Despair, lack of progress at climate talks, yet hope blooms

SHARM EL-SHEIKH, Egypt (AP) — It’s a desert, where little grows. It’s a climate conference, where water is scarce inside buildings and out, lines are long, tempers are short, meetings go late and above all progress comes in one-drop drips. 

Yet hope springs forth in the strangest places. 

Not in the naïve new face, but in the hearts and minds of veteran activists and officials, who have gone through this frustrating sleep-depriving exercise, not once or twice but numerous times. 

And it blooms in a odd metal “tree” sculpture in a center square here at the United Nations climate summit in Egypt. People write their hopes on green paper leaves.