Friday and Saturday: marching with 100,000

Sorry it has been a few days since my last entry—(Mother all is well, please stop worrying). I took the day off on Friday, and I never stopped going on Saturday. I never got the opportunity to sit down and write.

On Friday, I slept in a bit, spent some time making myself homesick via Facebook, and then biked to the train station in Hvalsoe, stopping by a pizza parlor to burn the roof of my mouth on the way. After pizza, I jumped on my train and headed into central Copenhagen, which is about a 50 minute train ride from my host family’s house. I spent the train ride reading my book, Black Elk Speaks. Once I got into Copenhagen, I spent a couple of hours exploring the downtown area of the city, and walking through the various side-event exhibits and demonstration tents. In the main city square is the main “Hopenhagen Live” set up, most obviously marked by a massive globe that displays news, climate change facts, and pictures. All around it are temporary buildings and tents filled with renewable technology demonstrations and climate change information booths. In the middle of the square, there is a huge Christmas tree whose lights are powered entirely by stationary bikes set up around it. A few blocks away, WWF had a large area set up with climate change exhibits, the most interesting of which being a Polar Bear skeleton which had ice frozen around it like a body. Slowly, over the two weeks of COP15, the ice is melting and eventually there will be only a skeleton—this all being symbolic of the potential, predicted extinction of the species over the next 50-100 years. There was also a really incredible photography exhibit, profiling indigenous peoples around the world who are being affected by climate change.

Then on Saturday I got up early and commuted into Copenhagen, arriving at the Bella Center around 8:45 or 9. (My commute consists of the aforementioned 50 minute train ride, then a 5 minute walk to the Metro—which is essentially a subway—which takes me directly to the Belle Center in 10 minutes.) Once I finally made it through security and checked my bag and coat, I sat down to eat my day-old chicken sandwich and checked the daily schedule. There was a Conference of the Parties meeting in the main Plenary hall right off the bat, so I got in there early and secured my spot—(the observer seats fill up quickly, so it can be hard to get a seat).

After sitting through most of the COP meeting, I left around noon and headed for Christians borg, the castle in central Copenhagen where the Danish Parliament works. This was the meeting point for the climate change march organized by Greenpeace International. It is impossible to tell how people marched for sure—the organizers planned for 20,000, hoped for 60,000, but told us right before we started walking that Danish Police had estimated 100,000. Newspapers have written all sorts of numbers, ranging from 25,000 to 100,000, but regardless, it was reported to be the largest climate change rally ever. It was quite an experience, needless to say, and it was really quite peaceful. The 100-or-so people who were arrested really asked for it—they were reportedly smashing out the windows of a building and attempting to fight with the police. I was never near any of this, and everyone that I saw was being very civil. It was incredibly cold, at the end of the 5-km march, I was ready to get back inside of the Bella Center. However, it was really an incredible experience for me, again as a small-town Montana boy. I have never been part of a group that was near the size of this one, so the noise and activity of it all was quite a lot to take in. The energy of the crowd was wonderful, and I was pretty much inspired by the whole thing. As a cynical environmentalist, I can’t tell you how wonderful it was seeing 100,000 people organize and rally for an environmental cause. There were signs like “Nature Doesn’t Compromise” and “Change the Politics, Not the Climate.” Even if these negotiations fail to bring about anything meaningful as far as treaty, I will leave Denmark inspired. To see the environmental movement grow in momentum, and to experience first-hand the peak of all that energy (and it will continue to grow—this is only the high-point thus far), has been, and will continue to be an incredibly moving experience. And the wonderful thing about it, to me, is the basis of it all—this conference is based around preserving the integrity and functionality of our world’s natural environment. And those of us who are here to fight for it—we are fighting for something that is very real and meaningful, and that fact unites us. I keep thinking about how different things would be if we were holding a conference based on banking (or something related to finance)—would there be this sincere energy of passion and survival? Would there be this innate feeling of brotherhood between all of us young people? Fighting for financial freedom or security would be based around the pretext of money, which is not a real thing at its core—it is a fabricated societal construct, made real only by our perception. However, the natural world—the environment—is something that we cannot live without. It is the very basis of life, and human survival and well-being. That is real. That realness creates an intangible dimension to all of this that truly stirs me.

After the march, I met up with Melissa and Yaicha, and went back to their flat. We ate dinner, and took the train to a night club called VEGA, which was rented out for a COP15 NGO party. So I got to have another culture shock-moment, as I had never been inside of a night club before. We stayed out late and danced, and I crashed out on a couch in their flat early this morning. As I said, it was a long day (and night), and I never got a chance to sit down and write.