking about how much of a party animal he was, so we were all a bit concerned that they were going to come back at 4:00AM and throw up all over the place, as party animals are wont to do. We were discussing this possibility and how annoying this would be, and even went so far as to move our stuff from the middle of the room to one side where it would be less likely to be in the line of fire. Yes, we were that paranoid. To be fair, the guy was talking about his previous Crazy Nights, and it sounded like he was like looking for another. The Slovenian girl was not interested, however, which may be an explanation for what happened next.

We had gone to bed around 11:30, because we had to get up early the next day. EC and Annie fell asleep almost instantly, but I was up reading a bit. At around 11:45, our roommates returned, much to my surprise. They got ready for bed right away, and were out by a little after midnight. I overheard them saying that they had an early start the next morning, which would explain it. I went to bed at the same time, happy to know that they decided to take it easy.

At about 4:00AM, I woke up to the sound of the guy throwing up in the bathroom. Yeah, I was surprised too. I'm guessing it wasn't alcohol-related, since he had slept peacefully for several hours before throwing up. I'm guessing it was a bug, or maybe food poisoning (probably the latter, but I say that mostly because none of us got sick over the next few days).

So, that was a night of double-irony. We expected them to be irresponsible, and they were responsible. Then I expected them not to throw up because they had been responsible, and the guy threw up. He cleaned up fine, and in the morning there was no sign of anything. No harm done, really. It was just a series of weird expectation-defying twists. Just another reason I should stop trying to predict the future.

Belfast, and the return of visual stimulation

Hey, it's a post with pictures! Haven't had one of those in a while. Hope you weren't bored by all the text in my blog, I know it's not really what they were made for.

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Above is a map of our 14km (8.5mi) walk around Belfast. We had under 48 hours in the city, which only included one full day, so we made the most of it. Points A and H are our hostel, the Belfast International Youth Hostel, which was a nice place and only 12 pounds apiece to stay in a six-bed room, which we were lucky enough to get to ourselves the first night. We ate breakfast at their cafe both mornings, which was delicious and similarly inexpensive. Annie and I shared a large "Ulster Fry," which is basically the "a little bit of everything" breakfast that many American diners also serve, but with more Irish foods.


(They asked me to pose with the breakfast. I obliged.)

Point B is St. George's Market, which is a huge indoor space with booths where people mostly sell food or crafts. I considered getting something, but I had just eaten breakfast and don't like buying things that just sit there looking pretty. So, we walked around for 20 minutes and left. Cool place, though. If I come back to Belfast, I'll be sure to go when I'm actually hungry.

Point C is the town hall, where there was a Ferris Wheel for some reason. It sounded like some kind of festival was being prepared for, but honestly, it appeared to just be the one attraction. We went on, though, and got the best view of the city you can get without going out to the hills. Good way to start our journey.




(Three different views of Belfast from above)

Part of the reason we came was to see the murals from the Northern Irish "Troubles," a conflict I'd learned a lot about my freshman year. I have yet to find a website that adequately sums up the conflict for the uninitiated, so I'll do my best in the next two paragraphs, so you know what's going on with these murals.

The British once controlled all of Ireland, but in the early 1900's, Ireland started its major push for independence. However, in the northern part of Ireland, there were a lot of people who wanted to remain part of the UK, most of them Protestant and of English descent. Although it's easy to say that Ireland should belong to the Irish, many of the Protestants had families who have lived on the land for hundreds of years. Think of it like modern America and the Native Americans. Even though it's easy to say that white men shouldn't have come to America and committed genocide, I'm also not sure that the right move at this point is to give the land back and find somewhere else for the 300 million of us to live.

Northern Ireland, it was decided, was going to remain part of the UK. And the battle lines were drawn. In general, Irish Catholics wanted a unified Ireland, and English Protestants wanted things to stay how they were. Militant groups on both sides started bombing each other. Regions that were already segregated in practice became even moreso. Belfast was and is the largest city, so it couldn't be easily labeled a Catholic or Protestant area, and the lines ended up being drawn by neighborhood. The fighting officially stopped about ten years ago with a treaty, but you still hear about the occasional bomb here and there.

That's about as good as I can do in two paragraphs, look up more if you're interested, or just e-mail me.

