Styrk Den Internationale Solidaritet

Trying to learn my Danish protest chants... Styrk den internationale solidaritet isn't so different in English: "Strengthen international solidarity / the international solidarity movement". I think it sounds cooler in Danish... a bit more rhythmic. But that's probably because Danish just sounds generally more interesting than English to me.

So proud of my friend for pulling this together in about a day's time!

The youngest demonstrators!

 

At the corner of Nørrebros Runddel. The red is just a sparkler but it looks pretty impressive here...

This is my favorite. The little anti-fascist patch tops it off...

demonstration i aften i solidaritet med Gaza

Tonight at 19:00 at Blågårds Plads. We'll gather and then walk up Nørrebrogade to Nørrebro Station. There will be live Arabic music and hopefully plenty of people and enthusiasm.  Facebook event for Blågårds Plads tonight.

ALSO- a larger demonstration is planned for 17:00 at Christiansborg this Thursday.  Facebook event for Thursday

And here's a link for the facebook page for the International Solidarity Movement.

I feel very lucky to know the person who is organizing this demonstration - it will be good to show solidarity and meet with others here who are also disturbed by the senseless violence now taking place. I'm excited to be involved with this movement / show of support in Copenhagen.

Over the past days I have thought a LOT about the messages and assumptions surrounding Palestine and Israel that I grew up with in the US. Bottom line is that for most of my life I spent a lot of time around Jewish friends and an extremely pro-Israel society and media... and I knew no Muslim or Arabic people. That has changed (thankfully) since I went to college. To be clear, many of my Jewish friends have an extremely nuanced and compassionate perspective on the conflict. The problem was that Jewishness was so normal to me while Muslimness which was foreign, exotic, 'other' and I had no idea that this was the case.

I am not interested in arguing about one state, two state or a red state, blue state solution. (That's supposed to be a Dr. Seuss reference... not US politics...) In other words... while it's ideologically important to discuss the origins and history of Israel and Palestine as states, that discussion often supersedes addressing the human rights situation facing people living in Palestine and Israel right now. The way Palestinian lives are treated as expendable and the discriminatory policies enshrined in Israeli law cannot be tolerated.

Words like 'occupation' or 'apartheid' or 'illegal settlement' once sounded extreme to my ear. And I can understand why - so much of what I grew up hearing was a not so subtle account of how violent and scary the Arab world is. On the one hand Europe generally and Denmark more specifically has it's problems with racism towards Muslims. Yet I still feel that the conversation - both in the media but even more so among people - is much more balanced and based in the reality facing people who live in the region.

Looking forward to the demonstration. Hope to see you there if you're in Copenhagen :)

Maryam al-Khawaja and Bahraini human rights

This weekend I had the extraordinary opportunity to meet Maryam al-Khawaja, a Bahraini-Danish human rights defender. Born while her family was in exile in Syria due to her father's decades long struggle for human rights in Bahrain, Maryam came to Denmark when was was two and lived here for twelve years until her family was able to return to Bahrain. Today Maryam is again based in Denmark because her family has been brutally targeted by the Bahraini regime. Her father has been imprisoned and tortured numerous times and remains in prison today along with his brother and daughter, one of Maryam's three sisters. Their life sentences were upheld this September.

Maryam heads the foreign division of the Bahrain Center for Human Rights... she speaks with an incredible passion and conveys the political nuances at play domestically and internationally in Bahrain with insanely articulate ease. The Humanity in Action Senior Fellows network in Denmark (I'm on the board) invited Maryam to come present her work and life's story in an informal lecture setting.

Here's an article that Maryam wrote about the misinformation about Bahrain that is rampant in Western media: Beneath Bahrain's Shia-versus-Sunni narrative, only the tyrants benefit. Maryam poignantly explained how over the past 80 of popular uprisings against repressive Bahraini regimes, the dictators have portrayed the people calling for human dignity and rights as whatever happened to be the international enemy of the day - Marxists, Communists, terrorists, and now Iran-sympathizers. Yes, that wasn't a typo - EIGHTY years of uprisings about every ten years. Today another false narrative paints the uprising as a wild mob of Shia Muslims revolting against a Sunni minority when in fact the revolution in Pearl Square was about demands for freedom, not religious sectarianism.

