A Mirror Picture
Dedicated to Mom. You asked me to paint a picture for you of everything I saw because you would probably never get there. So I did – I painted a picture of words.
I wonder why they didn’t do the Lord of the Ring movies in Norway. These mountains would have fit just as well as the New Zealand ones. They are covered by thick layers of clouds, enclosing the needle woods. My imagination does not reach far enough to understand how they are able to push their roots into the granite rocks, standing still, firm against the storm.
Between these trees you constantly expect little trolls hasting around diligently, mumbling nonsense. Their skin colour that of the granite under the small feet, their ears tall and attentive, almost testily, their noses small and dumb. Running around the moss covered stems, crawling into holes, fetching ingredients for their supper, cooked in a stone kettle upon a huge fire. At night, before they fall asleep under the fern, they come all together and start singing their ancient chants of days long since forgotten by human kind.
Albeit we are not able to understand troll language, it is always surprising how similar the Norwegian language and the German one are. Actually there are two Norwegian languages (Nyfolk and Bågmal). Both languages are Germanic and of similar origin. Still, the melody of the spoken word is so different that I do not understand a single word. Words of importance for the people didn’t change much for example the word for mountain, “Berg”, is still the same in German. This of course is very helpful, driving and reading street signs. Tunnels on the contrary are often surprising, for some of them are not lit and you feel as if sudden night has fallen upon you.
Norway is a very peaceful, calm and silent country there is not a lot of traffic beside the camping cars from all of Europe. The region around Bergen is probably the wettest in this country. Constant rain keeps the air humid, but clear, at times sharp like a razor, and the sea does its part to provide a fresh air, cooling your soul. The amounts of water in form of lakes, waterfalls and rivers is really stunning and even more alluring are the mirror pictures in the lakes showing a world, seemingly more peaceful than ours. I would so like to enter this dimension, and am searching for the aberration within the picture to prove that there is a whole entire different world awaiting us – or – turning us down, when we try to walk through the gates of this refugee.
Sprottes Block 