Transcript: If You Wanna Get Kosileg, You Gotta Get a Little Frilufstliv
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Sam Evans-Brown: Hello, hello, hello, friends.
Hello. Hello.
Justine Paradis: Yeah, we've really changed in these several months of isolation.
Sam Evans-Brown: This is Outside-in, a show about the natural world and how we use it. I am the host who carves the holiday roast. I’m Sam Evans-Brown. Here with me is Justine Paradis, [hello] Taylor Quimby [hi], and Erika Janik [hello].
Sam Evans-Brown: Hello. And and we have congregated here digitally, in part because of an article that you shared on our channel about how you know about the darkness that is now.
Justine Paradis: And by the darkness, you don't mean like emotional and metaphysical darkness.
Sam Evans-Brown: I'm talking about the darkness, the literal the fact that that night it's three forty two right now and night is falling as we speak.
Erika Janik: Yeah, so as we record this together, it is right around the winter solstice. And in Concord, where we are, we're getting a little less than nine hours of sunlight right now. And so the article I shared was written by Shayla Love from Vice. And it's basically asking, how is it that even though this happens literally every year, it always seems sort of surprising just how dark it is?
Sam Evans-Browns: Yes. It always feels like, sudden. And for many of us this pandemic year brought a unique sense of dread.
Erika Janik: So the article I shared, it didn't talk about this year specifically, but the scientific explanation for why it's always kind of a shock was sort of obvious. Basically, your brain and your memories related to time are kind of jet lagged on summer and fall.
Sam Evans-Brown: Right. And the end of daylight saving time comes around and it's like the absolute worst.
Erika Janik: Yeah, but my favorite part of the article is where it really says that one thing that influences our perception of the darkness is our attitude about it and how in Norway, which is way darker than it is here, they see this time of year as cozy instead of demoralizing.
Justine Paradis: Sam, you you have been to Norway, yes? Like, does this feel accurate to you?
Sam Evans-Brown: Yup, took a 10 day vacation in Norway and am now basically an expert in Norwegian culture. No, not actually but I did call up a college friend of mine whose name is Anders Folleras.
Sam Evans-Brown: So I said this to you and I hope it's not offensive that we called you that I'm calling you because we were hoping you'd be our token Norwegian on our show.
Anders Folleras: That's an honor, of course. But you do also have to keep in mind that I've been quite Americanized through the years.
Sam Evans-Brown: So rather than token Norwegian, perhaps like honorary Outside/In Norwegian cultural attache,
Justine Paradis: Esteemed Norwegian,
Taylor Quimby: Americanized, Norwegian ambassador.
Sam Evans-Brown: Yes. So so you guys probably many have perhaps heard the Danish version of this idea that winter is actually great, which the word is hygge. But there's a Norwegian word that's that's basically the same. And it's it's koselig.
Justine Paradis: Cozy?
Sam Evans-Brown: The coziness idea.
Anders Folleras: You would be saying, you know, leading up to Christmas. Now, this koselig, they want you to smell of baked goods and the Christmas tree and my American blown up Santa Claus outside. You know, that's koselig to some extent.
Justine Paradis: I don't think that the blow-up Santa is koselig.
Erika Janik: No, not at all.
Sam Evans-Brown: But but but I will say that that having spent 10 days in Norway and therefore having gotten the slightest sense about these ideas, I think that there's actually something that we're kind of missing when we talk about the idea of hygge or koselig. And to help explain it, I want to tell you about hytte, which I’ve seen translated as Summerhouse. They’re these little cabins that a lot of Norwegian families own, and they are actual cabins like uninsulated, many of them no electricity. Many of them don't have a road to get to them. So you either have to walk or ski to get to them. And Anders recently bought one of these and had he put this like outdoor pizza oven outside in the yard.
Anders Folleras: So for New Year's last year really going into 2020. It was, I think it was, you know, stormy weather. It was negative 10 degrees and cold, a lot of snow. And we were out there to make and make it pizza, just me and my and my wife. And I think that's also you can also then use the word koselig for that kind of setting. And especially then when you go inside and, you know, you light the fireplace and you feel the heat and it’s like those are the moments you essentially live for, right?
[mux swell]
Sam Evans-Brown: So the idea of koselig is really in in Norway is connected to another idea then, which is friluftsliv.
Anders Folleras: Friluftsliv. Yeah.
