24 December 2007
On Saturday nine ‘jólasveinar’ wandered into the Hellisheiði Powerplant by Mount Hengill, expressing their opposition to the rise of heavy industry and other nature devastating activities in Iceland, as well as solidarity with human nature conservationists. (The jolasveinar are 13 Icelandic santas, born of a child-eating troll mother, who descend from the mountains in the days before christmas to sneak through the houses, stealing, teasing and causing mischief.)
“We decided to take a stroll by there before coming to town, and give out rotten potatoes to the naughty industrialists, and maybe a gift or two to the workers that do their jobs badly” said Pottaskefill (Pot scraper) on behalf of the group. Naughty Icelandic children such as these traditionally get a rotten potato in their christmas shoe.
—
The Jule Lads, Nordic trolls who’s tradition preceed Father Christmas, descended upon a geothermal power station which is being enlarged to power the enlargement of an aluminium smelting factory by RUSAL/Nordural. Hengill was once a beautiful mountain range, at the edge of a highly volcanic area in Iceland, a ski resort peppered with natural hot pools and steaming rocks. Now it is nothing but a screaming factory.
The Jule lads join up for a special direct action with the Saving Iceland collective as they left to town… the video can be found here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rfY5Ou31SWE
Please consider coming out to Iceland for our 2008 action camp, we need all the help from activists we can get. This island is Europe’s last wilderness and with huge dams, geothermal power plants, power lines, tarmac roads, polluting factories, not to mention all the terrible affects on the surrounding sea, and a whole host of other forms of destruction.
More photos at:
http://www.savingiceland.org/node/1077