This blue marble

– and yet it spins


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Good morning Vienna!

Vienna

Good morning Vienna! Grüss Gott how pretty you are, old and new side by side. Bet everybody here eats Sacher torte for breakfast. I began my day with tea and coconut torte, and ended it with Sacher torte. Not kidding. This is Vienna, after all.

Delicious chocolates, dances, and Strauss waltzes beckoned to me as I sped through the morning rush in the cab towards Am Stadtpark. Forty-eight hours in Vienna can be a life-changing adventure, but for me it had to be a meeting room and many, many powerpoint slides. Next time, city of chocolate and music – next time I am yours.

(Vienna, Austria; March 2014)


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Modern amulets

travelessentials-1Amulet (ˈamjʊlɪt): an object worn to protect from disease, bad luck, and things evil.

We all have a few things that keep us safe and sane on our travels. For some of us, modern amulets are larger and more practical, such as my Rimowa. The beginning and the end of each business trip. Approved cabin baggage size – yet fits enough for a 3-night stay. Easily identified among the growing crowd of Rimowas on business commuter flights by a well-worn sticker once applied at Kathmandu airport. Bruised, battered, and unyielding after 200+ trips.

travelessentials-2The Beats and the iPod: for when babies scream, seat neighbors consume too much alcohol, or when I need to lose myself in thoughts for a while. And last but not least, the Nepalese silk and yak wool shawl – for winter dinners, airconditioned conference rooms, and those frigid mornings in the Finnair Embraer 190.

What keeps you safe and sane during your travels?


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Rain over the Minch

harris

One rainy morning we boarded a ferry at Uig, Skye. The rain clouds dragged over the water like shrouds, sweeping us into a soundless blanket. That morning the waters of the notorious Minch were calm. Suddenly the gray shrouds gave away for a few precious minutes of soft green-tinted yellow daylight, the kind you only see on a rainy day.

As we slipped into Tarbert harbour the light vanished like a dying ember, and the clouds swallowed us back into the shroud of swirling droplets. Sun is rare on the Hebrides.

(Isle of Harris, Scotland; July 2011)


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Dinner like a warm bath

Trugstad

One snowy January night we found ourselves at the doorstep of Trugstad gård. A little blackboard with a swirly heart wished us welcome, as we escaped the cold indoors – and right into a warm bath of candlelight and care. There were flowers, creaky floors, and couches to sink into. There were paintings, pillows, and a fireplace. And there was the most delicious, locally produced dinner and the warmest care, just like at a dear friend’s home.

I took a sip of the lovely Norwegian apple ice wine, looked at my high-spirited colleagues through the candle lights, and marveled what a good restaurant and human warmth can do for team-building.

(Trugstad gård, Gardermoen, Norway; January 2014 – photo from August 2013)


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Survivors of Smoky Bay

Iceland-7

This bare, godforsaken island in the middle of the north Atlantic catches four hours of daylight in January, snow in the winter, and a cover of volcano ash every few years. For some inexplicable reason of insanity or wanderlust, a bunch of vikings considered Iceland a better place to live than their native Scandinavia. There must have been intrigue and pursuit, and an escape to an unknown, unsympathetic land far away from family and trade. 1200 years ago Iceland may have boasted with a few forests, but it forced the settlers down to their knees, to build houses of turf, survive through volcanic eruptions, and learn to catch and eat fish.

And learn they did. The adaptability of humans is astounding. Today Reykjavik (Smoky Bay) is less smoky and the steam and heat is harnessed into a geothermic heating system for the city. And when Kaupthingi bank fell in the credit crunch storm of 2008, Iceland (in contrast to other countries in distress) went against most IMF recommendations on how to push through the crisis – and survived. Again.

Hats off to the toughest of all Nordic people.

Iceland-8(Reykjavik, Iceland; January 2014)


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Fire and ice and steam

Iceland-5

Fire and ice, and towers of steam. How easy it is to forget that we are all floating on a thin crust underneath so much heat! Yet this is the true nature of our Earth – both today and millions of years ago. This is where first life was created, in a primeval soup with a temperature close to 100 degrees centigrade.

We humans have a wonderful ability to restrict our reality to something immediate we can cope with. Curiously we consider ourselves safe and sound on a smoldering ball of fire and iron, spinning away in the solar system on the fine line between freezing cold and boiling hot. And so when a volcanic eruption blasts out a gentle reminder of a more objective reality, we are unable to accept that the world we consider green and beautiful and full of life is just a thin exception of the norm.

Iceland-6

(Great Geysir, Iceland; January 2014)