Sam Evans-Brown: Yeah, friluftsliv So what does that mean?
Anders Folleras: Being being outdoorsy, I say, but kind of outdoor lifestyle ish.
Sam Evans-Brown: There's an expression in Norwegian that I actually didn't realize was was a Norwegian expression because I had always heard it in English, which is that there is no bad weather, there's only bad clothing.
Anders Folleras: Det finnes ikke dårlig vær, bare dårlig klær!
Sam Evans-Brown: Kind of rhymes a little bit there at the end.
Anders Folleras: It definitely does
Justine Paradis: Friluftsliv
Sam Evans-Brown: friluftsliv.
[wind sound]
Sam Evans-Brown: I've seen it translated elsewhere as getting outside every day as part of your lifestyle.
Anders Folleras: But if we put it in terms of humanity is quite scary, right? We spend 90 percent of our time indoors. And when you turn 40, you spent 36 of them indoors.
Taylor Quimby: I mean, it's 36 years. Yeah. Yeah. Wow.
Sam Evans-Brown: Yeah. We’re like an indoor species at this point. We have, like, you know, indoor cats.
Oh, gosh.
Sam Evans-Brown: And so I think that when people talk about about hygge or koselig, they're missing, that this is like kind of half of a dyad, right? Like if you really want to get koselig you've got to be doing some friluftsliv .
Taylor Quimby: I think I get this. It's like you can only be cozy if you also love, but spend time in the noncozy. It's a balance.
Sam Evans-Brown: Exactly.
Justine Paradis: Also, if you want to get koselig, you got to get fr-fr.. friluftsliv is like the tagline of the episode I feel.
Sam Evans-Brown: So it is undoubtedly a weird and dark time of the year and in the world generally so today on Outside In we’re doing our take on the ubiquitous end of the year list. Our top hygge and koselig and friluftsliv inspired activities. Basically our recommendations to keep you healthy, happy, and busy this winter.
[theme fade]
Sam Evans-Brown: So, I think in the spirit of “you can’t get koselig if you don’t get friluftsliv,” let’s start with the outdoor recommendations?
Taylor Quimby: Sam, I feel like this is your area of super expertise.
Sam Evans-Brown: We can start with mine, if you want.
Justine Paradis: For those who don't know, Sam is also a Nordic ski coach in the winter.
Sam Evans-Brown: Yeah, and actually that's a great place to start because I wanted to start with an anecdote from my team from two years ago, I think it was, which was... so every year after Christmas, the team does a ski camp. It's genuinely the best part of the year for everybody.
And and basically, like I would characterize the shape of the ski season as as like trying to keep it together through the month of December until we get to ski camp. Then everyone has this, like peak experience and then everything else is like the glide path off of ski camp. That's like really is the it's like the thing that makes the team a team.
Two or three years ago, and I can't remember exactly how long ago we had a year where I looked at the forecast and the forecast forecast for Vermont, where we go. It was never going to be above zero the entire time we were up there and we were going to be there with 30 high school kids.
So so I was just genuinely terrified. But we skied every day, twice a day in that weather. And it wasn’t just like: we went outside and toughed it out! We did have to change our plans: we went out for shorter stints at a time, the kids would take little breaks to warm up, everybody skied with facemasks or tape on their cheeks and noses to keep from getting frostbite.
And they slowly figured out how to dress to stay warm.
And so, you know, you can turn to a lot of different sources that will tell you how to do this. But the basic concepts, you know, are really that the like layers are really important and that you want to start with things that are breathable on the bottom and then you work your way up the least breathable layers on the top.
And so none of this is particularly revelatory.
[mux]
But it was really interesting to just watch them figure it out. And to watch the whole group move past this FEAR of the cold, and my own fear that they would be miserable, to knowing how to handle it. And it kind of came to a close at the end of the week with a day of 14 degrees or something and everyone was like, oh, my gosh, this is tropical.
And and so my recommendations for how to dress are really more just encouragement that you can get out when it's really cold or wintery and and just to experiment with it and that and that once you experience it, you'll see that it's possible.
[mux swell]
Justine Paradis: So my question is, though, like, what are your recommendations for like. If budget is an issue for you and you're starting from zero…
Sam Evans-Brown: yes!
Justine Paradis: if you have say $100 to invest in one good item to keep you comfortable outdoors this year, what would it be?
