We protect what we love

FRIDAY . 11 . 03. 22 .

Hi everyone,

I am Salome and I have been given the opportunity to host the news letter for this week. I’m writing from lutruwita/Tasmania and I live on muwinina and palawa country in nipaluna/Hobart.

I have moved to Australia from Sweden a few years ago. I came here for the first time in 2014 together with a friend of mine. We were introduced to hitchhiking by a French traveller that we met, and we fell in love with that way of travelling. Thanks to all the generous people who picked us up, we had the most wonderful experiences and got to see places we never would have known existed otherwise.

In Sweden, I worked seasonally in the Swedish mountains, close to the Norwegian border, on a hostel located far away from the nearest road. So far you had to ski, run or hike 16 kilometres to get there. I mostly worked winter seasons but also had a couple of summer months working there. It is a superb place for trail/mountain running!

This area is a part of Sápmi which is where the indigenous people of Scandinavia’s north, the Sami people, live and many of them still herd reindeer. 

I also have worked as a nurse assistant in both Sweden and Norway before I decided to study to become a chimney sweep (yes, it’s true, even though a lot of Aussies ask me if they didn’t die out in perhaps the 1800s). As you might pick up, I am sometimes a bit of a restless soul who likes doing all sorts of things while I’m still trying to work out what I’d like to do as a more of a long term thing.

Growing cauliflower in my backyard.

I have found it surprisingly difficult to find a rewarding work in Tasmania but recently picked up work at a vegan, biodynamic winery not far from where I live.

When I’m not working, I like to go for a run on kunanyi, grow veggies in my backyard or I fiddle about on me and my partner’s recently bought sailboat. It is going to be our home from this upcoming winter onwards. We’re dreaming about one day sailing it all the way to Sweden so we are very keen to explore the waters around here while we learn a bit more!

⛵️ 💛 ⛵️

A few weeks back, Salome participated in takyana Trail, an event by the Bob Brown Foundation to raise funds and awareness for takayna/Tarkine, and have it listed as a World Heritage area, returned to Aboriginal ownership. Elle caught up with Salome after the event to hear more about Salome's experience both fundraising, running and exploring takyana/Tarkine.

Q&A SESSION

Elle: First and foremost, huge congratulations for raising over $1700 for the BBF. I know this is your second year running in the takayna Trail event - can you explain what made you want to participate in the event in 2020, and what brought you back again this year?

Salome: In 2020, I volunteered at the takayna Trail event and stood as a marshal cheering people on in the rain along the coast just south of Arthur River. I wanted to run in the event that year as well, but my knees were causing me trouble. Seeing all the incredible runners go past my spot made me incredibly eager to really get back in to running so that I could participate in all the upcoming takayna Trails. From the first time in 2020, my partner and I have made it a tradition to participate in this event. The setup is fantastic and being able to do what I love, and at the same time raise money to protect takayna, is just the best. It makes me feel good in many different ways.

I also find that people connect and talk to each other a lot more at this event compared to other running events. This is definitely helped by the fact that every year, Dr Lisa Searle is putting on a two day dinner-feast for everyone. I love having communal dinners! 

Running through the Tarkine. Salome is #21.

Are you able to describe your relationship to takayna/Tarkine and, for those who weren't able to make it there, what running through the forest is like?

I never understood what a real undisturbed forest was until I visited the rainforests in takayna. I grew up in Sweden and I really love my forests there. I was very confused and quite upset by my partner’s question - "where and if" we have any real forests at all in Sweden. I had never understood that the forests that I’d always played, camped and picked mushrooms and wild berries in weren’t more than simple plantations. 

Salome crossing the finish line, and looking pretty

happy about it 😆

So after spending time in takayna, both in the forest and with activist friends, my relationship with takayna feels very special. Special because I now can see that nature is, and has always been, fine doing it’s thing without humans helping (read; disturbing). I am used to forests with hardly any understory apart from blueberry and lingonberry bushes. When a new forest is planted, the understory is seen as nothing useful and gets slashed so that only the tall straight trees ones can remain.

When I think of the differences between my Swedish forests and the forests in takayna, I think of the word 'predictable'. Takayna's forests are not predicable. There are horizontal trees, rotting logs that crunch under your feet and the ground is sometimes as soft and almost bouncy as a trampoline. There are so many things you will never see it all. People are still finding new species of both flora and fauna in there.

When running in takayna Trail, I must admit that it is pretty difficult for me to stop and have a look around. A lot of my focus is where I put my feet and I do enjoy pushing myself to be fast in this run. What is extremely exciting though, is that I never know what’s next - a thigh deep mud hole, a giant log to climb over, or maybe to crawl under?

