I frowned, pressing my fingers into the soft, dark soil. “They look a bit droopy, don’t they?” asked my husband, unhelpfully. “Yes, but they’re still damp,” I replied, though concerned about these slightly sad looking pepper plants in the windowsill. One of our neighbours had made the potentially fatal error of asking me to care …
The cold sting of rain blew relentlessly on our faces as we trudged down the hill to the bus stop. My son pulled his hood further down over his furrowed brow. “Isn’t it supposed to be summer?” he muttered, waving one hand generally in the direction of…well everything – the heavy clouds, the buffeting wind, …
“I need to send a picture of my penis to Kate*,” said my husband. I looked up slowly from my laptop. “Why do you need to send her a picture of your penis?” I asked. “I need another one,” he replied matter-of-factly. “The one I have is too big. I need a smaller one.” Seeing …
In Greenland, the winds of political change usually come with a whiff of dried fish or mattak. So it was last week when change swept through the government of Greenland once again and a new coalition was formed. Two years on from the last election, the major party – Siumut – abandoned its minority coalition …
The other day I saw a video of someone extolling the virtues of Greenland’s living standards and free health and education systems over other ‘developed’ nations and I felt a stir of dissent. It is likely that most people probably think the living standard in Greenland is significantly lower than it actually is. Measured using …
The tide is low as we creep through thick fog toward the small harbour of Napasoq, a tiny settlement on a rocky island fifty kilometres southeast of Maniitsoq on the west coast. We pass the deserted pier jutting out from the rocky shore, towering over the still shallow water, and pull up alongside a ramshackle …
The antenatal classes I attend in Nuuk are a two-and-a-bit language affair. Our Greenlandic midwife speaks mostly in Danish, a little in Greenlandic, and – for my benefit – throws in a few short explanations in English, which is necessary now and then. Although I can manage pretty well in Danish, in antenatal class there …
Each morning on the bus to work, I pass the cemetary in the centre of Nuuk, a field of sparse, white crosses against a pale blanket of snow. The bus pauses there by that bare white field with its rigid crosses, gathered in by a wooden fence that holds back the steadily encroaching apartment blocks …
Photo by freestocks on Unsplash The boat pulls away, leaving the three of us standing silently in the sand by our rucksacks, watching its retreat, the cold, mirrored water swashing back and forth on the shore. Soon there are only ripples and the cool, wet air closes around us. Looking up the hill, where we …