Tromso (TAN): Residents of an island in northern Norway are campaigning to go free of time zones during summer months when the sun does not set for 69 days at a stretch.
Sommaroy, an island in West Tromso, north of the Arctic Circle, experiences continuous daylight from May 18 to July 26 every year. The island of 300 odd people also undergoes long periods of darkness from November to January, when the sun does not rise at all.
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This makes them realise the true worth of the summer months, when they want to stay away from conventional timekeeping. With summer solstice in the Northern Hemisphere approaching, Sommaroy or ‘Summer Island’ wants to declare itself as the world’s first time-free zone.
“There’s constantly daylight, and we act accordingly. In the middle of the night, which city folk might call ‘2 a.m.,’ you can spot children playing soccer, people painting their houses or mowing their lawns, and teens going for a swim,” resident Kjell Ove Hveding was quoted by media reports as saying.
The people of the island recently met a Norwegian member of parliament to hand over a petition for a time-free zone that was signed by locals. They also discussed legal and practical impediments of the drive.
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He added: “To many of us, getting this in writing would simply mean formalising something we have been practicing for generations.”
Islanders are rooting for the idea because it will make school and working hours more flexible during the 69 day-period, devoid of any fixed opening or closing hours. Hveding said that having no clocks “is a great solution but we likely won’t become an entirely time-free zone as it will be too complex. But we have put the time element on the agenda, and we might get more flexibility … to adjust to the daylight.”
“The idea is also to chill out. I have seen people suffering from stress because they were pressed by time,” he added.
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However, since tourism, along with fishing, are the chief industries on the island, it remains to be seen how easily the tourism sector can implement the time-free system.
The islanders have decorated the bridge to Sommaroy with watches instead of padlocks, symbolising that for visitors it could be a place where keeping time is redundant.
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