Mikið frá mynd (A lot from a picture)

You can tell a lot from a picture. Take this one for example. It is of some unknown Icelanders. I got it during a random search of websites having to do with Iceland.
What can you tell from the picture? It is easy to see that more than one family is represented here. At first glance it appears that there are two daughters and a son in the foreground. Upon closer inspection though you can see that the little girl on the right has the hand of, not the grandfather in the picture, but the woman behind her. The little one wanted to see something through the crowd but couldn't do so without squeezing through. Mom is holding on tight though. Whatever is being looked at is fascinating to the kids and adults alike. The boy in the red shirt appears to be a part of a youth soccer team and if you translate the words on his shirt, they read, "corner ball". There are some kind of festivities in the area. The red-shirt boy has a ballon with a netting around it. The girl on the left has a ballon but it is not blown up, though it appears she has and is trying. The boy in the blue shirt, by the way he is standing, seems to have been right there for at least a few minutes. There is likely some kind of performance underway that is captivating them all. I would dare to say that this boy is "popular" at school.

The date of the picture is August 21, 2004. On that day in Reykjavík it was the Reykjavík Marathon. There may have been festivities downtown on a warm Icelandic day in August that would have brought everyone out. The mom on the left is being entertained. She and at least one of her children came to the events with a jacket, just in case, but has taken hers off, as well as has perhaps the boy. The girl on the left doesn't mind dressing like one since she is wearing pink, has a butterfly on her pants and lace at the bottom of her shirt. Grandpa has a newspaper or a program of the days events and seems to be intent on the out of sight performance as well.

What else can you see about the picture of these unknown Icelanders?

Trip of a lifetime....again!

About nine months ago I received a phone call from my mother. During our conversation, she reminded me that in 2008, she and dad would be celebrating their 50th wedding anniversary. I had already given the subject some thought, and was ready (i thought) for what was to follow. I told her not to worry. I was already in the preliminary planning phases of a big party. We would fly in long-lost friends and relatives for an extravaganza not to be soon forgotten. She stopped me mid sentence, and said that they had some ting else in mind. She said, "Iceland has always been such an important part of your life, and dad and I feel like we've missed out on something....We want to go to Iceland, and we want you and Chris (my wife) to come with us. We readily accepted.

We left on the 12th of June, and arrived in Reykjavík at nearly midnight to a beautiful midnight sun. This is a picture we took at a baptism that we were able to attend on the first night there Mattíus Olafsson had a friend that was baptized. He got to know some of the kids in the branch through work.



This is Olafur Olafsson´s extended family. Olafur married Björg Marteinsdottir while I was there in 1984. When I left, Björg was expecting Unnur. That is her on the left. Sóley and her family are on the right. The young man third from the left was the one baptized that night.


Sóley hates it when I tell this story, but I can´t help myself. When I was just a new missionary, Björg and Sóley had just moved back to Iceland from the states. Sóley spoke very little Icelandic, but was learning quickly....probably more quickly than us. She used to corner the Elders in church and beg us, "Please .......speak English to me!" Inevitably, Björg would find us, and scold both of us. Sóley has such a great family. Kristján is a great man, and has done much for the church in Iceland. Together they are raising another generation of Icelandic saints. Daniel, their oldest, just became a Deacon this week. The girls are the cutest. Anja and Yrja. This was a great evening, getting caught up with Olí and Björg.

Að Læra Nýtt Tungumál (Learning a New Language)

Stundum hugsa ég svo oft um íslensku og Ísland and ég þreytast. Það er ekki einfalt ferli fyrir mig til að allt í einu og snögglega byrja að tala eða hugsa á íslensku þegar það er nauðsynlegt. Ég kann það nokkuð þegar nauðsynlegt er, en það er ekki auðvelt fyrir mig.

