ojnare

there are two things that characterise sweden most for me - lakes and trees. it's pretty difficult to go anywhere from stockholm outward without dome view of the water, or boats, or boats out on the water doing boaty things. but while i like the water it's the trees that are the most pervasive. for me, there's an odd feeling of being on the edge of something, even in stockholm. it may be there's lots of nice new buildings but you never seem to be far away from forest, first a wee crop of trees and then walk fifteen, twenty minutes and you getting into some proper woodland. take a bit of time and you can get into some really primal woodland (where many bitey things can get primal on you but that's another story).

when we were out in gotland the other week we passed by a bunch of people milling about at the edge of the forest. what's going on there we asked. oh, we were told, they're protesting that some finns are going to cut down the forest for a mine and poison the groundwater. this was ojnare and here it is in today's guardian.

now it's true i don't know the ins and outs of this particular dispute other than its depressing familiarity. at a gut level i don't much like the idea of digging a big hole in the middle of swedish forest (even if i do like the end result of all that limestone) and corporate assurances always give me the shivers. all these wee bits of europe being chiseled away until we're left with what - a vista of ikea and tesco?

sweden is the forest and the forest is sweden. i'm against it!

*there's petition site url's down in the comments bit of that guardian article if you're so minded....