j i l l e l l y n .....promoting fun in learning

Roar is available to give presentations on his nature life school on Norways western coast including powerpoint slides and video clips of student activities

P 1       Viking Nature’s ROAR www.sonsofnorway.com

P 5       THE ISLAND IN MY LIFE from Kystfolken

P 9       Spring Grove Herald Newspaper December 07

P11      Writing by Professor of Environmental Studies, teacher in Norway and friend of Roar Douglas Hulmes from Prescott College, AZ

Contact Jill Storlie to schedule a presentation for your group.  Travel expenses honorarium is appreciated.

VIKING    Magazine for the members of Sons of Norway. July 2008

Nature’s ROAR
www.sonsofnorway.com

One man’s quest for truth in the wilderness  Features Page 8

Nature’s Roar! An unconventional instructor makes us think twice about the great outdoors p.8

By Elizabeth Oliver Illustration by John Dinser

Meet an unconventional teacher with an island, a mission and a lot of mackerel.
On the western coast of Norway, about 159 kilometers north of Bergen, far into the sea from Sognefjorden, lies a rocky, windswept island called Litle Færøyna. Here, alone on this tiny island of a mere 600 by 700 meters, lives Roar Moe. Moe moved to Litle Færøy 10 years ago to start a school that teaches young people the traditional ways of Norwegian coastal culture, ways that Moe sees rapidly disappearing in today’s fast-paced, technology-dependent, nature-starved world. Each summer, Moe invites groups of youth to leave their modern lives behind by stepping back in time and back to nature.

The idea behind the school is to challenge young people not only to question the lifestyles they lead, but also to get them to experience-firsthand-other alternatives. Moe hopes his students- mostly primary school students from Bergen to college kids from Arizona  feel the empowerment that comes from self-sufficiency. He challenges them to look to history for answers to contemporary problems.
“Moe doesn’t want coastal traditions to disappear in today’s fast-paced, nature-starved world.

Living the philosophy
A T.S. Eliot quote Moe admires captures the spirit behind his work: “Where is the Life we have lost in living? Where is the wisdom we have lost in knowledge? Where is the knowledge we have lost in information?”

Moe also cites the philosophy of his friend, famed Norwegian philosopher Arne Naess, as inspiration for what he does on Litle Faeroy. Naess, with the likes of Aldo Leopold, Rachel Carson, and others, helped start the Deep
Ecology movement, an ideology arguing for environmental ethics that value the inherent worth of all beings. Those who work for social change based on this idea are motivated by a love of nature as well as a love of humans.

For Moe, Deep Ecology is not simply a philosophy. He is adamant about living and reaching these ideals. “I see kids coming here,” he says. “There is a disconnection between their hands and their heads. They have a shortage of practical experiences.” He sees a remedy for his students in Norway’s nature and history. “I want to fill old bottles with new wine,” he says. The traditional knowledge Moe teaches often applies directly to the contemporary environmental problems these kids are all too aware of. Moe asks, for example, How can I move from one place to another without using gasoline? Is there some tradition in history? You can souse sails and oars, but it depends on winds, waves, and the knowledge you have of how to do that.”

On Litle Færøy this practical experience begins with mealtime. Instead of the quick eats they’re accustomed do, Moe’s students work for their food at every stage. They are taught to set nets in the evening, then rise early to pull them from the sea, clean the nets, collect their catch (often cod and mackerel), clean it, filet it, cook or dry it, and finally, eat it.
All the lessons of Litle Færøy involve hard work, sharp minds and time. Moe’s friend and business partner
Gudrun Ingvaldsen _ a hardy 74-year old woman who, like Moe, lives a solitary, self-sufficient lifestyle on a neighboring island- teaches students the traditions of the land. She shows them how to prepare traditional fish dishes, how to cut grass using a scythe, and how to shear the island’s sheep, spin the wool and knit hats with the yarn.  At night, before retiring to tents t, the kids gather around the fire to share stories and ponder the mental and philosophical value of their labors.

