Erling Kagge

0:00This is an iHeart Podcast.

0:30Experience cloud-like comfort with high-resilience foam that's hypoallergenic and never needs fluffing. The sturdy steel frame ensures longevity, and the modular pieces can be rearranged anytime. Check out washablesofas.com and get up to 60 % off your Anabay sofa, backed by a 30-day satisfaction guarantee. If you're not absolutely in love, send it back for a full refund. No return shipping or restocking fees. Every penny back. Upgrade now at washablesofas.com. offers are subject to change and certain restrictions may apply. You are listening to Ruthie's Table 4 in partnership with Montclair. Arlen Kaga is one of the world's great explorers, a man whose life embraces solitude.

1:15He is the first person to reach by foot the North Pole, South Pole, and Mount Everest. His new book, The North Pole, The History of an Obsession, is published this week, a compelling read taking us into his world of adventure, hidden dreams, adversity, and silence. Arling and my life might be dissimilar, but we share a love for the unknown. For him, it might be a new horizon. For me, a discovery of a little-known Sicilian recipe. Today, we're here on our own adventure, not on the top of a mountain or in the icy North Pole, but safe and warm in the River Cafe.

1:56So, Everest, South Pole, the North Pole Can you remember the times when you actually thought you might die? I never felt I might die But if my mother had seen me She would certainly believe I was close to dying Quite a few times when you fall into the water But also, like, we were attacked by a polar bear Stop there, tell us that story There aren't many people who start a sentence like that What happened? What was the story? We were close to the North Pole. Suddenly I heard my partner Berge shouted, which I never heard him shout before. So I looked up and then I saw polar bear at 20 meters distance.

2:35How big was the bear? Probably, we figured out after maybe 250 kilos. And this far north, as we said as a joke afterwards, is nothing to eat but polar explorers. so we knew it was going to charge but when the polar bears saw that we had seen it it stopped and we were able to dig into our sledges and get a handgun each, a Magnum 44 each so I got the gun and it was this short barrel because we want to save weight so only two inches barrel so you can't hit a bear at 20 meters distance so I had to wait until it was closed. But then my partner, Børge, he had this idea that he really wanted to be published in National Geographic magazine, which was the biggest thing at the time.

3:33This was over the Bible. We kind of read like every third issue of something. I was an American who received it. Did you get it? Every month, you get that yellow... Exactly. Every third issue of something had something on an expedition, which we always read like it was the New Testament. so he got this idea this is my chance so he dropped the gun got the camera he didn't have a film in the camera this was the time he had a film in camera and then he got me posing between him and the bear so he took some photos and soon after the bear turned towards us start to dig its four feet into the snow lower its neck so he knew it was going to charge and it can run up to 60 kilometers and over so it's uh so it's and it's 20 meters so it's it's um let's say it was 40 kilometers and over so it really close up we both fired and hit it in the chest so it's uh and it's like you know neither of us had you know any desire to kill an animal and definitely not a polar bear but when it's a matter about who's having who for dinner uh the choice was simple Even Gandhi said you should kill an animal if an animal wants to kill you.

4:44We're here with Sean Winnowen, who is director of the River Cafe, the executive chef of the River Cafe, a great friend of mine, and has also wanted to talk to you when I told you you were coming about food, what we do as chefs, what you do as an explorer. What is the food? If I was coming, if Sean and I were coming to Norway, and you were cooking something to represent your kind of history and your life, what would you give us? I would, in terms of meat, I would serve you a reindeer, a low reindeer. And one reason I love reindeer is because a reindeer lives a happy life from it's born until it suddenly is dead, which I find very comfortable that the animal hasn't suffered because of meat.

5:30And also it's super tasty. Is it like venison? Is it sweet? No, I think it's richer in taste. Of course, it depends on what part of the reindeer. And it's tasted a little bit wilderness. It tastes a little bit like being above the tree line. You know, well-cooked. It's a really outstanding meal. And, of course, in Norway we have summer seafood. Now it's cod season. And I had some cod a few days ago, and it's just unbelievable. Amazing. And if I have a good piece, which I will get, it's almost foolproof. How do you cook it? The most important thing with cod is that, which people kind of forget or do not know, is that you need to, first of all, of course, get a great piece.

