Future of Hope Page #4

there was money to demolish it

already in the budget of the

City of Reykjavik but I think they

wanted to use the money

for something more productive

so it would not be demolished

and they gave us

the keys to the house for 3 years.

Hi, I'm Gudrun

Hi, I'm Hulda

Well the idea of Toppstodin

basically came over a cup of coffee

whilst discussing the crisis

and the situation in Iceland

which we could already then see

would impact our two sectors incredibly

the building sector, the architects,

workers, builders, so forth

so we started discussing

what could be done

We have often talked about the fact

that designers and the craftsmen

they don't seem to interact enough,

the schools are completely separate.

The best projects are when people

work together, trying to find the solution

and the practical knowledge

and the design knowledge

and the vision goes hand in hand

so we started talking about how

perfect it would be to create a place

that people who are without

projects could come together

and bring their ideas

and make something new

We have already harnessed as much

of the natural resources as we can

We have 5 times more energy than a

nation of 300,000 people really needs.

We are to the extreme in all

of the fisheries so the only thing

that we have to focus on are the

human resources, the skills that we have

and ways to communicate

them, so for example

the designers and the architects, they

are not going to build a house

for the next 5 years at least,

our carpenters and our skilled workers

they're not going to build a house

either for the next 5 years.

These groups have to re-invent

themselves make smaller things

make different things.

If nothing else would

come out of this power station except

new relationships and activities

within the people,

that is just quite enough

It's really important to have a

building like the power station

for start-ups to come into

because you can put in a lot of work

and pay less rent, so you can

get a larger space for less money,

but you have to work on it for weeks

or months to get it in good condition

but it's also just important to

have the dynamic of the house

and the knowledge

different types of people

with different types of

knowledge coming together

I don't think of it as a big project

we cannot expect miracles

to be happening here all of the time

so we have to think small

to make this big

Everybody says that the old values

are coming back, but it will take time

we are going back to memory

I think and going back to memory

gives us a new set of values

It has been so unfashionable and

negative words since the Nazism

to have a national feeling but

that is the only thing that can help us

believing in the country

and believing in the people

To collect the leaves we use gloves,

it's because we don't want to mix

our energy too much into the leaves

because the leaves are going into oil

and it's going to turn

into massage oil later

so what we do is...

you put the bags like this

on your belly so you are

going to be like kangaroos

and you only take the green leaves

because of the worm in the trees

down here, we have to go as high

as possible to get the greenest

and the most beautiful leaves

Our economic system is really

bad and it doesn't work out

It's all based on credit, it's all based on

debt and there's no getting out of debt

when debt is based on interest.

It is all the support for more

invisible numbers moving around

making people wealthy

some people wealthy and

some people more in debt

most people more in debt.

I hope Iceland will

survive the financial crisis

How to say no, that's what I think,

how to say no to big corporate

banking, special interests

how to rip up those contracts

and say this is unfair,

it's not really what we want

so we need to start over

What are the people prepared to do.

I feel very bad when I am a consumer

and I don't know where it is from

I don't need to consume,

I just need to live,

to breathe and eat and

enjoy the life, the real life

I think we can't just close our eyes

today, we really need to open our eyes

and look at what is

happening around us.

But I can understand why people

just want to have an easy life

and don't want to have to

think about the world

I think if everything is

on a smaller scale

we'll have more of a sense

of community, people won't be

driving their cars everywhere

and just in their own box

their own bubble, their own comforts.

I think just a slower way of life

would be good for everyone,

everyone is so stressed in the world today

and I think farming is a

great way to relieve stress

you're growing your own food I mean

it's so satisfying to eat your own food

that you've grown from the seed.

It's just a better way of life

than what we're living right now

I welcome you to the

Ministry of Ideas Meeting

We're driven by a certain vision

for the future of how we want Iceland

to develop in the future

and one of our biggest projects is...

the National Assembly Meeting which

is the national conference

that we will have in November

If we look at history,

we can see that crisis

is very much the

mother of innovation

I think that the current state

of the economy is going to give us

new ways of thinking,

and new innovations

and I think that it will give

Iceland a fantastic opportunity

and it could give us a strong role

as a member of the global village

It's a Meeting where

people of Iceland meet

it's about 1,500 people,

it's half a percent of the nation

and that gives us

the view of the nation.

It's basically like a vision planning

session at some companies

like Google or Nokia, we are

integrating that with what we can

learn from vision planning

for a whole nation

vision planning for a whole nation

is more focussed on our core values

rather than individual action items.

This is not being managed by

any single individuals or groups,

it's a cooperation between all

of the grassroots organisations

it involves the Government

and different specialists and

everything is voluntary work.

The main role of a politician is to listen

to all NGO's and the general public

and to try to ignite people to

put forward their opinions.

I think that's really one of the

main roles of a politician

to try to have some kind of a dialogue

because the history shows us that

the people in power

tend to grow a bit the same.

I think that's the role of the nation,

they must take care of that

that the politicians will stay

alert and keep on working

People usually think about sustainability

as only being about nature protection

and protecting the environment

but that's only one dimension

what is also important is to think about

the economic issues that are related

and that we don't over exploit or

destroy nature in our economic activity

as well as the societal issues of

creating an infrastructure to support

our people in terms of having

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