Sam Evans-Brown: for $100 you can get yourself a really nice lightweight shell jacket. Especially for endurance activities outdoors often is the key piece of gear, or if you’re doing something that’s a little slower, not generating as much heat, it’s a good base jacket under some bigger, thicker jackets.
Taylor Quimby: I feel like, so this is a stupid anecdote and probably not wise for like actual sporting activities. But I remember when I was in high school [00:38:00] and there was this epic nor'easter that was coming in. It was like whiteout, blizzard conditions, you know, cold up to your shins in snow already and like coming down hard. And I was like, I'm going to walk to the video store and rent a VHS tape. Or maybe this was I don't know if this was DVD or VHS, but it was a while back. You know, I didn't have any technical gear at this point. I wasn't into athletics of really any kind. I think I just wore like four pairs of sweatpants and like three pairs of socks, four sweaters and a coat. You know, I looked like the Michelin man walking down the street. But but there was something about it where I realized, like, wow, I can be warm in crazy cold, wintery conditions and just feel good. And it was it made me feel invincible in a moment that, like, gave me permission to get outside in crazy weather, probably was sweating too much underneath all those layers. In other circumstances, it might not be the healthiest or smartest thing to do, but.
Justine Paradis: But you were experimenting. Yeah.
Sam Evans-Brown: This is not going to like you know, this is not going to please the public safety officials of the world. But but like getting a little hypothermic is not is not the end of the world.
No.
I mean, this is like in like a serious way that like if you're close to home and and you get a little chilly to the point where you're experiencing like mild hypothermia um
Justine Paradis: Is shivering hypothermia?
Sam Evans-Brown: Yeah, yeah. Yeah. No, that's that's like the onset of hypothermia…
Justine Paradis: So like we've all experienced it.
Sam Evans-Brown: Yeah, exactly. And and so like learning the way your body works and learning to learn to recognize the signs of things that that your body will do in extreme situations in like a safe controlled environment.
Justine Paradis: This reminds me actually of, um, I used to attend like survival school, like outdoor school, survival school. And there's this one teacher that said something like hunger doesn't mean you're going to starve, like use. And so, like it's also about like reframing your attitude towards towards discomfort.
The exposure is the first thing that you die from. So, like, I don't want to say that, that yes. Like that one with hypothermia. But like, I know what you mean.
Taylor Quimby: I can say that, like, as somebody who I also get outdoor outdoors for some, like, winter activity, but I am not as naturally inspired to do it as you are, Sam. I've had to start small to learn what I can do outside in the wintertime. So when I started winter running, like start with a mile, you know, it's like it's like starting to learn how to run because there is more like both clothing but also equipment. You know, what kind of spikes do you need if you're going to start winter hiking, what kind of this you need? And for me, it's like I'm still working my way up. I try and buy like one piece of equipment per year rather than thinking I can just go out and spend hundreds or thousands of dollars on all the stuff I need to become like a mountaineer, just like take it one step at a time. And so, you know, I mean, like that that's that's one way to think about it. Also, hot, hot beverages. You get it, get a Thermos, put some hot cider in there and bring it with you and bring it with you.
Erika Janik: I was going to say that something that works really well for me is having a goal, even if it's a goal that you set for yourself. And so a goal that I've had. I've had this for a number of years, but I basically pick an area and I'm going to do all the trails in that area or all the parks. So here in Concord, like there are thirty one city trails and I've done all of them many times and I've branched out to like the other towns nearby and done all of their trails. And, but I think you can do this no matter where you live, because when I lived in Madison, Wisconsin one year, my goal was to visit all of the city parks, even the ones that were like a rock with a bench next to it. There are 270 of them. So it took me a while, but I did that and it really like kind of set a purpose where it was like, I do want to go outside and, you know, I just feel like it really helps you get to know where you live, maybe in a different way. Maybe I like working down a list too, but I don't know. I find it really helpful and motivating to get out at any time of year.
Sam Evans-Brown: At the beginning of the pandemic, my goal was to visit the beaver pond every day.
Justine Paradis: Oh, that's a really good goal. So I feel like I haven’t been as good at setting goals. One thing I like to do in the snowy winter land is nightwalks because snow at night is is just so special.
Sam Evans-Brown: Magical!
Justine Paradis: And I like to do it post storm or at the end of the storm which again maybe the public health officials wouldn’t approve of this recommendation but it sort of lets the weather tell you when to do it. So it's kind of responding to the world as it's happening and ofen you’re deliciously alone.
