Packing up, getting ready to go

This is it. My last day at work is behind me and now all there is left is to concentrate on travelling and enjoying myself. But during the last months I’ve been through so many special experiences, bad ones as well as wonderful ones, that I can’t just put it all behind me and go on as if nothing.
Greenland for me is much more than magical castles of ice and seal flensing. It’s the people and their way of life. I’ve seen wonderful loving people enjoy life and nature, and I’ve witnessed the very same people drink themselves unconscious on regular and very frequent bases.

I’ve been invited to complete strangers’ homes on Friday nights and was often treated like a guest of honour – which usually meant I had to take the first sip of a freshly opened bottle. People who try to get anyone who only comes here for a short period to stay for good have treated me like a precious trophy. I’ve been looked up to by some and treated with great suspicion by others.

All around me seemingly inexplicable things kept occurring. A case from only a few days ago says a lot about a not uncommon phenomenon here: Trying to get a couple in a car to take a woman who has passed out in the middle of the road, while still desperately clinging to the green bottle in her hand, won me the answer “Don’t worry about it, they usually survive”.

Once getting over the initial chock I managed to look deeper under the surface – where I found a few answers, some explanations and plenty of more questions. During the recent weeks I’ve been working on a last, rather desperate effort to organise my thoughts somehow. As time passed, this brain storm turned into an article – more than being about Greenland, it’s about my experiences and impressions – not so much of the wonderful nature and amazing trips and sailing tours I’ve been on – but of what really counts- the people. You find the article here.

This is also my last mail from here. In a few days I’ll be off to another great adventure, travelling up north. On Sunday I’ll be saying goodbye to my good friend Internet and will not be back on-line in the next five or six weeks. So on behalf of the staff and the management I would like to thank you all for following me in my adventures in the cold unknown.

This is Oren Richard logging off, over and out.