The Geography of Hope

Actually, it's my understanding that light sweet crude's more phytoplankton "bones" than anything else, but then Soundgarden never claimed to be a credible source or anything.

Anyway, in keeping with the recent theme here at Geography Of Hope HQ - i.e. too busy catching up on background reading to post anything original - I figured I'd steal another link from Metafilter, this time to A History of Oil, a one-hour monologue by British comedian Rob Newman, a stunning piece of oratory I've been recommending to one and all since I first saw it.

Rob Newman in disguise? No, but according to Rob Newman, one of the first oil warriors.

Yes, folks, this one's truly a dandy! (It features a pantomime of "gaylord tennis" and everything!)  And beyond the gaylord-tennis thing, it's actually an extremely cogent, insightful and brilliantly presented overview of the turbulent age ushered in by the rise of oil as the world's primary power source. You might be thinking an hour of invective from an eco-activist British stand-up replete with all-but-footnoted historical references would be less than edge-of-your-seat entertainment, but I assure you part of Rob Newman's genius is how propulsive and fun he makes this material. I couldn't recommend this more highly.

Watch this and An Inconvenient Truth back to back, and you know pretty much all you need to know about the impending crisis created by the coincidence of Peak Oil and climate change Which, not coincidentally, was the theme of this year's Ankelohe Conversations, not to mention the prime motivator for this here book thing I'm working on.

There's an excellent four-part series over at the Chicago Tribune that traces the full length and breadth of the vast global web of industry, infrastructure, and socioeconomic relations involved in bringing gasoline from deep underground to an SUV's gas tank in suburban Chicago. I found Part Two, with its images of Nigerian fishermen pulling meagre catches from the polluted Niger Delta under a night sky glowing orange with gas flares, particularly haunting.

I actually pitched pretty much this exact story to the National Post's business magazine a few years back. After reading the Tribune piece, I'm sort of happy the Post didn't go for it, because no way I could've done the story justice with a freelancer's resources. And anyway, the idea of tracing a commodity from origin to consumer did lead to an assignment - I just wrote my supply-chain expose on marijuana instead.

If you're looking for something fun, exciting and sustainability-related to bring with you to the beach - and who isn't? - I recommend you burn that copy of Crichton's State of Fear and instead head down to your local newsstand and pick up the summer issue of Maisonneuve. If you live in one of those sad backwaters where the newsstand can't find room for Montreal's finest ultra-eclectic general-interest recently-turned-into-a-quarterly rag, the best I can do for you is to suggest that you click through to the teaser page at their website and press your nose against the digital glass in envy.

The piece details a trip I took to the Yalakom Valley in the Coast Mountains of B.C. around this time last summer to visit Bill Irwin, a self-taught engineering whiz who'd built his own small-scale, run-of-river hydroelectric plant to provide power to his and about a dozen other homesteads. Bill and his microhydro project had come to my attention during the research for another story I was doing on the legacy of the draft dodgers in the Kootenays, centring on the group of back-to-the-landers (Bill Irwin among them) who'd built an A-frame house on my mother-in-law's property back in the early 1970s. (That piece has been in the can since last fall, and is currently scheduled for publication this December in The Walrus.)

The collapsing A-frame on Strawberry Hill, Nakusp, BC. (Photo by Ashley Bristowe, one of an excellent series.)

In a sense, that trip marked the beginning of the field research for The Geography of Hope. Though I was ostensibly there to talk to Bill about his days as the Canadian kid who'd led his American friends from the University of Maryland first to Vancouver and then to the Slocan Valley in search of a new utopian start, I went just as much to see his microhydro project. Sitting in Bill's kitchen, far off the grid, under warm lights lit by a full-blown power plant he'd built himself, I started to realize just how inspiring sustainability could be.

I'm not sure if Bill himself will turn up in the pages of The Geography of Hope, but his pioneer spirit certainly will.

Finally getting around to finishing up the posts from the German leg of the research so I can get to more recent backposting about New Mexico and Colorado.

So let's party like it's late May 2006!

