Looking behind my back

IGE Nordics plans of minebreaking in Rönnbacken outside Tärnaby might provide 250 jobs. 20 miljon tonnes will be broken every year wich would be the largest mine in Västerbotten history.

Sigrid Strångberg from Tärnaby in the south of Vilhelmina, Sweden.

The quotation above taken from the newspaper Västerbottens-Kuriren might be written in a positive way but tis large-scale braking of the mineral nickel will affect the minority of same that live in this area. When I for the first time looked behind my back I saw that a global problem I'd been caring for in other countries is about to happen in the country that I call my own.

I've been living in Ecuador and Chile learning about the indigenous people and their struggle against international companies exploitation their land. I've also red a lot about the organisation MST in Brasil and how they by land occupations are fighting for their constitutional rights.

The world is all connected and I know that my consuming habits do affect minority's over the world. We live in a global network and caring about farmers in Latin America do make sense. What really made me feel ashame though is when I first heard about the plans of mining in Västerbotten in the north of Sweden. It was on a lecture arranged by Latinamerikagrupperna that works with indigenous people in Latin America. The'd invited Sigfrid Strångberg from Tärna in South of Vilhelmina where this miner is going to take place.

Sigfrid Strångberg is working for the rights of same and is herself identifying as a same. Her story about how the same where she lives have lost the possibility of fishing and caring reindeer really affected me. According to the law, only the families that worked with raindeers when the latest law about same was written 1971, are allowed to be called same. Only the juridical accepted same are allowed to have reindeers. That means that being a same is something that you inherit from your parents. It doesn't matter weather you culturally live like- and identify yourself as a same, you wan't have the right to work and farm as your cultural origin if you aren't a same on the paper.

Not being able to have raindeers is one of the discriminating facts that had affected the family of Sigfrid Strångberg. She also talked about how international companies had affected their area by not taking responsibility of the roads that their machines had destroyed and about the loss of fishes in the lakes because of the contamination.

With the mine industry the same in the area are about to loose everything. 250 new jobs isn't worth much if the natural and cultural multitude is being destroyed. The same in the area has given their last word in this question by appealing the construction of this big-scale mine to the authorities. Their own municipality hasn't done anything against the mine.

"A group of young people visiting us in tis part of North Sweden reacted with: Is this really Sweden?", Sigfrid Strångberg said. I told her that I identified with that reaction and that I really appreciated her lecture about minorities in my country.

Let's make the struggle global! Let's make the hope global!, is a well known quotation for those who work for indigenous rights in Latin America. In my picture of a global world I want to add my neighbors in the north. I hope that affected minorities will unite their voice and start chairing their experiences over the nations. Let's all open our eyes to include local as well as global in our conception of the world. Together we are stronger!

Text and photo: Jennie Åström

The hunger of the city

When I saw this photo at the exhibition at Kulturhuset in Stockholm I just couldn't stop looking. So many details. I just found one person popping out of a window doing some strange thing, pulling something like, but even though he was the only one visible at the photo I could imagine someone in every window, behind every curtain. I's unbelievable how many persons that are living in one building. That's what's so fascinating about this photo. The huge number of tenants, the details, the pattern that makes the individuals disappear behind their curtains. They are all a part of the anonymity of the city, and they will still be as long as the city is hungry for more. I wounder for how long we will accept to be a part of this machine, to eat and be eaten in the wheel of over consumption. Those who win today might loose tomorrow. The only thing that doesn't change is the anonymity.

The name of the photographer is Jens Assur and the exhibition can be seen at Kulurhuset in Stockholm until the 26th of September 2010.

Running

I don't know if I do like running. But I run a lot. I run to be able to feel the existence of my body. To feel my heart beating when I reach the top of the last hill. To feel the drops of perspiration running down my neck, the pulsating heat in my face. There are moments when I forget the existence of my body. When I forget to breath. This is not one of them.

When I run my lungs swallow liters of oxygen. I feel them outside my body. They are so big that my body can't hold them inside me. I don't like the feeling of having my lungs outside my body. But I love to get them back aired and used to their maximum.

When I ran today I passed by two rats. Rats could never give me any good. They escaped quickly and so did I. There are lots of them in Stockholm. My heart beats harder every time I see them. The rats know to run faster then I. It doesn't help me anyway. I still hate them.

Sometimes I run to the bus. That kind of short running is a good feeling even in the moments of running. My legs turn into feathers. But the wind isn't able take me. I know exactly where I have my feet.

