Lögberg-Heimskringla - 01.11.2018, Síða 14

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14 • Lögberg-Heimskringla • November 1 2018
Strange, the things we
care about. Some people
care about the fate of
the timber wolf or the prairie
gopher or the red-legged
wombat. Others care about
historic events, are fixated on
Napoleon and the battle of
Waterloo. Others are passionate
about Mediterranean frescoes.
There’s no accounting for
taste.
Me, I care about Iceland.
If someone asked me why, I’d
have a difficult time explaining
the reason.
My mother was born of
northern Irish parents. That
makes me half Irish. And
the family tree goes back to
Scotland. If family lore is
accurate, two brothers came
with Cromwell. One stayed,
one went back to Scotland
and disappeared in the fog and
heather. The one who stayed is
an ancestor of mine.
My father, in spite of his
Icelandic name, was a quarter
English. One of his grandfathers
was a Bristow. There are, in and
around Oxford, lots of graves
with stones that say Bristow.
So that leaves me three-
eighths Icelandic. That’s not
much to hang a passion on. Of
course, there’s genetic folding
in. Icelanders have a lot of
Celtic background. The people
who settled Iceland weren’t
just Norwegians or Danes.
However, that strengthens
the Irish background, not the
Norwegian.
A big part of that
involvement in things Icelandic
came from growing up in Gimli,
Manitoba. Gimli was the centre
for Icelandic immigration to
Canada from the 1870s onward.
A lot of people came, stayed
for a while among people who
spoke the same language, who
were relatives and friends, then
moved on to places with better
land and more opportunities.
However, a core remained in
Gimli and the neighbouring
villages of New Iceland. There
was Hnausa, Arnes, Riverton,
Arborg, and, although it fell
outside the New Iceland
boundary, Lundar. To the south
there was Husavik, Selkirk and,
of course, Winnipeg, with its
concentration in the West End
that was known affectionately
as Goolie Town.
In the 1940s, Gimli was
still very Icelandic. People
spoke the language at home and
in conducting business. Church
services were in Icelandic.
However, my mother didn’t
speak Icelandic so my father
didn’t speak it at home and
when I was an adult, I was
surprised when I heard him
talk to someone in Icelandic.
So it wasn’t the language that
made me interested in all things
Icelandic. It’s not like I knew the
secret code. I couldn’t smugly
talk to some of my friends and
classmates in a language others
couldn’t understand. I did learn
Pig Latin but it didn’t make me
identify with pigs or Latin.
The defining event
in Gimli every year was
Íslendingadagurinn, the annual
Icelandic celebration. There
were official events. A woman
was chosen Fjallkona, the
Maid of the Mountains, who
dressed in regal robes and
laid a wreath at the foot of a
memorial cairn that, at that
time, was across the street
from our house. An elegant car
would turn up, there’d be a bit
of a cortege behind. The maid
would be led to the cairn and
people from the cars would
descend and gather. The maid
would dedicate the wreath to
the pioneers, get back in her
car, and go to the Gimli Park.
There, she would be led to a
stage where she would preside
over a Toast to Iceland, a Toast
to Canada, and numerous
other speeches, many of
which were in Icelandic and
were listened to raptly by an
older crowd. We’d have run
the two blocks to the park to
watch the formalities, then
leave for the far corner of the
park to compete in foot races
in hope of winning enough for
a hot dog and coke. From a
kid’s perspective, the day was
mostly about hotdogs slathered
in mustard and relish. In the
evening, we’d go with our
parents to the park pavilion to
watch adults dance to old time
music. The Icelandic part of
the day was eating Icelandic
pancakes, prune tort, donuts,
rúllupylsa on brown bread.
There were a lot of Icelandic
flags. Mostly, however, we
hung around our parents’ house
because relatives dropped by
from far and near. There was
a lot of eating, drinking, and
talking. The talking sometimes
went on all night.
The town was very Lutheran
and, at one time, services were
in Icelandic. However, I don’t
remember that. I’d have been at
the Sunday school, which was
in English. We did have some
ministers from Iceland. I don’t
remember that having any
effect on us.
When I was in grade three,
Icelandic lessons were offered
after school or on Saturdays.
However, the first thing we
were told was that in order
to learn Icelandic you had to
be exceptionally intelligent.
I didn’t have any reason to
believe I was exceptionally
intelligent so I didn’t go back.
There was the Sunrise
Lutheran Camp. I went there a
couple of summers. The only
thing Icelandic I remember
about it is the sago pudding.
Icelanders consumed a lot of
sago pudding. Someone said it
was frog’s eggs and, after that,
none of us would eat it.
There was, of course, the
visible existence that the town
was Icelandic. There was
Tergesen’s general store with
a drugstore and soda bar on
the south side. Nowadays, it is
mostly clothes, many of which
are Icelandic, and a bookstore.
It’s the one place where you can
go to get books by Icelanders
and Icelandic North American
writers. There was Bjarnason’s
store that was a mainstay of the
town. It was half grocery store
and half dry goods. There was
Arnason’s dairy bar. Arnason’s
had a dairy and delivered
milk that was so rich that, in
winter, the milk froze, popped
the cardboard lids off, and the
cylinder that rose up was pure
cream. We ate it. You could
hear Icelandic being spoken in
any of those places.
I don’t remember Gimli as
being particularly Icelandic. I
never heard of rotted shark or
brennivín, nothing of Iceland’s
history except that, at one time,
there were Vikings there and
not much was made of that. I
never heard rímur – no toneless,
tuneless chanting of rhymed
verses. I don’t remember
anyone quoting Hávamál to
me to get me to behave myself.
I was a voracious reader but I
read the Hardy Boys and Robin
Hood, not the sagas.
When I went to university,
I met some students my age
who were from the West End
of Winnipeg. I don’t remember
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Contributions will be: One Time Monthly Annually
Beginning /
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835 Marion Street, Winnipeg, MB R2J 0K6 Canada
Telephone: 1-866-564-2374 | Fax: (204) 284-7099 | Email: lh@lh-inc.ca
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THE THINGS WE CARE ABOUT
W.D. Valgardson
Victoria, BC
PHOTO: W.D. VALGARDSON
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