First, read all about Freiburg's innovative Solar City!

Then move on to an account of my first-ever cricket match!

Far fewer gratuitous exclamation marks in the actual backposts!

With the primary research now in sight of the finish line, your humble narrator's tour has thus far taken in nearly a dozen countries, too many airports, a couple of nasty bouts of traveler's diarrhea (thank you, India, indeed!), and more incomprehensible signage than could possibly be adequately summarized in a single blog posting.

Nevertheless, I'll do my best. What follows is a scattershot selection of some of the finest signs from the European and Asian legs of the research tour (with some southwestern US strangeness still to come).

Garbage can, Copenhagen, Denmark:

Have I got that right? All of us are 100% assholes? Huh. Being blanket-insulted by Danish cartoons - it's not just for Muslims anymore.

Theatre poster, Copenhagen, Denmark:

Oh, good. More of that subtle Danish satire I've been reading so much about in al-Arabiya.

Perimeter fence, Christiania, Copenhagen, Denmark:

The two chief targets of Danish caricature are Muslims, all of you, and cop . . .

The three chief targets of Danish caricature are Muslims, all of you, cops and . . .

Grocery store, Aeroeskoebing, Denmark:

Here is Netto Dog. He is for bringing you into best grocery store with friendly enticement of helpful dog with easy utilized basket. Name of store is also included.

Grocery store, Aeroeskoebing, Denmark:

Netto Dog is on this pole by itself. Such happy super-helpful dog, you can to the store come, he tells you alone himself. Name of store is not included. Crazy!

Ferry landing, Samsoe, Denmark:

Netto Dog is now going on journey, bringing happiness and helpful bargains to all of Danish peoples. A hat and scarf are for to protect against cold when in travel. See how it confuses about Netto Dog this time, making you give more love and spend more of your moneys? That Netto Dog! So crazy!

Historic site, Samsoe, Denmark:

(Bellowing in anguish): For the love of God, I don't! Speak! Danish!

(Obligatory Chris Farley gag. RIP.)

Public bus, Aeroeskoebing, Denmark:

Hey! Hey! You there! On the rollerskates! Eating the creamsicle! Writing the doubly parenthetical aside! Yes, you! What are ya, some kinda troublemaker? No, just put down the wine bottle and get the fuck off our nice clean bus, will ya?

(Some readers might need an example to pick up on one part of that joke (but maybe not?))

Bus shelter, Copenhagen, Denmark:

Radio 100FM. Playing all your favourites from the guys who were kicked out of Europe and the Scorpions for being too vain, talentless or fey.

Office building sideyard, Copenhagen, Denmark (the sign reads "HUNDETOILET"):

Honestly, officer, he was within the barriers when he started. But you know how they sometimes take a few steps to shake off the last couple of drops . . . Yeah, no, I told him about the conceptual fourth wall too, but what can I do? Dog loves his Beckett.

Interior of autorickshaw, Mysore, India:

This is Aamir Khan. For upward of a billion people, this man is about as famous as Tom Cruise. See how many things there are in this big ole world that you very nearly went through life knowing nothing about?

(This one's for our old pal Carla - who, notwithstanding her Columbia PhD and tenure-track job as an anthropology prof specializing in South Asian religions has a full-on schoolgirl crush on Aamir Khan.)

Billboard, Mysore, India:

Testimonial No. 1: I love the way it accentuates my house being washed away.

Testimonial No. 2: Well, I like how it reminds me of Shiva's bounty.

Testimonial No. 1: Washed away.

Testimonial No. 2: Shiva's bounty.

Testimonial No. 1: Washed away!

Testimonial No. 2: Shiva's bounty!

They advance on each other.

Enter Bob Uecker.

Uecker: Fellas, fellas, please - this poorly conceived Lite beer allusion is going nowhere. Can't we all just . . .?

A torrent of flood water sweeps all away stage left.

Exeunt.

