I attended this wonderful workshop at the Shetland Library on 10 December 2022. It was organised by Cato Draaisma who is a postgraduate film student who traveled from the Netherlands to Shetland to make a film about the energy transition and the Viking Energy Wind Farm.
I'm not a writer, so I was nervous about attending; but I was very curious to find out more about her work and especially her intention to make the movie together with Shetlanders. We were a small group, but we represented a range of ages, backgrounds and interests, with the youngest still in secondary school.
Unfortunately I was late and missed the first part, where everyone wrote texts. Secretly I am relieved as I am not a happy writer! Then Cato asked us to spend two minutes taking it in turns to write words on a large paper in response to different themes, including oil, wind farm, climate crisis. After this exercise, we discussed the words on each page and formed questions from our thoughts. I wish now that I'd taken notes so that I could share some of the questions, for I don't want to misrepresent our discussion. We've agreed to be in an 'Energy Transition' WhatsApp group, so I am sure I'll be able to get updates, and perhaps share here.
The most important thing for me from this workshop is the value of the discussion. I enjoyed it enormously, for it was hopeful and forward looking, even though we looked critically at all the themes.
I very much look forward to Cato's return to Shetland in January.
