Copenhagen Out of the Frying Pan, Part 8
Publisher's Note: I asked our guest blogger, Alex Carlin, to send along a wrap-up blog reflecting on his experience at COP15, and looking ahead to COP16 later this year. He graciously agreed, and here are his reflections on the conference and climate change. --Lisa Graves, Executive Director

Copenhagen, Out of the Frying Pan, Pt. 7 On my way to the final day of the COP15 Conference I stopped off at an exhibit called the Climate Maze. If you ever wanted to get lost in a labyrinth of hedges this is pretty close, but the walls are covered with pieces of canvas, each piece having one person's signature--multitudes of missives were delivered from every region of the globe. The signers all urge this Conference to get it done and "Seal the Deal." Sean Fields, who was caretaking the labyrinth, told me it was produced by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP).

Copenhagen, Out of the Frying Pan, Pt. 6 I stopped in on an event moderated by George Monbiot (the fine columnist from UK's "The Guardian" newspaper ) at Klimaforum dealing with how things are going and how we should proceed. He was taking comments from the large audience--a major hall filled to near capacity. Missing were heads of state.

Copenhagen, Out of the Frying Pan, Pt. 5

I walked into the Klimaforum hall and saw a group of newly arrived Bolivians organizing themselves near the entrance. I had just read some great quotes from South American leaders--Venezuela's Hugo Chavez saying if the climate crisis was a banking problem it would be already solved, and Bolivia's Evo Morales calling "shame" on America, as he compared the 687 billion dollar defense budget of the U.S. to the 10 billion America is offering to finance the third world climate budget being negotiated now at the Conference.

Copenhagen, Out of the Frying Pan, Part 4

Allow me to apologize for the delay in filing this report, but as we were walking back to our base in Christiania, we were blocked by shoulder to shoulder police and their vans. Christiania was again under seige, and I haven't been able to get to an internet access until now. My next blog will have some general information about this amazing phenomena called "Christiania", this city within the city. Tonight, I'll play a concert there and see how things have settled since the rather large battle last night.