Urfolkperspektiv

The following is a long epic story written in English to make the world outside aware of the treats to Sámi (Lapp) culture and homeland, in this case the hydro-electric dams in Sápmi, Northern Sweden: LULEJU

Din overskrift

LULEJU

a poem by Elle-Hánsa

*

LULEJU

FIVE FRIENDS IN MEMORIAN

EPITAPH To five faithful friends of my people This dream is dedicated To celebrate their loving memory For generations to come: † RUOHTJAJÁVRI † LUOKTANJÁRGAJÁVRI † RÁIVOJÁVRI † VUOKSAJÁVRI † SUORVAJÁVRI *

Written at Laakese, Sápmi 26. – 30.12. 1977,

revised 01. – 07. 01. 1978.

and Tjáskil, Leavnnjas, " 09.07. 1978.

I

What is more joyous more healthy and happy than a boisterous mountain-brook in the heartland of old SÁPMI.¹ fresh and free since the first Day of the Earth sane and sound, yes: what is more healing to the human soul when it is overtroubled coping with suffering and sorrow, than the cleansing song of a stream? And when it swells to a mighty river with shouts of joy and laughter jump fearless down the hills over stones and rocks spraying the happy herbs on its rim with a shower of sunblessed dew-drops, the waterfalls invite the strong salmon to challenge the stream’s fall downwards with a mighty jump upwards, till it finds rest in a lake this most sacred spot of calm solitude, mating ground and cradle for many a creature playground and home for all the fry, parents love to see happy children make the lake their life’s delight. The brook, once so small now proudly carries its living wealth to the next lake, then another, five in all, and between the mild murmur and rushing rustle of the river, a song of love for Creation! The Luleju² River and its lakes give birth and support many a being, a beautiful birch-forest soon adorn the banks. The animals of our ancient land found refuge and feed for life in the safe shelter of this forest, their thirsty tongues were quenched and comforted by its waters, the sacred springs of SÁPMI, the blood and life of our land. O my people, who season after season show such true gratitude in faithfully serving the balance and creative cyclus of a strong but sensitive land! A land full of fruits and riches for those wise enough to share. The wealth of our Sámi homeland is more edible and useful to creatures seeking for nourishment than is silver and golden power, because it is cared for in such a way that it reproduces itself by means of the secret Master-code hidden in the first germ-cell of the Universe. Never take more than you need and your children’s children will bless you, because you have gained such enduring wisdom. M o r e is the curse of modern times in those days, even in suffering, we could sing. yes. a love-song indeed was this bound to be, but damned! the devil is also here! Hush, my brook, not so loudly and free, don’t let them hear your sanssouçi ! *

II

A foreigner, a king in another’s kingdom walks on the old path by the lakes, steps aside it, stops, take notes and numbers. He is a field-officer from royal Stockholm where his masters have made him proud of his job: the use of advanced apparatus to measure the levels of lakes on maps and paper, so easy to handle those expensive tools almost like playing with children’s toys, he smiles taking down another figure for the big industrial progress. The “wilderness” of “Lappland” have been found fit to pay for those who foot in the frontline of the World’s greatest wonder since the sun: The Industrial Revolution and Progress, Electricity, Hydro-electric Power! The power of Nature, at last is under command of the mind of Man, man needs more light in his leisure, too, which politician dares deny that? The lakes in the “wilderness of Lappland” the potent falls of its rivers shall and must be dammed, and out of these five little lakes shall there come more: a b i g one. Another number in his notebook: at school he was the best in his class in accountancy. But what is this, we make him an evil, he i s not the devil. He is just one of the many who has got a job to do of which he in particular is even very proud. Though pride never understood the poor, behind him are all the millions uninformed and all that money, he has just a promille³-part in it all, the responsibility is not his, therefore and who is to blame? The dam will and must be built, who can stop the Progress? Yes, who will stop it? and he does for a short while, and gazes in amazement at the sudden beauty of the landscape. Even if swift clouds, carried by the wind in this day of destiny for this valley cast heavy shadows and hastily sweeps the protesting waves of the lakes, and the rush of the leaves in a sudden outburst of the gale blaming the stream for being so gay to continue its song of a happy paradise when such a day as this has come –––– the Sun suddenly strikes the Earth, powerful rays make clear its authumn-clothes, the land wakes up with glistening colours so powerful like flames of fire! quickly moves across the moor just like a warning, then it is over, the shadows now sleep where the fire burned the red and yellow heather have turned into ashes. But in the shadow of a raincloud with the mysterious background of lofty Áhkavárri-mountain lifted over ashes and flames millions of airy waterdrops made by the sun into radiant diamonds, the rainbow. God’s own poem and promise to Creation: Never will I punish Humanity again like this, with a deadly, drowning water-flood! * Unable to notice such inspiration unable to heed such wonderful warning the expert takes no numbers down; even though his tools are intricate with his advanced apparatus he can not come even near to the rainbow nor grasp it’s treasured secrets. All he does is to put up an umbrella to shelter himself and his instruments from rain of the sky and rays of the sun. As he hurries back homewards to his portable, synthetic nylon-tent (the first to be used in Sweden) to get ready to leave for Stockholm never to come back, he hopes, he passes the siida⁴ of a Sámi family they are not in, not even a dog to stop him, if he would steal: the old-fashioned fishing-boat seems ready for a try on the lakes, a trip into the midnight sun “Oh what a wonderful life they live!” he says while we must go here toiling in worry – oh yes, I must remember to mail that letter telling them to prepare for the future! As he goes to bed with his trophy a reindeer-horn he found left alone without a head, he dreams of his wife and their children yet not born, if they shall have any at all. “I wonder if they will like my Lappland souvenir I’ll bring the proud horn and antler of a real reindeer from Lappland! I’m sure they will, he says, almost sleeping. *