Finish line congratulatory hugs (Salome hugging her partner who completed the 70km run). Bob Brown also pictured.

It’s great being able to visit the rainforest the day after the run when there is no pressure. Then you can really see things in detail and just be with the forest. What strikes me every time is when you get out of the forest and the temperature is so different. The forest always feels several degrees cooler on a sunny day.

After having visited takayna and when travelling back home, that’s when I really feel how untouched it is. It’s not like running in a park where someone has prepared the ground for you, or cut the trees so that you don’t run in to them. takayna truly is wild.

A finish line celebratory dance with activist

friend, Colette.

You’ve been hanging out (literally?) in the defenders camp for a few days, what have you been doing there, and what’s the collective vibe like?

I hung out in camp for a day after the takayna run. There was a good turn out of people from the event that were interested in seeing how the camp was set up. Some of us went for a slow run down to the part where MMG, the internationally owned mining company, want to put down another tailings dam. I don’t think I have ever seen myrtle trees as big as the ones growing there. They were huge! Some of them were as big as the tall eucalypts in diameter.

I would like to describe a tailings dam, since I had no idea what that term meant; a tailings dam is basically the waste dump for all the toxic debris that is the by-product of everything that comes out of the mine – heavy metals and acids that leach out and make the area unlivable for everything, even the toughest tiny bacteria can't survive amongst such toxic waste.

Taking action at the defenders camp.

We were guided around by a forest defender who had spent a lot of time at that specific spot last winter and while we all lost our sense of direction, he confidently led us around the forest and brought us back to camp. At camp, we had a short introduction to NVDA (Non-Violent Direct Action) so that people could get the idea of how they could participate in the next morning’s mission to stop the mine workers from drilling at another proposed mine site. 

There was definitely a feeling of excitement being at camp. A collective sense of doing something important for takayna and its rainforests. There was also a small sense of nervousness when we got closer to the evening and night. We were all well informed that camp could be busted by the cops at any time - a non-infrequent occurrence which has previously happened in the pre-dawn hours of the morning. Luckily, the camp never got busted, so a group of us went on a mission to stop another mine project from exploratory drilling at Mt Lindsay, another area not far from camp. 

Mt Lindsay forest photo - a stunning scene along the

trail route.

You've been involved with the Bob Brown Foundation for a few years now - what changes have you noticed in the campaign to protect takayna/Tarkine? Do you feel a shift is underway?

I’ve spent some time thinking about this question. I personally can’t say I have experienced a shift in the protection campaign in the relatively short time I’ve been involved, however I don’t think that is necessarily a bad thing. What I do know is that from holding the space at the defender’s camp, plus having participated and heard of other direct actions at different spots, the logging and mining has definitely been halted. As an example, the current camp in takayna was set up two years in a clear-fell (an area that has had every tree removed), which was successfully stopped by Bob Brown Foundation and other protestors when they were only partway through their work. The logs they wanted to remove are still piled up, ready to get picked up. Every time there is an action, work is being stopped and every second of that counts. That area was cut down over four days. It’s gut-wrenching how fast humans can destroy something that has taken hundreds and hundreds of years to grow.

Mt Lindsay action group photo.

Sports activism is growing in Australia, from the Fight for the Bight campaign, to stopping offshore gas exploration and takayna Trail. As someone who has participated in sports activism, do you think it's an effective tool for change?

I absolutely think sports activism is effective! One example I can think of is that because the majority of people (this is a guesstimate) like sport, especially young people but also adults, they would have role models in different types of sports that they look up to. If people who are aware of the environmental destruction and spread the word while doing what they love, I think more people will start to listen and also have their eyes opened to what is happening.

2nd place at the takayna trail 2021. Salome raised $2654 - whoa go Salome!

Because sport is engaging for both participants and bystanders, it has an effect of drawing people in. It also feels really good! There are no truly grumpy people at an event like this. It tells a different story of activism being positive, approachable and a good time. Nevertheless, I believe it fits as another cog in the full campaign to protect takayna alongside all the other non-violent methods the Bob Brown Foundation and all the other groups are using.

You can check out some more of Salome's adventures at @salometobin. Thank you Salome taking the time to be a part of this week's newsletter and share your experience with us!

That's all from FWP this week.

Thank you for taking the time for wild places.

Salome & the For Wild Places team.

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We acknowledge the the First Nations people who have been custodians of land, waters and culture for tens of thousands of years. We pay respects to First Nations Elders past, present and emerging.

This newsletter was written on lutruwita lands. To these people, we pay our respects.

Always was, always will be.

By For Wild Places

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protect wild places we run on