Thursday, 11 September 2014

Our dear trees



"They are cutting down our trees. Decades of life and energy growing… and they cut it down in seconds. It was our backward, but they needed a path. They don't even care of what was there or who lived there, who was depended of those trees. They rape the trunk until it doesn't have any branches anymore.
They've killed the trees. 
They fall in front of my eyes, and my heart cries with them. Each trees is a piece of me that gets teared out. 

All that, for money. All this destruction is aimed to make … money. 
In the brutal noise of metal and machinery, man's greed harvests "its" resources. 


We've all seen it in videos and pictures, even in films. We've all seen the Rain Forest been destroyed… But, when it's so far away, can it really touch you, move you ? Yes, it's sad, it's terrible, but it's also very far away and we have things more important on the menu here. 
It's not quite the same when it suddenly happens in your backyard, in your garden. To see the trees you've gazed upon so many times while sipping your morning coffee on the porch, being taken down… just like that. Effortless and fast. Heart-breaking. 

They're killing our forest. And we have gave them the power to do it…

It feels so impossible to not hate them. To not hate these monkeys who "only do their job", who don't think, who feel so compelled to obey… those blind mind… I want my power back from society ! I don't want to watch them anymore destroy what it so important to me ! I don't want them to own me, my integrity, and my opinion ! Any more, never more ! I can't stand this any longer.

Nature will survive. She has done it so many times. The deer who were coming out of these woods to eat the grass on the meadow have been long gone. We wondered why for about a month and a half… I guess they knew…

In the end, we, humans, are the one who loses the most out of it."


This is what went straight to my head after filming "our" trees being cut down. It was an extremely intense moment and even if the pain is still there in minor proportion, I'm happy it's in the past. Boy, I cried like i never do. I screamed and cried to the point where the whole perron went shaking with me. I was lucky enough to have Morten with me to help going through such a deep and powerful pain. We were both shocked. It took us from the inside and, hours after the scene, tears were still flowing silently out. The heart aches and the mind wondered. "What can we do?" 
A million thoughts ran through. 
Suddenly, I went back to read Henry David Thoreau. After all, he lived in the woods, all alone, in a cabin that he had built himself. It looks almost like the best solution to my sorrow. Until I realized the obvious : this would be a beautiful, fantastic, dreamy and ever close to nature… escape.




Life is here. Life is now. 

I don't deny that we need wood. We live in a house made out of wood. We warm ourselves in the winter with wood stoves. I enjoy a good book and to paint watercolors on paper. 

What I refuse, what hurts the most, what I can't stand is the way we, today, in our so modern society, destroy forests. We lose so much in it. We don't just take trees that are ready to be cut, we harvest them. There is no care around it (or at least, it doesn't look like it). It used to be an craft. It was to be learned, how to recognize which tree is ready to be cut, which one will help the surroundings by being cut and used. We used to actually using the whole tree. Now, it's just the trunk. All the rest is left on site, to rot. It's gonna take years before it's completely broken down and made into soil. 
It looks like a mirror to the situation we have so often lived as kid, when our moms were telling us " eat your vegetable!" 

The reason for this is once more money. "It would cost"… "It's not worth it" … So, we make holes in the woods, on the hills, by the rivers. Just like borders between countries are drawn on the papers, areas are being selected to be harvested. This is what we often see around in Norway. Woodland are considered as an investment. The national statistics still confirmed that less than 1/3 of the annual growing woodland is being cut. 








And you can see the scars for years after. It's every other hill. 




This is the one by our house. When you walk down, you don't even walk on the ground most of the time, but rather half a meter above it. You walk on the pile of branches left there. 




And yet, the most impressive thing happened when I was down there. As I sat and listened, a bird sang nearby and the creek was still running under the ground. I thought it would be dead-silent, and it simply wasn't. 

Life goes on. Life is as mysterious as powerful. No matter what we do, it still pushes to the light. It's we, humans, who have to learn, who lose our connection to nature when we do such things. 


Nature will survive. Will we ? 






Monday, 8 September 2014

Documentary : Foods that make billions

A small serie of three documentaries on our western food habits and the marketing around it. It describes how water, cereals and yoghurt are being produced and how we have learned to desire it. Produced by the BBC, it's mainly centered on british food habits, but you'll see it's not so far away from the general western consumption… 


First episode is on water :




Second episode is about breakfast : 




Finally, third episode about yoghurt : 


Monday, 1 September 2014

B as Blueberry

One of the privileges of living in Norway is obviously to be surrounded by nature. The more I spend time here, the more I really understand it.

During this summer, two books have followed us Morten and I, coming back in the daily routine over and over. One is about plants in general, the other is specifically on berries. Although they're both in norwegian, they are a treasure of information once you can decode it (either with Morten or a dictionary).

 


In result, one evening, a fact suddenly blew our minds : We have 12 different kinds of eatable berries growing around the house ! 
Here's the poster Morten did about it the next morning :



Some of them can be eaten straight from the bush, some need a bit of preparation. But all in one, it's a hell of a good news ! 


So, after currants and black currants from the garden, cloudberries and crowberries from the swamps areas nearby, this is the time of the Blueberries !

Actually, to my greatest delight, the blueberry grows almost everywhere in the woods where we live. Although it doesn't mean that every bush produces berries, the potential is massive. It took us a couple of good walk through the forest and by the lake to find the precious fruits. 
And, oh boy, we find some…
It's not easy, because those little plants are tricksy you know. The have a special — I dare say brilliant — defense mechanism : camouflage. 

For those who are not familiar with the nordic blueberries (that is not the same as the american variety for exemple), the plant itself isn't taller that 30cm above the ground. Once you've spotted the little blue bullets hanging in a bush, the natural reaction is to come close to pick them… and there the magic happens. The berries disappear. As soon as you stand above them, the tiny leaves cover the fruits and you can't see them anymore. At first, it's really disturbing, as a dozen of blueberries noticed 10 seconds earlier have suddenly vanished in front of you. It's super effective. The leaves themselves are not big enough to cover one berry, so you'd think that you would still see through. Que nĂ©ni ! It's remarkable how this plant has evolved to protect it fruits this way. If it wasn't enough, the leaves change their color as the autumn comes and the graduation of red with green tricks the eyes in the most clever way. 

In the end, it takes a good dose of time and patience to collect this kind of berries by hand. But, the result is the best rewards. So far, we have made jam, drinking sirop, another kind of raw jam with the left-overs of the sirop making berries, liquors (hehe), and dry the most of it. Needless to say we have also ate a LOT of fresh ones while we were picking…
Coming from a world where blueberries are only sold in the shops in summer and for an expensive price, the past month has been like a dream. Now, there's still lots in the woods, ready to be picked, but we have to hurry as the season passes and the fruits started to dry on the plants. One or two expeditions more and the rest will be for our dear neighbours in the woods :-) 



The next berries coming are the Lingonberry, which also promises fantastic jam to go with wild meat during the winter. It feels so good and rewarding to harvest them ourselves and created what we eat. Beyond the financial gain and the control on the product, it just feels right. Right to put some energy in it, to work and play with nature, to not blindly buy a product with a nice picture on it but actually touch the fruit… 
It feels real.