After the Ferris Wheel ride, we walked north a bit then started west on Shankill Rd. It's a Protestant area where historically quite a bit of violence took place. One of my professors told a story about getting off the bus there once to find that everything was on fire. However, we went during the day, and in the 21st century, both of which I consider to be good moves. Basically, it's a fairly normal commercial street with shops and businesses and an occasional gas station. That is, with the exception of murals and political graffitti, both of which were notable. I didn't see a lot of random crudeness on the walls. People who buy spraypaint in Belfast do it because they have something poignant to say, and that doesn't include "for a good time, call..."

We stopped briefly at Woodvale Park (point D) and then walked through a very confusing suburban neighborhood (note our travel path between D and E; it was actually a bit windier than that, I think). At E, there was a large gate through a wall that was covered in razor wire. This separated Shankill from the Catholic neighborhood of Clonard.


(A mural'd gate)

(yes, razor wire. They didn't call them the Troubles for nothing)

And here's where I make the point about the murals. In Shankill, they looked like this:


(A mural calling out the IRA on their "strategy")

(The UVF, aka The People's Army, are noble soldiers and peacemakers, while the IRA are scary and wear black masks)

Once we crossed the gate, the murals became a little different:


(Glorifying the Irish guys with the guns)

(Calling out the English army on the Ballymurphy Massacre.)

Seeing the murals confirmed what I had already learned. While they were, in one sense, propaganda, the were also legitimate memorials to people who had been wrongly killed (as though anyone is rightly killed). The IRA mostly killed Protestant civilians, and the UVF and British army killed mostly Catholic civilians. There were very few cases where two groups of people with guns ever faced each other head on and had a shoot-out. I'm not trying to say that a shoot-out is a noble form of warfare. It's not. I'm merely saying that people who never intended to fight suddenly became part of the fight, if it could even be called a fight. The Troubles consisted of mostly marketplace bombings and shootings from each paramilitary group, and thousands of people died as a result.

The thing that defied my expectations was the lack of general peace murals. No images of Republican and Loyalist children playing side by side, or anything like that. Like in the Buffalo Springfield song, the murals "mostly say 'hooray for our side.'" Those that don't say "damn the other side for killing us." I expected at least one "hey guys let's all stop with this fighting, shall we?" Maybe we were in the wrong neighborhoods, or maybe they don't exist. I'm not sure yet, though I'd like to find out.

We wandered around some suburbs in the Irish part of town (around point F) where some official-looking people were hanging plain black flags on fences and poles. I never found out what they were for, though I kind of wish I'd asked. Annie and EC attempted to befriend two dogs, but they were having none of it. They became suddenly aggressive, and although they didn't touch us, we were all a bit freaked out. This is notable mainly because I was actually the least freaked out of the three of us when faced with a vicious dog. Those of you who have known me since childhood will verify that this is not typical. So, that was our 14 km trip. We stopped for some giant sandwiches, then headed back to the hostel.

I got up early the next morning to check out Belfast's botanical gardens. There's a huge rose garden with somewhere around 50 different kinds of roses, most of which have ridiculous names. Some had random abstract nouns, including two right next to each other called "Freedom" and "Mischief." I wish I could make a joke here and say that Freedom smells a lot like Mischief, but really, neither of them smelled like much of anything. Both were past their season (not a metaphor). Others were named after people, which was even funnier. At one point I was, in all seriousness, sniffing Uncle Pete, and I started cracking up.

After Belfast, I had a three-hour layover in Amsterdam, which might have the most ridiculous airport in the world, although I can't say that for sure until I've been to all of them. However, I feel comfortable saying that it's large, confusing, and expensive. But, I made it home, and now I'm back in Copenhagen where there's an annoying amount of schoolwork and other things I'd rather not have to deal with. It's only been 24 hours and I'm already longing for winter break. At this very moment, I'm not feeling particularly positive, but I think tomorrow will ease that a bit. I've got six things weighing on my mind right now, but four or five of them are going to be resolved by mid-afternoon tomorrow, and I'll feel a little less overwhelmed. I'll leave you with one final image for this evening:


(The obligatory adorable group pose. EC, Annie, me.)