From snow-clearing to bus stops, civic furniture to football teams, women and men are considered and treated equally in this small city in Scandinavia – with the aim of making life happier for everyone
he big red puma is the focal point of Umeå. The world’s first publicly commissioned statue dedicated to thedepicts a snarling cat atop a steel frame designed to imitate prison bars. Its official title, according to its artist creator Camilla Akraka, is Listen but everyone just calls it “puman” – the Puma.
The morning’s activity is a workshop for primary school teaching assistants, which seems to focus mostly on trying to get the participants to accept the idea that women don’t have to be the primary parent. In the afternoon we follow the route of a specially devised “gendered landscape” bus tour. The council is very proud and excited about this tour, instigated as an activity for visiting dignitaries.
There’s also a strong sense of defiance and having something to prove here. “We are remote and far from Stockholm,” says Ågren. Stockholm is 400 miles south, a six-hour train journey. “If we have a situation, we have to solve it ourselves. We are very dependent on each other. People have high trust because there is no other way to live. There is a very low crime rate. That’s not easily maintained, not least because we have a thousand people moving in and out each year with the university.
Round the corner is Umeå’s 9,000-seat football stadium. In the late 1990s a decision was taken to divide pitch practise hours according to whichever football team – male or female – was more likely to win their league. Before, the men’s team automatically got first dibs on practise hours, regardless of their fortunes. Here too, “there was a lot of protest”.
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