by aramatzne@gmail.com | 30 Oct 2023 | Roads Taken
Longyearbyen
Photos of houses and buildings that aren’t falling into the ground are not my specialty, but it seems incomplete to give the impression that there are no people or infrastructure in Svalbard. This is a company town transitioning into a tourist destination. The coal industry is being consciously closed as the government introduces its green sustainability agenda and levies the draw of the north for those who recognize its rapid decline.
The town is nestled in a valley (read never gets sun even when the sun never sets). The north end of town touches the fjord. To the east and west are high plateaus that climb straight from town, level out, and hold the town between their arms. Uphill, to the south, is a glacier. This confuses me almost daily. I expect glaciers to the north, and going south always feels like downhill, according to Ents, so this is a double cross of my wiring.
Housing is mostly company-owned, apartments and row houses in bright colors are nestled below the avalanche fences on the east side of town and the now-derelict coal shuttle structures. Across town and the river, the church takes the high ground. Although it, too, is in a high-risk avalanche zone, no fence has been built above the church yet. Walking into town from the south, you walk toward the fjord, toward another mountain through the ubiquitous street lights – my arch nemesis the world ’round.
The tradition in town is to take off your shoes and hang up your coat when entering many public places, including the library, where I often work. Like kids everywhere, the after-school crowd rarely remembers the “hang up your coat” part. It makes me laugh every day.
by aramatzne@gmail.com | 15 May 2023 | Musing
Twenty years from now…
Twenty years from now, you will be more disappointed by the things you didn’t do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowline. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.
**H. Jackson Brown, Jr. (often misattributed to Mark Twain)
This year, 2023
I am once again throwing off the bowline and going north. Two weeks of sailing on Greenland’s west coast, similar to the Svalbard residency in 2018, with a smaller sailing vessel and fewer people – many of them from the Arctic Circle. Illulisat and Disko Bay are the area of exploration. Then, a week in Iceland with a dear old friend to share the northern calling and expand horizons.
Finally, in early September, I return to Svalbard. I will stay through the final sunset of 2023. On 26 October, after a day with one hour, thirty-five minutes, and twenty-five seconds of sunlight, the sun will set and not rise again until 16 February 2024.
I experienced 24-hour daylight in Alaska —the long, hyper-stimulating days, the sun circling the horizon, never dipping below its edge. Now, it’s time to try the flip side. The moon will be my ally, the stars and northern lights companions.
I’ve flown over Greenland many times on the way to and from Europe (photos from 2009) – always looking down and saying to myself, someday, I will be there. This time, I’m catching the trade winds to weave among the icebergs. A new road with no asphalt and no driving. I hope you’ll sail along.
by aramatzne@gmail.com | 13 Apr 2020 | Roads Taken
18 October–Oslo
It is almost awkward to be in the world of light, trees, and birds again. The noise and chaos of the group over the last two weeks remain in my head and feel familiar now in the sounds of Oslo, children, motors, bikes. The space of the fjords and mountains is closed in by buildings and blocks. Withdrawal from Svalbard physically is too abrupt. The reality of trains and city and money return to the fore and leave me turning inward again. Shy and reserved. New space. New head. New. Again.
The sun has been above the horizon for some time already today and will continue 
there for several more hours. The light is strong, almost harsh – a beautiful sunny day in Oslo in October. Rather unusual. There is no snow in sight and the trees are full of autumn-colored leaves. How did I get here?
Tomorrow is the first leg of the last leg. Oslo to Newark.
I need time to reflect and process. I need to put photos and places together, I need to fill in the many gaps of things that happened and the things I saw.
For today, I plotted a course through the botanical garden and I’ll walk through the university as well. See what I see.
I met a friend of a friend at a coffee shop this afternoon. She was great. We had a lovely conversation. She was the mayor of Longyearbyen for many years. First arriving there to introduce the university research branch. Apparently very successful at that. And, as it happens, she is also the wife of the Mayor of Oslo. She worked for the UN on the climate change panel. She’s smart, ambitious, and looking to the climate/emigrant/world changes that affect all of us.
I came from the burning west to the melting Arctic. The changes are evident. How 
could I not see that? And why did I have to travel so far to identify this issue? Connecting Cooper with Svalbard seemed obvious but now connecting Ashland to Svalbard seems more obvious and more necessary. Shifting my focus and adjusting my perspective was anticipated.
I used the analogy of the wars. How does that go? – They came for the socialists, the trade unionists, the Jews, but I was none of these and I did not object, it was not my business. And when they came for me, there was no one left to stand up for me. [First they came… by Martin Niemöller]
When Bangladesh is underwater, and Sudan reaches 50ºC (122ºF) on a sustained basis we don’t blink. What happens when the permafrost no longer exists and the seed vault is flooded, Europe is on fire, and what was once productive farmland is desert? Who will hear the complaints? Who will rescue us? All of us?
