Stine
I love my busy everyday life. I love it. But sometimes you also kind of need to get away from it a little bit to actually remember what you love about it.
Topic
Type
Article | 04:33 mins read
Portrait of
Stine
Location
Copenhagen, Denmark
Still photography by
Frederik Kjeldgaard
Interviewed by
Frederik Kjeldgaard
My name is Stine. I’m 25 years old. I live in Copenhagen and I study interactive design.
I grew up in Copenhagen. My dad was a sailor, so he wasn’t there much. I mainly grew up with my mom. And then when I was seven, I got a little brother and we decided to move to the countryside. So my dad quit his job as a sailor and we lived together as one happy big family at the countryside. I would say that I had a really good childhood, and I’m really happy that I grew up on the countryside surrounded by nature and the possibility to bike around and see friends all the time instead of growing up in the city. I was a child for a very long time. When I compared to people I know who grew up in the city, I think that I had a childish mind for a longer time.
Do you have some special memories that have shaped you?
If I should if I should point out one thing that was meaningful to me during my childhood would be that I really wanted a younger sibling for many years and my mom got pregnant five times but lost the child. And I remember being told that now you’re going to be a big sister. And then it never happened, and I was so disappointed and I was so sad. And then I just remember when she finally got pregnant and I actually got a little brother. It was like the most precious thing, it was the biggest gift I could imagine.
I was seven years old. I remember that I fell asleep in my parents’ bed and then I woke up because my grandmother came to the house and then my dad left because my mom was giving birth and they were gone like the whole day, the entire day. And I was so confused and worried that something went wrong because it did so many times. And then I just remember the next day that my dad comes home and wake me up, and then he’s like, Oh, you got a little brother and he’s this big.
And then he shows with his arms like, it’s a huge baby. And then it was just like a huge relief because I was worried for 24 hours that something went wrong. Sometimes if you imagine something is really bad and then it turns out to be actually the best thing, it feels like the feeling is even stronger.
What makes you happy?
It makes me happy when I create. It makes me happy when I work with inspiring and talented people and create something that I’m proud of. I realized that it actually makes me happy to be creative and to be able to create something. And I’m really trying to achieve that as much as possible right now.
What do you fear the most?
I fear losing the people I love. I actually lost a big part of my family like grandparents recently. And since then, I found out how much I like to spend time with my family, which is kind of ironic now that they’re not there anymore. It is not something that I ever really thought about before. But I guess it just kind of entered my life recently that people can disappear. Um,
I also fear that I won’t be able to make a living of what I love to do. I fear a little bit the life after studying.
What is important for you?
I think the short answer is that it’s important for me to be happy. And it’s important to me not to be stressed. I think for me, the feeling of happiness is very equal to the feeling of excitement, like it starts in the chest and in the stomach, and it’s kind of like tickling.
What is sustainability for you?
For me, sustainability is small actions that we can all do every day. I like to think of sustainability as me being the focus and not anyone else. And I try not to involve anyone else in this because it’s so easy to get disappointed and it’s so easy to get lost. It’s easier to be motivated to do something sustainable when I focus on myself, and the actions that I can do in my everyday life, whether it’s small things or bigger decisions.
It’s not really a question for me whether I should take the most sustainable choice or not. I think that’s obvious that whenever it makes sense for me, I will try to do that. And with that said, I’m no angel.
I think it’s impossible for anyone to do everything in the most sustainable way.
It’s just super important to remember that everything counts, and even though you maybe took some bad choices during your life or during the day, you can still make up for it by making the right choice in the end.
What is unique about this planet?
That’s a tough one. Actually, I try not to think about our planet in relation to other planets or other kinds of life forms, because it’s too much for me to wrap my head around.
The planet is unbelievable bull and amazing. I think that we have something that is potentially amazing and unique. We’re just not grateful enough. When thinking about this planet, I get a little sad, actually, because even just in my lifetime, we destroyed it so much.
It’s evolving so fast. And it’s scary that in another twenty-five years, where are we going to be? Are we even going to want to make babies and families like three generations after me? I sometimes doubted a little bit, if we’re going to continue to destroy it as fast as we do now.
Do you think there is hope?
I think my generation is super aware and super good at taking action. And I think that the next generation is going to be even better and the next again, it’s going to be even more aware of environmental issues.
So I think there is hope, but maybe not in my lifetime.
I highly doubt that we’re going to turn the ship around within the next few years, but I will definitely do mine to make the best possible footprint.
What can we do to make this happen?
Regarding the environment we can all do something, but we also need a greater force. We need the politicians to help us get back on track.
And then there are also other issues like politics. I think it would definitely be a better planet if we were all a little bit nicer to each other. It makes me sad when I see how nasty people are being online, for example. I feel like this is something that is becoming a bigger, and bigger problem.
Is nature important for you?
Yes, I found out when I moved away from the nature and into the city, I realized that this is actually really important to me to be able to go out and then there is green and not busy.
When I when I step off the train from the city and to my hometown, I kind of like, take a deep breath.
I have traveled quite a lot actually, and I’ve seen some amazing landscapes and amazing nature in more exotic places than Denmark. But this summer, I spent a lot of time at my parents house and we started kind of track how long we could walk. Every morning we just packed our bags and walked 20 to 30 kilometers.
There was something really special about those trips. It was just the Danish forest and there were no people. Those experiences with nature, actually is worth more to me than going to see a waterfall in Thailand.
I can forget sometimes that, there’s super beautiful nature in Denmark.
