The Nikolaj Coster-Waldau on television screens and the one in real life share a striking similarity -- both are adamant in their wills to fight off the White Walkers.
Best known for his role as Ser Jaime Lannister in HBO's Game Of Thrones, this latest season sees the golden knight taking a solid stance to battle against a gargantuan number of White Walkers -- a race of ice-zombies steadily descending from the North and likely to ravage all of civilisation on the continent of Westeros. Their true motive is still unknown, but it's never rang more clear and true that all warring kingdoms must inescapably band together to combat this lethal threat, regardless of their sides or loyalties. Spoiler ahead: Ser Jaime even abandons his queen twin when she reveals her impassive attitude toward taking part in the cause, this a momentous step considering their inseparable nature and incestuous relationship.
Out of the telly and in the real world, Coster-Waldau was appointed a Goodwill Ambassador for the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) last year. Clearly chosen for his extensive reach and sporty disposition (although the latter not a requisite for getting chosen as a UNDP ambassador), he joins the ranks of other high-profile ambassadors, among them Antonio Banderas, Michelle Yeoh and Crown Prince Haakon of Norway. As part of his ambassadorship, Coster-Waldau was in Thailand last month to raise awareness of the causes he hopes to shine a spotlight on, namely poverty, gender equality and climate change.
Coster-Waldau plants mangroves in Samut Sakhon.
"I could have chosen more or less, but it just seemed like an obvious choice, with my connection to Greenland," he explains of ambassadors given the freedom to choose causes they'd like to take a stand in for themselves. "My wife's from Greenland and in Greenland, you actually see the effects of the temperature rising. You have this rather big block of ice and the ice caps that we really don't want to melt."
The foreboding peril of climate change is a perfect metaphor for the threat of the White Walkers -- a looming menace soon to come -- that people even deny (cough, Trump) until it finally arrives and it's all too late.
"The world is coming together and almost every country has signed the Paris Agreement, so I'm very optimistic about the future when it comes to fighting to take climate action because we are taking climate action," says the Danish native. "The tough thing is that the goals are very ambitious. But we don't have a choice -- we have to reach them. It's all about political will and it seems that right now we have it. My big fear is that we'll have another big financial crash because last time, just before that in 2008, there was so much momentum behind this movement, and when the crash happened, it kind of just fell down the list of priorities."
He knocks on wood playfully, ensuring that he's not just a robot reciting the kind of wonted monologues expected of ambassadors.
Coster-Waldau's ardent charisma shines through the dark, dingy room as we sit on dusty plastic chairs and talk in Krua Cook Moo's seafood restaurant at Samut Sakhon. Towering and large even without his armour on, he stands out in a sea of Thai UNDP staff and press that surround him during the field trip around Khok Kham, a district in the Samut Sakhon province internationally known for its salt pans. After his first day of touring Nang Loeng market and sustainable tourism in Bangkok, his second day's trip involved more mud -- be it birdwatching by the salt pans, getting a bit wet while planting mangrove trees and talking to the villagers about how global warming affects their sea-salt production.
It all seems like a random list of activities, but all are essentially interlinked -- despite one auntie's answer to the actor's question of how her salt business is affected by the changing temperature.
"Nothing's changed much really. We'll still rely on this occupation. It's managed to pay for my three children's college education," she proudly proclaims. Coster-Waldau muffles a grin at this unpolished answer, but members of the Khok Kham Natural Conservation Club explain that while her family may have no plans to sell their land in search of more lucrative pursuits, some of her neighbours already have, as sea-salt farming is no longer as profitable as it used to be.
This directly contributes to globally endangering waterbirds and migratory shoebirds such as the spoon-billed sandpiper, of which fewer than 400 remain. With over 50 types of birds heavily relying on these disturbance-free salt pans for food sources before they continue to migrate on the East Asia-Australian Flyway, these birds are becoming vulnerable to extinction with no place left to breed and feed.
"What's been inspiring for me and this trip is to see that sometimes it's just a tiny little project that's done by a few people, but actually makes a huge difference in those people's lives," Coster-Waldau says, as he learns of the situation at the same time as the press tagging along. "It's been so cool to see the effect of the little projects, because it's the quality of life of the culture, and it has this ripple effect. It's the same with the migrating birds -- it's part of your culture and it's part of something unique and you want to hold on to that."
The other main event of Coster-Waldau's visit saw him refereeing the Global Goals World Cup at NIST International School the next day, wherein 16 women's football teams across Thailand came to compete.
His daughters are the main catalyst behind his choosing to speak for female empowerment, and the father of two says: "I come from a country with a high level of equality, but there's still work to be done. It's still not perfect, but when you look at the global scale, women are being stopped from engaging, stopped from living free lives and stopped from being productive. Every country that empowers women flourishes, so it doesn't make sense. We have more than 150 countries that discriminate against women and that has to change. There is no reason why women shouldn't be afforded the same rights as men. Obviously, I have two daughters and I want them to be able to go anywhere in the world and enjoy the same rights as men do. We should all be equal."
Equality for all means he's going to have to head back to Thailand again soon, having been in this area of the world for the first time without his family.
"My kids are very unhappy that I didn't bring them with me, so I'm going to have to come back," he laughs. But beyond being a family man, the face of television's most loved villain-hero and a posterboy for world-saving issues, audiences can be sure to still see Nikolaj Coster-Waldau continually doing what he does best: acting. "I've been doing this for 25 years. My job is to try to understand human behaviour, being an actor, and I find it fascinating."
From thrilling roles as a nightwatchman to strolling through the slums of Flea Bottom, the actor has definitely seen his share of injustices around the world, but asserts that there's nothing on the screen that could replicate what reality entails.
"There's no movie that can describe the real experience of extreme hunger," he says, sounding a bit like Ser Jaime making a moralistic, righteous speech, only this time it's not fictitious. "No one can really understand it, but I think you can relate to it. I think all of us would understand that it's not good, that it's not right for any child to be born in extreme poverty or hunger, and that's why we have an obligation to do what we can to better the world.
"Sometimes you can get a little impatient because the task is enormous. But it's like anything: you just start slowly, but surely get there. But everyone has to be part of it."
