Friday 7 September 2001

Pic of the day: This place is named Kokerotten, which means "White thunder that comes down from heaven". Well, literally it means "Cooking the rat", but you have to admit that my translation is more poetic. Update! According to local authority, the stream is actually called "Bakkefjellsgroa", which incidentally doesn't mean "The Back Fields Grow" as a friendly relative translated it for me. In fact, it means "The Hill Mountain Stream". Sad but true.

The invincible village

Well, at least I believe this is Kokerotten, and at least I believe that's how it is spelled. You see, I learned the name from my late grandmother back when she was a reasonably early grandmother and I was just a small boy. My attention wandered. I think I asked what the name meant, but like most adults she would not understand that names must mean anything. Names just are. And so this stream remain in my memories "Kokerotten". There are plans to put also this one in concrete pipes, a fate that has befallen another of my favorite streams. But the concrete pipes that lie along the road are half overgrown with moss. And the stream is still a good place to wash one's feet.

I took a walk to the end of the valley. Our farm is not the last in the valley. There is one more farm, fairly large by local standards and well kept. The people there have always been kind of energetic. Beyond that farm (which has itself been slowly growing) there used to be wilderness for a long long time. But lately the bogs and parts of the sparse forest have been cultivated and grown into fields of grass.

***

The small village of Rivedal, into which I was born (literally - I was born at home rather than at a hospital) ... this village has thumbed its nose at centralization and the graying of rural Norway. New fields are put under the plough, new houses are built on old farms, even a few new homes. Small children abound. Like a certain Gallic village known as the home of Asterix and Obelix, there seems to be nothing that can crush the spirit of these people. Some have taken to making a living by computers, while others work in school or health care. And of course, there is always the soil, from which our ancestors have harvested most of what they needed, albeit with much hard work. The rivers and the fjord a couple kilometers away still give fish.

The last of the fields is further west now, but still it ends against the wilderness just waiting for strong men and horses, or tractors these days, to change the bogs and copses and meadows into farmland. Like so much of Norway, there seems to be room to grow for generations into the future.

***

Today I met the second of my brothers. (One to go.) He was here to deposit another of his daughters, who came to help in the barn. She has taken a liking to agriculture and such work, while her twin sister (who was here yesterday) is more likely to help with the kids. Speaking of which, the domineering nephew was at school today. Much appreciated. I took walks, photographed, wrote a little bit, played a little bit, and generally had a good time.

The pain in my guts has grown less frequent and less intense over the day, and my apetite has returned. Though it is still immeasurably small compared to the local standard. I think most people here eat about as much in a day as I do in a week. This includes the boys. Usually when I am here, my apetite gradually grow during the stay. Seeing other people eat like that convinces me that the stomach is not likely to violently explode if given three slices of bread instead of two. But right now, I am just happy to return to my ordinary standard of gastrointestinal health!

And the library here. I mean here in the house. Remind me to tell you about it one day. "When book lovers unite." Perhaps I should after all have more and longer vacations here. When the nephew grows old enough to understand that I've not traveled this far for him alone.