World Cup Blogs 30: Switzerland

When I was growing up I had a shortlist of countries I'd like to visit someday.  In a non-internet world and from a family that could never go overseas for a holiday it was more dream than aspiration.  In order of preference counting upwards the list was probably as follows;

5 Iceland - wild, cold and an island
4 Norway - snow, mountains, boats and fjords
3 Malta - the only hot one but somewhere we watched a film about in Junior School
2 Switzerland - snow, mountains, little trains going up mountains
1 Canada - huge, snow, mountains, big trains going past mountains

Of these five, I have (with no great sense of intention) visited four. Perhaps it is because my dreams were so sky-high that I have found each of them a little disappointing.  Canada was a lot more boring than I expected, Malta a lot more crowded (buildings as well as tourists), Norway, like Canada, quite sleepy and rather unfriendly though with wonderful scenery.  Iceland fared better though Reykjavik felt too much like a misplaced Reading with its modern malls and office buildings.

I liked each place but they were not the heaven on earth my imagination had built them up to be.  That's very similar to the way football fans look toward competitions like the World Cup - high expectation that is therefore doomed to somewhat disappoint.

Switzerland is the auspicious missing visit from my list - though I have visited other parts of the Alps in Bavaria and Austria.

Maybe one day I'll go there.   But . . .

I have only met - in close proximity - three Swiss people.  One, in one of my pastorates, was very nice but loved England and hardly ever went back to Switzerland even with family there.  Another was a Swiss girl I met when she was working at a Conference Centre I was connected to as a teenager.  She loved England too, and wanted to stay here instead of Switzerland.  The third was someone who lived with us for a year.  She hit new depths of off-puttingness by insisting that she hated (her word) snow and mountains . . .

In other words, my fandom toward Switzerland as a country has been gradually eroded by the people who belonged to it and who have themselves not appeared to be fans.

Hopefully the Swiss fans at the World Cup were more commending of their homeland. And hopefully anyone who meets me - even if they dislike the thought of being a Christian - will at least notice that I'm an enthusiast for Jesus.

World Cup Blogs 13: Iceland

I pulled the car up, climbed out and took this photograph.

Of course there are countless mountain passes where one could do such a thing and see rocks and more rocks.  But this was not on a mountain pass.  It was on a flat road through what might be, in most parts of the world, fields, meadows, houses, farmland or woodland.  This is Iceland though, and this is rock, and volcanic rock at that.

That Iceland, with a population similar to a London Borough, should be at the World Cup while the world's four most populous nations are not is itself quite miraculous.  That they have achieved so much not only from a small population but in such a geological and climatic background is almost incredible.

In their opening game Iceland scored and drew with the famed footballing nation of Argentina.  How do they do it?  Perhaps the picture holds a clue.

For looked at quickly and without local insight the sight stretching off into the distance is, somehow, green.  This was deep winter and if you visit Iceland in summer the green can be overwhelming so that the rock is invisible.  It is, of course, moss.

When dried it could be used for bedding or to insulate housing structures.  Life is so persistent, so innovative, that a large area with no soil at all can still be very green.

The Icelandic football team, together with nature, remind us that a promising environment is not necessary for success.  

It is a thought that, as a Christian in London in 2018 I find uplifting too.

Iceland

Celebrating a 50th birthday in December isn't easy in England. In Australia it must be easy, but England in winter is no place for hot air balloon rides or garden parties. So I decided to go deeper into the dark with a week in Iceland!

From the moment I was nearly blown from the airline terminal onto the bus this was going to be a wild week. But whether I was bathing in an outdoor geothermally-heated jacuzzi in the dark at 10:30 in the morning, listening to children singing Icelandic Lutheran carols in Hallgrimmskirkja or watching wild horses grazing on a volcanic bog this was an amazing life experience.

Not only was it a fantastic experience of a great country; it also meant that as I stood outside Waterstone's Bookshop in Wycombe with folk from church singing carols this morning what would previously have felt quite cold, dark and wet felt relatively tropical!

I especially like the picture below, which was snapped at 12:38pm at Grindavik on the south coast. If that sun doesn't get up soon it will be going down again before it starts!