Greta Thunberg, Climate Champion Quiz

Answer: Sweden

Greta Tintin Eleanora Ernman Thunberg was born in Stockholm, Sweden on January 3, 2003. She first learned of the global climate crisis at the age of 8, and it led to a period of profound depression. In 2018, Greta started her campaign to raise global attention about the issue of global warming.

Greta is the daughter of Melana Ernman and Sven Thunberg, a Swedish actor. Her grandfather was the noted actor and director Olof Thunberg. In January 2021, the Swedish postal service featured Thunberg on a stamp. She has won several Swedish honors, including the 2018 Fryshuset scholarship for Young Role Model of the Year and 2019 Swedish Woman of the Year.

Answer: Opera singer

Melana Ernman is one of Sweden's premier opera singers. She began performing professionally in 1997 and was of Europe's leading singers for almost 20 years. Melana represented Sweden in the Eurovision Song Contest in 2009. The mezzo soprano has over 10 albums to her credit and was named a Royal Court Singer by King Carl XVI Gustav in 2010. Ernman dramatically cut back on the amount of traveling she did in order to reduce her carbon footprint, at the request of Greta. Greta's younger sister Beata announced she would follow in her mom's footsteps as a singer.

Answer: Asperger's Syndrome

In her TED talk in November 2018, Thunberg stated "I was diagnosed with Asperger's syndrome, OCD and selective mutism. That basically means I only speak when I think it's necessary. Now is one of those moments." Apserger's is part of the autism spectrum, first identified by Austrian pediatrician Hans Asperger in 1944. While it can lead to awkwardness in social interaction and difficulty in communication, Asperger's patients have also shown remarkable focus and attention to detail.

In May of 2015, Thunberg's mother made Greta's autism public, hoping it would help families with similar challenges. Greta herself has said that she does not regard her Asperger's as an illness, but states that "given the right circumstances - being different is a superpower." She even used the hashtag #aspiepower.

Answer: School strike in front of parliament

In August, 2018, Greta started a school strike in front of the Riksdag, the Swedish Parliament building. She had been inspired by the students of Parkland High School in Florida and their activism on the issue of gun violence. Thunberg held up a sign reading "Skolstrejk för klimatet " (School strike for climate). Her example inspired young people in other communities, and the group "Fridays for the Future" was formed, leading to weekly protests on the issue of climate change in countries around the world. In September 2019, Climate Strike protests around the world drew over four million participants.

Thunberg began her strike on August 20, and she said she was staying out of school until the general election on September 9. Her actions took place in the wake of the hottest summer in Europe in over 250 years, which included wildfires in Sweden. Within a week, Thunberg had earned international media attention for her school strike. In 2019, Thunberg graduated from Franka Skolan, a private school in Stockholm, with outstanding grades: 14 A-grades and 3 B-grades. Apparently her activism has not hurt her academic performance very much.

Answer: Malizia II

Thunberg sailed from Portsmouth to New York City on the Malizia II, on a voyage billed as carbon neutral. The boat was equipped with solar panels. The journey across the Atlantic took from August 14 to 28. The Malizia II is competitive sailing yacht, an IMOCA 60.

It sailed in the 2016-2017 and 2020-2021 Vendee Globe round the world sailing competition. The Banque Populaire VIII was the winner of the 2016-2017 Vendee Globe race. The Maitre Coq IV was the winner of the 2020-21 race. The Ericsson 4 won the 2008-2009 Volvo Ocean Race. Thunberg sailed back to Europe on La Vagabonde from November 13 to December 3, in order to attend the Climate Change conference in Madrid.

Answer: Pearl Jam

In the Pearl Jam video "Retrograde" Thunberg plays a fortune teller who stares into a crystal ball showing scenes of devastation caused by climate change. Pearl Jam is a grunge band that started in Seattle in 1990. "Retrograde" includes shots of the Space Needle being inundated by flooding. One of Thunberg's most famous statements was at her September 2019 UN speech: "This is all wrong. I shouldn't be up here. I should be back in school on the other side of the ocean. Yet you all come to us young people for hope. How dare you!" Several musical artists have used the speech, including John Meredieth, Megan Washington and Fatboy Slim.

Answer: Donald Trump

In a tweet, Trump called Grunberg "a very happy young girl". The activist responded using Trump's phrase as her twitter handle. A few months later, after Thunberg won "Time" Magazine's person of the year, a frustrated Trump tweeted that the activist should "go to an old fashioned movie with a friend... Chill, Greta, Greta!" Thunberg changed her twitter profile again, once again kicking Trump's ass in their Internet feud. During one of his rants about the 2020 election, Thunberg tweeted "Chill, Donald, Chill". Joe Biden even waded in, criticizing Trump for bullying a teenager.

Russian President Vladimir Putin described Thunberg as a "kind girl and very sincere" who was being manipulated. When Thunberg protested the destruction of the Amazon rainforest and defended native protestors, Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro called her "a brat".

Answer: Lakota

In October 2019, during her tour of the United States, Thunberg traveled to the Standing Rock Indian Reservation, which had been the site of massive protests against an oil pipeline. The Swedish activist was invited by Tokata Iron Eyes, a 16 year old Lakota climate activist.

Her new Lakota name is "Maphiyata echiyatan hin win". During her travels in the United States, Thunberg frequently noted that the land she was on had originally been indigenous land.

Answer: Beetle

Nelloptodes gretae is a type of beetle identified by entomologist Michael Darby. The insect's antennae look a little like Thunberg's pigtails. The beetles are very small (less than 1 centimeter), yellow and gold, and are native to eastern Africa. It is part of the Ptiliidae family, also known as featherwing beetles. Two species of snail have been named after Thunberg: Craspedotropis gretathunbergae Schilthuizen (native to Borneo) and Opacuincola gretathunbergae (native to New Zealand). Archanologist Peter Greta created a new genus of huntsman spider after Thunberg, Thunberga greta, in June 2020.

Answer: False

She didn't win the Nobel Prize. In 2019, Thunberg was nominated by three Norwegian members of Parliament. The prize went to Abiy Ahmed Ali, Prime Minister of Ethiopia, for his work negotiating peace with his neighbor Eritrea. In 2020, she was nominated by two Swedish members of Parliament, Jens Holm and Hakan Svenneling, but lost to the World Food Programme, a United Nations organization that provides food for the hungry in conflict-affected regions. Media reports indicate that Thunberg was once again nominated in 2021.

Thunberg has won an impressive number of other awards, including the Rachel Carson Prize (2019), Ambassador of Conscience Award (2019). Right Livelihood Award (2019) and the International Children's Peace Prize (2019).