I was born on July 4th, 1950 outside of Stockholm, Sweden, to a father who was an internationally active judge and legal advisor to the governments of various developing countries and a mother who became an early activist against the practices of female circumcision in Africa and elsewhere.
At the age of six, I traveled with my family to Kabul, Afghanistan, where I spent my first 2 school years in an international school. After returning briefly to Sweden, we spent 3 years in Kathmandu, Nepal, where I continued my schooling, first at a Nepalese Jesuit school, and then at the American Lincoln School of Kathmandu. This early exposure to different cultures made a great impression on me, and ever since I have seen myself more as a citizen of the Earth than of any specific country.
Having returned to Sweden, I graduated from high school, did my military service and studied physics, mathematics and geophysics at the Royal Institute of Technology and Stockholm University. I graduated with a B.Sc. in Physics and Geophysics from Stockholm University in 1974.
I spent two years working at the Swedish State Institute for Building Research as author of manuals for architectural computer programs, and co-authored a book about Swedish building research in Third World countries.
In 1976 I left Sweden, and have not lived there since.
Feeling unfulfilled with my life in Sweden, and fairly "stuck" personally, I went to visit a radical community in Austria, which had developed a communitarian lifestyle of their own, with an emphasis on artistic expression, daily spontaneous theater, and art. I ended up staying there for 3 years, and left because I disagreed with many of the structures that had been created there.
I then spent 3 years in the United States, patenting and marketing new technologies and inventions in the areas of oil recycling, cleaning of oily waste water, and cleaning of air and gas.
After that, in 1983, I joined an experimental social model in Germany. My main work there was as the head of a "free university", organizing visits by internationally acknowledged researchers and innovators from the social, scientific, and spiritual areas.
In 1990 I and two friends of mine founded the German non-profit organization "Aktion Perestroika", which I headed for 3 years. We organized aid programs and the transfer of technological know-how, and carried out a number of projects in the area...
