Cape Farewell Youth Expedition 2007

    I was looking forward to returning home and being with my family and sleeping in my own (non moving bed). But now that I am home I feel like i dont belong here. Everything seems strange and I feel so out of place. Waking up and seeing cars, houses and pavement doesnt compare to the glaciers and mountains that we had all come acustomed to seeing. I feel very empty and alone. Going back to school today was the strangest feeling ever. Everyone around was asking me what it was like and i found that i was at a loss of words and it couldnt be descrided. The only other people that truely understand what it was like are the others on the voyage and they are miles away right now. I feel very disconeted with everything. My friends that i was looking forward to seeing seem different and distant to me now. For the last few weeks the only people that I have known is the others on the trip and now that we are no longer together i feel very lonely and lost without them.  Things that seemed to matter no longer do. What i am going to wear or how my hair looks seems pointless and unimportant on the grand scale of things. Seeing how everyone was so dressed up at school and seeing all the efforts that they put into in seems ridculous to me now. All the time they spent on getting ready could be spent on things that really mattered, things that have an effect. To me it seems like, well i just saw pieced of our world come crumbling down, so who cares what t-shirt you are wearing today. Also something that i really miss is the peace and quiet Svalbard had to offer. Here the noises never stop and the people never stop. I find myself dreaming of a quiet, peacful place and escape there forever and never look back. I find myself lost in a crowd of people, I dont know where to go or to look. Being surrounded by people seems odd and it will take some getting used to.

     But i am home and i will have to learn to adjust to ”modern” life. Svalbard has taught me some very valuable lessons that i will never forget. This island have given me a new perpective on life and how to live. I wouldnt trade this experience for the world, i will cope with the horrors of daily life and soon enough i wont be thinking twice about the constant hum of traffic or the smell of fumes or the hustle and bustle through the school halls. But Svalbard will always be on the back on my mind along with all the incredible people that i experienced it with.

I miss you all and wish that you could all be there with me,

lots of love,

Shona x

Hey guys!!!

It’is me, Franzi, and just have to say that I miss you all tons. Seeing my family and friends was great and to be home is also very nice. But I feel like I am at the wrong place: All the traffic, the people, the stressed life…we had nothing of this and it was more than good!!!! I enjoyed the “freedom”, as Amélie would say, there so much. Here is everything so different. So loud. So dirty. So stressed. I had a lot of annoying interviews with german tv, everyone had no time. Up in the arctic we all had relaxed AND succesful days, here it seems like I work for nothing… I miss everyone of you, the songs (speccialy “Wonderwall”), Amy Love, Darling, the Crew and the good food. I still have to say that this trip was one of the best experiences in my howle life. I will never forget it. I share my experiences with everyone here but I know that they do not understand it so much like you all do. We have been a great team.

So I think you all have the same feelings, and I hope we all can stay in touch a long time. WE ARE ALL IN THIS TOGETHER and we CAN make a differents. Hope to see you again soon.

A lot of love, xxxxxxx

Franzi

To Cape Farewell: Where is Ina’s and my last video with our sience and art projects???

SAILING THE NIGHTS AWAY

Let me tell you ‘bout a ship

Making that Cape Farewell trip

Where all the kids are super hip

Sailing the nights away

Our Captain is a hunk called Gerd

First mate Barbara’s quite a flirt

Ice Killer Christian went and lost his shirt when we were

Sailing the nights away.

Sailing Sailing

Everybody’s face is green

O sailing,sailing

Sailing the nights away

Renska crews the zodiac

Puts all the big boys in the back

She shouts ‘een twee’ at all the pack

Sailing the nights away

Anna gives us killer soups

Motivating all the troops

She’s the queen of puds and fruits

Saiing the Nights Away

Sailing Sailing

Everybody’s face is green

O sailing, sailing

Sailing the nights away

There’s a girl called Suba here

Wearing all the latest sailing gear

She likes plenty plankton in her beer

Sailing the Nights Away

Mark’s a prof in playboy pants

Who loves to do that arctic dance

He puts those ice bears in a trance when we were

Sailing the nights away

Dan the artist’s working hard and long

Lifting icebergs with a cheery song

He only wears a thermal thong when he’s

Carving that ice away.

Carving Carving

Chips and Splinters flying out

He’s carving, carving

Carving that ice away

Capt Akash, Liam and Joe

Nonie darling and Jethro

I think Amy merely dipped her toe

When we were swimming the night away

Franzi, Ina, Hayley jumped right in

Amelie soaked Shona to the skin

Doriana was blogging and just couldn’t swim when we’re

Sailing the nights away

Sailing Sailing

Everybody’s face is green

O sailing,sailing

Sailing the nights away

Keith’s in love with Anna’s food

He’s hard as nails and very rude

He almost did his night watch in the nude when we were

Sailing the nights away

Art is what Jess likes to teach

She made a sculpture on the beach

And she kept the glacier water out of reach

Sailing the nights away

Becky’s got a great big lens

She’s had to snatch her sleep in here and thens

Watch out all you funky mens when she’s

Sailing the night away

Our editor’s a man called Dunc

He’s sleeping on the topmost bunk

We all think he’s such a hunk

Sailing the nights away

Lastly let’s remember Joe

He’s just a plain hero

He’s almost always on the go

Sailing the nights away

Sailing Sailing

Everybody’s face is green

O sailing, sailking

Sailing the nights away

We wish that it would snow and snow

Sadly we all have to go

We’ll not forget the things we know about

Sailing the nights away

Sailing Sailing

We’re all going to be green

O sailing,sailing

Sailing the nights away

Thanks again Cape Farewell. Reflecting back on what I have done, what I have seen and the people I have met, is absolutely amazing. People back at home are mesmerised at the whole experience.

