Iceland review - 2015, Qupperneq 60

58 ICELAND REVIEW
From ruins to riches, in Iceland, World
War II was sometimes called “the blessed
war” because of the boom in employ-
ment, improved infrastructure and tech-
nological development brought on by the
allied occupation. But social development
resulted in depopulation of the country-
side. To address the problem, a resolution
was submitted at the 1947 agricultural
Congress (Búnaðarþing) to “import for-
eigners” to work on farms. Two years later
the resolution was put into effect and
German newspapers advertised for farm-
hands in Iceland. The Icelandic Consulate
in lübeck was responsible for the hiring
and Gisela applied along with a friend. “I
didn’t make any plans. My friend was going,
so I just followed her.”
froM city life to coUntrySide
Not every applicant was escaping a hopeless
situation. “I had work. I worked in a drug-
store in lübeck,” stresses Hildur Björnsson,
then Hilde Raabe. “But after five years in
an office, I wanted to be in the country.”
By far the youngest of her siblings, she
lived alone with her mother, as her father
had passed in 1945. When Hildur saw the
ad in the paper, the 21-year-old jumped at
the opportunity. The destination seemed
unimportant. “The only thing I knew about
Iceland was that the capital was called
Reykjavík,” she smiles. If distancing her-
self from city life was what she wanted,
Hildur’s wish was certainly granted. She
was placed at the farm Grjótnes (‘Rocky
Cape’) on Melrakkaslétta, a vast tundra
just below the arctic Circle in Northeast
Iceland. The journey was long and com-
plicated. “I traveled by train to Hamburg,
by ship to Reykjavík, by bus to akureyri,
by plane to Raufarhöfn and by motor boat
to Grjótnes.” When I ask whether it was
a shock to arrive in such a remote loca-
hiStorY
laufásvegur in reykjavík, where gisela and árni live.