Meanwhile, much of Moe’s teaching takes place on the water. Like the land traditions Ingvaldsen teaches, Moe wants students to practice the ways of people in Lagoy - Solund (the region surrounding Litle Færøy) around the turn of the century, prior to the introduction of the motorboat. Students sail the same type of square-sailed boat that the Vikings used-a boat that Moe helped build. It’s an extremely difficult type of boat to sail.
While traditional European sailboats have two to four gaff sails, the square sail has one main direction, with the wind coming from behind, but any change in orientation or wind direction and sailing this boat becomes technically complex. Of course, that’s part of the point. “It is important for me to articulate the process, the time it takes,” says Moe. “I want young people to reflect on how we can transfer these old lessons into modern times. What can we learn from the past that we can use today and in the future."

Practice to theory, and back
Moe’s interest in the past stems from his own seafaring youth and is intricately tied to the history of the Norwegian coast. Moe’s father and grandfather were seamen in the glory days of Norwegian shipping and fishing. “My grandfather is my great hero,” says Moe. “He taught me how to sail, how to navigate tough waters, the basics of how to survive.” That was the early 1960’s. When oil was discovered in the North Sea around 1970 life in Norway changed dramatically- especially along the coast. Tremendous wealth entered the country. The standard of living soared, and people on the coast left centuries-old ways of life and moved to inland cities for education and higher-paying jobs. “I was part of it,” reflects Moe. “I went from a traditional self –sufficiency taught from one generation to another and into an academic way of getting knowledge. I went from practical knowledge into theory.”

Moe studied physical education in Oslo in the ‘70s. participated in a sports clinic at Luther College in Decorah, Iowa, in 1980, and taught skiing at Voss Folk High School throughout the ‘80’s/ At Voss, Moe became involved in the resurgence of Telemark skiing and began working on projects building traditional boats. He apprenticed sewing traditional canvas sails and sailed on the Hjemkomst, an authentic Viking ship that sailed from New York to Bergen (and now sits in a museum in Moorhead, Minn.). Moe went on to acquire coastal navigation certification and worked as a fisherman for a few years before, in 1990, he began to ponder how rapidly Norwegian life as changing

This was when he and three friends from Voss went in search of a location for a new kind of outdoor school, a place they could dock their historic sea crafts, and a place where young people could, as Moe put is, “get away from the myths of the history and find out how life on the Norwegian coast really was.” In 1993, they found a heather-covered island named Litle Færøy. Moe and his partners spent three year renovating the dilapidated farmhouse (abandoned in 1965) and building boathouses, an outhouse and other outbuildings.

A rustic beauty
Former students and visitors to the island speak fondly of it, often mentioning the pinkish hue of the rocks at sunset
They talk of the wildlife: fish, deer minx and eagles. From the high point on the island, you can watch steamers and freighters sailing north and south along the coast.

All the beauty doesn’t mean visitors sugarcoat how trying life on the Litle
Litle Færøy can be, though. It is isolated-the nearest village of Hardbakke has only 350 people and is a half-hour away by motorboat. The winders are dark and wet. Modern luxuries are few.

Douglas Hulmes, an environmental studies educator, says, “There is nothing comfortable about being out the island. I could never give my students a lecture on the strength, tenacity and acceptance of a hard life that epitomizes the West Coast peasant and fishing culture. We’ve experienced only a glimpse of it.

“But,” he adds, “I can’t wait to return.” Others agree. Jill Storlie, Moe’s old friend from Luther College, (who brought Moe to the Midwest last year to talk to Sons of Norway members (Nordmansforbundet in Decorah, Vesterheim Museum, University Club of St. Paul and Thomson Reuters employees about his work ) remembers the simple, day-to-day danger of being s solitary among such harsh seas and conditions. Yet, she is returning to Litle Færøy for the second time this summer. Paul Hough, a friend, praises Moe’s mission: “I think it is important, because Roar is showing that it is possible to live in balance with nature, close to nature, simple in means but still rich. He provides challenges and exciting activities that are grounded in culture, not just nature.”

When asked of the challenges that he faces on the island-long winders, harsh seas, intense solitude and minimal luxuries-Moe acknowledges them simply: “I am a very social person. Wintertime can be kind of lonely.” “He fights the loneliness with practical, interesting activities. He has a phone, a radio and newspapers to keep him in touch and entertained. Occasionally he makes the four-hour boat trip to Bergen, where he meets friends at the pub and sees films and theater. It is the social life and cultural activities of the city that he misses most, but he says three days of that is usually plenty. After a trip to the city, says Moe, “it is always good to come back to the island. It can be lonely here, but I can really feel the life, not only around me but inside me.”

