Saturday, December 16, 2006

another elf story

photo: statue in gimli, manitoba
from
museum of huge beings


the other night was a restless one. after a few hours of tossing and turning, i finally sat up and decided to put the radio on. listening to a local station with my clock alarm next to my bed, i sat there for a quite a while, concentrating on an all night radio program in the dark.

on came a segment with a guest from iceland. i thought, "that's different .... when do you really hear much about iceland?" well, different it was. the guest's name was magnus skarphedinsson;
"[he]is both the brother of the leader of one of Iceland’s most influential political parties and the head of The Icelandic Elf School.

That’s right, Elf School. With a curriculum, classrooms, textbooks, diplomas, and ongoing research, Álfaskólinn (Elf School) teaches about the five different types of elves, hidden people, and other invisible beings that inhabit this island nation." (quote from following article; see below).

that certainly got my attention! who would have ever thought.

apparently, this is taken very seriously and he said that if they believe a spot is elf or hidden people-inhabited they will actually zone around building anything in that area!!

the read more about this, look at the article, in the land of the fairy king: iceland's elf school.

here is a very interesting article about iceland and some of the beliefs they have. more about the hidden people in this report. elves in modern iceland.

i wonder if i dreamt about little people that night. i know crumpet was on my mind.

canada has the largest number of icelandic immigrants in the world. most of them settled around gimli, manitoba. read about gimli's yearly icelandic festival.

4 comments:

Cheryl said...

Perhaps life in the land of the midnight sun (and, for the rest of the year, land of endless darkness) makes us humans more open to magical belief. This is a good thing, I think. The world needs more magic. :-)

(That said, I can just imagine the reaction of local developers if we suggested "zoning around" an elfish home in southern Ontario! LOL)

burekaboy — said...

i think you are right — that setting would make for great lore. and you're also right that we need more magic. look what is going on everywhere these days. :(

i was really surprised at how much they apparently believe in this stuff and how ingrained it is in their culture. you'd associate them more with battling norsemen/women, i'd think. enchanting idea believing in elves and hidden people, nonetheless.

lol, they'd lock you up in some mental institution faster than you could blink here in canada if you said you needed to rezone due to possible elf housing!!

Jihan said...

wows... how did you get the spellin for his name? I dont think I can pronounce it without risk of suffering some serious tongue sprain..

this elf business is serious in real life... I never knew... oh well I use to believe in fairies when I was small

burekaboy — said...

pj - lol, it's called copy and paste. i don't think i'd be able to pronounce it either!

i had no idea about how seriously it is taken in iceland either. strange, isn't it? or maybe not.....