Lögberg-Heimskringla - 27.08.2004, Blaðsíða 16

16 » Lögberg-Heimskringla • Friday 27 August 2004
“I always think
in Icelandic”
Kristján Gunnar
Anderson in Ottawa
first went to lceland in
1930. Fifty-one years
later he and his wife
Phyllis went there
with their twin daugh-
ters. The couple’s visit
this summer was their
sixth but his seventh.
Steinþór
Guðbjartsson visited
them in Ottawa.
Not being able to see, or
having next to no
vision, is one of the
hardest handicaps to face.
Kristján Gunnar Anderson, or
Kris, lost his sight about six
years ago, but he has respond-
ed to it as well as he can.
“Through Gísli Helgason in
Iceland I got a Swedish voice
computer program that reads
my e-mail in Icelandic and tells
me the message,” he says.
In recent years, the couple
has visited Iceland mainly to
strengthen the ties with his rel-
atives. “A few years ago we
had a family reunion in
Akureyri and some 70 people
showed up,” Phyllis says. She
is of English descent but has
fallen in love with the Icelandic
roots of her husband and acts
as “Icelandic” as he does.
“She is not only my better
half because without her help I
would not have been able to do
anything after I lost my sight,”
Kris says. His mother Guðrún
Kristjánsdóttir was from
Víðigerði in Eyjafjörður, Ice-
land and his father Páll Andrés-
son from Sigurðarstaðir in
Bárðardalur in Þingeyjarsýsla.
His paternal grandparents
emigrated with three boys to
Canada and homesteaded in
Argyle, Manitoba, in 1887. His
mother moved to Canada in
1913 and Kris was bom 78
years ago. “I was raised up in a
very Icelandic atmosphere in
the southwest part of Manitoba
and leamed the language as a
kid. I read the Icelandic paper
all the time and in particular
did I enjoy the Icelandic
þjóðsögur [folk tales]. Actually
I was crazy about them. When
I was four years old I went to
Iceland with my parents. We
participated in Alþingishátíðin
1930, the thousand-year
anniversary of the Alþingi. I
remember a few things from
that visit.
“In 1981 our twin daugh-
ters graduated from the univer-
sity and wanted to see Iceland.
The whole family enjoyed the
visit very much and we have
been regular guests since then.”
The Icelandic language
means a lot to Kris and last
year he took some Icelandic
lessons on the Internet. “I took
10 lessons with Inga Karlsdót-
tir in Kópavogur and then we
met her earlier this summer in
Iceland. It went extremely well
and I am very pleased,” Kris
says. Recently he translated an
article from Morgunblaðið and
had it published in Lögberg-
Heimskringla.
Kris has been instrumental
in the buildup of the “Ice-
landic” society in Ottawa. With
Bjami Guðlaugsson, he was
the co-founder of the first Ice-
landic club in the capital some
20 years ago and he is a board
member of the Friends of Ice-
land (FOI). “Bjami was eager
to get the Icelandic people
together so we went through
the telephone book, found Ice-
landic names, called them and
established the club,” Kris
recalls. “We had about 100
people participating in
þorrablót and summer picnics,
but when he went back to Ice-
land the club collapsed.”
Since the establishment of
the FOI Kris has been very
much involved. “He sits down
with his computer, organizes
the picnic and keeps us going,”
Lou Howard says. “I try to help
as much as I can,” Kris says. “I
have always enjoyed working
in the Icelandic surroundings
and as a matter of fact I always
think in Icelandic.”
“Sometimes he says some-
thing to me in Icelandic but I
only understand 'hœ'’ and
‘bless, bless,' Phyl says, and
says it’s better to stick to Eng-
lish for her. “When Kris’s sister
went over to Iceland she had to
go to a washroom and could
not remember the Icelandic
word for it.”
“She could hardly stand it
any longer when she asked:
‘Hvar er kamarinnV They
understood her and she got to
the right place but we don’t
know all the new Icelandic
words,” Kris says.
Kris has been working on
his genealogy, and recently he
translated the genealogy of his
grandfather from Icelandic to
English. “The Icelandic ver-
sion was 109 pages but my
English version is 130 pages,”
he says. “It was fascinating
doing it,” he adds. “It took
some time but it was very
interesting, because I am Ice-
landic.”
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