Elizabeth Oliver is an avid outdoorswoman and freelance writer.

How to Get There

WHO: Young people: primary school, high school and college students.

WHAT: A few days to a few weeks of fishing, sailing Viking ships and living life as people on the Norwegian coast have done for centuries.

WHEN: Summer (April-
August/Sept)

WHERE: Litle Færøy Island, Norway; about four hours north of Bergen by Express boat, bus and taxi boat.

Contact: www.roarmoe.com – E.O. roar@roarmoe.com or for immediate response email jillellyn@jillellyn.com or call 651 2709362 or 5634190986

Litle Færøy  is a place to get away from the myths of history and find out how life on the Norwegian coast really was.
Students borrow techniques from the Vikings as they learn to sail a square-sailed ship.
Roar Moe (pictures in the VIKING) shows his students that one is never too young to learn practical skills for the outdoors. 

Translated to English  THE ISLAND IN MY LIFE from Kystfolken

At first, people looked at me as if I were an eccentric, alone on an island. Now, more and more, people want to know what it is I have discovered out here.

Roar fires up the diesel motor. We move out quietly between giants.

We are in a landscape which does not resemble anything we have seen along the long Norwegian coastline. If there is anything that is “furrowed, weathered, over water” as in the Norwegian national anthem, it is Solund, outermost in the district of Sogn. It has the appearance of giants having thrown boulders at each other. Enormous bare-scrubbed mountain sides tower over us. In this light, the surface of the sea is pink, and looks completely friendly. Among them, it seems that the giants have simply laid themselves down in shallow waters. Then, suddenly, the deciduous trees on the point up ahead are perhaps the last strands of hair before they dive completely under, or rise up again. We are on our way to the Little Faeroe islands with a solitary man. Here he has made his way alone for nine years.

You can call it a quiet revolt, but a revolt without hatred, as the poet Hans Børli put it. When I decided to gamble on moving to an island all alone, I thought about it carefully. Very carefully. Could I tolerate the solitude? Did I dare to recognize my own limits? And even, could I risk going mad?

Roar Moe’s eyes smile at me while he maneuvers the wooden boat past a marker in Inner Stone Sound. I try, but cannot quite see the revolt in his friendly face.

“In some circles what I have done is a provocation in itself. I moved out to a place people had moved away from. I showed interest in the same roots and values the local people had said no to. People wondered, ‘Is he a hopeless romantic? Is he trying to drag himself backwards into the future?’ I had to begin things cautiously, be careful not to get burned when I wanted information, to find the right sources. And my friends thought that I had gone completely mad. Was I going to live on an island all alone, without a woman? When you want to do something like that, it is clear that people are going to wonder about you.”

We round the Little Faeroe, one of the many huge rocks out here. Suddenly there is a large opening in the mountain, and the whole landscape softens into a lush green field stretched out between the stone walls. And there lies the small farm! A more beautiful place one earth could not be found, at least not on a summer day! We glide into the tiny harbor, and Roar comes alongside. Ashore, there is actually a woman standing there—Gudrun Ingvaldsen—who takes the mooring line. She lives alone, too, on a neighboring island. Gudrun is more than seventy, originally from Bergen, but says that is going to live here until her dying day.

We walk up over the grassy ground to the house. A strong interest in traditional coastal- and boat-culture led Roar to Solund. The hobby became a vocation. School children come now regularly to Little Faeroe for five days at a time to find and experience the culture that once gave life to the whole west coast. Roar teaches the courses and the outdoor activities, and Gudrun is his assistant.

“Out here we live like Askeladden. We ask questions. Try to find solutions. Every new day is spread out before us, without an agenda, and we have to decide for ourselves what to do with it. For me, that means to search, discover, and find a path to follow. I want to map how these people lived, these people who were here before me. Was it just hard work, hunger, and gray days? Little by little, I uncovered the past.”
Roar showed us into the tenant farmer’s cottage. When he first came here, the house was in ruins. Now it is cared for, warm, and inviting. We are served chocolate cake.

