Thursday Thoughts – Houses and Colours

6 augusti, 20265 augusti, 2026 / Leya / 7 kommentarer

One of the first things I noticed in Greenland were all the colourful houses. In this harsh landscape, they really stood out. And they made me happy!

This is a green gym to the left, and to the right a kindergarten. Every kindergarten we saw had these multicoloured fences.

This supermarket chain in Greenland can provide you with everything you want or need. This one in Kangerlussuaq.

We stayed here for some days, making excursions to glaciers and walks in the mountains. The first look into Greenlandic everyday life and joys. As you can see, letting their children out alone was nothing to worry about.

Everyone living here was somehow connected to the airport, and its buildings dominated the whole village.

There were loads of huge containers with everything needed for the aircraft – mostly fuel of course. And, even the containers were colourful…

On our tours out of the town, we saw ”summer houses” in the mountains. Very lonely – but not abandoned.

Next we stayed several days in Ilulissat, a charming town with a busy harbour and colourful houses and boats. It was a relaxing joy to walk there watching the boats come in and go out, loading and unloading their cargo.

Now, why all these bright colours? We learned that there were several reasons to this. One was that a certain colour meant the owner of the house had a special profession and the building was meant for a special thing. Red – churches, schools, Yellow – hospitals and doctors, Blue – maintainment and factories in the fishing industry, Green – post and telecommunication. Black – police stations.

It all started in the 18th century when there were no street names and no numbered houses. It was also easier to find what you were looking for when everything was lost in snow during winter.

Nowadays you can paint your house in whatever colour you want, but most churches are still red and hospitals are still yellow.

Old and new are mixed – as Greenland expand and get more tourists

– but all buildings and houses have their pipes on the ground because of the harsh winters. People also depend upon steps and stairs to reach their front doors…I can truly say I have never walked that many steps in two weeks before.

Close to our hotel we also found some super modern cabins overlooking the sea. Somehow the architects had managed to make them fit in with this very special landscape – both shape and the open glass solution seemed winning concepts.

Many houses were brought from Denmark or Scandinavia and put together in Greenland. They have no forests here – in fact the only thing I might have missed during these glorious two weeks!

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5 augusti, 20264 augusti, 2026 / Leya / 6 kommentarer

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Lens-Artists Challenge #407- Celebrating the National Day

1 augusti, 2026 / Leya / 34 kommentarer

Patti leads this week, and I was happy to find the prompt to be Celebrations! In Greenland they celebrate their National Day on June 21, and we were there. It is always fantastic to see how other countries and nationalities celebrate. This time it didn’t look much like any other National Day I have attended.

In voices clear and strong, the songs were performed by a small but well trained choir.

Then, there was an hour of sermon and more singing in the beautiful Zion’s Church in Ilulissat.

On marching in, some of the people wore the traditional clothing in red, white and black. When we visited Greenland in 1982, everyone wore the national dress for the visit of Queen Margarethe. In former times the Inuits only wore clothes made from animal hides or skins. When the Europeans came, and began to trade using glass beads in the 17th and 18th century, these beads gradually were incorporated in their festive attire.

After church, everyone gathered on the shore, and many small boats arrived… There was anticipation in the air! What was everyone waiting for… ? Some kind of competition or performance was expected.

We didn’t know exactly what, but finally one participant was spotted, and someone told us that first out would be kayak rolling.

He started preparing…and soon they were ready for the show. It was this man and a young girl performing. The water held approxiamtely 2 degrees C and they rolled for half an hour…

It was a big day for the young woman´s mother as well. She stood right beside me so I could admire her elaborately made seal boots. She coached her daughter on when and how to do different, difficult rolls – which the girl performed to perfection. ”My daughter!” the mother smiled at me, shining with pride.

The last activity was the seal hunt. After the kayak rolling, the motor boats roared and headed out between the icebergs. The one who came back first with a seal would win a rifle. We didn’t stay to see the results of the competition, because this event could take a couple of hours or more – and we were hungry. Rumours had it they might have hidden a seal already caught somewhere…so cheating was maybe allowed!

Tradition still means much to the Inuits, and we were so fortunate to get the opportunity of joining in this day. An adventure to be remembered, and the many smiling faces too.

Finally, this young couple made it the perfect day to get married!

A huge thank you to Anne for letting us rest in a summer daze. and to all of you for the terrific responses! Also a huge thank you to Patti for the fun challenge and for giving me the opportunity to show pictures from Greenland’s National Day.

Please remember to link to Patti’s original post and to add the Lens-Artists tag!

Finally, we hope you’ll join us next week when Egidio leads us once again. Until then, please stay safe and enjoy your week.

Lens-Artists Challenge #406 – Summer Daze

29 juli, 202629 juli, 2026 / Leya / 19 kommentarer

First of all – huge thanks for sharing your many interesting adventures last week! I finally found about 15 of them in the spam folder…but I did find them! Loved the variety and that you shared adventures from long ago too. I could recall the feeling of adventure from my own youth – that original feeling doesn’t come easy nowadays… Age and life experience has taken away part of it. We have to take that.

This week Anne has got some really good tips on how to enjoy, or cope with, the summer heat…please visit her lovely site for more daze inspiration!

To me, summer means late nights and early mornings, the only time when it’s not too warm. My absolutely best temperature is 23 degrees C – unbelievable to some, but that’s when my body works the best. When we stay for a longer time at warm places, the body gets gradually used to it after a while.

When evening comes I might go biking in the soft air…

Or walking by the sea to watch the youngsters fishing or swimming.

Early mornings we can take the canoe down to the lake, watching the great herons lift from both sides of the canal.

In the middle of the day, we all stay in the shadow, reading or playing games – or just relaxing with our dog. Except for my husband, who always has loved the sun and can sit in a chair just letting it wash all over him.

The best thing is a short, cooling swim. The water temperature seldom rises above 20 at our summerhouse. This year, I haven’t jumped in the water more than once – 11 degrees is far too cold for me!

A warm thank you to Anne for letting us soak up the summer daze this week – next week it is Patti’s turn to lead – see you then!

Thursday Thoughts – Wildlife in the Landscape

29 juli, 2026 / Leya / 4 kommentarer

The northeastern part of Greenland is the world’s largest national park. Climate change is a great danger to flora and fauna here. We know that the fastest warming is in this area. I captured some photos of the most frequently seen flowers, and not surprisingly they are mostly white and very small.