[mux]
Justine Paradis: But these are good tips. I am going to take a leaf from your book, I think this year and….
Taylor Quimby: Visit the Beaver Pond.
Justine Paradis: It sounds Beaver Pond. You'll see it in your yard every day. It's probably
Sam Evans-Brown: it's not mine. It's public . You can go
[mux swell]]
Sam Evans-Brown: So, let’s say you’ve got your fill of friluftsliv. You’ve been to the beaver pond, you’ve made the blizzard pizza, you’ve hit up all the parks on your list -- and now maybe you’re ready to curl up and get koselig. I think we have a few non-screen recommendations as well, but first, how about our Outside/In digital hygge recs? What have you guys been watching lately?
Justine Paradis: Um, I can go first. So I think there have been a couple of things that have come out lately that really tie into themes that we explore on Outside/In a lot. And so my TV recommendation is a little mainstream and might be kind of funny to recommend… it’s The Crown.
Clip: bagpipes
Sam Evans-Brown: Can I can I confess to have really no, like I know that the Crown exists and I've heard people say it, but I genuinely have no idea what it is.
Justine Paradis: I mean, sure, not everyone will have seen it of course but it is popular on Netflix but I think it can be interesting to approach mainstream shows with an eye to how nature is treated, especially when nature isn’t the explicit subject of the show. , so for Sam and anyone else who hasn’t seen it, the Crown is basically, it’s a show that dramatizes the reign of Queen Elizabeth II. So it’s not it’s not a documentary, but it’s based on real events,the first season starts before her coronation.
And now this latest season is in the 80s. So the main storylines here are the entrance of Princess Diana and Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher. I’m going to focus specifically Episode two, The Balmoral Test
Clip: [stag bellow]
… and the stag character therein. This is a moment when the royal is up at the queen's estate in Scotland, Balmoral and a stag, which has been critically injured by a trophy hunter on the neighboring estate, stumbles on onto their property.
Clip: So we go after him.
No, no, no. See that wee stream down there? That was the border where our estate ends and the neighbor’s estate begins to sleep again. We never cross that line. Ever.
Justine Paradis: So there's a lot of material in this episode here about like hunting and sportsmanship in the upper classes and how these class structures are kind of represented by your ability to navigate the natural world
Erika Janik: and also your ability to wear the right outfit for the right situation.
Justine Paradis: Indeed. For instance, Margaret Thatcher, who comes from like a working class background, kind of apocryphally, doesn't bring outdoor shoes. And she goes out hunting on the Scottish more wearing this like bright blue dress… So the queen kind of like reprimands her.
Clip: We're talking the trick really is to disappear into nature, to preserve the element of surprise. So next time you might not wear bright blue. It means the stag can see you. Or wear scent. It means he can smell you. Now he can hear you, too.
Justine Paradis: I think it’s really interesting to watch this show through the lens of Outside/In and see a dramatization of the elitism that pervaded 19th and 20th century conservation, ideas that Taylor really explored in his Fortress Conservation episode that we put out recently… this is following on the same ideas of a. like a walled off hunting park in which the elites get to play
Sam Evans-Brown: and make the rules for who gets to visit. And how.
Clip: It's not business. It's conservation. This is what people fail to understand.
[stem]
Sam Evans-Brown: Taylor what have you been watching?
Taylor Quimby: So the show that I would recommend people watch is Netflix. It's called Alien Worlds. And it's this really cool mix of speculative science fiction and nature documentary, the basis of the show being that scientists have been searching for Goldilocks exoplanets for decades now. And there are estimates that there are something like 80 billion trillion possible Goldilocks planets in the universe. So obviously, some of them …
Erika Janik: Eighty billion trillion?!
Sam Evans-Brown: you made that up.
Taylor Quimby: No, no, no. It's actually it's how that's how they said 80 billion. So as far as the actual show goes, half of the scenes take place on Earth where we're learning about biological concepts. And it's, you know, it's like a nature documentary. But you're actually talking to scientists like they're in the in the frame talking to you while they look at some species that they study or something or tell you about work that they're doing.
Clip: We calculate the energy intake from the nectar and the energy output from the oxygen, and we can calculate very accurately how much energy the bird is using. A hovering hummingbird consumes oxygen at an incredible rate 10 times faster than an Olympic sprinter.