III

The old goahti,⁵ shelter of many a trustful time of happiness-sharing between Sámi families, simple, but true as the mountains themselves welcomes its wandering people. Young and old alike love the warmth that comes from the hearth of a goahti, listen to the thrilling tales and tremendous story of a tribe surviving in scanty arctic for more than ten thousand polar winters. With the very fire that gives warmth and light in the gloomy time of arctic night the Sámi people have survived together with it through the centuries that went and came. Sometimes the flame was almost extinguished but even the most feeble flame or the most humble and faint smoke told its story of a stubborn fighting glow deep inside the hearth of my people. With this little child inside our small body carried through the centuries we were able to keep close together families united in a Sámi siida, where parents are equal partners in carrying out responsibility for all, where the oldest and youngest were not isolated but willingly took their share of the work to tend and cultivate a heritage of traditions laws developed since olden ages to protect and care for a living land life to make others live. All over SÁPMI the faithful siidas were the very guarantee and security for the heritage and health of this part of our irreplaceable hemisphere. This little glow of simple love for the Creator and his work of art Creation and all its creatures, this spark of eternal joy carried us over the dangerous cracks of glaciers over the icy uproaring streams across the desolate desertlike plains or the death-sucking swamplands in between, in to the safety of a well-built goahti a turf-hut, a tent cleverly constructed cool in the heat of a summer day, warm and close and cosy in the frost of winter. The glowing sparks from the crackling fire run upwards through its open ceiling followed by the laughter from ancient folktales humour and wisdom so masterly combined, stars lifted high above the siida sent to be seen like they want to tell the world outside: We are here we survive, the Sámi people of the North, Come in and share our happy hours stay, they are so short, before the burden of daily duty call us all to take our share in caring for our Earth and each other! *

IV

Morning comes, awakened with the spirit of dawn the people prepare to continue their work, not just like a job, this is their life. Most of the siida-people go healthy and fit to the reindeer-flock to train a trek-animal or mark the clever calves that escaped the swift suohpan,⁶ the lasso of the quickest herder since last time in the gárdi⁷ where the mixed flocks now are gathered shouts and the constant run in a circle the flock demonstrate its freedom with sharp sounds of their sinews as they all run to escape the sharper eyes of the siida-isit,⁸ the owner looking for his particular part. Suddenly a look leads into action fast as a flash he throws his suohpan ropes a silver-swift bull-to-be, it is stubborn, but at last they manage to hold it down while the sharp knife makes the necessary marks in its ears to separate it from the other beasts and make it a part of their eallu,⁹ their life “better this” thinks the youngling as it relieved runs away, than being between the teeth of a wolf or caught in the claws of a mighty eagle or swallowed alone by a cleft between rocks. Here I am not alone". *