Ég man eftir því, jafnvel þegar ég hafði verið á Íslandi eitt og hálft ár og gat talað nokkuð, að ég hafði erfitt með að muna að tala hægt, eða á minnsta kosti á venjulegan hraða. Ég vildi alltaf virðast geta talað vel svo að fólk myndi hlusta á boð okkar heldur en hve slæmt tal mitt væri. Svo ég talaði of hratt stundum og myndi hrasa um orðin mín oft. Ef ég hugsaði um það, gat ég hægt ferð orða minna og orðið skilinn.

Ég held að allir sem læra nýtt tungumál verða taugaóstyrkir reglulega (í byrjunni) þegar nauðsyn kemur fram til að tala málið við einhvern sem talar málið sem moðurmál sitt. Jafnvel á þessa stund er ég að nota orðabækur mínar til að skrifa þessa grein þegar ég get ekki munað eftir orði hér og þar sem ég vil nota. En að skrifa þetta hjálpar mér til að æfa mig svo að hæfileiki minn með málinu heldur áfram að vaxa heldur en að minnka. Ef ég hugsa aldrei á íslensku og tala aldrei, hvernig getur hann vaxið?

Nokkrum finnst gaman að læra mörg tungumál. Ég hef enn svo mikið til að læra af íslensku að ég hugsa ekki um önnur mál. Ég kann ekki að tala önnur tungumál. Það er í lagi. Ég skil mikið á spænsku og pínulítið á fáein önnur. Ég veit þegar ég er að heyra þýsku, dönsku, norsku, ítalsku, frönsku, portúgalsku, hebresku, kantonsku, mandarínsku og rússnesku. En, ég er ánægður með að eyða tíma mínum að læra íslensku vel. Er alltaf meira að læra um hana og dýpri til að komast í henni.

Karlakór (Men's Choir)

A few weeks ago I was contacted by two people who serve in the leadership of the Icelandic Association of Utah, David Ashby and Jack Tobiasson. They asked if I would do as I have done in years past and arrange some kind of musical number for the Sunday night fireside which is associated every year with "Iceland Days" in Spanish Fork. I agreed and then proceeded to send out a mass email to all the former LDS missionaries who had served in Iceland. The email went out to over 100 email addresses. I asked all who might be in the area and available to come to Spanish Fork and sing "God Be With You" in Icelandic for the fireside last night. There ended up being eight of us there: Tyler Shepherd, Craig Holdaway, Matt Lillywhite, Brian Moser, Cody Sunderland, Matt Hyatt, Dennis Flynn and myself. Right before we sang I told the audience that we had not rehearsed, but that we would sing the same "parts" as we did when we were missionaries. The pianist played the introduction and I heard a power come out of these men as they sang that favorite hymn, "Guð sé með sér uns við hittumst heil".

I was able to get everyone rounded up afterwords for a picture except for Matt Hyatt. He got away somehow before I could catch him. From left to right in this picture we are: Darron Allred, Dennis Flynn, Cody Sunderland, Tyler Shepherd, Brian Moser, Craig Holdaway and Matt Lillywhite.

A woman named Telma Marínósdóttir gave the opening prayer in Icelandic. Then I noticed her crying as we sang. When I heard her fluent Icelandic during her prayer and noticed her crying, I wondered who she was. I had never heard of her, and yet here she was, involved, praying powerfully in the spirit. She was not a Western Icelander so who was she? I spoke to her afterward and got her interesting story. She basically moved with her family to Las Vegas when she was younger for her father's work, found the Church there and joined, has since married and just found out about the Icelandic Association of Utah not too long ago. We became friends immediately and she promised to help me in any way she can with my teaching Icelandic 201 in the fall at BYU.

The Western Icelanders in the Icelandic Association of Utah continue to hold on to their heritage. I heard someone say that the first Icelandic Days celebration was held in the 1880's. A proud heritage that I am honored to be a part of, even though the closest blood tie I have found so far is only in Denmark....