“There were nine siblings who lived here, but the last one died in 1960s, and after that the little farm was largely abandoned. The descendants of the family were a great help when I tried to reconstruct their history. What surprised me was how strong the spirit was of the tiny community. They were both physically and mentally self-sufficient. Their sense of humor was perhaps their most vital asset; the ability to laugh at themselves, and see the humor in everything, to brighten the days with laughter in both work and play. The people here had an eye for detail which they shared with each other. Besides, they were their own bosses, with twenty sheep and a couple of cows. For the most part, the women and children took care of the farm while the men were out fishing, farther west. The fishing earned them money, and the small farm made them self-sufficient. We know a lot about how rich people used to live, but the life of the coastal people out here is not as well documented. Maybe that is why there are so many myths about them?”

Maybe there will be fewer myths both about how the coastal people lived, and how Roar lives, when it is better documented? [end of professional translation]
*approximate translation follows
*He smiles at the fact that he was for many years almost anonymous on the island but both radio and TV reports have altered the life of the bachelor alone on the island. Suddenly he got both postcards and letters from interested people. Some were women who took the trip to the community center Hardbakke. The polite Roar has opened his island to visit. There were good dinners, wine and good talks. And that was it…? Yes, you know what Bob Dylan sings “I gave her my heart, but she wanted my soul. Don’t think twice, its all right.” I found that chorus explains the situation. You know there is much that nice ladies from the cities haven’t thought about when it comes to the life on a small island…they ought to talk to my neighbor, colleague and my good friend Gudrun Ingvaldsen from Lågøy. That is a human being who has lived through great changes coming from a civilized life in Bergen to being widowed and surviving alone out here. For her, it has been hard work with many hardships but also real pleasure. Gudrun is a magnificent example of the species.

Although it is very nice that people get in touch with me, I try to answer all those who write and if strangers come for a visit, I invite them in, but a normal relationship is not on my priority list. Not as long as I live on Litle Færøy

What Roar prioritizes is to give young people knowledge about how they can go to sea in an old western Norway traditional wooden boat. He tries to teach them the art of how to catch the wind in a square sail. He drills them in team work and helps them understand what responsibility each crew member has on board.

When on shore, they can learn about “grindverks” building, the very special construction of many boat houses on the western coast. These are solid buildings that have proven to withstand windstorms better than new houses. Roar uses the situations as his teaching program. He wants to invite young people to reflect about past, present and future.

In our time there is a belief that technology can fix everything. But when you push a key on a computer it doesn’t’ fix your own life. It’s interesting to see in teaching when students have to use their senses how young people can master tasks that they didn’t believe they could handle. Here they get time and space for trial and error. In the meantime I see that the connection between hand and head is in disorder to many of the young kids. There are many youth that try to avoid the outhouse the five days they are here. “It’s bad they say. They take many things for granted.”

Roar himself has lived for many years in an economically minimal existence. The quality of life is not less for that reason. An old saying goes that a seaman doesn’t ask for good weather – he learns to sail. So is the live on Litle Færøy.
THE CHALLENGE is to master life day by day both physically and mentally. To live an economically minimal existence and to be totally in nature, and living with the rhythm and the unpredictable laws of nature has made me humble.

This is not something that you can read. You have to live in and with the elements to understand and respect them. Originally I had thought that when I turned 50 I would make a decision and maybe end the project. But now life has been so exciting that it is hard to get away from it. It is only now that I really see the perspective in the work I have done. Imagine the first time when I was looked upon as an odd stranger on an island but now many more want to know what I have discovered out here.

Well, in theory I can tell both about dark winter evenings with northwestern storms and sleet and describe with pictures the delightful days like today.
But in many ways it that doesn’t matter, it is not the truth. Because you have to be here, live in the environment and live in nature to really understand what this is about.

We strolled with Roar down to the harbor. He fired up the wooden boat’s diesel engine and we chugged back to Hardbakke. Next for us - coast writers is Flora. Such tourist journalism Roar does not do, it doesn’t motivate him. He is
faithful and loyal to the only priority in his life… Litle Færøyna..