6:21But then you need to salt it heavily and leave it for at least 20 minutes. and then rinse it with cold water because that makes the fabric of the meat, do you call it meat? Fabric of the meat, much more like, almost like lobster meat. So it doesn't fall apart in a way. And also the taste gets a little bit richer. And then afterwards, you salt it and pepper it. And I usually then put it in the oven on maybe 220 degrees for 25 minutes, maybe plus minus depending on the size of the piece with some herbs and maybe i make some mashed root vegetables but definitely have a great salad and some good wine okay let's go

7:15i love having people visiting and make food because that's one of the greatest pleasures you can have is to share great food that you really put your heart into and some good wines yeah what was it like growing up in oslo were you to your family what was food like in your house you know i grew up in oslo in the i was born in 63 and in the typical middle class family and middle class family at that time in norway was it's very different from middle class families today because post oil fortune and mid-class in Norway is different so we had like typical was you start a week Mondays Tuesdays with something called fish balls like and then whale steaks whale real let's take this slowly fish like you made it kind of instead of meatballs like fish balls like very popular Norway kind of simple not super healthy kind of totally okay food and at that time What fish is it?

8:17Quite often cod and whale was very popular in Norway in the 60s What does whale taste like? You know, if you have the best part of the whale it's delicious but whale is huge and of course we didn't have the best parts and then it's quite rough, raw rough taste, a little bit like seal but that maybe doesn't say so much either Seal, no, yes I've never been to the fishmonger and seen whale of seal It's rough. But that's, you know, it's a common course in Norway at the time. And then you ate? And the rest of the week, you know, the quality increased. And then typically on Saturdays we had shrimps or a good piece of meat and the same on Sundays.

8:59And always pudding. What would you have for pudding? You know, this kind of chocolate thing or like the strawberry thing. Kind of quite simple, but still pudding every day. Was food important to your family? Yes. and it became more and more important. My father was a jazz critic and to have something extra to do, he became a restaurant critic. So he took me to the restaurant quite often when he made a critic. So yeah, it became more and more important. And did you play a lot of jazz? We played jazz all the time. My father said that pop music, TV and cars are diseases in society. and we should only listen to jazz, blues and gospel music because it was a jazz critic.

9:45We got to meet all these jazz musicians. Who did you meet? Ed Lef, his general comp bass. Really? She came to Asda? They all came to Norway because in Norway, Skaneva, they were superstars. Yeah. They came to our house and alcohol was very expensive in Norway at the time. So my father sailed over a sailboat to Germany every summer, and we bought liquor and took it back home to Norway. And then we had big parties in the house. People got drunk, and they were playing and jamming into the night. Do you play? I don't, unfortunately. And what about school? Tell me about going to school every day. School was not good to me.

10:29I know. You were dyslexic, yeah? Yeah, I was. My husband is dyslexic. Yeah, exactly. But in those days, they didn't actually, well, in his days, he was older than you. They just called it being stupid. Exactly. I think, you know, the good thing, having those disadvantages, is that you learn all of the teacher tries to help you. You learn not to trust authorities. I had to find my own way to learn the same as everyone else in class. So the teacher really couldn't help me. And also you learn that life is brutal. at an early age. And I think the sooner you learn it, the better it is in your life.

11:08You have children, don't you? I have three daughters. You want them to know that life is brutal? Yeah, actually, I want them to know life is brutal, and they know life is brutal. But of course, they have to learn it their own way. Yeah. When did you first become in love with the North Pole? The first time I became aware of the North Pole, I was seven years old. My parents gave me this globe, this globus, for my birthday present. And this was in 1970. So at that time, the globes were small, a bit bluish, dark blue where the oceans were deep. It was dark brown where the mountains were high. And at the top of the globe, it was a little flat metal plate to kind of hold the globe together.

12:00And then I was wondering, what's below that metal? And of course, that was the North Pole. And then I was wondering about it, and then slowly through my life, I got more and more interested and eventually obsessed about walking to the North Pole. So I was in love with the North Pole for many years. And of course, as soon as I got to the pole, I understood my real obsession had been about walking towards the pole and not getting to the pole. The arrival, right? The arrival is like, you know, the hunt is always more fascinating than actually the killing. Tell us the early days of walking. I remember the first time I understood that I could walk in any direction I wanted.

12:47I walked home from kindergarten, Norway safe, so you walk back and forth to the kindergarten by yourself. And I was walking towards our home, But then suddenly I understood I could just turn 90 degrees and walk straight into the forest. That was a beautiful feeling. And then? And then I was dreaming, and I was dreaming about sailing the oceans, which I eventually did through my 20s. And then this idea about really fulfilling my dream about walking to the North Pole kept on popping up in my head. and eventually in 1990, Børge, Elsland and myself, we did it. And we prepared for more than... Who was he?

13:34He was a guy I had never met before. He had the same dream, obsessed by getting to the North Pole and obsessed by getting to the North Pole in the most difficult way. Not using skidoos or dogs or air supply, but just walking, dragging over sledges all the way to the North Pole. The first 30 nights, we shared sleeping bags. And then eventually, like, you know, during such an expedition, you either become close friends or the opposite. Unfortunately, we became very close friends. You had a great question. We were just asking how you know when you get to the North Pole. Is it like a sign? Welcome to the North Pole.

