Back in Minnesota

After nearly nine months on the road, coming back to Minneapolis, where I lived from 2002-2003, is the closest that I have come to feeling at home for quite some time. It is also a gentle reminder that our homecoming is just around the corner.

With less than a month remaining, the end of our trip is in sight. Our sailing date from Philadelphia to Antwerp has been brought forward by nine days so we have had to change our itinerary and prepare ourselves for our return. Over the past few weeks Mission Mississippi has taken us from the deep south to the extreme north of the United States, from the mouth of the Mississippi in New Orleans to its source in Lake Itasca; from crazy Mardi Gras parties to the frozen wilderness of northern Minnesota and everything in between. For me, Minnesota is the beginning of the end, time to start preparing myself for the ‘real world'.

Minnesota has an extreme climate which reflects on people’s personalities. It fluctuates between -20 and +40 ° C between the seasons of winter and road-mending (the locals favourite joke). We arrived on the warmest day of the year so far, when Minnesotans were bemoaning the long hard winter and preparing themselves for the frivolities of spring and summer. In the Twin Cities (of Minneapolis and St Paul) the snow had melted and people were starting to thaw out - the streets and bars were full and coats were open. However, in the north of the state the snow was still thick, people were huddled inside and you could walk on the frozen water of the lakes.

We noticed that people didn’t seem quite so fascinated by us Brits in Minnesota, as very few random strangers had commented on our accents or inquired as to who we were and what we were doing, in contrast to the warm reception we had received in the southern states. I don’t think it’s because people are any less friendly, for they are, but they are just more reserved and perhaps think it rude to ask. The difference is much like that in Europe between the austere Finns and the gregarious Spanish. Perhaps that is why I am drawn to Minnesota so much - it does remind me of Scandinavia, my mother‘s homeland. It is known as the state of 10,000 lakes, is covered in silver birch and pine forests and people go to their cabins in summer. Indeed many of the settlers in Minnesota came from Scandinavia.

I also hold the climate partly responsible for the three pillars of Minneapolis/St Paul culture - theatre, heavy drinking and politics. The cold drives you indoors to drink, think, talk and create. Minneapolis has the biggest theatre scene in the U.S., after New York City, including the annual Fringe performing arts festival. The Twin Cities can also be politically outspoken, as recently demonstrated by graffiti outside the National Republican Convention. The array of liquor stores and funky bars is testament to the drinking culture.

It is strange to return to a former life, one that has been carrying on in parallel in my absence. It is like visiting history. Minneapolis looks the same - my favourite liquor store, coffee shop, bars, the Wedge supermarket - and most of my friends are still here. Even more remarkably people still remember me and have been incredibly nice (and not just Minnesota nice) to us - buying us drinks and dinners, taking us to diners, housing us, entertaining us at the roller derby and theatre and mending our increasingly temperamental laptop.

Minneapolis doesn’t look as aesthetically exciting as, say, Chicago, and isn’t a major tourist destination, but underneath it is full of quirky and fun places to explore. It has an interesting mix of Germanic/Scandinavian settlers, resettled Hmong and Vietnamese, Mexicans and more recently Somalis. It makes for a fantastic array of restaurants. It is also one of the more progressive cities I have been to in the States. People cycle (even in the below freezing winters it has one of the highest commuter cyclist rate in the States), shop at co-ops supporting local agriculture and the gay scene is blooming. It is also a hotbed of not-for-profit organisations, such as my former workplace, the Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy, where we gave a presentation and a radio interview that will be available at Radio Sustain next week. People in the States have been some of the most interested in our trip so far - it really seems to spark the imagination in a country that is waking up to the realities of climate change.

We’ve been crazily busy in the Twin Cities as I tried to fit a year’s memories into one week so there has been little space for reflection. Now on the eve of our departure from Minneapolis I’m starting to reminisce, about our trip around the world in slow motion and about previous departures from places I love. It’s going to be hard going home. Minnesota has been a wonderful trip back in time and has also provided a gentle insight into what is to come back in Blighty.







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Turning thirty at the roller derby

“It’s springtime!“ boomed the commentator at the Minnesota RollerGirls roller derby. An exciting time for Minnesotans as they come out of frozen hibernation and a big day for me as the first day of spring is my birthday.

The Legendary Roy Wilkins Auditorium in downtown Saint Paul was full of thousands of roller derby fans revved up on springtime warmth and ready to cheer on the Minnesota RollerGirls. I had no idea what to expect. Then the lights started flashing, the music started blaring, the blue-haired commentator started shouting and out skated (roller skates, not blades) the Rockits and the Garda Belts. Two teams of feisty women in florescent minidresses and brightly coloured, pattered pantyhose (a much more fun word than tights!).

Roller derby has been reclaimed and revamped from the ashes of its 1970’s predecessor. As the programme clarifies, ’Hair pulling, punching, etc. went the way of macramé and satin jackets.’ That said, roller derby is still a full-on contact sport. Ten women (five from each team) are on the circular track at the same time - two jammers, six blockers and two pivots. The pivots lead the pack around the track while the jammers try to make their way through the blockers to the front. Points are scored when the jammer passes members of the opposite team. Blocking tactics are pretty ferocious - pushing, shoving and pulling are all par for the course, with girls going flying off the track into the audience, crashing down on their knees, belly and bum. We winced when Dudezilla, co-captain of the Rockits, collided with two others and had to sit out the rest of the show.

The best part of watching ten women whizz around a roller rink isn’t their short dresses (although Tom may disagree), but their names. All players have an alter ego that the commentators clearly enjoy: There’s Harmony Killerbruise, Flora Flipabitch, Venus Thightrap and the crowd’s favourite, Suzie Smashbox, which was chanted around the auditorium. My favourite is Chinese Takeout, my former flatmate, now an Atomic Bombshell celebrity. These girls really are superstars around town - you can buy their player cards, people queue up for autographs and they get recognised when out on the tiles. They do it all for love not money - training three times a week, competing in tournaments and volunteering in the community - for all the money raised from ticket sales, sponsorship and merchandise goes to charity.

When it’s all over Wet Spot, the janitorial artist, does a final lap of the track cleaning up spilt beer and firing T-shirts into the crowd through an automatic drainpipe.

Fun as the roller derby was, we shunned the official after party in favour of my favourite bar in Minneapolis - Nye’s Polonaise Room. Nye’s is an eccentric bar with an eclectic crowd. It’s all heavy velvet, thick carpets and candle light. White-haired locals sat around a piano and crooned karaoke oldies; hipsters laughed and sipped martinis; a transvestite chatted up the doorman and through the double doors in the polka bar the (self-proclaimed) world’s most dangerous polka band was in full swing. An old man alternated between growling down a microphone and playing the trumpet while his large-kneed partner remained seated playing the accordion. People young and old did bad dancing in front.

I’m not sure what women of my age are supposed to be doing - having a successful career, buying houses, making babies perhaps? - but right now I am having fun doing random things in strange parts of the world.







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