Scan Magazine | Scandinavian Everyday Heroes | Trampoline House
My house, your house With its resolute, democratic ethos, Trampoline House has become a beacon of support, purpose and equality for refugees and asylum seekers in Denmark. Knock on the door and you will be welcome. It does not matter who you are, where you are from or what your situation is. You are now a citizen of the Trampoline House. By Maya Acharya | Photos: Trampoline House
Before becoming co-founders of Trampoline House, artists Morten Goll and Tone Olaf Nielsen were living in Los Angeles. Inspired by west coast grassroot organisations, which were mobilising to pursue justice for their communities, the couple set out to do just that: promote a sense of community and belonging, except in their own 106 | Issue 86 | March 2016
home country of Denmark - and during challenging times. Their first objective was to organise a workshop with asylum seekers in 2009, where they asked them for their expert opinion on what it was actually like to live in an asylum centre. “After a lot of talking, we boiled it down to three main prob-
lems: poverty, isolation and mental paralysis. And from what we know, these issues are still felt in the Danish asylum system today,� says Goll, who has been director of the Copenhagen-based house for over five years. A remedy for disempowerment Trampoline House started as an antidote to these issues. At the house, asylum seekers and refugees can take language classes, have a hot dinner (cooked by volunteers, including asylum seekers themselves), learn practical skills such as sewing, cleaning and hairdressing, get free legal aid and partake in all sorts