Strikkenomaden

Travel diary

The knitting came along

Tine sits with a coffee cup under a wooden roof surrounded by greenery, laughing. Across the photo it says «I just did something…».

A little over a year ago I made the scariest, hardest choice of my life: I quit a safe, well-paid job in Oslo to move to Indonesia 👀

A jetty on a still lake in Norway at dusk, with people around a fire. Across the photo it says «My stable job and livelyhood for 7 years».
Tine and a colleague in party hats at the office. The colleague's face is covered by a purple heart. Across the photo it says «…my like-minded coworkers».
A hand holding a fan of photo booth strips. Across the photo it says «I'm leaving all of this, I quit my job!».

Plenty of things in my life led up to it, and at last I dared to act on a dream I had carried for decades. I had no good new plan — no plan at all, really 😂 — I just did it. Plus I was far too cold in Norway, hahah.

I packed a great deal of lovely Norwegian yarn, because knitting was one thing I was going to keep doing, and I wanted to see things like this:

A narrow road between green rice terraces, with palms on both sides.
A woman shaves coconut with a knife over a basket while Tine sits beside her and helps. The woman's face is covered by a purple heart.
Tine in a sarong in front of a temple gate with red parasols and stone figures.
A deep bowl of soup with chicken and vegetables on a green tray.
A procession of people in white ceremonial dress walking along a road, with mountains behind.
Two hands knitting something blue on a circular needle, with palms and green rice fields just beyond the railing.
Ten women and children in traditional dress lined up on a veranda with Tine. Every face but hers is covered by a purple heart.
A ceramic teapot on a wooden table in an open café, with the street outside.
Tine sits in an outrigger boat on bright blue water, under a blue tarpaulin.
Tine sits at a red table with a meal served in small dishes.
The poncho on a circular needle in blue yarn, on a table with orange flowers beside it.
A meal laid out on blue patterned fabric, with small bowls, coffee and glasses of ice.
Tine stands at a railing on a rooftop looking out over a pink and orange sunset above the water.
A small slice of the past year — Sumatra, Bali and Lombok.

Strikkenomaden means the knitting nomad. I picked the name because it sounded fun, something I could do here in Indonesia, and I did not think about it much further. Then I moved, and it turned out to be fairly literal.

These pictures are from Norway. Wool sweater, wool trousers, snow in every direction, and hands that went cold within three minutes without mittens. Those were the winters the sheep mittens came out of. I did not knit them as a project — I knitted them because I needed them.

And I bought far too much yarn. The last picture is me in a yarn shop with an entire ceiling of wool above my head, laughing, because that is exactly where I want to be.

Tine stands in the middle of a snow-covered road with her arms out, laughing, in a patterned wool sweater and dark red trousers.
the winter before
The same road from behind. The pattern across the back of the sweater shows, and there is snow in every direction.
the pattern behind
Tine reaches up towards a ceiling hung with large skeins of wool in a yarn shop, laughing.
far too much yarn

Now I live somewhere it never gets cold 🌴 My wool sweaters are in my brother’s attic. But the knitting came along. That surprised me a little, because I was certain I knitted because I was cold. Maybe it is because my hands need something to do while my head takes a break. I do not really know. But that need does not seem to care about the weather.

on the way somewhere

Maybe it is like that for you too. Or maybe you knit for entirely different reasons.

What changes is what ends up on the needles. Heavy wool in thirty degrees is unbearable, so it is thinner yarn, smaller projects, things that do not sit in your lap like a blanket while you work on them.

And mittens. Still mittens… for people who live where they are needed ❄️🩵