V

Now is the time when night begins to grow and compete with the day. One early morning in the mystic mood of twilight Siida-isit goes out of the goahti earlier than the others, for some reason, maybe he should repair the fish-nets now examining them carefully. He holds the well-worn net so neatly tied by trained hands, this net have brought us many a meal now its threads are broken and in the middle of a big gap, won’t be winked at: But ho! What is that he sees: Through the hole of his net a dead fish is floating on top of the lake white side up as to show its innocence that this is no suicide, and around it a few leaves and a flower. The family father throws away the broken net and rushes to the rim of the lake but splashes in water before he reach it. So wet here, and it hasn’t rained tonight, did it rain tonight, my son? No, says the son just arriving his home, proudly holding two ptarmigans up “at least I got some in my giella,¹⁰ my snare” he smiles as he goes in. He has been out watching all night the reindeer-herd for wolves, longs for a smiling meal. Not will that smile last long, thinks his father as he intend to send him as soon as possible to the far away village, to its office and ask some of the dáOat¹¹ there what the foreigners have done to our clean and pure food-chamber, what happened to the lake! Last time when they came from the mountains he couldn’t see or feel anything strange except the usual sound of small waves talking the language of sleeping well. Maybe they were so tired after hard work of three days and nights out in the open, it was dark, the autumn is already in power. Now he is almost afraid of these signs will there be less of the smiling meals? Such signs, – the old people didn’t tell about it, has he ever heard of dirty water and dead fish at the same time: some catastrophic accident among the beings in the bottom of the lake? He looks at the lake and the floating fish, so unnatural, then a hasty hawk comes to catch it but ere his claws touch the water surface it turns away and flies back to the mountain. Certainly something is rotten and wrong, he must look into it later, but now they shout from the goahti: get some food. He walks inside with slow, heavy steps, then as he smells the tempting scents of a well-prepared tasty meal of nature he reminds himself with a smile: “Well this time the hawk won’t have his meal, but I most certainly will!" *

VI

Autumn-winter means much hard work; the reindeer-mothers with their calves must be kept aside from the rutting bulls, now is the time to milk and make cheese, after the meal the whole siida goes to work. On his way to the herd siidaisit thinks what might have happened to the lakes of his land, and will later, to the creatures in and around. Then he sees far away two strong reindeer-males with impressive big horns fight with each other head to head horn clatter against horn, two bulls are fiercely fighting for control and the respect of the females. Who will win her territory and proudly issue the mating call? Or will they both die this day of the fight because they are fighting each other? New worries have come into the heart of siidaisit, as he goes further. During the work, which he almost can do blindly he wonders what all those new signs mean. *

VII

While all the adults have gone to the mountain even some of the children follow them, the oldest áhkku,¹² too weak for their work yet what a wealth of wisdom in her eyes to support and strengthen the hearts of hopeful broods yet unhatched, she sits outside her tent watching the youngest have fun. while some fine handwork keep her fingers busy. Through the laughter and shouts of the children she remembers her days of the past and nights keeping watch over the herd on the white mountain-plateau, the duottar¹³ high above the forest line, orda¹⁴ with nothing else to keep her company than the stars, sometimes the moon lighting so softly the resting herd even the dogs sound asleep on the snow, what a thrill in her body as she could witness such solitude and the ghostlike guovsahasat,¹⁵ the northern lights pursuing itself in a flight for rest would send waves of mystical wonder shiver as an echo in her soul. She would pray them not to touch her. Then on the sound of a wolf she would shout back to keep the fear away with a howl and when that just made many howls appear she would yoik a luohti¹⁶ with gentler sounds if the beasts might have a hearing heart it would certainly appeal to it:_ Do not take from our little flock, it is the only we have for life! She would remember a happy person in another siida and yoik his luohti, this person later became her husband. Now he is dead, and she sings his song, his luohti silently for herself can almost see and feel his presence, those wise, old eyes blessing her age. The children love her too, they are busy with games they love to play. But unlike certain games in this world theirs have a purpose, a natural plan. their game is a training for adult activities. They test their skill in catching each other while running with the suohpan, the lasso rope. They play as children who aim to grow not like some who plays for pleasure of playing whether he is a child or not. The dominating materialism of modern society produce people who never learnt in childhood that all, even play have a purpose to serve. Therefore all they do nowadays becomes less than children’s play in their official adult society. Nature and nature’s creatures, its people become like toys in their hand. Their running the world is a threat to its security and survival, they’re like a gang of rascals disobeying their Father playing with paper, pistols and puppets an infantile struggle, a game of power of who’s the strongest in a world where people need peace! *

VIII

Áhkku, áhkku! shouts from afar, the grandson is returning from the village: a letter has come, a letter from the capital! As he breathless gives it to áhkku she says jokingly to him: This is certainly not for you or me, no love-letter is this! No, says the boy, it is from Stockholm, from the Royal Hydroelectric Department,- almost proud of his pronunciation, what does it say? No, answers áhkku, we must wait till father comes home, it’s for him. As they all come home from the mountain the shocking script gathers the whole siida like was it a religious meeting. With difficulty they get through its foreign language but its intention is clear enough like thunderclash from an awesome lightening flash: We have to move, disappear the rivers are dammed, the lake will grow bigger overflow it’s banks. “Move your homes further up a bit, prepare for the future!" In the letter is stated that this is the second warning, but the first letter was never received, did it disappear? The expert only knows. Mii fertet jávkat,¹⁷ we disappear, asks áhkku, but what about them, the children? The father can give no answer, he has to ask the river, our lake. Now he understands the dead fish and all the dirt on its level. Will they kill all the fish, our future, our children? *