Translation of the first portion was done by Conrad Røyksund (Retired Luther Professor of Religion, Poet, Writer, boat builder and Norsk translator – see:
- Johnson, Pål Espolin. For Love of Norway (Alt for Norge, Norwegian, 1975; MSLT, 1989). Trans., with an afterword, by Conrad Røyksund. 147 pp.
Pål Espolin Johnson (b. 1940) Alt for Norge (For love of Norway), followed in 1975 and was another tribute to both ordinary people and perseverance in the face of adversity and also was an immediate success. Translated by Conrad Røyksund this book was published in the USA by Nebraska University Press in 1989.


This article comes from Kystfolket a trip from Stavanger to Alesund

Author of this article - Østein Rakkenes

KYSTFOLKET - ei reise frå Stavanger til Ålesund
Av Øystein Rakkenes og Eivind Senneset Skriv ut vareinformasjon

Slik bestiller du:

BTkort-pris: kr. 280,00  Ordinær pris: kr. 349,00

Sommeren 2006 tok skribenten Øystein Rakkenes og fotografen Eivind Senneset ei reise langs Vestlandskysten. Blant fjord og fjell møtte dei ei rad spennande menneske. Det er dei denne boka handlar om. Gjennom varme portrett både i tekst og bilde gir boka eit møte med det rike og mangfaldige livet langs Vestlandskysten.
______________________________________________________________

Norwegian teacher speaks at Sons of Norway  By Marlene Deschler, Community Reporter  Spring Grove Minnesota


Roar Moe will share his experiences of living on an island and teaching youth of Norway about old-time boat building

"Where is the life we have lost in living? Where is the wisdom we have lost in knowledge? Where is the knowledge we have lost in information?"

These three lines from a T.S. Eliot poem written in 1934, makes one ponder about what has been lost with the current fast-moving, fast-paced technical age that exists today.

This passage has special meaning to a gentleman from Norway who has made it his ambition in life to remember the past, to learn from it and to teach others the importance of this as well.

Roar (pronounced similar to roo_- ar) Moe grew up along the West coast of Norway. He always had an interest in sports and history. At one time he was a physical education teacher and a ski instructor. In 1980, he came to Luther College in Decorah, Iowa, to study United States sports during a summer session. At the time, U.S. sports such as football and golf were not being played in Norway, so he came to learn these, as well as others, sports.

About the school of history

In 1990, Moe and his partners started searching for a place to dock their authentically restored boats - boats that had been made in the traditional way of boat making before there were power tools and engines. They found a small island, Little Færøy, on the western side of Norway near the Solund community.

They then began their non-profit outdoor school. It was their desire to "fill old bottles with new wine." In other words, they wanted to teach students a new perspective on old history; they wanted them to do more than read about history, they wanted them to have hands-on experience.

Their program is set in an era in the early 1900s before the introduction of the engine. The activities are not only connected to the sea, but also to a Norwegian farm of that era.

The students learn traditional sailing methods with square sails that date back to the time of the Vikings. Moe is the main instructor, having left his other jobs to pursue this venture full-time.

"The Vikings were important because they were the super power in the world long ago," explained Moe. "They [the Vikings] had the technology to go to another country, settle it, and return. Others couldn't do that."

The weeklong programs run from early May through. The students sleep in tents and use an outhouse. They do as much as they can to be self-sufficient- in the morning they put out nets, in the evening they bring in their nets and get the fish and clean them. They also bake their own bread and other traditional foods. "The kids are participants in all that they do while on the island," Moe remarked.

Buildings on the island have also been restored. The last family that lived on the island left in 1965. They had some old pictures of the buildings, so they were able to restore them close to what they originally had been, again using the old-fashioned traditional tools.

In 1996, Moe moved to the island to live there full-time. Two individuals that students will meet during their time on the island are Martinus, an 88-year old boat maker, and Gudrun, a 74-year old lady who teaches skills including cleaning fish and cooking. These two people know the traditional methods first-hand and are able to pass their knowledge on to the students.

To earn a little extra money in the off-season of the school, Moe navigates a cargo ship along the coast. Recently the school culture program hired Moe to sail his boat to ten different schools along the coast to allow them the experience of seeing a boat built with traditional building methods. Next year they will be visiting 20 more schools.

