I am extremely happy about the post I am about to write. This post is the second of two subjects that I planned to write about before I even touched down in Denmark, so it’s rockin’ to fulfill that dream–that’s the dream of writing about wind turbines and alternative energy.
So let’s begin!
OH MY GOD WIND TURBINES. Wind turbines are so damn cool. They’re clean, they’re a source of unlimited energy, they have a minimal environmental impact, and they’re fairly efficient, although they have problems with storing energy and, obviously, wind power is a not-entirely-reliable source of energy. I also think they’re quite beautiful, in a very modern way–the sleek white blades moving against a sky a shade of blue that somehow mixes bright with dark…it honestly moves me. And I had the great fortune to spend a weekend on the island of Samsø, a small island community that produces an energy surplus from renewable sources: solar, biomass, and above all, wind. Aside from transportation, the island is able to meet its entire energy needs from these renewable sources and still be able to sell energy back to the national grid, which is DOWNRIGHT INCREDIBLE. ALTERNATIVE ENERGY IS A PROFITABLE ECONOMY HERE. Our guide on the island, a man named Frank who deserves more mention and will receive it soon, referred to the wind turbines as “money presses” for that very reason, and said that the wind turbines single-handedly saved Samsø’s economy in the early 2000s. Now, I suppose I have to qualify the magnitude of this: Samsø is an island of roughly 4000 people, and it’s very small-town. My friend Eric referred to it as “the scenic Midwest”, and that’s a good way of describing it–lots of farmland, small villages, etc. It’s not as though this is some Danish Hong Kong being powered by the wind. But it’s still an incredibly beautiful place–emphasis is needed on the “scenic” part of Eric’s statement. It is also a small community, yet very warm for it. When we had stopped in one small town and were wandering around the neighborhood, two of my friends were stopped by two elderly Samsø residents. When my friends responded that they were American students visiting the island, the elderly people (a mother and her son, it turned out) invited them in to their house so that the Americans could have a true feel for what Samsø was like. Isn’t that incredible? Apparently the mother even apologized for not having any tea or cookies to offer my friends, as though generous hospitality was just what was expected from a home in Samsø.
We traveled around Samsø on bikes, which was definitely the best way to do it–biking gave you the best feel for the island and gave you the freedom to stop and take pictures every 50 meters, which many of us chose to do. And I’m proud to say that despite my inexperience with biking (keep in mind, my 12-year old host brother mocked my poor biking abilities), these sudden stops didn’t throw me off at all–no collisions with others, no riding into the curb and going over my handlebars…nothing but smooth sailing and INCREDIBLY sore legs for the next week or so. Seriously. We biked about 40 miles over two days. But it was completely worth it, even when we biked up this wretched kilometer-long slow incline. It left my legs burning, but it was worthwhile to get to the stop and sit on a cliff overlooking the ocean.
When we weren’t biking, we were being taught about alternative energy at the Samsø energiakademi by a man named Frank, who described himself as a “frustrated nuclear physicist”, and my God did he look the part. He wore this garishly colored polo shirt, and those who know me and my appreciation for colorful clothing should be shuddering at the thought of something that would make me declare it outlaw. The polo was striped in two different patterns: the front of his shirt was striped in reddish-pink and blue, while the back was striped in green and orange. I spent the better part of the day quietly asking myself what would move a man to commit such an act against himself, and I was surprised when we received an answer, and a damn clever one at that. Frank finally acknowledged his shirt (after it had been shrieking at us all day) and said “You might wonder why I wear such a shirt. It is my defense. As long as I wear it, I give myself a guarantee that I will never be filmed and added in to a documentary.” It was his silent protection for his camera-shyness. I instantly gained newfound respect for this man, because not only is it clever, but it is self-sacrificingly so. This is the type of wisdom that this man possessed–the insight to solve a problem so quietly and so decisively. Frank also spoke at length about how Samsø came to be Samsø, and that too demonstrated his wisdom. He said that the most important part was to make everyone feel like they had a role in shaping the island, that they were invested in and responsible for the project and its outcome. This meant slowing the process down, but the end result was that a much more dedicated community supported the project, and there were more resources (both abstract and concrete, like willpower and large supplies of straw for burning) brought to the table. Everyone on Samsø, Frank said, is proud of what they have done for themselves, for Denmark, and for the environment.
And lest we feel out of place, we did our best to participate in the community/environmental friendliness of the place because, well, everyone on the trip was a hippie (yeah that means YOU TOO, Eric!). So we bought our own food and cooked dinner together, collectively dividing the labor between roughly thirty-two people, and the results were a LOT better than my previous foray into student-led cooking. We had three types of salad, chicken prepared in two ways, an appropriate amount of pasta (although ironically, I volunteered to buy the proper amount of pasta. Why the hell did I do that? Don’t I EVER learn? Thank God someone else was with me to check my impulses), and garlic bread with this incredible goat cheese dip.
And then, when we returned to our hostel, we found that the hostel had a little playground, including this AWESOME semi-inflated…THING. There’s no real way for me to describe it other than a huge sheet of thick rubber stretched over the grass and slightly inflated. When roughly fifteen of us got on the mat, the air was pushed in to the center so that we could all bounce around on it. This resulted in a lot of stupid ideas, including running from one end to the other to ride the wave of inflated plastic/knock each other over, playing duck-duck-goose, and just bouncing around like a bunch of loonies. Subsequently, there were several, several collisions. But one of the professors on the trip with us (who was bouncing around with just as much vigor as the rest of us) pointed out that having fun in this way used no CO2 emissions and was run off of renewable energy (BOUNCING!), and thus it was wholly sustainable. This comment easily added tenfold fun to the entire affair.
The hostel was also situated in the middle of a field so large that you could lose yourself in the sky. My friends and I would go out and stand in the field before going to bed each night, and one of us pointed out that if you looked long enough into the sky, it looked like there were cobwebs between the stars. It was incredible.
The hostel also had ponies. That’s right. Sustainable energy, long bike rides in perfect biking weather (warm enough to be outside, not too warm to make you really sweaty when you were bike riding), the moving asthetics of wind turbines, great food and great community, communitarian committment to a greater good, sustainable fun, and ponies.
Awesome.
P.S. The post title comes once again from Belle and Sebastian’s “Asleep on a Sunbeam.” Second time using that song in this blog. That tells you, dear reader, that you should look into it, because you can bet that it’s a pretty great song.
P.P.S. And speaking of Belle and Sebastian, when we were doing introductions with Frank, he asked us to say something that meant a lot to us. A lot of people talked about building relationships with others, helping others, making their community better, etc. I fell in to the first category, but I said that it was best summed up by Belle and Sebastian’s “I’m a Cuckoo”, the lyrics of importance being “I’m glad that you are waiting with me/Tell me all about your day.” This resulted in many people talking about Belle and Sebastian with me, which made me really, really happy. And one person said I looked like someone who would listen to Tegan & Sara. HUGE compliment in my book.