Taylor Quimby: And then the other half are CGI laden scenes that imagine how those biological concepts might play out if species evolved on one of these other earth-like exoplanets. So, for example, the first episode explores what life might look like on a planet with two times Earth's gravity. And you'd think that everything is just heavy and low to the ground. But actually the extra gravity makes the air in the atmosphere really dense. And so it operates more like water. So there are these animals that they that they what they call them sky grazers that are basically swimming through the atmosphere, eating seeds that are, you know, sort of like floating through, you know, like with fluid dynamics
Justine Paradis: Oh fun.
Clip: On Atlas, the sky grazes never need to land. They're front and back wings are for direction and thrust. They're long middle wings are for catching the.
Justine Paradis: Well, like this might fit the same theme is like your episode on nature documentaries, Taylor with all manufactured audio, like they maybe use the same techniques.
Taylor Quimby: And so, like, there's some really cool learning opportunities in the actual show that that feel bigger and broader and more interesting than just like what would aliens look like? And in fact, you know, they they continually touch on points that we have talked about. In Outside/In, for example, there is a whole section where they're talking about generalists versus specialists, which is something that, Sam, you covered with Vulture's. And what was the thrush? What was it?
Sam Evans-Brown: Bicknell's thrush.
Taylor Quimby: Yeah, the Bicknell's thrush.
Clip: The generalists are the bone, the scavengers. Like crocodiles, they eat any.And live anywhere. On this imagined high gravity world, they could be the great survivors.
Sam Evans-Brown: I consider myself a boneless scavenger. It’s how I’ve gotten to where I am today.
Sam Evans-Brown: Erika, do you do you have a show for us?
Erika Janik: I do. I have a very, very different show than the TV that I've been recommended so far. Mine is actually Scandinavian,
Sam Evans-Brown: so it has to be hygge.
Erika Janik: Yeah, exactly. By design, as you know, I watch a lot of foreign dramas, but this one is a Norwegian show and it's called Occupied and it is a climate change political thriller. Can you believe it?
[Clip] Occupied theme
Erika Janik: So the plot revolves around oil production being halted in the Middle East due to war in this near future that it set in, the U.S. has become energy independent. And so Norway is left as the main supplier to the world. But but. But but there are Norwegian prime minister. He's a member of the Green Party. His name is Jesper Berg. And he's decided to shut down the Norwegian pipelines in favor of thorium nuclear plants. And not everyone is happy about this decision. And Russia basically invades and Jesper is forced into a partnership to keep the oil and gas going.
Clip: They came as a shock to European leaders who knew that Jesper Berg had threatened to turn off the gas, turned off the oil. But when he actually did so, it came as an enormous surprise to them.
So what's next? How can the EU put pressure on Norway?
I would think that in the corridors of power in Brussels, people are already making it very clear to the Norwegians that unless they change their policies, there will be draconian trade sanctions will. [fades down]
Erika Janik: This is from the first episode. You'll kind of hear Prime Minister Jesper Berg, he's in his office, but he's actually watching the BBC talk about what he's done. And this bit does happen to be in English. The show, I would say, actually does have a fair bit of English in it because there's a lot of interaction between the Norwegians and the Russians and they speak English to each other. But for me, part of the fun of watching these shows, part of why I watch so many of them is because I have to read the subtitles and it's one of the only times that I it's the only thing I can do. Like if I tried to do something else at the same time, I would miss something. And so I'm like just paying attention to that show and that story. And it feels like forcing I kind of have to, like, force myself not to multitask. And in some ways that feels relaxing.
Clip: [people speaking in Russian]
Erika Janik: And, you know, in those parts of the shows that I think feel far fetched. But at the same time, it doesn't feel that outside of the possibility what really unfolds the show is three seasons long and there's domestic terrorism, there's a nativist movement, there's a kidnaping. And I think one of the things that I find the most interesting about it is there's this generational kind of tug of war about energy solutions. There's a whole group of of older people on the show who are like, we can't just shut off the oil immediately. Like, it has to be gradual. And there's a whole group of other people that are like, no, like stop now and let's let's move. Let's transition. Why are we doing this?
Sam Evans-Brown: I don't know if you guys knew I was actually executive producer of that show.
Erika Janik: I do feel, Sam, that you in particular would enjoy the show.
Sam Evans-Brown: Thorium reactors.