I saw a man today. He was running with two different legs. One leg looked like my legs, the other looked like a iron strip that helped him jump like a kangaroo. He seemed to be pleased being able to run with one leg and jump with the other. I'm also pleased even though I don't rune like a kangaroo with my left leg. At least now when I'm back home again with my lungs inside me.

Text: Jennie Åström

Photo: Sebastian Estay

Don't tell me I'm naive

When I sat at the bus waiting for it to take off my eyes got stuck at a blinking lamp at the wall outside the window. The lamp was pink and had the shape of a square. I'm sure it's been there since the 80's. I stared at the lamp and listened to the almost inaudible sound of a crackling radio that I located from the speakers above me. The crackling and the blinking made a rhythm. This would be a great starting scene in a film, I thought. For a while I forgot that a sat at the bus taking of for work. I was only thinking about what a great film could come out of this scene.

The moments when my brain start to think creative like that are few. I've been working constantly for two months now. At work I meet only people with problems, trying to solve their lives. I get the feeling that in this small world that I share with my workmates only contain two groups. Those who have succeeded with there life and those who have not. To succeed is to have a more or less well payed job, to have somewhere steady to live, to be able to save money to the retirement and to consume clothes and jeweleries and a nice dinner every now and then. Not to succeed is not to have a job, not to have money to spend, not to be shore about where to live next, and most of all; not to bee ware about the seriousness in the situation. There are two groups according to the climate where I work; the employees in the office and the clients.

To have to work and live in a discourse that serious about life really affects me. I start to think like it. I try to structure my life according to the plan. But it only ends up in one way. I keep on identifying myself as the clients more than the employees. It wouldn't bee a problem if it wasn't for the discourse; that I've failed if I don't live in a secure world with a steady salary and somewhere to life for the next few years. I don't want to be like THEM, will I?

With this discourse in my mind there isn't much time for dreaming. That makes the blinking lamp and the crackling radio at the bus quite amazing. The thought about my dead dreams reached me today, when I took a walk in the forest at lunchtime. I was trying to find a topic to start write about but my brain was empty. I started to construct sentences in my head but I only found pieces of story's that couldn't be put together. A few ours of puzzling and I actuality started to put sentences together. My head started to wright about my life and my dreams. I was the topic I'd been looking for. I knew I was close to something great.

The few times when I've told my colleagues at work that I want to be an author, they've only laughed at me. One said: "you sound like our clients", another asked how I'll be able to support my life economically. Is a matter of fact; it do exist other groups of people. They are few tough. It's a great effort to risk the halfboring life of security for the dreams.

Now that I've started seeing every second of my life as a part of a story, I feel more alive. It's only when my creative mind is wide open that I feel my life being closer my dreams.

I'm gonna live a happy life, working as a writer, living as a poor.

Only if I want to see it I'm not so far from there.

This summer l'm going to send my book to the publisher.

Wish me good luck.

Text: Jennie Åström

Photo: Sebastian Estay

Postkulturkrock

"Har du varit med om någon kulturkrock då?", har jag kunna få höra då jag bott utom Sverige. Folk förväntar sig oftast att flytten till ett land bortom födelselandet ska innebära en rad möten med knasiga kulturer. Dock måste jag säga att jag har haft ytterst svårt att svara på den frågan fram tills nu då jag återvänt till Sverige.

Redan i gymnasiet började jag krocka med min egen kultur. Jag är en tjej från landet som vuxit upp med knäna i morotsodlingarna och fötterna i skogens gröna mossa. Jag vill minnas att jag ägnade endel tid åt att drömma under min barn- och tidiga ungdom, trots att jag var en person med livlig energi. Barndomens dagar på landet hade iallafall en hög grad av njutning.

Höstlöven föll, vintervindarna isade, tussilagon blommade och glassar svalkade varma sommarkroppar. Barndomen flög iväg och jag började sakta men säkert socialiseras in i den kravfulla vuxenvärlden. Under mitt första år på gymnasiet flöt jag mest med. Jag gjorde det jag skulle men inget mer. Betygen blev godkända och jag var nöjd med det.

Men så hände det som händer allt för ofta. Jag ändrade plötsligt studestrategi till en mer prestationsinriktad. I takt med att svårighetsgraden ökade satte jag också en allt högre ribba för mina studiemål. Jag minns hur jag om kvällarna kämpade mig igenom matteböcker, historietexter och engelskaglosor som envist slank ur mitt minne trots att jag skrev dem om och om igen.