IX

What happens to a child if in rage you punish and beat it even if it is innocent of your guilt? You cause physical pain, and worse it becomes a victim of psychic terror, words that you have invented for yourself, mental disturbances hardly ever to achieve balance any more. Cut off a finger, cut off a foot, will there come a new one? Like this you turn off for life Nature’s creative progress. They have amputed me, my land, our lifegiving rivers meant to fill the needs of coming generations have now to feed the robots, the generators! This is done to my body, my land to our own dearest mother! They even ask and expect us to forget the crimes and injustices that have passed. But how can you forget an amputed arm if that was the one you brought or food to your hungry children with? A distant but disturbed childhood can not be pushed aside with words, the need for an arm will always be there because it is not where it should be. An official annihilation of the right to live for us, whose destiny, like that of all is unavoidable death, but even that has its timing. We do not have an infinity of time to take from. While you enjoy in self-conceited security what you hold for a lasting happiness the amputated body is back with all the problems. It won’t take long, shall this continue before the last Sámi looks himself in the eyes in the mirror of a doomed lake that swallowed his people, and now wants him, too. More, more, isn’t that the word? *

X

A shadow has been cast over the siida like a mighty curse sways its hearths. Asked to move they can’t realize the truth, but the dam doesn’t wait for them and water grows and flow into the goahti. In painful resignation they take out what they can another site has to be found, but there is no other lake they have. (lake once friend, now enemy) So a new goahti is built quickly but with quality and skill. It is good that our homes in this shadowful world are moveable and easy to build, not like the palaces of foreign kings where once built only a war can remove them. Much care goes into the work, this will be the home for the whole family where young and old and all between respect each other’s individuality. In a goahti even the dog is welcome to share the warmth and the food after sharing a hard days work. That night (when work is done)all sleep well, now even the wolf and the eagle are friends of the Sámi people. What is their taking of reindeer calves for the need and feed of their young ones to the greedy beasts of a fish that will swallow five innocent small ones! But now, silence, - sleep well! *