Erika Janik: Yeah.You know, I think it does depend on what gives you comfort? Like, a climate change political thriller might not like the thing that gives you comfort, but I don't know. I found a lot of value in it and a lot of things to think about and talk about. And it's a show that I have told many people to watch because I want to talk about it. Even if I have to talk about it over Zoom.
Erika Janik: What about you, Sam what have you been watching?
Sam Evans-Brown: I don’t tend to watch a lot of TV, and when I do, I’m kinda looking for just … pure escapism. And so I will say I think my recommendation stands out for having some pretty bad acting… BUT it’s got spaceships
Clip: You know, when you spend your whole life [00:22:00] living under a dome, even the idea of an ocean is almost impossible to imagine.
They are an entire culture, working together to turn a lifeless rock into a garden. We had a garden and we paved it [Fades down]
Sam Evans-Brown: So, The Expanse is set in a future in which humans have colonized the solar system, there’s this Cold War-esque tensions between Earth and Mars, and people live for years or their entire lives on space ships.. It’s a science fiction show that was on the sci fi network and sci fi let it die. And then Amazon rebooted it with their own season and they're actually doing a new season, which has just started. -- It's funny, there are a lot of bad TV moments in it that I can recognize that these are bad TV moments. But they're also there's also so much just like good sci fi that I'm willing to forgive it. And mostly it's just like the physics of space that they do really well. And so, for instance, there's no gravity in any of their spaceships unless the spaceship is rotating. Right. Because that's that gives you sort of you know, that that would push you to the outside of the ship and make your feet touch the touch of the deck. Or if a ship is accelerating
CLIP: This is a high G maneuver. Prepare for flip and burn
Sam Evans-Brown: so you can be on a ship and if it's accelerating in one direction, then then it'll push you toward the floor. And that means then that all the ships are designed in such a way that the floors are like sort of sideways to how you would think they would be right. If, like the engine is the back, the the floor has to be facing away from the engine, essentially in order for it for thrust to generate gravity. And and it was actually like I was like two seasons into the show before I realized that was the case.
I was like, why are they oh, the ship is sideways.
Justine Paradis: I'm still trying to wrap my head around that. But it's really interesting.
Sam Evans-Brown: The one that really got me is this very, very short little moment from from, I think, the first season where all the characters are on this rotating space station in the asteroid belt. Which… because it’s not real gravity it means a bunch of weird things that happen and one is that when you pour liquids they behave kind of strangely. And so there’s this scene where a character pours a shot of whiskey and it does this little spiral out of the bottle into the glass. And they don't even mention it. It's just like it just happens, you know.
Justine Paradis: Oh, I love that worldbuilding.
Sam Evans-Brown: Exactly. So so that's my recommendation for a show that puts like the sci in sci fi.
Sam Evans-Brown: So we should take a break because that is that is a very hygge… breaks… naps. That's not being hard on yourself.
Erika Janik: Also because we have sponsors.
Sam Evans-Brown: We do have sponsors. OK, be right back.
[BREAK BREAK BREAK]
Sam Evans-Brown: Welcome back, this is Outside-in, and to start off the new year, we’re trying something different: this is the Outside/In team’s recommendations for how to make it through a long, COVID winter. So for our kosileg or cozy recommendations, we started with screen based things, and I think now we should be giving people recommendations for what they should do when they're hoping to take a break from their laptops, since that's where we live these days. Who wants to go first? Erika, feel like you are the queen of of non screen based activities?
Erika Janik: I suppose that might be true. I do have a lot of hobbies… craft projects…
Justine Paradis: Didn’t I just see you post on Instagram that you made a set of Shaker-style brooms?!
Erika Janik: yes… I did just make a bunch of brooms, which was fun! But I feel like the pandemic changes things, I’ve just been having a hard time finding the same motivation and satisfaction in doing the same things I used to do, which is kind of sad. I’m still making things but it’s been a little bit harder to motivate. I’m going to recommend something that’s a non-craft activity though, it's a book that I have really enjoyed and it's called Home Going by Ya Gyasi . And I missed this book when it first came out in 2016, but I read it a few months ago. And it's a book that looks at how the legacy of enslavement passes through generations. And it starts in 18th century Ghana with two half sisters, one of whom is sold into marriage. She actually marries a slave trader and goes to live in this place called the Cape Coast Castle, which is where they actually keep people that are enslaved before they get sent on the middle passage. And the other sister is taken in a raid and ends up in the dungeon of that castle before being transported to the Americas. So one is enslaved, one is not. The book follows a different person from each side of the family through the generations, all the way to America, the Civil War, Harlem. And you might be thinking that this book must be 3000 pages long to cover, because I think it's just really remarkable that, you know, we go through three centuries basically of stories and people in about 300 pages. And it's just really, it's really beautiful. Like, the topic is obviously heavy and very serious, but it's written just with so much care and love. And each of the characters in each of the chapters really just come alive. I just loved it and found it transporting and beautiful. And maybe I like to relax with heavier things, but I highly recommend this book. I thought it was amazing.
