A moment with the sea – communicating caring actions for the Baltic Sea!

Inspired by the Ocean Confessions by Pete Fung and Samein Shamshar and adapted in Tvärminne research station in Hanko by a multidisciplinary research group as part of the Baltic Sea Lab in the CreaTures Research project funded by the EU Horizon 2020 grant.

We invite you to participate in this action of caring for the Baltic Sea!

We want to enable a personal encounter with the sea by providing the participants to express their love, concerns, transgressions or fears for their local sea. The science we face daily is worrying and might easily lead us to feeling defeated and powerless. Through voicing our emotions, we can move into a space of gratitude, poetic, reflective, collectively caring. You can participate by attending the event at Hanaholmen or remotely by sending us your message to and for the Baltic Sea.

Participation at Hanaholmen 3 PM – 6 PM:

Professor of practise Julia Lohmann with her team presents her work and encourages us to show our engagement and care for the Baltic Sea. In this activity we will ask participants to spend a moment with the sea and share a thought with this body of water by writing it with chalk, a calcium based medium that acts as a token against ocean acidification. This writing will happen either directly on the rocks or on smaller stones and pieces of bark that can be placed by the shore. The reflections of care will be given to the sea.

As a symbolic act of care, the writings on the rock will be done using street chalk, which is made of calcium carbonate, and will enter the sea in the end. Calcium carbonate buffers the acidification of the sea caused by climate change.

Please sign up through this form.

Remote participation 

We ask you to reflect on your care for the sea, confess, praise, thank, wish for this body of water. You can send us your message to the Sea by this form.

Or by writing you message by a chalk on a piece of rock or bark, taking a picture of it and sharing on social media with the hashtags:#östersjödagen; #itämeripäivä; #balticseaday; #hanaholmen. Please remember to use a street chalk, which is made of calcium carbonate without petrochemicals. Please sign up through this form.

Simultaneous activities at other sites 

Students and researchers at Tvärminne research station in Hanko reflect on their care for the sea and write down their thoughts on the rock by the boat pier. The writings offer an insight into the scientists’ emotional connection with the sea, seldomly articulated but often the reason why they embarked on their topic of study. Simultaneous events are also arranged in Sweden and Estonia.