Golden temple, Bylakuppe Tibetan Settlement, Mysore Distt., India:

Dude, there's some weird shit going on in the fine details of Tibetan temple art. Here, for example? The upside-down skull with its innards sort of erupting out the top? Wearing a blue silk parasol? That's, uh, that's about inpermanence.

Golden temple, Bylakuppe Tibetan Settlement, Mysore Distt., India:

This one is way down in the bottom right corner of a fresco the size of a billboard. Pretty much goes without saying, I guess, that the red, balding demon is refusing the offer of a severed human head from a long-haired, red-skinned John Malkovich because to do otherwise would be a deviation from the little-known ninth spoke of the Eightfold Path: Right surrealism.

Golden temple, Bylakuppe Tibetan Settlement, Mysore Distt., India:

It should be noted that Bylakuppe's golden temple was built within the last five years. It's thus not entirely clear whether the Grateful Dead owes the Tibetan government-in-exile a shitload of back royalties on their t-shirt and bumper-sticker sales, or whether, conversely, the exiled Tibetan community's master temple painters just really really dig "Ripple."

Train station, Bangalore, India:

If, however, you are not a suitcase lifter, pickpocket, or bomb, feel free to take all the drinks or eatables you want from your co-passengers.

Chinatown, Singapore:

Who knew the Year of the Dog would prove to be so cuddly? And so willing to risk infringing on any number of Hanna-Barbera's copyrights?

It should also be noted that no one in the history of Singapore - least of all a fur-covered dog - has ever had occasion to wear a scarf. Especially someone already wearing a bulky sweater.

British Museum entry hall, London, England:

Easy for you tossers to say now you've carted off everyone else's knowledge and locked it all up in the bleedin' British Museum, innit?

Pub door, Inverness, Scotland:

That poor sod headed down the pub in his favourite wacky "test pattern" t-shirt will probably never know what hit him.

Inverness Airport, Inverness, Scotland:

Three stock photos of psyilocybin mushrooms: $45
One glossy poster: $4
Informing every easy-trippin' backpacker just arriving after a month in Amsterdam that your municipality is an excellent place to score 'shrooms: priceless

We extended the Colorado leg of the tour an extra day to have a chance at interviewing Steve Burkholder, the mayor of Lakewood. A central figure in the conceptualization and development of Belmar as Lakewood's new city centre, Mr. Burkholder is a friendly and well-spoken guy, a man finishing up his tenure as mayor knowing he helped create a great legacy for Lakewood and the greater Denver area, besides.

Turner plays the good cop as Sloane grills His Worship on various esoteric aspects of urban design and social engineering. "Does form dictate function, or does function dictate form? ...Answer me!"

Steve Burkholder, Mayor of Lakewood, champion of Belmar.

There comes a time in every research tour where a trip to the local park is in order. If you have a toddler along, finding a park can sometimes become the central occupying obsession in your soul, as she dejectedly whines from the back seat, "...Go go! ...Whee! ...Go go! ...Whee!" until you snap.

Hereby let us present a (partial) tour of the parks we frequented throughout Colorado and New Mexico...

Twirly-go-round contraption at the chi-chi Aspen downtown playground.

Turner took Sloane (middle, near slide, in pink dress) to his old Aurora, CO, elementary school for some old school good tymes.

Colorado shopping mall: beautiful day outside, a zillion kids indoors swarming the mall's play area.

Carla and Ash take an adults' go on the swings in Boulder, CO. (Attention funders: swinging time is essential to the creative process. Please do not cut our funding.)

Turner shows his daughter a thing or two about how you go down the slide, not up. (Denver, CO)

Are we having fun yet? (Taos, NM)

So obviously this here geographically themed book project has involved a lot of travel, which of course has meant a lot of hotel stays. And one thing I've noticed is that damn near every hotel on the planet - from Kowloon to Vancouver to Snowmass to Chennai - now has a sign somewhere in the room informing you that you can make a massive difference in the fate of our world by choosing to reuse your towels.