Taylor Quimby: It sounds amazing.
Justine Paradis: Erika, your tip made me think… I mean I feel like we move in and out of relationship in terms of what we seek. Like, at the beginning of the pandemic, I went through this period of wanting to watch movies and read about history, specifcally related to the Holocaust, which has held a lot of interest and fascination to me - like I want to engage with quote unquote heavier material or learn about times in history where people experienced seismic or incomprehensible events. And at other times during the pan, I’ve looked for humor almost exclusively. Which I guess brings me to a kind of obvious point that some of our recommendations will work some of the time for some people.
Taylor Quimby: Yeah, it's well, it's like it's like music. Do you ever you know, like like if you're feeling down sometimes you want down music that represents how you feel and sometimes you want the opposite to like stir something and get you moving in the other direction. And, you know, sometimes, sometimes we want to reinforce exactly how we're feeling and sometimes we want to change it.
Sam Evans-Brown: Yeah, I know I personally lapsed back into the Mountain Goats in terms of listening choices lately. So so I that resonates with me.
Taylor Quimby: I have been listening to a lot of Taylor Swift, which is not my recommendation for this.
But I must admit, I.
Justine Paradis: Just came out with some big albums. I know that's what I'm listening to.
Taylor Quimby: It's oh, gosh. I've just...
Justine Paradis: you know, don't ignite a debate here about Taylor Swift.
Taylor Quimby: Just put myself in a terrible position here. Just pretend I didn't say that.
Sam Evans-Brown: Taylor, do you want to go next?
Taylor Quimby: Oh, yeah. Yeah. Let me let me cleanse my verbal palate. As you all know, I've gotten pretty big into board games these past few years. There's this one called Cartographers. It's really neat. It's played on just basically a sheet of paper that the game comes with, like hundreds of these sheets so you can hand out one to each player. The theme is that you're a cartographer and you're building a fantasy map that has forests and rivers and occasionally hoards of goblins and things like that. And you're sort of arranging these shapes of those different land masses onto a grid. It's kind of like Tetris or like Blokus. But has this feeling that you're making a map, you can sort of like inject a little more artistic esthetic into it if you want, or just do it really simple and play it for the points. But but it's a really neat game. It's not like super complicated, but it's just complicated enough. My nine year old likes to play it and we, as we often do, he he doesn't like competitive games. So sometimes we play games that are supposed to be competitive, but we just don't. We deemphasize the points and we play it for the fun of playing and we add our points together at the end. So that's that's been a really fun two player game that I've been playing lately, another game that is very outdoorsy, a little more complicated and one that you guys probably have heard of because it won a ton of board game awards a couple of years ago. It's called Wingspan.
Sam Evans-Brown: I was hoping you were going to talk about Wingspan.
Taylor Quimby: And Wingspan is the best, isn't it?
Justine Paradis: I've never heard of it.
Erika Janik: Never heard of it.
Sam Evans-Brown: It very much falls into that category of what you're just talking about, where it's like it's competitive, but like you only know who who's winning or losing at the very end when you count the points. And mostly you're just like, look at my beautiful birds.
Justine Paradis: Look at my beautiful birds.
[BIRD NOISES]
Taylor Quimby: Oh, it works because the art is gorgeous. So there's tons of cards. There are real birds. They have like fun bird facts on the cards. And then when you're playing the game, the the the way it works is each bird has sort of like a special power and you can activate a row of birds that you're attracting to your nature preserve throughout the game. And all of their powers are like actually associated with the the behavior of that species. So, you know, they're like predator birds that you get points for killing mice. And then there are birds
Sam Evans-Brown: that cash seeds in the bark of trees.
