When did it end?
To find out I decide to contact the world outside, bringing Desert Walker No. 2 (Saila Hyttinnen, actress, theatre director) and No.4 (Håkon Gundersen, journalist) into the conversation. I present them with similar questions via Skype instant messaging and Email respectively. They are both in Oslo.
Skype conversation with Saila 11th March 2009.
Amanda Steggell
12.49 AM: Hi Saila
12:50 PM: I am writing about Desert Walker and I have a question for you if you have time.
Saila Hyttinen
12:51 PM: Nice. I am just writing some emails. Can contact you when I’m ready in about 20 min?
Amanda Steggell
12:51 PM: Ok. Good.
12:52 PM: I’ll post the question here and you can look at it when u r ready.
12:54 PM: Can you tell me what you thought and/or felt when you had completed your last round of walking, when you were waiting for the performance to end, and when it finally seemed to have ended.
Saila Hyttinen
1:33 PM: I thought nothing during the first minutes, but a feeling of joyful emptiness filled me. A very good feeling. Then I thought that I could continue to walk if I wanted to. I MADE IT !!!! After a while fatigue and the coldness took over my muscles. The view was so beautiful. There, within it, are my fellow Desert Walkers. Are they going to make it?
Amanda Steggell
1:34 PM: Thank you.
1:35 PM: What about when it grew dark? When Håkon wandered off into the darkness alone. Did you think about him? When did you know it was over?
Saila Hyttinen
1:43 PM: I thought it looked great when Håkon continued to walk. A totally fantastic image as he walked into endlessness. After a while, as we packed together our things and drove out to find Håkon (who had disappeared into the darkness) I became frightened that he would be sucked up by Nothingness/Infinity. It was not until we arrived back at the motel and I was lying in a hot bath that I finally realised that it was over.
Email to Håkon
From: Amanda Steggell
Sent: 11. mars 2009 12:38
To: Håkon Gundersen
Subject: Desert Walker. A question
Hello Håkon
I am in Berlin writing about Desert Walker. I have a question for you. Can you tell me what you felt/thought and any impressions of when you walked out into the darkness at the end of the last round.
wbw
Amanda
From: Håkon Gundersen
Subject: Desert Walker. A question
Date: March 11, 2009 1:50:47 PM GMT+01:00
To: Amanda Steggell
I remember thoughts and feelings, but also that I was conscious of what I was thinking and feeling. In one sense, then, it was not authentic. On the other side these thoughts and feelings were authentic, cause the whole square was an intellectual as well as a physical experience.
Anyway: I felt relief when the pattern was completed and a surge of energy when I could walk on outside of the pattern and just go straight. I walked pretty far, that’s what Per said, who came in a car to pick me up. I could have walked much further without being exhausted, but it was getting dark and a bit scary. What if nobody finds me?
I had been thinking, while walking the square, that this was a safe way to live. Good to always do the same, the sun and wind from various positions, north, south, east, west, provided sufficient variety in life. And the whole walk also became a metaphor of life. (which everything tends to be).
So when walking into the distance at the end I was wondering if I now would feel unsafe, out on my own and insecure. But I didn’t. The experience of being within a comfortable metaphor was not that deep, or not that intellectual. Breaking the square gave a feeling of relief. For my legs, my back and my mind.
But I pissed two times out there, while walking, with all of you out of sight.
And I was wondering if I should turn the flashlight on – thinking that it would look good in your film- or if I should keep it off, to save batteries in case I really would need a light in order to be found. I think I left it on first, then turned it off for a while, and then on.
- something like this, Amanda. Make out of it whatever you can.
On Mar 11, 2009, at 13:57 PM, Amanda Steggell wrote:
Lovely. Thank you. One more little question.
When did you know that it was over?
On Mar 11, 2009, at 14:01 PM, Håkon Gundersen wrote:
Good question! I remember that I stopped walking in the ”desert walker”-tempo/rhythm some time before I heard the car behind me. But this was longer after anyone could see me. So “it” continued on my own. But then enough. I started “å rusle rolig” (to wander slowly).
On Mar 11, 2009, at 14:07 PM, Amanda Steggell wrote:
Cheers. I am struggling a bit, torn between sitting inside and writing and going out and having fun! As Beckett would say, I can’t go on, I must go on 
On Mar 11, 2009, at 14:09 PM, Håkon Gundersen wrote:
Write some more. Then out. Thanks for the link, will look at it later. Now writing.