Þurrkaðir Fiskar (Dried Fish)

Some of us have been back from Mormon missions to Iceland now for 33 years. Not me, of course, but some of the 165 of us. Dan and Dave Geslison, Gary Buckway and Blake Hansen, for example. We come home from that nearly other-worldly experience and pick back up with our former lives. Some of us maintain some pretty close ties with a few Icelanders who we got to know well and loved. Some of us developed deep and long lasting friendships with some of the other missionaries who served there and with whom we had some amazing experiences. Those experiences were often laced with a fair bit of pain and hardship along with the occasional amazing point in time. These experiences are hard to describe to those who didn't go through the same thing there....

On that rare occasion when you get into a conversation with someone who has never even heard about Iceland, let alone been there, the back and forth of that exchange usually revolves around only one or two questions and our standard answers of, "yeah, it was pretty cold there." and "no, not many people were interested in our message." (Kind of a dry conversation, like these drying fish). We walk away though with very specific and vivid memories returning, very few of which would have been considered "normal" or "cliché" to the person we just spoke to (like the story about how the Icelanders dry their fish). If we had been able to sense an interest from the person in getting past those initial clichés, then we sense we can be a little more open about how deeply our feelings run for that land and the people there.

A few times each year, a former missionary will be able travel to Iceland, not always on the way to somewhere else, and spend a few days with old friends and somewhat familiar places. That is when the store of love for and interest in Iceland and the Icelanders returns and we each feel the same feelings we did when we lived there as missionaries, wanting to help that group of people to come to know God better.

I know it is the same for Mormon missionaries wherever in the world they serve, but to me, Iceland, its people, its land and its language are THE place. There is nothing cliché about Iceland to any of us.

Auka Fréttir (Additional News)

Just a few additional bits of information about members of the Church in Iceland and how the "jarðskjálfti" affected them. This is from Lee Wohlgemuth in an email he sent me yesterday from Iceland where he and his wife are serving as a senior missionary couple.

"All of us are fine. A number of local people were injured and had to go to the hospital, and a few members also sustained some minor injuries. The epicenter of the quake was near Selfoss, about 40 miles from where we live in Reykajvik. We have missionaries and members in Selfoss, and many members in Hveragerði, a small town about 9 miles from Selfoss. The mountain between Selfoss and Hveragerði is where the quake was centered. We had driven by the area about 1/2 hour before the quake occurred, as we were returning to Reykajvik from Selfoss.

The quake was, of course, felt in Reykjavik and in surrounding areas, but the damage was worst in Hveragerði and Selfoss. Our chapel, a rented hall in a store building in Selfoss, was also slightly damaged, and we have some small repairs to make. Our members in the area were harder hit in their homes. The Selfoss Elders Quorum President, Jóhann, who lives in Hveragerði, lost about everything in his kitchen and dining room. Everything was dumped onto the floor and is broken. The house itself sustained damage, and the walls are not at right angles any more! During some of the aftershocks, Jóhann could see the walls swaying and moving a bit, then settling a bit further off square. A nearby neighbor, Sveinbjörg, also lost almost all of her dishes and crockery and china, plus the cabinets all came off the walls. Sveinbjörg is the lady who translated the Book of Mormon into Icelandic in 1981. Her house is a mess.

Other members in Hveragerði and Selfoss had some significant losses, but not as bad as Jóhann and Sveinbjörg. They all have their miracle stories, of things that were spared, and they are all grateful that everyone got through it as well as they did. They have had a very healthy attitude, as they have simply cleaned up, thrown away the broken items, and moved on. Stoic. And faithful.

There is a little remaining road damage in the quake area. The surrounding area is well known for the hot geysirs which are everywhere. They are all steaming as usual. They seem to be even more active than normal, so you never know when the ground will open up again. The whole countryside is broken up lava rock from previous eruptions, and nothing is very stable.

You may be interested to know that the mountain Hekla erupts about every ten years. Hekla is about 40 miles from the latest quake area, further away from Reykjavik. There is talk that Hekla will spew lava again, perhaps earlier than its expected next eruption in 2010 or 2011. Of course, the Elders are praying that it will blow while we are here, so we can see it. The Relief Society President of the Selfoss branch lives near Hekla, and has a good view of it from her living room window. We always joke that we´ll all come to her house when Hekla blows again, and eat popcorn while we watch the eruption in comfort. Until we have to run! Hekla erupted the last time in 2001, and ash darkened the sky and fell in Reykjavik at that time. We drove up near Hekla a few days ago, just to look."

