On golf

Serenity. Or, as you might know it:golf.

What is up, what is down, what is real, what is dream? What is crap floating in a golf course pond?

Such an odd mix of sports...

Lucky clover? Or just a bunch of unlucky weeds?

Someone must really love golf. Or is it only me that can see the heart? 

"No, I said tee!"

I don't golf. I've tried mini golf (once or twice), and Wii Golf ® (once, and I lost spectacularly to my entire US family). But I've never played real golf. Not that the opportunity hasn't been there - my hometown has the most beautiful golf course I've ever seen (but then you all know I'm comparing it to mini golf and Wii).

On rowan

The riping of all sorts of fruits and berries might be the first sign of fall (or autumn if you like), but nothing is so inevitably a message of summer's end as rowan berries. There is a saying in Norway, that if the rowan tree is laden with berries, we won't have much snow that year, since the tree shouldn't carry that kind of heavy load twice in a year. Actually, it might be the other way around... That the tree is tempered or toughened by the berries, and thus is capable of carrying more snow when winter comes. It doesn't really matter anyway, since the amount of snow we'll get is much more likely to be influenced by climate and weather conditions than the state of the local rowan trees, but whatever. Whether it's a sure weather sign or not - it's a sure sign of autumn.

I meant to take some grand pictures of the red, lovely rowan berries (which were plentiful and beautiful this year), but I missed my chance. The heavy rain we've experienced for weeks and weeks have made photography difficult, and the rowan berries are now soggy and not their usual glorious self. I missed a narrow window due to bad light conditions. Another time I didn't have my camera with me (and the pics I took with my phone are a) crappy, and b) stuck in my phone because I've lost the chord).

So we're left with the only semi-decent, slightly out-of-focus, berries-looking-more-orange-than-red shot I've got. It's hardly enough to build a blog post around.

But there you go.

On chocolate. And then some.

I took on quite the research project for today's "Topical Tuesday" post over at Burrowers, Books & Balderdash. It started out as a new perspective on Valentine's Day (as if we didn't have enough of that last week, right..?), inspired by my surprise at the Japanese version of the Western holiday (they do so love to adopt holidays over here). But then I discovered a whole new story within the story, which led me to read up on African politics, specifically that of the Ivory Coast (or Côte d'Ivoire, as I've now learned it's supposed to be - though I am not sure why the French name reminding them of the colonial past is better than the English version meaning the exact same thing..).

As usual, you'll have to go over there to read the full post. This is just a teaser, and an outlet for all the things I didn't manage to fit into the post at BB&B. For instance the demoralizing statistics on fair-trade chocolate versus definitely-not-fair-at-all-trade chocolate (the fair-trade one only accounted for about 1% of the market share in 2005, the most recent number I could find). The latter often uses child labour, many of which are the victims of human trafficking and slavery.

As if this was not enough, cocoa production also contributes to deforestation, as the coca trees often compete with rain forests for space. The cocoa tree itself is also a fragile plant, which holds an important part in the ecosystem. With deforestation, the cocoa tree is endangered too, and farmers will constantly need to chop down new areas of forest to plant new cocoa trees. Thus it is a vicious cycle.

All this reading made me want to stop eating chocolate and go hug a tree (if it hadn't been for the fact that I once heard that trees were actually hurt by hugging...). Instead I wrote a blog post (or two, actually, since this one probably also counts with all its depressing facts) about it - so maybe you can find the inspiration to stop eating chocolate and (not) hug a tree.

No. I'm not pointing any proverbial fingers (not even the middle one, though the cruelty in cocoa production does seem to warrant it). I bought a packet of chocolate myself today (though in my defense, it was before all the researching took place...), and there isn't as much as a hint of any fair-trade emblems or rain forest frogs on it. Thus I am pretty sure I would be tossing cocoa beans in a glass house...

We should all be buying only fair-trade. We should all recycle, and while we're at it, we should floss our teeth and make our bed every morning. It is when I realize I fail on most of the above I wonder if I'm a faux idealist - if I am not willing to change myself, then how can I expect the world to change?

At least I can advertise. Buy fair-trade! 

And if you see this little guy on your products, you can be sure it didn't kill any trees.

If you want to read more, I found this pretty cool blog - The Frog Blog - which is where the Rainforest Alliance shares info about new initiatives. One of them, the REDD+ is a UN programme to reduce emissions in developing countries by providing a financial initiative (so there is environment and development). As for fair-trade, you find lots of useful info on both the Fairtrade International and World Fair Trade Organization. For instance, you can here see lists of products that are fair-trade, so that the next time you go chocolate shopping, you have a choice.

On spruces

When I visited the National Zoo in Washington D.C. last August, most of my pictures were of animals. As it should be. One of my non-animal pics, however, look a little (actually, a lot since I am posting the actual picture and not a drawing of it...) like this:

I am sure we can all agree this hardly is a spectacular motive that deserves a prominent place in a photo album, but I still was very eager to get the shot. Why? Well, duh - the NAME of course. Prior to this, I had no idea that this tree was called "Norway Spruce". We don't call it that here - in Norway, it's just a regular spruce. Well, actually, it's a regular gran, but that's beside the point.

The point? There isn't much of a point, but the fact that I could read the name of my country way over in the big US of A felt like a little piece of fame for my home right there and then.

Speaking of fame and spruces, did you know that the world's oldest living tree is a Norway Spruce? It's called Old Tjikko, it is located in Sweden (but it's still called Norway Spruce - hah!), and it is - wait for it - 9,500 years old! That means that this tree already was 8,500 years old when actual vikings roamed its forest. When a bloke named Jesus was born (though not in Sweden, I should add) some 2010 years ago, this spruce still had been around 7,480 years (or so). The spruce had been around for more than 4000 years when the ancient Egyptian civilization formed as well. In fact, the first humans were just settling down for a life of agriculture as opposed to just hunting and gathering when this spruce was born.