Here's a representative sample from the lovely Best Western in Nederland, Colorado:

I'm beginning to think that the ubiquity and hysterical tone of these things kind of sums up the successes and failures of the first wave of the environmental movement. To wit:

On the one hand, it's great that there's near-unanimity among innkeepers the world over that action must be taken to reduce our impact on the environment, and certainly reducing our energy consumption by refraining from washing essentially clean towels surely helps.

On the other hand, is that really all it's going to take to "SAVE OUR PLANET!"? I mean, the action is so out of proportion to the scope of the problem as to make a mockery of the idea that it's a serious issue. It's like recycling: By all means do so, and diligently, but don't fool yourself into thinking that reducing the number of soup cans in the local landfill is the sum total of "doing your part."

It's all the rage, these days, to have a little (or big) local farmer's market. Mostly it's crafts and food and hemp clothing and whatnot, with a few "farmers" thrown in to keep the name honest. But authenticity aside, the vitality of a community's farmer's market is generally a good litmus test of the vibrancy of the area in general. People, on foot, eating ice cream and shooting the shit over a pile of commercially-grown eggplant, walking their dogs up the centre of the road and basically enjoying being outdoors - that's what it's all about.

Belmar has some great ideas and their introduction of a farmer's market was truly inspired. I won't go on and on, but let me just remind you that this ex-shopping mall brownlands were populated by gang turf jockeys and crows only a few years ago.  

I like a smartass. When I sidled up to this woman's booth to get a photo, I started out with, "So... tell me a bit about your product here..." This lady pointed to the lemons in the hanging basket. Leaned in close: "Those are l-e-m-o-n-s. We squeeeeeeeeze them, and out comes this liquid. And you can drink it!" Cheers.

Everyone loves a jaunty-coloured cowboy hat here in Colorado.

What's a farmer's market without the hardcore vegan clothing merchants? The folks here at Cruelty Free World (.org) sold us one hell of a belt for $10: made out of an old bike tire.

A great many feature stories and books on climate change and its possible solutions feature interviews with, descriptions of, and/or odes to Amory Lovins, co-founder (with his now ex-wife, Hunter) and CEO of the Rocky Mountain Institute in Old Snowmass, Colorado. With good cause: Lovins has been breaking new ground in the sustainable-development and energy-efficiency world almost daily since the RMI got going in 1982; his book Natural Capitalism (co-written with Hunter Lovins and green entrepreneur Paul Hawken) is to my mind the most important book on economics since at least Keynes; and the think tank of two he started 25 years ago is now a green mecca attracting a few dozen of the best minds in the sustainability field to cook up solutions for everyone from Wal-Mart to the Pentagon.

So it was only natural that we scheduled an RMI pilgrimage into the Southwestern US leg of the research tour. Turned out that Amory himself was off on one of his many, many speaking engagements, but that didn't bother me much, because he's on record at multiple books' length as to his ideas about what needs to be done to build a sustainable world. No, I was more interested in the Institute itself. I mean physically, as a building tucked into a steep valley in the Colorado Rockies. Because it's long struck me that in all the tales of RMI and its founder that I've read, I can't recall ever reading a detailed description of the place Lovins built as his private residence, workspace, and showpiece of his ideas in action.

Fortunately, RMI's affable outreach coordinator, Cory Lowe, was only too happy to give us a tour. (A pre-tour sidenote: Lowe and most of his colleagues work not at the state-of-the-art RMI headquarters but further up the valley in a complex of several bungalows that sit on a nature reserve formerly owned by John Denver.)

Now on to the tour:

Set among the aspens high up a side valley, RMI's building is built of local materials, utilizes solar gain to handle the temperature fluctuations throughout the year, and includes an enormous greenhouse.

Turner on a tour of the roof, perusing the solar hot water heater panels.

See the whole Flickr photo set for the RMI visit, here. (Highlights include many photos of the elaborate greenhouse adjacent to the main office area, which is home to the resident bug-eating hedgehog, Hedgemon, and at least two turtles. (Our man Mr. Lowe had never seen Turtle No. 2 out sunning himself until the morning of our visit, so who knows how many their actually are.)