XI

Not many meals have they been able to enjoy in their new-built turf-huts when the expert from Stockholm suddenly appears. Leaving behind the manners of Swedish sociability he walks right in without knock or notice, with a smile this time, not paying heed to their surprise: “Oh, what a nice knife you’ve working on there, how much does it cost?" “I don’t know” says the father, “yet.” “Well you see when I left this land of the midnight sun the only thing I got from here as souvenir was a worn old reindeer-horn left alone superfluous in this land of plenty, I took it home, but they wanted something else. So I thought I should buy some handicraft. My neighbour in Stockholm, by the way, he is second in command in the iron-enterprise of Giron,¨ he has got a guksi¹⁸ in which he has a lot of arrogant pride, I can’t be worse off, can I, how much do I have to pay, my goodness what a wellshaped sheath!" What is this, thinks áh??i,¹⁹ he want to pay ere the product is clear? “You can have it”, says the father, no need to pay," and gives it to him, “taking our land you can take this too.” “O thank you” says the expert admiring the almost finished work, “I am in a hurry, have to leave today.” Áhkku whispers to the giver: "One should never give away a knife, according to what the old ones said." “Oh, it doesn’t matter, he says back: what shall we do with traditions when they have taken away our land?" The expert, content putting the gift in pocket, “Just one more thing, before I leave: This letter is for you; that’s all I can pay with." “What? a letter, for me? From who?” I am sorry, says the expert, I have to say it’s from the Royal Hydroelectric Department… “But we have already moved.” “Well you see, the dam is too small didn’t fulfil the expectations, some underestimated calculations have made it unfit out of fashion already. We must think of our responsibility of building up an industry this country must be strong enough to compete in that matter, too with powerful competitors like Germany and Great Britain and others, many others." “But what has that do do with us.” “Well, you see”, continues the expert in a milder tone, but gaining in weight: “You will have to move again.” “Again” almost shouts the siida-isit, Maid dat dáOa dadjá,²⁰ asks áhkku. she does not understand the language. “Yes… further…into the future.” The siida people are too shocked to protest, in a persuasive manner the convinced expert continues: “How can you, after all go on living like this? I am sure because of lack of hygienic conditions the death-rate of your children must be quite high because they are not kept clean, I mean, you have no wrappings on your food, just eat it the way it is, straight from nature, maybe you do not even wash your hands! Can’t you see what time we live in, how new and proper demands rightfully have entered the scene of natural life, and with the help of modern technology the future is ours, isn’t it? We who have made up this land worked steadily on it for ages it’s advanced society, it’s culture, the future is certainly in our very fist!" As the audience neither curses nor praises his sermon but gaze with troublesome eyes and trembling hearts at him, he goes on explaining: “I know this can’t be easy for you, but is it better that millions of homes in this our Swedish homeland shall be without electricity and power, not to speak of all the factories that produce all the things that we need for our daily well-being." As he pauses to get some breath his eyes fall on a little girl outside where there are no houses nor any factories needing electricity, she plays with some sticks making up a reindeer-herd out of them, (blocking his vision of bored Swedish rascals in contrast to the happy and natural intelligence of this girl) and he goes on:"Of course here in the wilderness you might think such power is not needed, but maybe one day Civilization will take pity on these poor scanty areas. I am sure it will come here, too one fine day. Without this dam there would be no toys for the children, kettles for the housewifes or magazines for the men, no sewing-machines or aeroplanes with which we can reach unlimited lands! Well, our daily work is so hard so boring and demanding we need more leisure and more interesting tools games to use up our freehours, all the things that we have longed to own. And I want you to know this: I myself tried to ask for more time so that you shouldn’t need to move in such a hurry. I even proposed a little sum of money a kind of compensation, a help, but no. You know, they are hard on it those business men down there. They brushed aside my objections like the ashes from their cigars: “Those tiny lapp.dwellings they are the smallest price paid for such a promising power-project, this is Sweden, not their land: You must show some harder stuff if you want to stop the Swedish Steal²¹!" Even I wanted to open up a shop up here, but I have to wait till next year, they’re hard, aren’t they? I hope to be a shopkeeper who sells and buys, maybe even your neighbour. Therefore to be proper I would like to pay for this beautiful product," pointing to his pocket-bulge where the knife can be seen. As he places some coins and a paper-note on the floor, he silently says goodbye and walks away like before. When he can still be seen one of the daughters of the siida silently whispers, as to herself: The lake and the land don’t like you as you walk there, they don’t love your approach like they love us and trust our steps. Even the trees are trembling with fear (/unrest) when you come with your boasting-machines. You think you are clean, but the dirt is doubled wherever you touch the earth. And what is death but a friend if we honestly serve without shame our God-given purpose and each other! The oldest son is more angry than in sorrow: “Had we not given the knife I don’t know what i then would have done!" Some of the children are crying, but áhkku is the one who tries to cheer all the others up; she has gone through this before, kept many a wolf away: “Maybe we should ask him if he has time to mend our broken fishing-nets!" *

XII

Another silent night is disturbed by the bullying busyness of the bulldozers, mocking the purity of Mother Earth, naked noise exhibited here in the kingdom of sweet and pleasant peace, through destroying only constructing a new road, the broad way of no silence. Disgusting roars dirty the air that once was the home of happier songs, hell has come to Sámi land! nursed by lust and liquids from deep down under the depth of darkness, spreads its sickening songs through the incredible magic of boosting batteries. Look at the rivers, even the eagle refuses to eat its dying fish its waters polluted with dangerous poison. Those who dare to take the juices of growth from their natural connection with life be prepared for their revenge, as they turn into death-bringing tissue, when the smallest are killed even by its smell. The artificial lake grows so unnaturally large, like an ill-natured, untimely tumor spreading its sepsis all over the body, our earth is infected and who can ever cleanse it from this sin? The silvery beauty of the trees is attacked, the birch-forest, unprepared does not know its own drowning until it is too late for rescue. The lust waters magically made from a friend to a fearsome foe, creep up and lick the white stems of the birches, steal their simple pride and beauty stripping them of their last protection deprive them of their chance to serve creation, rape them till the result is death, and they fall for the power of a dammed lake designed for self-indulgent forgetting of facts: These trees can never be used to build another Ark for Noah! Some are pulled down by powerful machines man wants to show himself and the God he thinks he has killed who is now the Lord of Nature, and who the conquered losers are. And many are their falls as the motors utter ugly howls. But to the driver they are like music with selfish pride beating all morality, stopping the birds in the middle of their singing. But beware! you proud one run by your greed and lust: Stop the machine which carry you along, stop it, and listen! Look up. Look down, and all around: if you are honest and listen enough you will hear from the depth of drowning lakes even the stones will tell you the truth. *

XIII

As a result of the small lakes being swallowed by a big one the siida has split into smaller pieces. The other goahtis are already drowned their families found it too hard and moved with their herds away to other poorer parts of old Sámiland, or they have, as the dá