I didn’t actually know how sprouts grew until I started growing them.

Neither of us have any kind of background in this, so it’s a bit kind of random that we’ve all ended up here. Even if I really wanted to grow things. We’d imagined a kitchen garden and 10 chickens.

 

It got a bit bigger. A very different kind of life.

It was hectic before. Not that it’s any less hectic now, but life was kind of put together a bit differently.

 

I was working with drug abuse and psychiatry and had a little flat in town.

 

I also had a tiny little flat in Oslo, so we turned to Vestfold.

But just when I was thinking I don’t really want a little flat in Tønsberg, this turned up.

 

And so we got a great big tumbledown house in Nykirke instead.

 

Yes! Nykirke is ... It’s struck us how much of a community it is.

When new people move in, they come to the door with flowers to wish you welcome.

 

Yes, that was really nice.

 

I’ve never experienced that before anywhere. So Nykirke strikes me as a really nice place.

 

What’s good about Nykirke is that it’s close to Oslo in a way. It takes us less than an hour.

It’s just straight onto the motorway and you’re there in no time.

Borrevannet is just around the corner. The forest. Lots of beaches. It’s just really close to everything: town, villages, beaches, the islands.

 

We’re part of an agricultural cooperative. Where families buy a share. I think we’re about 80 families now. And you pay a sum at the beginning of the year that goes towards production,

and then you can harvest your own produce throughout the year.

So here we’ve got courgettes, cucumber, melon, pickling cucumbers, pumpkins and all sorts.

 

They build cabins all over the place. They’ve got one over there which is fenced off and with its own little terrace and picket fence.

 

Why we wanted to do this has got a lot to do with being self-sufficient, at least with vegetables.

So that’s a lot of the motivation and the drive, and it’s fantastic to be able to go and pick your own food right outside the door.