Well… It is all our choice.
We are back to Norway… A «happy island», as Italian journalist Adriano Sofri depicted it in a well written article on repubblica.it. A text about the massacre at Utøya/Oslo. This happiness is gone for ever, he says. Shall we let him be right?
What is happening right now makes us reflect on life during and after this long voyage across the oceans… Did you think the sea is dangerous and tricky? It’s nothing compared to the gruesome world we live in today. It is not only what happened lately in Oslo I think about. I hear the comments from relatives and friends in both Norway and Italy, read the news… People who drive with powerful RIBs after a party and kill themselves being high. Politicians that cheat and quarrel for power and money, more than for doing the best for their country… People that are robbed in the centre of Oslo as soon as they come back from the trip…
The little bubble we lived in while sailing across the ocean, was a happy one. Our biggest challenges were then squalls and waves. Not even Portuguese Man o’ Wars or whales were dangerous to us. The worst danger was actually created by human beings: garbage! Nets and ropes floating on the ocean surface, containers, even a washing up sink, thrown into the water by some cargo ship…
Now we are at home and have started living almost like before the voyage: «normally». But is this normal life? Hearing about more than 90 people killed by only one man who has got a strong «belief»? In the country we live in!
HOME SWEET HOME… BUT SAFE?
Home is home, and it is incredibly pleasant to be able to wash bed linen in the proper way, to have a lovely shower in our own bathroom, to have a lot of place to live in, to use a a dishwasher instead of washing up by hand and a car to go shopping instead of going on foot.
All these comforts, that we missed while sailing from country to country, make our life easier, but they are also our death. We excercise less. We surround ourselves with lots of things we actually do not need, shopping because life is too boring. We close ourselves in our family world and create an artificial Garden of Eden, our own little protecting bubble. Outside it blows a lot, storm every day… Just read the news. Maybe we need a «life raft» also now.
A happy island? Well, if we choose to be critical to all that is happening around us and try to contribute to a better society, being proud of our country and spreading the belief in positive values, maybe we succeed. Look forward, never behind.
Paradise, like when we were under sails, is not being in paradise, but living in a «happy ship».
Benures Bay: Amokura resting right beside Avventura
Avventura 