Being that the sails are square, at least two people are needed to sail the boat and it is best to have five. For these school visits, their boat is followed by a motor boat incase the winds are not right for getting them into land, the motor boat can pull them in.

Moe has a wonderful story to tell about a project that is clearly close to his heart. He has many wonderful photos and video. Norwegian Public TV created a documentary about Moe and where he is living in a remote area and his program. "I have gotten many letters in response to that program," Moe said with a smile.

To hear even more details about his project and way of life, attend the Sons of Norway meeting -the public is invited. According to their Website, www.sofn.com, "The mission of Sons of Norway is to promote and preserve the heritage and culture of Norway

Writing by Professor of Environmental Studies, teacher in Norway and friend of Roar Douglas Hulmes from Prescott College, AZ

I first met Roar when I worked at Olavskolen, when he taught Friluftsliv at the Foss Folkehøgskule. Since 2003, I have visited Litle Faerøy with 12 students every two years for
approximately 5 days.

I selected Litle Faerøy because this remote island at the mouth of Sognefjord gives my students an opportunity to experience the traditional West Coast fishing culture. We are given the opportunity to sail traditional wooden boats, and learn techniques of fishing and preparing traditional foods as well as gain perspectives of the long history of fishing and trade that has occurred on the west coast of Norway. This opportunity gives my students a meaningful way to understand cultural traditions, and the challenges of surviving on a small island that is buffeted by storms off the Norwegian Sea and North Atlantic.

Roar is a quiet self reliant man who incorporates direct experience into his teaching style. He has studied under Nils Faarlund, one of Norway's top Friluftsliv vegleders (sp?) (leaders
of the way). Roar decided to commit his life to a simple life style based on the deep cultural traditions of the Norwegian west coast fishermen and farmers. His work with young people
demonstrates, through example, the philosophical values of Deep Ecology, and the need for cultural wisdom to be retained in a modern world that cannot continue at the present level of
consumption. My students recognized the incredible value of experience and through discussions with Roar, they gained a perspective of the depth and commitment of his philosophy and chosen life style. Several of my students have been profoundly impacted by their experience on Litle Faerøy and are continuing to reflect on ways to simplify their own lives and incorporate some of their understanding of Friluftsliv into their personal and professional lives.

When I see Gudrun, tears come to my eyes. She reminds me so much of my Swedish mormor, grandmother. She is clearly a dominant force to be reconned with on Litle Faerøy, and she keeps me and my students busy with her tasks for preparing traditional Norwegian meals from the fish and crabs that we have harvested from the sea. It is apparent that her strength and character has been molded from the icy grey waters that lash the coast, and she has kept us entertained late into the evenings with stories of rescuing a cow that had fallen into the sea or the time that she has had to swim to shore with the boat in tow with a rope after being smashed onto a submerged rock.

Roar Moe,  year-round inhabitant, caretaker, teacher and program director

A few of the people who support programs in their own ways

There was Steiner, and eccentric plumber, who has restored an old trawler that docked at Litle Faerøy, and kept us entertained for an evening last September, with stories of his personal research into the possible relationship of the disappearance of the West Greenland Colony described in Jared Diamond's book, Collapse. Steiner believes that some of the colony may have sailed to Hudson Bay, in 1352, up a river to Lake Winnipeg, and from there sailed up the Red River into Minnesota. The famed Kensington Stone, found in 1898 by a Swedish American farmer, and thought by most to be a hoax, Steiner believes to be a credible record of the lost colony from Greenland. He has found "mooring holes" along the route that could have been drilled in the old Viking tradition, as a technique
to tie boats to land, while allowing for a rapid release incase of attack. Ten of the members of the group, according to the translation of the runic description on the rock were evidently
killed by local indians. He informed us that a film crew from Bergen was planning to travel to Minnesota and investigate a location where he believed the bodies may have been buried. When I returned to Prescott at the end of September, I coincidentally, met a couple of young people from Wilmar, Minnesota, who had heard about a Norwegian that had been in the area last summer, investigating the legend. They knew of the "mooring holes", and
the woman said that her brother had found one on their farm....

Litle Faerøy, which I believe is Ny Norsk dialect of little sheep island, is a glaciated granite rock encrusted with patches of heather, (lyng). In late August and September, the heather blooms, and the island glows with purple and pink in the twilight of the late summer evenings. When not buffeted by storms off the North Atlantic, the island is a beautiful hidden retreat, far from the destinations of tourists and the crazy realities of the modern world.