Nýjar upplýsingar um jarðskjálftann (New Information about the Earthquake)

The earthquake in China was an 8.0 on the Richter scale. The epicenter was in Sichuan Province. About 90 kilometers away is a city called Du Jiang Yan. I girl at BYU sent me a few pictures of the damage to her family's home today in Du Jiang Yan. It had been condemned and will need to be rebuilt. Many families there are living in tents at the edge of the city. The following is a portion of an email I received from this girl in my office at BYU, "My hometown Du Jiang Yan is only 92 kilometers away from the center of the earthquake; therefore, my hometown is one of the cities that has been damaged most severely. Over 4000 people died in my hometown alone and 80% of the households are so seriously ruined that they need to be demolished."

In contrast, the earthquake in Iceland was not as strong--in the 6.0 category--and did not kill anyone thankfully. But there was still a lot of damage. I just received a few pictures of the Nóatun grocery store showing some of the damage there. Lots of things thrown off of shelves and broken glass.

I wrote to the current senior couple who are serving in Iceland right now and they wrote me back the following about the members who were in that area: "Most of the damage was in Hveragerði and some in Selfoss. In Selfoss, Barður had some glass things break, they were able to clean up the damage. No one was injured. Johan and Þorstina seemed to have a good deal of damage in their home. Things fell off the walls, much internal damage. In fact Johan said that his walls weren´t at right angles anymore. They are not cleaning up because insurance needs to come and take pictures. They also had a trip to Paris planned and will leave on Tuesday for a week. When they return, many have offered to come and help them clean up. Sveinbgörg had many things fall out of her cupboards. She said she has 4 plates left out of a servive for 12 china and everyday ware. Her children have been very good to come and help her clean up things in her home. She said after the earthquake they were told to stay out of their homes. She said she had walked up and down the street for as long as she could and then she went into her garden to work. She said she was kneeling to work in her flowers and for about 20 minutes while working, the earth just kept moving around. She mentioned that she has felt many after shocks, as have many of the people in Selfoss and Hveragerði. Valla said they just had a few trinckets that were broken. Margret Annie did not report any damage either, but she was further away from the center of the earthquake. Greta was in Spain at the time with the kids. There was minor damage to the road from Hveragerði to Selfoss, a couple of new bumps and one small crack across the road. We have felt no aftershocks in the Reykjavik area. We were very blessed that there were very few injuries, and nothing serious. Since it was a good day in Iceland, some school children were outdoors playing and a ceiling came down in their school. Also some men digging ditches took a late break and so they were away from their machinery when the quake occured. All is well with us here. We are happy to report that everyone is safe and many of the messes have been cleaned up and now they are back to their regular lives. We will send more reports if anything major occurs."

Sigh of relief....

Jarðskjálfti (Earthquake)

Not knowing more about the causes of earthquakes than that the tectonic plates are involved as they move, I used to think it was strange when I would hear about an earthquake occuring in Iceland like it did last week. I thought it was strange because the plates are pulling apart in Iceland, not coming together and colliding. That is why when you go to the visitor's center at Thingvellir in Iceland, there is a display there which shows how much the land has separated in the last 1000 years. I saw that back in 2004 and was reminded again how unique Iceland was as a landmass.

I searched the internet today looking for a unique picture which showed what the earthquake had been like in Iceland last week. I found this seismograph image which is said to be showing the "P wave and the surface waves." I don't remember enough from my college geology class to remember exactly what those were, but it is easy to see that some serious movement was going on. All news reports say that the damage will be expensive to repair, but no one was seriously injured.

