There was a letter...
My interest for vikings appeared long before I knew that my ancestor were from Sweden. It was weard that I saw dreams about bronz age, and I was experiencing deja-vu on the historical places where I was visiting, like in Norway, Danmark, Sweden and of course Finland. Seven years I wrote book about same subject and during that time it came to daylight that my roots are in the land of the vikings.
Consequently now arose the question, who am I actually ? Where do I come from? If I travel to the landscape of my ancestor, what would I feel? Would my spirit recognize the original surrounding of my blood? So I travelled Nordic landscapes around, without knowing, that the answer was all the time at my reach. Why did I have to know these things? To know who I am, what my D.N.A. was, is and what I want it to be in the future. For how can human have clear picture of his identity and of the self, if he don't know his past or his origin? Without this information something will be always missing in one's life.
So actually curiosity about my roots brought me here in Sweden in first place, but just to live here didn't satisfy my urge to search the fountain of the blood-heritage. Or just to know the origin of my familyname wasn't enough, nor reading about birth and death of those who lived before me. No, I did have to know how did they live, how it was alike in reality. Then I found out, that in Foteviken is possibility to live as a viking! I knew that I have found what I was looking for.
How was it, those nine days in the viking reservate? Me and my 10 years old daughter learned more about the ancient handicraft and obtained many new friends. Even if it was raining, thundering, cold and we were totally alone at evenings, it was magnificent experience. Meditation on the shore of the Foteviken was also an moment that stays in my blood forever. To see the sun turning to scarlet red, then to colored carmine red and finally setting : illuminating the sky with gentle orange glow. After sunset were stars above the Foteviken… that was magical moment.
The girl, Jenicé, enjoyed that lifestyle with whole her little heart! She loved to cook food over the campfire and to learn how to make viking-candy, and bread she baked with great devotion. No missing to home, nor tv, nor data or any material thing of these days. Most she loved to shape wood with her little knife, and to throw battle-ax, to learn how to make viking gear. In all, she was like at home. Now she knows what she was, is and going to be, she has wider picture about her identity and about the history of the legacy of her blood.
What did I get with me?
First of all, the deep respect for those wise and clever people who faught for their living in hard circumstances under the iron- , bronze- and middle ages. Although, if I knew already how skilful they were at those timeperiods, so I know now better, and I'm dazzled how extremely well-endowed the ways of human were. The beauty of the culture in reality's light made deep impression onto me, it mesmerized the observer.
I got a little glimpse back to the history, also I grasp an answer how it was like to live as a viking : it is not something that we do or what kind of gear we put on, it is what we are inside, all our actions and behaviour in everyday existence - the way of life.
Sincerelly yours,
Freja Lindahl (Sohrabi)