Maryam's father, Abdulhadi al-Khawaja, received the Politiken (one of Denmark's largest and most influential newspapers) Freedom Prize this year for his bravery and activism. Anders Jerichow is one of the editors of Politiken as well as the chair of HIA Denmark's board, and so invited HIA Senior Fellows to join the event this afternoon honoring al-Khawaja and sharing his story. I have more to say but... I'm quite sleepy so more soon....

Boykot G4S

hullo hullo again!

Two posts in two days, Hege and my mother will be so pleased. Susan - thank you for reading! My Aunt Mary told me that you had been checking in earlier this summer and I was very touched.

Today was my first day with Copenhagen-freedom aka a CYKEL! Ohhh it's the best feeling.... really the way to get in the flow of the city, to feel like you're a bit a part of it. Pubic transport is excellent here - at least compared to Seattle and many other cities I've been to. But biking, that's the way the city really moves. On my first day with a bike I had to start out by getting the tires pumped which, luckily for me is extremely easy in Copenhagen. There is a bike shop on any somewhat major street and every bike shop pumps up your tires for free - many even leave the air hose outside the shop for people to use after hours. Let's hear it for social cohesion and community trust!

I ended up biking almost 50 kilometers today.... I am going to have one sore rear end tomorrow, that is for damn sure. First off to a meeting with the World Food Program, which has one of its headquarters in Copenhagen. More on that later... then I walked ALL OVER with a "treasure hunt" get-to-know you thing for my masters program, THEN to Albertslund and back to Brønshøj. I know that doesn't mean much to most people who might read this... but Albertslund is a WAYS away - it's a suburb of Copenhagen where, among other things, the headquarters of G4S is located.

G43 is a security corporation, like I said in my post yesterday, that does some "normal" routine security jobs - at Aalborg University for example. But they also are the company that provides the equipment and surveillance for Israeli prisons which we know have violated human rights repeatedly. They contract all over Gaza and the West Bank, policing the borders - in other words enabling Israeli occupation and exploitation. (** For the record, I am not against Israel being a state. I oppose the forced displacement and/or ghettoization of Palestinians and existence of a second-class citizen regime within Israel.) This is a "week of action" for the group calling for an end to G4S involvement in Palestine. The route we took included stops at prominent businesses that use G4S. One of the really empowering things about Denmark, from my perspective, is that national change seems so much more tangibly possible. Already some companies have left G4S and G4S has said that it is talking about leaving Gaza by 2013. The US can seem like such a leviathan at times. Good to remind myself, though, that we have local communities, smaller units as well.

The demonstration was extremely fun! So many happy, open minded people. And so much bike riding! My first biking demonstration, I have to admit. There were plenty of signs and some bell ringing and horn tooting, but mostly just a happy group of people cycling around with a police escort. Most people were young, unsurprisingly, but also a fairly sturdy middle-aged to older contingent. Older protesters really have a soft spot in my heart. My two friends from my masters program who invited me we very protective of me, made sure I was having a good time and not biking in front of oncoming traffic or anything exciting like that. The weather was very nice... which I think contributed to quite an upbeat protest atmosphere given the content of what we were demonstrating against!

One of the friends from my program, was one of the people who organized the demonstration... she grew up in Nørrebro, Copenhagen's most multiethnic neighborhood, and was politicized about Palestine from an early age due to having plenty of friends who are Palestinian refugees. We talked a bit about challenges of being in Denmark as a foreigner - it was so reassuring and fascinating to hear her perspective. Though she was born and raised here she is very much bicultural, and didn't have the same childhood exposure to Danish tradition and culture at home. She's also a invisible minority - she easily passes for Danish and her name blends in as well. Denmark can be a very rigid place to join. It's open in some ways - open to new ideas, to exchange... but when it comes to what is "normal" and what is "done" I have felt that there is a pretty narrow idea of what to do here. 