As missionaries in Iceland, every one of us used to wish for some kind of cataclysmic event there to help people realize they needed God. I suppose we didn't really want people to suffer much of what that type of event would bring, but something Elijah-esque would be okay. A famine, bank and money problems, an earthquake or two, with a volcano eruption in a populated area thrown in for good measure. Oh, wait. All of these things have happened in Iceland, if not during this last 12 months alone, then we can go back to the volcano that covered a good part of Heimaey of the Westmann Islands back in the 70's. And okay, the famines were not that recent, but some serious suffering was going on in those days.

But even when those things do happen, the missionaries continue to move along, working as hard as they know how, and continue to find just the one here and two there who can sense the gift they are being offered. The key then, I suppose, is to try to avoid having to receive a "shaking" from God in the spiritual sense by trying to sense the gifts that are right in front of us.

He exists. He loves us. He has ALWAYS given his truth through his Son, in person, to prophets who then go forward with authority to preach the purest Word. We can know him today and hope to avoid a spiritual shaking. As Nephi was commanded in the Book of Mormon in 1 Nephi 17:53 "And it came to pass that the Lord said unto me: Stretch forth thine hand again unto thy brethren, and they shall not wither before thee, but I will shock them, saith the Lord, and this will I do, that they may know that I am the Lord their God."

Íslensk Æfing (Icelandic Practice)

Ég borða (yeg bore-the)-I eat.
Ég sef (sev)-I sleep.
Ég fer (fair)-I go
Ég kem (kem)-I come
Ég sé (sye)-I see
Ég byrja (beer-ya)-I begin
Ég hætti (high-tee)-I stop
Ég mun (moon)-I will
Ég skal (the “a” like in fall)-I shall
Ég elska (el-skuh)-I love
Ég þarf (tharv)-I need
Ég get (get)-I can
Ég hátta (how-tuh)-I get ready for bed
Ég vek (vek)-I wake up
Ég lifi (liv-ee)-I live
Ég skil (skil)-I understand
Ég geri (Gary)-I do/make
Ég finn (fin)-I feel/find
Ég vil (i like in ill)-I want/will
Ég hugsa (hoog-sa)-I think

Bara nokkra íslensku til að æfa ykkur.
Just a little Icelandic to keep you in practice.

The Best "Falls"

Which of these is the best "fall"?

Skogarfoss in southern Iceland?

Near Mount Timpanogos in Utah?

Holly, my daughter. A year ago. Her first time skating?

Tilfinningavekjandi Myndir (Emotion-causing Pictures)

Why is it that some pictures cause such strong feelings or emotions when we look at them? Is it because our minds and heart can do such a good job of "filling in the blanks" when a really powerful picture is taken and we place ourselves there?

This first picture looks like it could have been taken with black and white film. It wasn't though. For me it is extremely easy to imagine being there. The mist. The wind. The freezing water and air. The desire to take it all in, while at the same time wanting to head for shelter. This picture was taken on the southern coast of Iceland a few years ago. The original Vikings would be out in open boats on the open seas in weather like this and not think anything of it.

I've been reading Egill's Saga recently (for the first time ever). I am about one third through it and am amazed at how the elements didn't frighten them like it might you and me out on the open sea, or even close to land like in this picture. That they sailed in open boats too amazes me.

I spent my early years from age 6 to 12 in Tallahassee, Florida. My father had a friend who we went to church with who regularly went deep sea fishing in the Gulf of Mexico. He took us along on occasion. We would leave at 5am and head out to sea three or four miles. Then we would trawl for King Mackerel or Hardtails. I thought seeing the fish come in on the lines was cool as a young kid, but the sea scared me to death. And then to be seasick often on top of that. And the Gulf of Mexico waters were warm! These Norwegian/Icelandic vikings must really have been tough.

I think I would want to stay in an area like this last picture from the Westmann Islands just off the south coast of Iceland. This picture evokes a lot of emotion for me as well. Imagine that being your backyard....

