It was a relief to finally hear my client's voice on the phone. She was a bit breathless, but not sounding in distress. She had been out food shopping by taxi just that afternoon (this was Monday, 31 January), able to find what she needed, "though many people are just buying up whatever they can … Continue reading Watching Egypt 1 – Private Worries, Public Hopes
Author: Alan AtKisson
Letter from Syria / the Tigris-Euphrates Region
Picture the cement superstructure of some future small office building, vaguely futuristic in form, strange angles, sitting on scrubland. No walls yet, just empty space between the beams. Strung between the beams is somebody's laundry. It's hard to imagine who would hang laundry here. The nearest residential housing is at least a kilometer away. More … Continue reading Letter from Syria / the Tigris-Euphrates Region
What it Means to be a Sustainability Change Agent
I was lying on my back in the snow, staring up through the branches of the big old oak tree in front of our house, when it hit me. That's where I'd ended up after going down hill on my buttocks (on purpose, riding tea-saucers with my youngest daughter). It felt lovely just to lie … Continue reading What it Means to be a Sustainability Change Agent
“And the winning song is …”
Aren't you curious to know which of my songs is the most popular? That is, the most purchased in its digital format, on iTunes, Amazon.com, etc.? You won't believe it. I certainly didn't believe it. Let me back up. It would be easy to scribble pages and pages of philosophical rumination on the importance of … Continue reading “And the winning song is …”
Revisiting the Big Push: A Strategy for Scaling Up Renewable Energy
While the Cancún climate talks were under way, I published several different versions of the following short essay, which first appeared as a blog post in "Triple Crisis," then as a comment in Eurovoice newspaper's "Comment:Visions," and finally is slated for publication in the academic journal Solutions. Here is the Comment:Visions version: In late 2009, … Continue reading Revisiting the Big Push: A Strategy for Scaling Up Renewable Energy
Climate and Health: Side Issue, or the Bottom Line?
The fall has been so full of climate change-related seminars that I earlier forgot to write up this one: a day on The Health Impacts of Climate Change at Stockholm's prestigious Karolinska Institute (Oct 11, 2011). (Here I must reveal that my wife works at the Institute, Sweden's leading medical training and research center, as … Continue reading Climate and Health: Side Issue, or the Bottom Line?
Wailing on the Road to Cancún
"It's so bleak, it's very depressing. But we are activists. When things are bleak, we don't give up. We get busy." So said Meena Raman of the Malaysia-based activist group Third World Network at a small seminar on climate change held in Stockholm this week. For me, it was an excellent opportunity to get updated … Continue reading Wailing on the Road to Cancún
On Being an American Troubadour at the Swedish Climate Change Conference
This is the third and last installment on my series of posts from the Climate Existence 2010 conference, organized by my friends and colleagues at Uppsala University's Center for Environment and Development Studies (CEMUS). To read the posts in order: 1. Bill McKibben 2. David Abrams I am on the 5:23 morning bus, leaving the … Continue reading On Being an American Troubadour at the Swedish Climate Change Conference
David Abrams: Breathing ourselves aware on planet “EAIRTH”
This is the second in my series of posts from the conference "Climate Existence 2010." The series began with a post on Bill McKibben's opening keynote. This one covers the afternoon keynote and the workshop I went to, which awakened some memories ... "We don't live on the Earth. We live in the Earth. Or … Continue reading David Abrams: Breathing ourselves aware on planet “EAIRTH”
Bill McKibben on Climate Change: The Depressing Bad News, and the Amazing Power of People to Create Good News
I'm attending a conference in Sweden called Climate Existence. I'm here not as a speaker, for once; I'm here as a musician, scheduled to perform this evening. I'll blog some of the highlights over the course of the day. Here is what was happening just as I walked in (late) to the event, in Sigtuna, … Continue reading Bill McKibben on Climate Change: The Depressing Bad News, and the Amazing Power of People to Create Good News
Alan AtKisson 