Lögberg-Heimskringla - 15.09.2006, Qupperneq 4

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The huldufólk, I think, get a bad rap. They get blamed for just about anything.
For those unfamiliar with
these figures out of Icelandic su-
perstition, they are the “hidden
people” — not exactly elves, or
sprites, but similar perhaps. The
story is that when Adam and
Eve had their first children in the
Garden of Eden, Eve was bathing
them just as God came strolling
up. Ashamed that some of the
children were not yet clean, she
hid them in the bushes.
When God found out, he
was a bit miffed and so declared
that the children who had been
hidden would stay that way, and
their descendants have since
been invisible to the other de-
scendants of Adam and Eve.
Now, I am hesitant to laugh
too much at this conceit. My
mother told me once that when
researching a project for folklore
studies in university, she inter-
viewed my langamma about the
huldufólk. Langamma admitted
there were stories about them,
but refused to say more than that
— it was bad luck to talk about
the hidden people.
Flash forward to today,
when it is common in the Ice-
landic community to hear “the
huldufólk did it” when some-
thing goes wrong. Lost your
car keys? Must have been the
huldufólk. Cheque gone missing
in the mail? Ah, those huldufólk
again. A few spelling mistakes
in Lögberg-Heimskringla? You
guessed it: huldufólk.
It raises the question: at what
point did we all lose our minds?
To attribute normal mishaps to a
horde of well-organized invis-
ible squadrons is questionable
at best. When returning from
Iceland, I related to a friend
here the story about the area in
Hafnarfjörður which was left
undeveloped because the build-
ing equipment myseriously kept
breaking down. The Icelanders
attributed the accidents to the
huldufólk, and so stopped build-
ing. Her response was, “So what
you are saying is that Icelanders
are insane?”
Whether the belief or not
holds up to scrutiny is one thing,
but I think a larger question is be-
ing ignored. If the huldufólk are
real, would it not be completely
insane to blame them for every
single thing that goes wrong?
Think about it. You can’t see
them or hear them, they might
be standing right next to you, and
the first thing you say when you
stub your toe is, “What huldufólk
did that to me?” If I were one of
them, I’d despair of ever getting
credit for doing good. I mean,
how often to you hear huldufólk
getting thanks for a lottery win,
or a lost scarf turning up, or
running into an old friend you
haven’t seen in years?
So if there were no recog-
nition for good deeds, any self-
respecting huldufólk might well
say, “What’s the point?” and turn
their energies solely to mischief.
At that point my langamma’s
caution about not speaking of
them seems pretty good advice.
Now, I know habits are
hard to break, and far be it from
me to cull one of the Icelandic
community’s favourite expres-
sions. But maybe we can start
using it when little things go the
way we want them. After all, if
you dwell on the negative, soon
that’s all you’ll be able to see.
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Heimskringla stofnað 14. janúar 1886
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4 • Lögberg-Heimskringla • Friday 15 September 2006
Don’t blame the huldufólk
Do you know these people?
The Icelandic Archives of
British Columbia have a num-
ber of early photos from Ri-
verton and Hnausa, MB need-
ing information. If you have
any information on this photo,
please contact Robert J. As-
geirsson at (604) 536-9377 or
robasg@telus.net.
Photo 2. Date circa 1925.
This photo might be of a per-
forming group, a local choir or
a graduating class photo. Notice
the ribbons on the chests of the
men. I believe that ribbons were
common ways to show that peo-
ple had paid their admission to
the park for a celebration. Rib-
bons were also issued to indicate
Íslendingadagurinn Commit-
tee members. On magnifica-
tion of the original photo, there
is a larger ribbon seen on the
sleeve of the man seated in the
middle row. That ribbon reads
“NEFNDIN.” Most of the
women in this photo, however,
do not seem to have ribbons.
Notice several women
standing on the left are holding
scrolls/certificates/programs/
music. Ingibjörg Lilja Hall-
dorson (m. Asgeirsson) is seen
seated on the grass second from
the right in a dark hat. To the
right of her on the end might be
Dora (m. Jakobson). Could this
group have been a local com-
munity choir? All the women
seem relatively young. If this
is a graduating class photo with
some of the teachers, why are
there ribbons on the men?
Bernard Eastman, of Toron-
to comments: “In the second
picture, where your mother is
sitting on the grass (with dark
hat), I believe the man immedi-
ately behind her, (fourth from
the right), is my grandfather, my
father’s father, later, the post-
master of Riverton.” Bernard
Eastman is son of Gunnsteinn
S. Eastman, son of Halldór and
Anna Eastman of Riverton.
Minnist
Remember
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