Biketour visiting JAK member’s bank

On the 22nd of July, Biketour passed by Skövde on the way from Bossgården to Broddetorp. Skövde is a small town of 35 000 inhabitants somewhere in the middle between Vättern and Vänern, the two big lakes of Sweden. It happens to be the place where JAK Medlemsbank, a members-owned alternative bank, was founded in 1965 based on the concept of JAK Denmark, which has existed since 1931. Knowing some alternative banks from other countries, which are a part of the capitalist system just like any other bank, except that they invest their money into more social and sustainable projects, it seemed…

Continue reading

Links #2 – Vio.Me blockade, COP21, bicycle repair man

Vio.Me successfully blocked and postponed the auction where the factory is supposed to be sold. Vio.Me is a soap factory in Thessaloniki that was squatted by its workers in 2011 and has since been run as a cooperatively and democratically self-organised organic soap factory. We were there with the Biketour in 2014. In Paris, the COP21 (the 21st Climate Change conference of the UN) has started. It will officially last until the 11th of December (but is expected to last longer, like the previous conferences). France already announced in the beginning of November to close its borders in prospect of hundreds of thousands…

Continue reading

Links #1

If Bicycles Took Up as Much Space as Cars Mesmerizing Photos of People Lying in a Week’s Worth of Their Trash Syrians cross Norway’s Arctic border on bicycles Critical Mass from London to Calais – Bikes Beyond Borders The Invisible Bike Helmet Johnnyrandom | Bespoken (full song)

Continue reading

Biketour at Bossgården

After Jönköping, the Biketour stayed at Bossgården, a small farm on the country-side between Falköping and Tidaholm. One of the farm buildings was built in 1818 and still has a traditional reed roof, making the farm an official cultural heritage site. On the farm lives a small family with children, and some volunteers are around as well. There is a big vegetable garden that is being operated as a CSA (community-supported agriculture, where people pay a fixed rate to the farmer but get a varying amount of food depending how much grows). We stayed for two nights and helped with…

Continue reading