Iceland review - 2013, Qupperneq 52

50 ICELAND REVIEW
premiered during the festival. Including never-before-seen foot-
age and new and open interviews with islanders, attendees at the
premiere were visibly touched.
“I cried when I watched it,” admits Svanhildur. During the
eruption, her second daughter was born. “I wanted to have her
christened and the priest convinced us to do it in the church on
Heimaey on July 8. She was the first child to be christened there
after the eruption. Everything was black and I struggled with
keeping the christening gown clean. The church was crowded
with men, bearded and dirty with ash. They took their boots off
at the entrance and wept, so happy were they to see new life on
the island.” Along with approximately two thirds of inhabitants,
Svanhildur and her family moved back in the autumn. However,
they never moved into the house she and her husband had been
building close to the source of the eruption, which was left buried
in ash. The house was dug out but Svanhildur preferred to relocate
and they built a new house in a different part of town. “The view
of the glacier [Eyjafjallajökull] was gone. Instead, all I could see
was the volcano.”
“I admire the people who returned when everything was cov-
ered in ash and rebuilt the community. I only traveled to Heimaey
when I had an important reason to go there,” says Einar, who
unlike the rest of his family, made a life for himself in Reykjavík.
“The place where I grew up had disappeared underneath the lava.
It took me a long time to accept it. To me the lava was a tumor,”
he reveals. “But now I enjoy coming back. Heimaey is the most
beautiful place on earth—at least when the sun is shining.”
liVing mEmoriES
The café where we’re seated is called Vinaminni (‘Memories of
Friends’), named after a house destroyed by the eruption. Each table
is dedicated to homes lost to lava, decorated with pictures of what
they looked like and their inhabitants at the time of the eruption.
A popular hangout among locals, it’s the venue for several events
during the festival and a favored place for reunions. At the café,
Einar is repeatedly greeted by old acquaintances, friends and family
members coming in from the cold. Outside, the rain is pouring and
the wind is picking up speed. The festival’s opening ceremony has
been moved inside.
“Things change,” states Mayor Elliði Vignisson in his opening
address. “We were supposed to stand outside in the sun; instead we’re
here with sun in our hearts.” Elliði gives thanks to U.S. authorities
for their help during the eruption and welcomes U.S. Ambassador
Louis E. Arreaga to the stage. “Ambassador Frederick Irving sprang
into action,” says Arreaga of the former U.S. Ambassador to Iceland’s
reaction to the eruption in 1973. “And so began the most unusual
efforts born out of Icelandic-U.S. collaboration. Ambassador Irving
still speaks of the Heimaey eruption as the high point of his dip-
lomatic career.” At 92, Irving is unable to attend the ceremony but
is represented by his daughter Barbara and eight other descendants.
“My father wanted to be here,” she announces before reading a
statement he has prepared, “and I’m proud to be among the people
my father considers as the most courageous and determined he has
ever encountered.” The statement bears evidence to Irving’s love for
fEsTIVAL
ELDHEIMAR (‘WORLDS Of fIRE’), A
MUSEUM COnSTRUCTED AROUnD THE
REMAInS Of A BUILDInG DUG OUT Of
PUMICE AT THE fOOT Of ELDfELL,
IS SET TO OPEn BEfORE THE 2014
GOSLOkAHÁTíð.
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