Travel as a Political Act by Rick Steves

Author:Rick Steves
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Avalon Publishing
Published: 2018-03-15T00:00:00+00:00

With little money, advertising, or styles to keep up with, Christianians do a lot of swapping.

Many predict that Christiania will withstand the government’s challenge, as it has in years past. The community, which also calls itself Freetown, fended off a similar attempt in 1976 with the help of fervent supporters from around Europe. Bevar Christiania—“Save Christiania”—banners fly everywhere, and locals are confident that their free way of life will survive. As history has shown, the challenge may just make this hippie haven a bit stronger.

As I left Christiania and headed back into clean, orderly, and conformist Denmark, I looked up at the back of the “Welcome to Christiania” sign. It read, “You are entering the EU.”

Later that day, on the bustling streets of downtown Copenhagen, I paused to watch a parade of ragtag soldiers-against-conformity dressed in black and waving “Save Christiania” banners. They walked sadly behind a WWII-vintage truck blasting Pink Floyd’s “Another Brick in the Wall.” (I had never really listened to the words before. But the anthem of self-imposed isolation and revolt against conformity seemed to perfectly fit the determination of the Christianians to stand up against corporatism, against thought control and against stifled individuality.) On their banner, a slogan—painted onto an old bedsheet—read: Lev livet kunstnerisk! Kun døde fisk flyder med strømmen (“Live life artistically! Only dead fish follow the current”). Those marching flew the Christiania flag: three yellow dots on an orange background. They say the dots are from the o’s in “Love Love Love.” (For a fascinating documentary on Europe’s longest surviving squat, see www.busno8.com.)

While I wouldn’t choose to live in Christiania, I would feel a loss if it were shut down. There’s something unfortunately brutal about a world that makes the little Christianias—independent bookstores, family farms, nomadic communities, and so on—fight aggressive giants (such as developers, big chains, agribusiness, and centralized governments) to the death. Those economic and governmental behemoths always seem to win. And when corporatism wins, we may become safer and wealthier and even more comfortable…but it all comes at a cost.

The need for a Christiania is not limited to the Danes. After that trip, from the comfort of my suburban Seattle living room, I stumbled upon live TV coverage of the finale of the Burning Man Festival (the annual massing of America’s artistic free spirits each Labor Day in the Nevada desert). Watching it, I heard the cry of an American fringe community that—much like the tribe at Christiania—wants to be free in an increasingly interconnected world that demands conformity.

Traveling in Denmark, considering well-ordered Danish social-ism and reflecting on the free-spirited ideals and struggles of Christiania, gives me insight into parts of my own society that refuse to be just another brick in the wall. Hopefully when the pressures of conformity require selling a bit of our soul, travel experiences like these help us understand the potential loss before it’s regrettably gone.

Denmark is a riddle that I love puzzling over. On the one hand, their dedication to their social contract is the bedrock of their insistent happiness.

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