The Hitchhiker’s Guide to Climate-KIC



At 14.00 on Saturday afternoon, a little later than planned, Gillian and I set off for our Climate-KIC adventure. At the official Utrecht hitchhiking stop, just past the Galgenwaard stadium, I took out a black sharpie and wrote ‘Copenhagen’ on an old notepad. On the other side, to keep it a bit more realistic, Gillian wrote ‘Amersfoort – A28’, the next city on our route.

At that moment, our states of mind could not have been more opposite. Gillian was the very picture of serenity, holding up the sign, beaming at every car that passed. I, on the other hand, was feeling very anxious, convincing myself that this had been a stupid idea, desperately thinking of contingency plans, feeling more and more rejected with every passing par, my plastered-on smile stretched so wide it was starting to hurt.  

Then I looked at my watch. It was only 14.05. “Get it together,” I had to tell myself firmly, “there is still plenty of time.” The first time a car stopped for us, relief washed over me and I went giddy like a child with a new Harry Potter book. We were on our way! The mother and son who picked us up were so lovely that I promptly forgot the solemn promise I had made to my mother to text her every license plate number.  

For the next 24 hours we were confronted with so much kindness that my faith in humanity (steadily declining since the election of Donald Trump) was swiftly and fully restored. Everybody we approached was so kind to us. Several people even brought us to destinations they had not planned to visit. After first telling us they were heading in a different direction, something compelled them to come back and say: “fuck it, put your bags in the trunk.” One father and daughter had wanted to help, but their car was too full. However, without telling us of their plan, they drove home, dropped off the dog, and came back to drive us into Hamburg so we could find a place to stay for the night.

Not just the kindness, but the sheer diversity of the people we rode with was astounding. Two Jordanian car exporters, a German soldier ready to quit after ten years of service, PVV politicians from the Almelo area, a seller of sustainable beds, a tattooed party animal from Kazakhstan, and finally, Pavel the Polish van driver. He picked us up at a rest stop just before Neustadt and delivered us all the way to the front door of our hostel in Copenhagen. He cheerfully chatted to us for hours, showing off pictures of his wife and son, and teaching us the odd Polish phrase. We were grateful he was bringing us all the way to Copenhagen, because this meant we would arrive in time for the first Climate-KIC introductory session. But we soon realized we weren’t the only ones feeling grateful. As we drank our coffee on the deck of the Puttgarden-Rødby ferry, he looked us straight in the eye and said in his broken English: “You know, I’ve been on the road for 40 days straight, and when I woke up this morning I look out the window. The weather was terrible, I missed my family, and I was feeling so low. You girls really helped me get through today.”   

And what better way could there have been to start the 2017 Climate-KIC journey? Of course we were bone tired, but our hearts and minds were as open as could be, ready to meet our journey participants from all over the world.

Cross posted from: Climate KIC 2017

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