Taylor Quimby: Yeah, yeah. It's so it's a beautiful game like is very sort of natural world inspired. Like it's complicated.
[bird ambi]
Sam Evans-Brown: It's very complicated, I would say. But it's essentially like it's an investment with your friends because the first round is going to be them learning.The first time you play with them is going to be them learning.
Taylor Quimby: Yeah
Sam Evans-Brown: I think board games generally though are like they are the definition of koselig.
Clip: Wingspan is again about. But it's a lovely, gentle thing and there's beautiful pictures. But the purest jewel and not for box is as simple as saying the names of the birds. Carolina Chickadee painted bunting, loggerhead shrike, Juniper, Titmouse, Buick's Wren and the Blue Gray nuthatch .
Sam Evans-Brown: Justine, what do you have?
Justine Paradis: So I have a couple of things I've been doing, like Taylor, I've been playing some games. My fiance and I play a lot of backgammon. And I think next we might seek, you know, the game of Go.
Taylor Quimby: Yeah
Sam Evans-Brown: Oh, yes. Yeah.
Justine Paradis: Yeah it’s a board game, sort of a grid. It’s a game of strategy, which as I understand it originated in China, y’know, several millennia ago. It’s very a simple game but takes a lot of skill and has the prestige of games like chess. I've played like once back in the day and I'm looking to find another Go board. The classical version is made with clamshells and slate pieces and the board itself, this company that I looked up in Japan on their website I read that it takes 15 years from start to finish to make a traditional board... but it's yeah, I might I might pursue some more like sort of traditional games.
But the other thing I'll recommend is during this pandemic, I definitely have had moments of like high anxiety where like maybe I like had an encounter that I thought was like maybe not totally Covid safe or something and I'll have trouble sleeping occasionally because I'll be thinking about it or something. And I've been using this technique called yoga nidra. It's part of a restorative yoga practice and it basically means yogic sleep. And it's a style of meditation that's. Have you ever heard of body scan meditation?
Sam Evans-Brown: No.
Erika Janik: Yes.
Justine Paradis: Yeah, it's it's very effective for me. Like, you can go on YouTube and find, like, free versions of this, but you'll lie down in a comfortable position. And the the teacher will prompt you basically to move your your mental attention to different parts of your body in a scan.
Clip: Begin by bringing your awareness to the right hand. Right thumb. Index finger.
Justine Paradis: It like literally puts me to sleep, it's incredible. So if anyone is shares that kind of like difficulty sleeping sometimes in the pandemic, I would recommend trying that.
Erika Janik: I found that really helpful. Meditation is difficult and takes practice, but I found the body scan as that as a good way to help focus your thoughts.
Justine Paradis: Well it’s also like, as far as the hygge idea, the idea at the center of this too is at the center of yourself is always a place of peace. So, finding home in your body. And that is always there for you.
[mux]
[theme rise]
CREDITS
As this episode goes out, we are still in our mid-winter fund drive. We have a goal of 100 donors in this drive, and if we get there, our promise to you is that we will produce an EXTRA episode, in addition to our regular biweekly releases. This episode will be an installment in our 10x10 series --- deep dives into special ecosystems. We hope that these episodes are like little trips, that transport you to another place on our spectacular planet. And, if you donate, you get to vote on which ecosystem we explore - choose between winter beach, city gutter, snowpack, and birds nest. We’re well on our way but we are getting into the final stretch - as I record this, we have 32 more donations to go. The link to donate is ---- OUTSIDEINRADIO.ORG/DONATE. That’s OUTSIDEINRADIO.ORG SLASH DONATE. If you have already donated - thank you, thank you.
Outside/In was produced this week by me, Sam Evans-Brown, Taylor Quimby, and Justine Paradis. Erika Janik is our executive producer.
Maureen McMurray is Director of Moonlit Snowy Walks in the Great North Woods.
Music in this ep came from Blue Dot Sessions.
Our theme music is by Breakmaster Cylinder.
OI is a production of NHPR.
I [00:44:00] have this deep wish that winter would actually be the time when we have the most daylight and summer would be the time when we have the least daylight.
Right. But yeah, isn't that just so if you just move to the southern hemisphere. Yeah. Is that way. But but you call winter, summer and summer. Oh my God, Taylor.
No way. Right. No, no. We have to change our orbit and our winter habitat because there's less sun. That's why winter happens.
Ok, ok, I cut that. Don't use it. Don't use it.