The Icelandic Canadian - 01.05.2008, Side 6

96
THE ICELANDIC CANADIAN
Vol. 61 #2
Editorial
by Lorna Tergesen
This editorial will deviate from my
previous point of view, that I should not
have anything from my family as an entry
into the magazine.
As so many of you already know, my
father, Stefan J. Stefanson passed away on
January 2, 2008 at the age of 92. In fact, he
would have been 93 on February 13.
Because it is so personal for me, I had
always felt that dealing with material from
him was out of line.
Now I regret that so! A short while
back, Dad was invited to Iceland for a June
17th celebration in Borgarness. There he
spoke of his adventures with having sever-
al plane loads of Icelanders come to Canada
in 1975 for our celebrations. (100 years of
the settlers landing in Manitoba or as it was
then, New Iceland).
This all began with several people
going from Canada and United States to
Iceland for their celebrations in 1974. They
were celebrating 1100th anniversary of the
settlement of Iceland. The entire trip was
exciting and well organized. So it was
decided to invite everyone over for our big
upcoming year. And come they did!
He had great tales to tell. Along with
my mother, Olla, Kristine Tomasson,
Marge and Ted Arnason they billeted
somewhere over 800 guests during the
summer months. This was no easy feat.
Many stayed with relatives but many found
new friends by simply moving in with a
Canadian Icelandic family. Some of these
relationships still exist today. The weather
was good and hot, the mosquitoes were
plentiful but it did not dampen the spirits
of those that came.
Dad was the one who would meet all
the planes. Acting as an interpreter he
would guide them through the steps of
going through customs, assuring customs
that hangikot and hardfish were indeed
allowed to come into Canada. Then he
would assign them to the appropriate hosts
or bus! This went on for several weeks. For
those that got too much sun and too many
mosquito bites, he would assign someone
to get them to the doctor or hospital. There
were a host of social events here and many
for these guests to attend.
The high point was when President
Kristjan Eldjarn and his lovely wife
Halldora arrived. This was an official visit
and so with an entourage of security guards
they took the guests to visit all the smaller
Icelandic communities in the Interlake.
There were some great tales of adventure in
those small communities. Every communi-
ty opened their hearts to the guests, doing
their utmost to make it all memorable.
There were also many official func-
tions to attend with all the federal, provin-
cial and local politicians. Each day had a
tight iternary.
My father being a storyteller often told
us of some of the problems they ran into
that needed to be solved as quickly as pos-
sible. One tale being of a very elderly gen-
tleman coming on one of the planes and not
having been registered beforehand. He had
no knowledge of relatives here and so out
of desperation, he was taken in by the
matron, Sigga Hjartarson at Betel in Gimli
for just one night. They found some rela-
tives for him in Lundar, where he was sent
but he returned to Gimli to the lovely hotel
he had been at. Then they found some rel-
atives in Selkirk and once again, he did not
wish to stay with them but wanted to be in
Betel. The end of the story is that this man
was put on one of the returning planes to
Iceland as he was not ready to co-operate.
His stay was shorter than most but he cer-
tainly thought our Betel was a fine place.
As Canadians, we were unaccustomed
to sun bathing topless. This was the norm
for our guests. Some very awkward but
funny moments arose from this. Beer was