So it's a really old tree.

On fluff

It’s been snowing a lot lately. I know – crazy Norwegian weather, right? Well, actually, it’s not that kind of snow. It’s some sort of cottonish seed falling from the sky; much like someone was sitting in the top of a very tall tree blowing dandelion parachutes down on us. He would need a lot of dandelions to do that, though, since these candyfloss-like specks have been dancing through the air - day and night, unstoppable except when it rains - for about a week.

The dandelion-candyfloss-snowflakes gather on the road like real snow would. They settle down in your hair, but they don’t melt. They enter my apartment through the open window, and land on the floor where they look suspiciously like albino dust bunnies. If you try to catch them they slip away, brushing their soft fur against your fingers.

This summery snow has an annoying sort of beauty to it. I just brushed one of the seeds off my nose because it made me sneeze. But I cannot stop marvel at the way the specks catch the bright sunlight, or how the larger clouds of them are slowly falling, until they are whirled around by a breath of wind. Seconds later they return to gliding lazily through the air like feathers.

I don’t know what kind of seed it is, but it is definitely not dandelion. All I know is that with the rate they are falling we should have candyfloss trees popping up everywhere next summer.

On missing the wood because you're barking up the wrong tree

I was walking home from the archive one beautiful, sunny day, when I decided to stop and take a picture of a tree. I’ve been walking the same route for weeks now, passing this three twice a day, but I have never noticed just how beautiful it is. It is tall – very tall, in fact – but it doesn’t look too tall, since it’s also a very wide tree. If I am to give a rough estimate of how wide the crown is (keep in mind, very rough, since estimates fall into the category my brain defines as “science” and thus “not my domain”) I’d say it’s maybe 15 square meters. The branches stretch out, neatly, but not too evenly – just enough so it doesn’t look lopsided, but not so much that it looks trimmed. Because this is a wild tree – no doubt about it. To emphasize the wildness, the stem is covered with a climbing vine, striving to join the leaves of the crown in a beautiful harmony.


Are you tired of reading my lyrical description of this wonderful tree yet? Or are you happily imagining sparkling fairies fluttering around the vine-covered stem? Either way, there is a question that surely must be pressing – why are you describing this tree with words when you simply can show us the picture you took? Well, actually, you hit a sore spot there. Because there is no picture (and that is the topic of today’s post, the tree merely plays a secondary role in the upcoming tale).

Why is there no picture?

Let me assure you, none of the normal excuses apply. Yes, I did have my camera with me. Since it’s my primary working tool in the archive, Buck has become my companion through thick and thin. No, she didn’t have film in her, but then again, that is of little relevance since she’s a digital camera. Before you have the time to reply to that, let me quickly add that she did have a memory card. One that wasn’t full (though it was not empty either – 283 pictures taken from three archive boxes). Battery? Well, actually, that is almost correct – there was little enough battery left for that to be a perfectly valid excuse. But then I’d have no blog post (or at least a significantly shorter one). The lack of sufficient battery capacity does play a role, but still, it’s not the superstar. (When will I get to the point, you say? Never! I laugh evilly. But then I will reluctantly admit that I am on my way.)

I stopped and pulled out my camera. I removed the lens cover (there goes another potential reason); adjusted the camera; looked through the little thingie that isn’t the screen (I like to pretend I know what I’m doing, after all) and was just about to take the picture that forever would capture the spirit of this tree, when I was rudely interrupted. A car had stopped behind me, and a voice called out from it.

My first thought was “please, don’t let it be the owner”. The tree, wild as it may look, was after all firmly placed in the middle of a neatly trimmed lawn, in front of a “two SUVs and a Porsche”-looking garage and a huge house with lots of windows where the blinds were firmly shut. The entire property screamed “paparazzis will be shot first, then questioned”. And yet I thought it would be a good idea to wave my camera around like a crazy person.

Slowly, I turned around, to face my potential killer. The guy in the car looked good-natured enough, but you never know with potential killers. I kept my distance (which was a pretty safe one, considering he was on the other side of the road).

“Excuse me, you couldn’t tell me where X Road is?” he asked.

Seeing as the driver was asking for directions, it was apparent (even to me) that this was not the owner, and thus I simply wanted the man to go away, before the real owner turned up, or my battery died (whichever came first). However, even if I had wanted to help him, I don’t know any roads in our neighbourhood named X. Therefore I put on my finest Norwegian accent (reserved for occasions such as this) and replied: “Sorri, I am djust a torist, I don’t know where aniting is!”

He looked at me suspiciously, but as I was holding a camera, my story seemed likely enough. “Just a tourist, huh?” he said, and took off. Happy that this minor setback was overcome, I returned to my task. The battery was very nearly dead now, so it took me a few moments to convince the camera to wake up again. Just as I was ready – another car approached and slowed down.

What – was this “plague the photographer” day? Again I turned around, half expecting the same guy to be back, accusing me of employing a fake Norwegian accent since I, after all, had been able to pronounce W. Only this time it wasn’t a false alarm. One of the SUVs who belonged in the garage whose tree I desperately was trying to capture, nearly pushed me into the ditch as it pulled over and into the driveway I seconds earlier had been standing in. I was worthy of one hateful look cast from the woman in the car before the (automatically opened) garage door swallowed both her and the car. She was quite obviously on her way to find her shotgun, and as my battery in that very instant shut down completely (probably out of fear), I realized it was not meant to be.

I could go back another day, (at the risk of my life and pride,) to once more try to photograph the tree. But I think the opportune moment passed – it’s time to face that some pictures are just not supposed to be taken.