14:18Because when you get to the pole, you're standing in the ice. The ice is moving all the time. So after a few hours, you're a little bit off the North Pole, depending on the drift. But the thing at the North Pole, which is interesting, is that the sun has the same angle above the horizon for 24 hours. So the needle goes up and down. And then, of course, the compass needle is pointing to our south. The wind comes from the south. it blowing towards the south it's one day and one night every year the sun rises once and it sets once during a year so it's but then again it's it's just ice it's just a mathematical point you have to lose yourself to get to find the place that's the interesting thing because when you get to norfolk it's no there there it's nothing it's just ice gray white and maybe the horizon is blue that's it and it's moving so it's it's it's nothing there perhaps we should actually talk about you and i and sean we're going to the north pole

15:31we're going okay we can we can we can slaughter halfway and eat it

15:40so we're there and i would like to know what is my food day like what will i be eating what's the longest time you've gone on a trip would it be for a month would it be weeks two months no like 60 65 days 65 days that you bring all the food you need with you for the whole time okay so what are the disciplines around that how much it will weigh to carry how much space it will take and how much nutrition will it give you yes how do you balance all that You eat around one kilo every day with dried food, and you mix it with water. It's all dried? Yeah, all dried to save weight. Tell us, what is it?

16:21For breakfast, you have oatmeal. You have to use a lot of water then? Yeah, from melting ice and snow. Oh. So you don't bring in the water. Oh, poor enough. That's a good news, so don't worry about that. And you just take the snow and just let it... Yeah, you need to find old ice because fresh ice contains lots of salt. So you can tell by the color of the ice if it contains salt or not. How do you melt it? You melt it by having little primates, is that what you call it? A little heater, which is made in a way so all the heat from the flame goes to the pot. So even when it's minus 40 and 50 degrees, we're not heating the tent.

17:08It gets a little bit warmer because of the body heat, but we don't heat the tent. Why don't you want to heat the tent? Because you want to save weight. So you have like two deciliters of fuel per day, and then you have to really save everything because you've got to drag everything you need for more than two months, and then you're not having enough fuel to heat the tent. So you're freezing so much, you actually, you know, sometimes you start crying because you're freezing so much. but anyway so this oatmeal but also we mix it with formula milk dried formula milk because that's what gives the most energy per gram and then eat the same for lunch throughout the day maybe some chocolate or definitely some chocolate but with extra calories especially made chocolate with extra calories just as a snack?

17:57yeah like a snack having breaks what is this chocolate like that you bring? you have to get used to the taste because it's so much fat in it so it doesn't really taste well at home but you know the thing is this food is none of this food tastes really good when you start eating it but then as the days and weeks pass by and you get more and more tired and more and more hungry it tastes better and better and better and eventually it tastes as good as the food at River Cafe That's amazing That's the whole thing with expeditions you need to be really well prepared. It's like this Norwegian explorer Amundsen wrote that victory awaits the one who has everything in order.

18:44People call it good luck. While defeat always follows bad preparations, people call it bad luck. It's brutal and true. Are you hungry? Always hungry. You're always hungry. So we are still meeting twice a year, Börg and me, and we're eating the food we were dreaming about while walking towards the pole. Oh, that's nice.

19:14So then that's all through the day. Yeah. And then? Then we have dinner, which is dried meat and either some pasta or some mashed potatoes to get some volume. And again, lots of fats. And that's it. When you say lots of fats, what would that be? Like quite a few spoonfuls every evening. And then, because we're starving, one had to split the portions, and the other one had to choose. So then you make sure that we get, you know, equal portions. You have to take, like, implements to cook, like a regular billy can, or would you take special lightweight kit that you can use to cook? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, super light.

19:58Everything is light. Super light. Everything is light. That's the thing. You need to keep everything. The slogan is, think ahead, travel light, and leave your fears behind you. Your fears. Yeah. That's the kind of recipe for getting to the North Pole.

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22:19Would you celebrate in any way? Yes. when I walked the South Pole alone. I had Christmas and New Year's by myself. I was alone for 50 days and nights. 50? You were alone for 50 days and nights. And no radio, no telephone contact. So in total solitude. So then I was still remembering Christmas Eve, which is the big day in Norway. I ate a little bit extra, had a piece of cake with me. When you're alone for such a long time, you kind of stop thinking. in the sense that the past and the future don't matter so much. And of course, that's a kind of a noise too, because when you're thinking, you're thinking about the past or the future.