It all starts here in terms of climate change, but I’m sure everyone will change the attitude and actions not only in primary schools but in there community.

It’s great to be home to see the gorgeous shine of the Northern Lights, well the street lights anyway. It’s ace to be home to see all my family and friends but I can’t help but feel empty. There’s no rocking me to sleep, there’s no Amy Love at night, there’s no tiny room to stay. It’s just all gone! The “Hello Darling” and “Dude” jokes don’t make sense, the sound of the glacier crying out, the fact that ice is slippy and photography is dangerous. These things can’t be shared with the guys back home as they could with you lot! It’s just not the same! I now have a different perspective of life than my friends, i’m going to have to share my thoughts and memories with them in detail. It will be all okay, I’ll spread the word because..Together we really can make that difference!
Amy-Love is always in the hearts, Keep smiling!
Amy
x

As we have all made our safe journeys back to each of our homes and then to our schools it has been a very sad time as we may never get to see what we saw again. Now we are all back home our schools have been wanting to know what it was like whilst we were up in the Arctic and boy that has taken some time as person after person ask you the same thing. Now we need to get back to our daily routines and remember what we have experinced was amazing and we may never get to see the same thing again.

Lets just hope that Cape Farewell hold a reunion to see how we have been getting on.

See you later

Akash

Been back in London for three days now and it seems like such a long time ago that i had to say goodbye to all the wonderful people that I had the pleaseure of working with over the two weeks of the Cape Farewell youth expedition. I am really missing the quiet, majestic, awesome landscape of Svalbard, particularly Ny Alesund. It really was the most amazing experience of my life, everybody worked so well together and resolved differences quickly and amenably, without hidden agendas or resentment – just goes to show how fantastic the human race can be when it tries. I learned so much about so many things and experienced so much including many challenges, and I am proud of what i accomplished. I am also aware of the fact there is so much more to be done and that is the start of a big journey that is going to be hard work, but worth it if we can get people to significantly reduce their imapct on climate chaos.

I have some absolutely wonderful memeories that Iwill cherish for the rest of my life, thank you to everyone involved, I will never forget you. From Polar Bear pawprints to the graphs being moved their were so many highs (and lows) I can’t believe we experienced so much in so little time. i never believed I could fall in love with a place, but now a little bit of my heart will always belong to Svalbard.

Keep the faith,

Jess x

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Monday 24th September

Back home.

Well I’ve been filming all these lovely people for more than a week, trying to document their private thoughts and personal feelings when they reflect on being here. And guess what, I’m going to miss them all, they have been such good company. They must be fed-up of being interviewed and filmed, and a couple have suggested I’ve been hiding behind the camera. Yes that’s true. I can hardly string a sentence together at the best of times and you have all been so good at it… some needed less persuading than others.

So my closing thoughts are;

Svalbard is a place of human failure, a frontier that is just holding on against something that would not be tamed. For all the ingenuity, all the technology, the mining, hunting trapping, whaling, exploring, not much has stood to time except as a kind of epitaph.

This place has existed since the first continental land mass appeared on earth. It is humbling to think that every geological age from Precambrian, the era from the beginning of earth’s history, through to Tertiary, is laid out in the mountainsides, revealed as the glaciers gouged out the valleys, then freeze-thaw shattered the cliff faces. Rocks of the most varied geological types, carved, crushed and ground on their way down to the shore, then dumped as the glaciers have melted. Heaps of bolders and pebbles, from every age lying jumbled together, no two the same, arranged in great piles as if by a deranged JCB driver.

Memories of being there.
So quiet, empty and lonely, lovely, brutal and fierce.

For a place so baron, to have so much seems peculiar. You become focussed on the huge and the tiny.
Bright orange lichen. The ice split pebbles. 100 meter high glaciers. Sweeping mountain ranges, Huskey dog blue eyes. A red sailing boat on crystal blue water. Anchor chains rattling, booms swinging across the deck, hoisting sails. The churning of huge volumes of water as I try to sleep. Banging on the deck as the night watch tack the ship at 4 am. Coke cans crashing in the galley. Getting off the boat and still feeling I’m moving.

A glacier crumbling at two metres a day, cracking like thunder, a frosty blue diamond fragmenting in distant slow motion. Cool blue sea ice drifting by on a marmalade sunset sea.

The arctic swim by teachers and students. Brave stuff that.

A reindeer grazing just a few metres away. A butchered carcass beneath a bird cliff. Walrus feeding at sea. Whale vertebrae on the beach, bleached white, Russian bones in a 18th century coffin. Angel seabird wings lying on a soft moss mattress, attached by a bare breast-bone. Polar bear on the shore.

As Dan Harvey said, ‘Everything a man does here gets rejected; even his bones when he’s dead.’
Svalbard is what is natural in this region of the earth, and after struggling to exist here for so long, it’s ironic that without effort, our modern life-style is resulting in making it more hospitable, accessible. It is changing before our eyes, and it does make me seriously think about the true cost of what I have and want. I think there were moments for all the students when their perspective changed.

They will bring it all back home, first-hand witnesses. Telling stories, distil, put into words, music, picture, pass on their experiences hopefully to persuade others that we can’t always get what we want we want. The climate is changing and if we want to do something to reduce that, we’d better do it now.

The moments of being there become memories in a busy urban life, collecting e-mail, catch the evening news, open the front door to all that traffic, and in time remembered, perhaps unexpectedly summoned to company by the ringing of a ship’s bell.

Duncan