Forgive me for being so ominous less than two days from Christ’s birth. However, as a chill, unseen in years, strands most of the country for long stretches, I don’t care about stranded holiday travelers, annoyed, but warm in airports because I’m thinking about this man and woman and how easily they could be me, […] More »
She beats a heavy heart that is her engine. She seemingly jumps up to the sky and crashes down into her own wake in the open ocean, only to repeat it again and again. She is as cold as death. Yet there is a quickening to her pace as she heads toward history-making. She is […] More »
Happy Holidays, bloggers. It’s less than a week until Christmas and Kwanzaa, and Hanukkah is coming even sooner, which means it’s just about time for me to start proselytizing about how much I despise the term, “Happy Holidays.” I have a couple reasons for this, and none of them stem from how my love for […] More »
I am writing this on a crowded flight from my adopted home of Toronto to my former home of Edinburgh, where I am trying to ignore the brainwashing effect of Fred Claus on ten tiny screens in front of me. Like countless others, I am heading home for Christmas. So far though, I’m having a […] More »
I frequently bemoan the fact that my mom gave me a name that is both incredibly common for my age group, as well as (apparently) impossible to spell. As of this moment, however, I will cease complaining and be grateful that she did not name me Adolf Hitler. Little Adolf Hitler Campbell ran into trouble […] More »
They are both Canadian, in their mid-20’s, female and with long brunette hair. One women is on a high-speed inflatable boat called a Zodiac in the Pacific Ocean. The other, on the bridge of an entirely black 59-metre Scottish patrol vessel in the Antarctic Ocean. The woman in the Zodiac steers her inflatable in front […] More »
This video, compiled by Swiss scientists, shows 24 hours of global aircraft travel in 72 seconds. I think the fact that it resembles a petri dish swarming with disease is only partly coincidental: Airplane travel is one of the largest and most damaging carbon-emitting actitivies on the planet. [spotted on Wired, via Worldchanging] More »
This week I’m coming to you live from Morinville, Alberta snuggled around the fire with the aunts and uncles. It’s not as frosty as liquid nitrogen here, but at -30°C my body might as well be experiencing the final round of a Japanese game show. At least we have each other, right? While my body […] More »
Today is the 60th anniversary of the adoption of the Declaration of Human Rights. On December 10th, 1948, 48 states voted in its favour. Although not one state voted against it, eight abstained: including the former Soviet Union, taking issue with the inclusion of individual property rights; apartheid-era South Africa, saying that “human dignity would […] More »
[Editor’s note: today we introduce “Polarized,” Emily Hunter‘s dispatches from Antarctica, where she is documenting Sea Shepherd‘s 2008-2009 anti-whaling campaign aboard the Steve Irwin. The campaign lasts until the spring, and Emily will periodically post her writing, photos, and video on BLOG THIS.] Sitting in a grey room that feels as cold and stale as […] More »