About the World Food Program: 

Quite an interesting presentation - among other things I have been shifting my opinions on the important differences between humanitarian and development aid. It's pretty easy for these statistics that can really knock the wind out of you slip into your mind and off the radar very quickly. And of course we can always say - yes, this is an important cause but there are SO many important causes. But then again.... 1 in 7 people in our world go to bed hungry every night? A billion people? I've heard before that we have enough resources to feed the world it's just political will, infrastructure, societal stability, and other human factors standing in our way. It's not a matter of fancy science or over population. Though, of course, over population is something to think about.... especially since we haven't proven that we can manage a world humanely with the number of people we already have. But I hadn't intended to go off in this direction... suffice it to say - I used to be highly skeptical of the type of development that you see in movies - bags of rice dropping from the sky, etc. I still am, and I absolutely believe that we must remain skeptical and critical of the ways this type of aid casts recipients as "less-than". It was heartening to hear the director of WFP talking about the need to not simply say, "Hello poor Africans - here's some rice and beans, off you go." They try, when possible, to use food aid toward sustainable development. But the sad fact is, a lot of their work IS patching up crises. WFP is the largest humanitarian aid organization in the world. They are able to reach about 90-100 million out of the 1 billion hungry people in the world.

Sandholm Asylum Center

Last wednesday (yes I'm a bit behind) we visited the Center Sandholm - the first place all asylum seekers go when they arrive in Denmark. The tour itself was a bit odd, as always. The center is run by the Red Cross which is highly controversial because in order to do so they have entered into a private contract with the Danish government, which inherently compromises their commitment to impartiality.

























The place is run very much like a prison. It is isolated and individuals are treated like criminals... a funny thing when you consider their actual situation. We couldn't take photos inside the camp of course because it is where people lead their private lives. We did, however, photograph a protest going on right outside the center by some of the Iranian asylum seekers who may soon be deported. If deported they will most likely be murdered.


























When I say isolated - the asylum seekers are allowed to leave but in reality there is no where to go nearby that they can afford to access. Some of the children are bussed to school, but many are not allowed to go to Danish schools because the Danish authorities do not want them to develop connections to Danish society.

These photos are taken by Eda Elif Tibet, the Turkish fellow from Istanbul. She is interested in documentary film making and photography.

 




We spoke with the man who was coordinating the protest. They had been protesting for 28 days when we were there. For the first three weeks they were on a hunger strike. The man organizing the campaign was clearly highly educated - we speculated that he is a political asylum seeker as he made some illusions to that possibility though of course didn't want to compromise his identity.



Very descriptive.

Constitution Day? ...and a tour of KPH neighborhoods

Today is "Constitution Day" in Denmark... Which is both celebrated with typical Danish flag waving (every single city bus sported two little Danish flags at the front) and gathering in crowds. We had normal programming in the morning – but one of the speakers was actually a Danish political scientist and political economist who I relied upon heavily in my thesis! I have to admit I was a bit star struck. I don’t suppose he’s used to young American followers. He probably just thought I had some sort of staring issue. A fair assumption really given my recent tendency to gape open-mouthed at any Danish speaker. All the neurotic writing down of vocab words and listening to Danish music and deciphering newspapers HAS paid off though… I’m just in the socially-awkward staring space at the moment.

 But to Constitution day! We went to a Ny-Dansk (New Dane) youth council celebration that featred local rappers and reggae artists as well as politicians such as the Minister for Integration and the Minister for Religion and Equality. They gave rather white bread talks but it was super cool to see them there in my neighborhood.... which you will read more about below and hopefully see why it was interesting to have the mainstream Danish political set present.

One of the program participants was a founding member of the Republican Movement in Denmark - which has nothing to do with American Republicanism as understood today. It's all about arguing about the state of democracy in Denmark and against the monarchy because it is so extremely undemocratic to preference certain people because of their birth. Not to mention pretty fiscally irresponsible to give them so much money when Denmark is in the red. The core argument though is that the constitution gives the Monarchy too much power and this flies in the face of Danish political values enshrined in the welfare state. In short, it is outdates. Maybe fine in 1849 when the constitution was officially written, but certainly unsuited for today. Technically no law is in force unless the Queen approves it. The Danish monarchy has significantly more power than the British monarchy because it's not just a verbally "understood" relationship between the crown and Parliament - the Constitution actually vests sovereignty in the Monarch. So. Constitution day. A bit of a big day for the Republican Movement folks.