Gömul bréf (old letters)

My full time job at BYU is as the Director of the International Admissions Office for the undergraduate students. I love my work and enjoy getting to know so many international students day in and day out. But because I was a missionary in Iceland, I get to use my experience in Iceland and the Icelandic I learned there in unexpected ways. One of the things I get to do with the language is to, on occasion, translate old Icelandic letters and journals into English for different people. The last two days I have been translating an old letter that was written in 1888 in Spanish Fork, Utah. The author had immigrated to Utah and wrote it to a friend who was still back in Iceland.

Between the years 1853 and 1914 there were a number of waves of immigrants who left Iceland and headed to Utah. Most were Mormons who had joined the Mormon faith in Iceland but wanted to gather with the other Mormons in Utah. They were also often eager to leave behind the hard life they were experiencing both physically and spiritually in Iceland in those days. Once they got to Utah and experienced what seemed to be in all ways a better life, they would send letters to family members and friends who were still in Iceland to tell them about it. They would spend most of their words in these letters telling their families back home how much wheat they raised or how many sheep they had and what price they were getting for both. The page of the letter I have put in this entry is one of a four page letter talking about how much the writer earned shearing sheep and how much wheat he was given in payment. He talks about the number of Icelanders who built homes that year and about how hard it was to not be able to understand everything that was heard in church because the Icelanders of that day didn't understand English as well as they do today.

I never considered myself one who really had an interest in History, per se. But as I've become involved with these letters, journals and newspaper articles from the mid- to late- 1800's, I find that I really do like history, at least the history of this people in this part of the world. Most of us don't spend much (if any) time thinking about the cost of wheat or how much we would get for the wool from a newly shorn sheep, but these were big deals to these folks and many others of that day. Their spelling and sentances were a bit different from today. They would write the words "fyrir" and "gefa" for example as "firir" and "giefa."

The most interesting statements or sentances in these old letters for me are ones that say things like, “Ifir höfuð lifum við nu mikið goðu og rólegu lífi á okkar ei in plássi. Höfum nog að borða, drekka og brenna.” Or in English, "Overall we now live a very good and peaceful life in our own space. We have enough to eat, drink and burn." The measuring stick for a good and peaceful life was often, "Do I have enough sheep, a few good horses, a full crop of thickly growing wheat, a place to live out of the elements, a place to worship with others of ones faith and a healthy family?" All other considerations were secondary. No phones, computers, iPods or day planners.

There is something to be said about living simply with an eye focused on the things that really matter. Too bad that the act of living simply has now become for most a lost art--one that many people no longer seem to be concerned about discovering.

Trúboðaskór (Missionary shoes)

Back in 1984 when I went into the MTC, I remember thinking how cool my missionary shoes were. I thought they would last forever they seemed to be so well built. This picture shows pretty much what they looked like at the beginning of my mission. The sole was about 3/4 of an inch thick (it seemed) and looked like it could last even through an entire two-year mission in Iceland. I ended up being mostly right. They did last my whole mission and I could have worn them home. The missionaries of my day had a tradition though. Sometime in the last week or two of our time in Iceland we would take the bus down to one of the nearby rocky beaches with two pairs of shoes. We would wear our old worn out shoes to the beach and then change into the pair we would go home in once we had arrived at the beach. Then after a bit of nostalgia-filled expressions of shoe appreciation, we would tie the shoelaces together of the faithful pair and chuck them out into the ocean.

We thought doing so was an appropriate rite of passage, one that all missionaries there should go through. Maybe I would not do the same thing today, being the environmentally conscious fellow that I am now, but there was something very satisfying about sending those shoes to the cold Icelandic depths. In a way it was tangible evidence that we would soon be able to leave the cold behind and rejoin lives that were somewhat distantly remembered by that time but were dearly missed. It was also a physical act that allowed each of us to symbolically and in reality leave the pain and hardship of the past two years and start another life, one that focused a bit more on each of us as individuals after two years of the opposite. I remember the beach being very rocky that day, as most Icelandic beaches are, and the water and constant wind very cold.

I wonder where those shoes are today 22 years later....

