Story Weaver Joana Avi-Lorie comes along to Edinburgh Climate Cafe at Portobello Promenade, a 10-year running project meeting people where they are through informal climate conversations about “climate change stuff”.
“We seem to get caught up in conversations straight away. It works like that, we never know how many, how long or on what topic we’re likely to engage with folk about, we just make the most of every conversation we have. Sometimes it’s with kids and sometimes it’s with older retired folk, sometimes it’s a minute or two and sometimes folks stay and chat for hours! You never know…” Callum McLeod, with his friendly smile and approachable manner, stands behind the fold-out table covered with leaflets, maps and curious objects. He tells me these objects are used for different activities that are part of the Climate Café’s repertoire to spark conversations.
My eyes rest on a beautiful globe, glistering under the sun. After the birth of my son, I felt that it is easy to forget we are living on one planet when we don’t look at it regularly. Not in a flat-earther kind of way, but in the way that often our world becomes small and local, which is important, but it also made me browse the local charity shops for a globe for my desk. I know from my friends who live here that Portobello is a tight community. But on the Promenade, where people from all over the world, residents and tourists alike, walk along to enjoy the changing seasons of Edinburgh’s seaside, it feels right to be reminded in the context of climate conversations that we all share this one large, interconnected home.
On a hot summer day like this, I am struggling to take photographs and make sketches and notes while Callum and Stuart Hart continue to lay out the Climate Café set up – the fold-out table in front of the Promenade benches, the literature, the objects. On the cement Promenade ground, there is now a hopscotch game where the squares drawn with chalk are numbered with the degrees to which our planet could warm in the current climate and intensity of human activity. The information and games are prepared in over fifty languages and there are animal-themed activities for the children.
“Children are surprisingly knowledgeable,’ Callum adds. I believe him. I look over the shoulder at my small son who, closely watched by his dad, moves between investigating the hopscotch and trying to pet all the dogs that walk by.
Pete Cannell and Cait Ni Cadlaig join Callum and Stuart. Pat Smith, also part of the project’s core team of volunteers, isn’t here today. Despite the strong heat and light, they all move with ease. The Café has been dwelling on the Promenade on the weekends for two years, but they have been doing it for over 10 years often in adverse weather conditions – it is Scotland, after all. Stuart, Callum and Beth Cross began these climate conversations at the crossroads in Edinburgh High Street, in the wind, in the rain, in the snow.
Made of an incredibly committed group of people involved with different climate action, climate justice and environmental organisations, Edinburgh Climate Café strives to meet people where they are through informal climate conversations about “climate change stuff”. ‘What do you think is happening? Is there anything happening in your part of the world (impacts)? What about solutions to those problems?’. These are some of the questions posed to begin chatting, to see where people are at, and where they can or are willing to go.
And some of the good news is they are witnessing change. “We only got two climate deniers. Usually, people are responsive,” says Callum, keeping an eye out for the passers-by while chatting with me. “And there has been a change in the way people chat about energy, for example. They would say ‘we need electricity, we need food’ to defend fossil fuel use but this has changed dramatically lately.”
“Since we are facing an energy crisis that fueled the cost-of-living crisis,” I try.
“Yes. People are starting to realise there’s alternatives.”
On the table, there is plenty of literature on different issues related to the climate crisis and information on ways to take action in Scotland, on a national and local level, supplied by groups and organisations. There is also the visitors’ book (which I didn’t get to see, remaining a mystery and a trinket to go back to!), a huge narrative of Edinburgh’s Climate Café journey at the Portobello promenade which tells more about the stories of the people who passed by here to talk, think, share and learn, which I can only see partly represented by the hundreds of pins on a large map that rests against the table.
I blink under the blazing sun, and everyone is already engaged in conversations, leaving me to contemplate the scene. A lot is happening but here are the things that stayed with me as I write about my afternoon with Edinburgh’s Climate Café and that I would like you to see. A busy seaside promenade at the peak of Scottish Summer. A calm shimmering sea. People. Strolling, running, limping, scooting, cycling, stopping, laughing, eating, drinking. People being. Seagulls patrolling above and planning their next food-snatching missions. My son’s white hat against the colourful playpark at the back of the Climate Café site. A boy squatting next to the Earth temperature hopscotch, listening attentively to Stuart. The beautiful globe sitting on the fold-out table next to Callum. A promise in the air that as long as we keep talking to each other, we hold a strong chance of succeeding.
Special thanks to Callum McLeod for welcoming me and my family on the day of this interview and a big thank you to all the Edinburgh Climate Café team for such a great and necessary project.
How to catch Edinburgh Climate Café at the Promenade: Every Sunday 3 pm Portobello Promenade https://climatefringe.org/events/edinburgh-climate-Café-at-portobello-prom/
Facebook Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/1151036858806619/
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