23:02But you're very much in the present. You kind of stop thinking, which is a beautiful feeling. But then on Christmas Eve, I sat there eating this cake. I felt like at least like, you know, then I was thinking about people back home and that they were thinking about me. Because also when you're alone for such a long time, you don't really believe people. Then you kind of get a feeling that you're also kind of forgotten. And was there a pleasure that you had when you were walking? The pleasure is, I think the pleasures on an expedition are the original sources to gratefulness in the sense that you get rest when you're tired, you get warm after having been cold, you get full after having been hungry and that's what gratefulness is about and I think gratefulness is one of the most undervalued things in life and as I say in Norway where most people should be super duper grateful all day hardly anyone is grateful so you should almost learn in that school to be grateful but anyway on an expedition you really feel gratefulness for those three reasons and the same reasons why humans were grateful 100 ,000 years ago.

24:22When you walk to the North Pole, when you walk to climb Everest, what is the difference between walking to it and walking towards home? Is there a difference? From Everest, most accidents are happening on the way down from the mountain because then you are more self-confident, you're happy with yourself, you kind of reach your goal, at least that's what you believe. Then suddenly you take a wrong step or forget being careful and then you may have an accident. We've talked about getting there and preparing to leave, but what about returning and what kind of process is that to return from being 50 days on your own, eating porridge with fat, walking and feeling cold, feeling hungry, feeling tired, to coming back to an embracing life of friendship and people and choice.

25:26It's especially coming home after having not speaking with anyone for 50 days. It's really strange. and eventually after a few weeks I didn't really miss speaking to anyone either I'm a very social person but I kind of liked it I liked the rhythm I liked the routine I liked, you know you're getting a part of nature it's like your body doesn't stop by your skin or your fingertips but kind of extend it into the eyes and the horizon and you have a dialogue with the nature you send some ideas out to get all your thoughts back again without words and suddenly you're back home. After a few days, your washing machine breaks down, whatever you need to have help.

26:12But after a few weeks, you get into the rhythm of daily life in Oslo. And I like that too. When you're back in that world, do you dream of the world of walking on your own? I don't dream about it, but I keep on going back to nature. I think that's maybe the biggest mistake humans are doing today. that we have separated ourselves from nature, that we think we are above nature, we don't need nature, we have conquered nature. And I think that's one of the sources for many of the problems we have in the world today, that we don't relate to nature, not understanding or accepting that we are part of nature.

26:53We've talked about being solitary. We've talked about going far away from a community, from family, from friends. We've talked about thinking about them when you're away. We thought about leaving them. We've talked about coming back. Can you tell us the effect of your obsession on people you love or people you want to love, people you want to be with? How has that affected your exploring? It is difficult because when you have this desire, you leave so many things behind you, your family, your kids. wives and girlfriends in Norway and the kind of expression that every girl loves an explorer and the reason a girl loves an explorer is because it's so much fun it's so much going on so much curiosity so much wonder so many things are happening so many adventures etc.

27:49but eventually the girl will understand that this is not going to stop all these men they went out they had wives girlfriends fiancées kids and quite often and the Navy came home, and nobody knew what had happened. How many people died going to the pole? Were you one of the few survivors, or is it not? No, it's traditionally until 1900. They say, you know, the numbers are not easy to figure out, but they say around 1 ,000 people died, and 751 died. so it was the north pole has been the most difficult place to reach on earth and also where people have sacrificed the most i would think and also the longest period because people tried for 400 years and what's interesting is that no one knows who got to the pole yeah the north pole remains mysterious and that's also one of the reasons i want to write the book from prehistoric times when people sitting in the northern hemisphere looking into the skies 10 ,000 years ago, 100 ,000 years ago everything was going around and around, all the stars the earth was moving in circles, just one fixed point in the whole world and that was the north star, the Polaris and then people start to wonder why is that this one fixed point and what's below it on earth and they understood it's probably midnight sun and then they started to have this idea that it was original life was at the North Pole and as late as 1884 the dean at Boston University wrote a full book to prove that Adam and Eve and the Garden of Eden had been at the North Pole that was a common idea belief until the 1880s.

29:44When did you go to Cambridge to study philosophy in 1995 I already had a law degree but in 1995 I or 94 I kind of felt go on going on expeditions had become a routine like any other routine you get a goal you get sponsorships you do the expedition you do talks you do maybe write a book and then another expedition so I want to break free from it and I was also fed up kind of talking about it. So I fortunately they let me in Cambridge like a visiting scholar. It was a true privilege to be there and really dig deep into moral philosophy. Do you have a philosopher that has had an impact on you? Yes quite a few.

30:39it is Spinoza and also this Norwegian philosopher Arne Ness who was an expert on Spinoza I knew it but he kind of also explained to me that kind of importance in life that you need physical pain you need psychological pain to have a great life I think it's important every day to make life more difficult and the best things in life are difficult to achieve

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