Næðingur frá fortíðinni (Blast from the past)

Okay, so the translation leaves something to be desired. The one disadvantage of not having Icelandic be my native language is that when I want to translate a unique English colloquialism like this one, doing so ends up proving quite difficult. The Icelandic-English dictionaries out today are better than we ever had on my mission. They provide tons of common phrases using many of the individual words in the dictionary. This helps a lot when we are trying to know the proper ways to express these unique phrases. I am happy to know though that even advanced speakers of their second language often do not understand these unique phrases which do not translate word-for-word.

I got a very cool picture in an email today from a returned missionary who served in Iceland named Rob Mikkelsen. He was there from 1976-























1978, about seven years before me. I've attached it here. This is a picture of Gerhard Guðnason the day he was baptized in the summer of 1978. He has German and Icelandic roots. The missionaries in the picture from left to right are Doug Brinton, Jerry Ohrn, (Gerhard), Rob Mikkelsen, David Knechtel and Kevin Barton. I don't know the whole story behind Gerhard's conversion to the Church back then, but I know that every one of these missionaries was very happy that day. They are even happier today because 30 years later, Gerhard is still active. I saw and spoke with him two months ago on my trip and he is doing well. It is people like Gerhard who help to keep things stable in the Church in a land, like so many others, where people come and go spiritually. Golden for these missionaries and all who have known him since.

Nokkrar myndir (A few pictures)

Not quite the cliffs of Dover, but impressive nonetheless.
I must not have gotten an invitation for the branch outing....
I lived in the north of Iceland during the winter of 85-86 in a fjord town called Akureyri. Winter in Iceland in a small northern town with few city lights is the perfect place to see the Northern Lights on a regular basis. My companion and I used to walk home after meeting with people in town to our apartment a little outside of town in the dark of that winter. It hadn't snowed too much that winter so it had been nice taking that 20 minute walk home on the dirt road. We would regularly see the Northern Lights just like you see them in this picture, twisting and weaving along slowly in the sky. They were usually green and white, but on occasion there was a dramatic bit of purple and red to make us take note. Once we saw a single strand of light from one mountain to the next like someone was slowly wiggling the end of a rope just out of view of the mountain. The Northern Lights move in what seems like slow motion, providing a silent solar symphony just for us, it seemed. I didn't realize it until later that I never saw the Northern Lights in Reykjavík. Too many lights in town there and too many buildings in the way. But if we just got out of town and paid attention during the winter--there they were.

Eldur og ís (Fire and Ice)

As missionaries in Reykjavík we frequently found ourselves downtown on the Torg for a number of reasons. The woolen outlets were easy to find, each attempting to draw in as many tourists as possible. We'd browse on occasion to see what was being sold. Without fail there were the tourist books which frequently had titles like, "Iceland: Land of Fire and Ice" or something very similar. I guess it was what made Iceland unique in a lot of ways. You could find glaciers right on top of volcanos.

It isn't hard to imagine the cataclysm that must have occurred to make the rocks look as they do in this first picture. Broken lava flows are everywhere in Iceland, frequently with a freezing river running around each twisted mass of rocks.

It was sometime during my mission that I started to think about the earth, and land in particular, in a different way than I ever had before. The way each land on the earth looked was interesting and varied, to be sure. But the real reason that the earth has any land masses on it at all is so that man will have a place upon which to work out his salvation. Whether a person's "plot" of earth is in Iceland, Utah, Cypress, Banff Island, or anywhere else in the world, the Lord gave the land so that each person could have a place to work out his or her salvation. In Noah's day all of the land was taken away for a time so that those left would remember their God. "Behold, the Lord hath created the earth that it should be inhabited; and he hath created his children that they should possess it." 1 Nephi 17:36.

Iceland provides a unique set of trials for those attempting to come to God. The trials are different there than for those who live, say, in Hawaii, or Australia. And yet, each land gives the same opportunities to know one's God. I found it easy to get to know God better in Iceland.

