*Photograph by Chris Kirkland “F*** Greenpeace,” declared the bumper sticker of a battered old station wagon. I couldn’t but laugh – only in Greenland. Greenpeace devotes a lot of energy to Greenland. But they are very unpopular here. Here are some reasons why. One – oil. Education standards are low, unemployment is high with …
October is late in the year to be sailing. It’s cold. An icy rind is forming around the shore and a blanket of frost now rarely releases its grip on the land. We took the boat out for one of our last trips of the season. The bay we sailed into, only a short distance …
Owning a boat is an unrivalled way of experiencing Greenland’s natural beauty. It’s also an effective and efficient way of getting into a great deal of trouble, as learned by our friends. What’s in the box?” J asked, heaving it onto Ane, the 18 foot Hansvik the three men shared. She was a nice little …
Fishing in Greenland is like, well, shooting fish in a barrel. I grew up spending my Christmas holidays in Australia, on the beach with my family, getting sunburnt, building and destroying sand castles, filling buckets with soldier crabs. Fishing was an integral part of those holidays. It was a serious business, overseen by the menfolk. …
*Photograph by Elis Hoffman. There is a brief moment in the early Greenlandic summer when a confluence of factors make it seem that the very essence of living is presented for your personal pleasure. The weather is warm enough to relax outside, albeit perhaps not in your Hawaian shirt. The snow has, largely, melted. The …
Greenland is cold. You probably know that. One consequence is that almost all fruit and vegetables are shipped from Denmark. This means you need to be careful making your selection at the supermarket. A single aubergine might cost you eight dollars. Although the range and quality is still probably better than you might expect, visiting …
I had to laugh when I got this shopping bag from a supermarket in Finland. Not because of the weird language or any of the other super weird stuff that makes Finland the special country it is. But because when I bought my shopping, I had a choice of this paper bag, or a range …
*Photo by Daniel Herwartz When the wind blows in Greenland, you know about it. The winter storms are terrific. ‘Terrific’ in that they induce terror. As I write this, the wind is hurling wet snow at our living room windows. Windows which, at times like these, I wish weren’t so large. When the wind really …
My husband and son stand together on the balcony outside our house in the darkness, warm inside their thick down jackets, furred hoods hiding their chilled faces. Side by side they watch the lights drifting across the night sky over the mountain. A ghostly green illuminates the snowy tops, shooting forth soft tendrils of light …