Litle Faerøy, Roar, and Gudrun are authentic Norwegian landscape and culture as you can ever hope to meet. There is nothing comfortable about being on the island. If it is not windy
in August, the midges are constantly biting and swarming around your face. One evening, when I and my 11 students were huddled in the yurt, listening to a presentation by one of my students on Norwegian fairytales, the rain pelting on the canvass, a sudden especially strong gust blasted the tent, and it came collapsing down around us. Four of the students kept the canvass from touching the glowing wood stove, while I ran to the house for Roar. We held the tent up, while students pulled out all of our sleeping bags and packs. Roar, with huge insulated mitts, pulled the stove and chimney out from under the flapping canvass. Within
a half hour, the tent was fixed, and though soaked to the skin, we resumed our positions in sleeping bags around a roaring fire, and fell asleep, listening to the wind and rain. I could never give my students a lecture on the strength, tenacity, and acceptance of a hard life that epitomizes the west coast peasant/fishing culture, but we experienced a glimpse of it, that will forever be remembered by me and my students. Life takes on a different meaning ntirely from what most Americans experience today. On Litle Faerøy, you work to live. You connect with the land, the sea, the weather, and the people in a way that is honest, genuine, and eaningful. I can't wait to return.

American culture has become a simulation of life, where communication is primarily done through cell phones, text messages, computers, and television. I work with 90 fifth grade students every year in an 8 week creeks and watershed program. Most of the kids have never put their feet in a stream, or climbed a tree, or a mountain. Last year, 12 out of 30 students in one class had parents who were in jail, most because of meth, or domestic
violence. And I live in Prescott, Arizona, a nice town that is recognized as one of the best places to live in America!
Richard's Louve's book, The Last Child of the Woods, is an accurate description of an entire generation of children suffering from what he describes as "nature deficit disorder". It is real, and it is a huge problem throughout the modern world cultures. Environmental Education is often being reduced to another attempt to satisfy state standards on tests, and if it occurs at all, is often filled with facts and information to support testing, and the information rarely questions the direction of progress or sustainability in our culture, or considers how our ancestors survived in the past. It occurs in the middle of the day, for an hour or two, and maybe a three day residential camp during a child's 12 years of education.

Roar Moe is one man, living on a small island off the west coast of Norway, who recognizes that the direction we are going in modern culture cannot continue without serious and perhaps devastating consequences to life as we know it. On Litle Faerøy, one can
experience a life that is simple, real, connected with the landscape, and one learns humility, cooperation, and experiences a sense of the wisdom from past traditions that have nearly been lost. Roar has an important message, and we should all pay attention.
  

 Gudrun Ingvalsen

Gudrun traveled with us to Bergen to visit her daughter, This photo was take with me ( Doug Hulmes) while waiting for the ferry.

My name is Douglas Hulmes, I am a professor of  Environmental Studies and Education at Prescott College, Prescott,  Arizona. I have extensive experience teaching in Norway. I taught  for 6 months at Olavskulen Folkehøgskule on the island of Bømlo  with a Friluftsliv program in 1991. In 1996 - 97 I was a guest  professor at Telemark College, in one of Norway's first  interdisciplinary environmental studies programs for international students. I take students from Prescott College to Norway every  two years for a class: Explorations of Norway, Nature and Culture. 

We study how landscape influences culture and how culture as a  result of its unique history, including mythology, folklore and  traditions, influences the cultural landscape and cultural perspectives toward nature that is evident today. We visit  cultural sites, schools and natural areas with an emphasis on  experiential education as a means of learning about and  experiencing the culture and landscape. I have a chapter in a  book, Nature First, Edited by Bob Henderson and Nils Vikander, that  focuses on ideas of Scandinavian Friluftsliv. In August of 2007, I  was one of 10 people asked to present my paper invited at a  conference in Norway, entitled Being in Nature. I am attaching the  chapter that I have published in this book. The conclusion of my  essay is about being on Litle Faerøy and includes a shot  description of Roar. You are welcome to quote any part of my  chapter that you feel may be relevant.