 Thought I'd write about København neighborhoods! Or at least my take on them… might be interesting to look back on once I've lived here for a while.

Indre by – City Center, or literally “Inner City” but it has NONE of the connotations of an American inner city. This is the old part of town where you’ll find churches, castles, Parliament, the old stock exchange, and Nyhavn (the famous canal that is just crawling with picturesque boats and Danish flags and colorful canal-front houses). It’s very pretty and fun to walk around though of course the streets are very much pre-motor vehicle so it’s easy to get taken downstream to the wrong end point when you’re on a bike. Also prohibitively expensive place to eat or do anything really.


Here's a photo of me in Indre by taken at Distortion, which I wrote about a few days ago:



Vesterbro – “Vester” means Western. This is one of the ‘hip’ neighborhoods to live. Lots of artists, coffee shops, a totally different feel to the streets – a bit more close together. This is one of the places where communities of immigrants live because housing is less expensive. The old meat packing district was hear… today that’s a cool place to go for bars and dancing because the big warehouses have been converted.


Fredriksberg – A fancier neighborhood northeast of Vesterbro…. lots of pretty gardens and expensive apartments and nice schools. Part of Fredricksberg is literally in a different municipality than the rest of København because they’re the wealthiest and have their own system of garbage collection and recycling going, etc. Very strange to find that out because it doesn’t seem to fit with the Danish mentality… I will try to learn more.


Nørrebro – Nørre means North. Sensing a pattern!??! I thought the neighborhoods and streets were so clever last year until I learned what it all meant. Really quite factual and unimaginative… Danish itself is the spicy thing. This is THE most multiethnic place in all of Denmark. And I live in probably the most multiethnic spot of all, Mjølnerparken. Closer to city center, Nørrebro has bunches of places to go out and coffee shops and cheaper food options. As you go further from the city center it gets less wealthy and more populated by immigrant families. My neighborhood, Mjølnerparken, is actually a complex of four big apartment buildings that are the Danish version of “the projects”. Here’s an aerial photo of the complex:
 

In the media this place has been spoken of as the ‘ghetto’ but that word choice is highly contentious, extremely racially loaded, and completely far off from reality. As I sit on the balcony of the apartment where I am staying I can see a woman putting out laundry. She’s wearing a veil. That’s really what it comes down to. In the courtyard I see a guy helping his friend fix a bike and about 20 kids running around playing in the jungle gym. Hardly that terrifying if you ask me. Anytime there is a WHIFF of crime or trouble in this area it is front page news. So much so that Danish politicians have made a show of going to visit the neighborhood. And others (Pia Kjærsgaard of Dansk Folkeparti) publicly say that they are too afraid to go here. Here are some politicians 'visiting':
 


Østerbro - Øster meaning "Eastern". Unsurprisingly it is to the east of Nørrebro, along the coast. It is a more calm neighborhood. Definitely a place to raise your kids. The huge city stadium and one of the biggest parks Fælledsparken is there as well. This is where I stayed with Thomas for the first week. He's always complaining that it's not 'edgy' enough and that the only thing remarkable about it is the high number of grocery stores you can find there. It's nice though!


Amager - this is the island south of the rest of the city.... Morten lives here and we had our staff welcoming dinner there at his house but that's the most I've really been there. Pretty residential / isolated. I actually have hung out along the huge canal on the Amager side but that's it. We'll see if that changes or not!

And then there are other little neighborhoods within neighborhoods of course, and places on the periphery like Hellerup (POSH) north of Østerbro and Valby south of Vesterbro... but I can't claim to know much about it all beyond that. Hahah except i took my bus WAY too far past my stop yesterday almost to the next county. Nice sight seeing at least. Hej hej for now!