Þrír óþekktir trúboðar (Three unknown missionaries)

Well, it's been a bit of time since my last post. I went to Iceland in early March, only to find that the weather this winter has been about the worst in living memory for most folks. I guess it didn't bother me too much since we planned to spend most of the time inside doing research at the University of Iceland library and the National Archives (a fun name to say in Icelandic, incidentally: Þjóðskjalasafnið). I'll spend some time in the next few weeks talking about the things we did there.
I met all of the current missionaries who are there right now. Elders Teodoro, Lyon, Redford, Brockmann, Higgins and Soelberg. They were in church the morning we flew in. A few were out at the Selfoss branch that morning, being stationed out there. We saw them later that night.

While there, the current senior couple in Iceland, the Wohlgemuths, told me of a woman who had a ton of photos of many of the previous missionaries. I told them I would love to see the pictures. They offered to send some of the missionaries over to borrow her photo album and to scan all the pictures for me. They did so, and now I have a ton of new "old" photos to add to the photo archive I've been creating of all who have served. There were only four missionary photos I could not identify. I have attached them below. If you know who they are, let me know.

Nútíma Vík (Modern-day Vík)

A friend sent me this modern-day picture of Vík recently. It was taken in June of 2006. In one of my early posts I posted a picture that I had taken of Vík twenty years earlier in 1986 from a different vantage point. I love this newer picture, again because it was taken from a spot where few people photograph the town with the church on the hill. I love the shadows in the foreground with the cloudy top part of the photo being fully half of the shot. I could have a summer home there and never get tired of it. The quiet with the waves and black sand beach and the endless individual flights of the birds in the cliffs off to the right and out of the picture.

There is a lot to be said for small þórps like Vík.

Skeljar (sea shells)

I don't recall ever seeing seashells while I was a missionary in Iceland back in the mid eighties. I went to the beach with my companions a few times, but it was never to get in the water, of course. We weren't supposed to get into the water. It was too cold anyway, so that was okay. But then in 2004 when I went the second time to Iceland, I spent a little time walking along the shores of the Westmann Islands off the southern coast of Iceland. The main island isn't that big so there weren't a whole lot of places to stop and see the sea, so to speak. One of the beaches had a bunch of little shells strewn all over it like in this picture. I got this picture from a missionary couple who lived in Reykjavík there in 2006 and took the picture sometime while serving there for 18 months. I don't know what beach it was from though. To me it looks just like the one I walked along when I was there in 2004.

I spent part of my early years growing up in Florida. We would go to the beaches on occasion and see lots of different kinds of shells. But they were never like these. If you look closely at these, you will notice that most look "thick". I brought a few home and added them to the aquariums I had who's occupants lived in much warmer waters than these shells came from. It made sense to me that these shells would have to be thicker in Icelandic waters to keep out the cold when compared to the Florida water shells which often seemed so delicate and thin.

After having collected a number of these shells to take home, I began to think of how similar most Icelanders had been to these shells. Most had a pretty thick shell and were trying to keep warm in a land that had been cold spiritually for a very long time. Trying to break through those shells was hard when the people had spent so much time growing them so thickly. But on occasion, one or more would come out of their shells on their own and gladly feed on the spiritual food that was being provided. Those were the people and the experiences which kept us warm as missionaries as well.

Sandurinn Minn (My sand)

I spent all of my really formative years in St. George, Utah. I went through junior high and high school there--and liked it. I grew up with these kinds of white, yellow and red sandstone rocks. On the west and east sides of the city there are mountains which are covered in black lava boulders. The north of the city has the orange and red type of sandstone.

That was my kind of countryside. We would go to the Snow Canyon Sand Dunes, before the whole place was declared a national park and you had to pay to get in, and play in the sand dunes and hike on the wild rock formations. There were a few extinct volcano craters not to far out of town and to the northwest. No matter where I go in the world now, these dark red sandstone cliffs make me feel like I'm home.

I never saw anything in St. George anything like these next few pictures.
I can't imagine playing in black sand dunes....

Kross Beach.