On the final morning of the conference, Marianne (of VOKK ) showed a remarkable video about a
teenage girl called Pien, who is the youngest beekeeper in the Netherlands.
Part way into making the film, Pien had been diagnosed with osteosarcoma, bone
cancer. The producer suggested they stop filming but Pien insisted they
continue. The result is this magical 16 minute short, Pien the Queen Bee.
The film had a particular resonance for me and my wife
Hilary, who was also at the conference. I wear an enamel badge of a bumble bee on
my suit lapel and people often ask me why. The answer is that it is part of the
paraphernalia that the Bumblebee
Conservation Trust send me every year; my daughter Bethan was a member and
we keep up the subscription. Joining the
BBCT was one of the many fads of a
teenage girl but it also says something about the kind of person Bethan was. I
don’t suppose she knew any more about the ecology of bees than I do, but she
understood that everything in nature is connected and she instinctively sided
with the small against the mighty and I think she found these bumbly little
creatures in their stripy fleeces fun. So I wear the badge to remember her and on
the stone above the plot where her ashes are buried (like Pien, she had bone
cancer), the outline of a bee is chiselled, as a tiny symbol of renewal and
defiance.
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