Där någonstans började jag känna hur min andning förändrades. Och under en lektion med inriktning på den egna hälsan lade jag upp minskning av prestation och stress som ett långsiktigt mål.

Jag fortsatte att springa genom livet. Arbeten utfördes och universitetsstudier inleddes. Jag älskade att promenera i naturen. Men takten var oftast skyhög. Jag hade alltid brottom vart jag än skulle.

Där någonstans under andra året av mina universitetsstudier brast det. Jag satt hemma in min lägenhet, efter ett jullov tillammans med mina studieböcker, och grät över att jag inte kom vidare med ett enda ord i min B-uppsats. Jag pluggade och grät. Pluggade och grät. Till slut visste jag inte längre varför jag grät. Jag bara grät.

Jag hadde då nått kulmen på min kulturkrock. Efter att ha dumpat en psykolog som ville få mig att tro att jag inte hade någon egen identitet tog jag mitt förnuft till fånga och försökte ändra min livvstil. Jag kämpade för att stå emot en djupt rotad idé om att alltid uträtta något. En idé om att tiden är kort och måste utnyttjas rätt. Jag unnade mig själv att stirra in i väggen. Att sitta i soffan med en kopp the. Att bara fundera och att inte fundera. Ibland minskade jag till och med takten på mina promenader. Men det var svårt att stoppa snabba fötter.

Ecuador och även Chile bidrog med de sista dropparna som fattades för att uppfylla mitt långsiktiga mål från gymnasiet. Där fanns en lunk som jag tidigare aldrig upplevt. För första gången på åratal slutade jag att kämpa mot tiden. Från att alltid ha kommit till officiella och inofficiella möten fem minuter innan utsatt tid började jag komma över en halvtimme försent nästan jämt. Det fantastiska var att världen aldrig gick under.

Den första juni landade jag den senaste gången åter på Svensk mark. Stockholm blåste mig runt med stark vindkraft, men jag var snart åter på det landställe som ständigt finns i mitt hjärta som jordens mest natursköna plats.

Familjen tog emot mig med öppna armar. När fredagsmiddagen avslutats började lördagens måsten att planeras in. De gamla omvårdades medan färgburkar öppnades. Snart badade hela stugan i ett orange-vitt lödder av målarfärg, disvatten och nybakad rabarberpaj.

När bök och stök var avklarat fick skogen äntligen återförenas med min naturlängtande själ. Genom kamerans lins blev jag ett med blommande blåbärsris och ståtliga tallstammar. Jag tog mig tid att njuta. Till ljudet av susande träd somnade jag till på en mossbeklädd sten drömmandes om hur jag vill leva mitt liv.

Trädens susande var dock en kort dröm.

Krocken som kom med Sverige fick mig ännu en gång att trycka på ömmande knappar om prestationer och livets värde. Snart stod jag åter med målarpenseln i min hand. Tårarna rann sakta ner för mina kinder. Det var inte färgen som var problemet, utan min kultur som sakta äter upp mig inifrån. Den här gången visste jag iallafall varför jag grät.

Det har förändrats från början av min resa.

Stockholm is so full of life

Stockholm is full of life. So is my time here. Every day I meet different friends and different groups of people.

Stockholm is full of life. Stockholm is changing. Stockholm never gets boring. Yesterday I went to a house party. We drank wine. Today I went to another party, we drank the. I laugh and I talk. I meet so much people.

Stockholm i so full of life. So am I. When I get home I have a little bird inside me. I don't know why I can't give my bird enough love.

Stockholm i s so full of life. The life runs trough me. I'm moving around and and so are everyone else. The bird is leaving me.

Stockholm i s so full of life. My bird is crying. I can't give it enough love.

Stockholm is destroying life. Please wait my little bird. I'll come with you.

Text: Jennie Åström

Foto: Sofie Åström

Paper paper

Bank paper, insurance paper, tax paper. Get money, pay money, save money. Choose that pension saving company, choose your bank, your future. Feel safe, feel happey. I can't see the forest for all the papers. Could it be because the threes has been cut down.

I throw my papers away, close my eyes and fly away to the green forest where the blank sheets have there origin. At least I can pretend that I drop the control of my personal institutionalized life. But at work I'll keep on turning papers. I'll be a paper robot controlling your life instead of mine.