I grew up on a farm just outside the village of Vopnafjörður northeast-Iceland. The village with ca 600 people is surrounded by a few farms like ours but the next living soul is more than 40 km away! It is one of the most isolated places in Iceland (8 hours from Reykjavik).
Back in the 1970´s the roads out of Vopnafjörður were frequently closed for weeks, even months. So apart from flying in or out (not cheap!) via the airport, our only connection to the outside world was the radio and the TV. But until the mid 1980´s Iceland had one radio station!
This sole station is still known as RUV
@RUVohf an abbreviation which stands for the State Radio! And there was only one TV station – you guessed it, the State TV, established 1966 (available in colour from 1977).
The radio and TV were operated by the State to provide news and useful information and to promote culture (particularly Icelandic) to the public. The idea of “fun” was pretty low on the priority list. Being State owned meant also the State Employee Rep. Union had a strong say.
To save money the TV did therefore not broadcast on Thursdays. Or in July. YES, that was the whole month of July! The employees needed their summer break. And there was no money for extra shifts. The TV normally ran from 6 pm to 11 pm.
The radio station did obviously afford shifts as it did operate on a daily basis and in July as well. But normally only between 7 am and midnight – unless a natural disaster was unfolding. So this was setting for our Radio, TV and their importance at Christmas.
Iceland is formally a Lutheran country, with the (yes) the State Lutheran Church dominating. When I grew up +90% belonged to that church (considerably less now). The Scandinavian Lutheran churches generally celebrate the start of Christmas at 6 pm on Christmas Eve (24th Dec).
So Christmas Eve is the key moment in Iceland. The Christmas family dinner starts after 6 pm and the kids then get to open their present. For kids it is an incredibly long day!! Back in the 1970´s even more so thanks to fun-loving Radio and TV.
The TV did put on a special program for the kids from 2-4 pm! YES two hours of Children´s TV. Otherwise we had maybe one 5 minute cartoon on Wednesday and a half-hour kid´s show on Sundays. Christmas here we go (see TV and Radio program from 1978 below)!
Seriously, as a kid I would look forward ALL YEAR to binge watching on the Kids TV on Christmas Eve. Usually 1 hour cartoon plus 1 hour of a child-friendly show, like a Christmas special of the Little House on the Prairie – the most popular show in Iceland back then.
But then the TV went off at 4 pm. And wouldn’t come back on until 22 pm to broadcast a recording from the Christmas mass in Reykjavík Cathedral earlier that night. So now the worst 2 hours of the year for a child in Iceland in the 1970´s had started.
We used the time to get properly dressed for Christmas dinner. And by properly, I really mean that. Our finest clothes. Mum would ensure that my brother and I had our best clothes on – often specially bought for Christmas. N.b. that is not us on the photo (it is modern).
Dad would put a tie and a jacket on and mum her finest dress – having just cleaned the house high and low. But having put our finest clothes we could not even play any rough games anymore or go outside. Oh the wait!
To add insult to injury the Radio went off. See program below
YES, the State Radio station deliberately went silent at 5 pm on Christmas Eve. So we sat there listening to the silence on the radio. I kid you not. We even avoid talking much among ourselves. You were supposed to sit in silent if you could.
Now, I mention the State Lutheran Church. We were all members of the Church, even though my entire family is basically atheists. Mum is perhaps agnostics. This is quite common in Iceland. People are in the church because that is just what you do whether you believe in God or not.
Side note – the State Lutheran Church is pretty mellow now. Which is why it is happy to have atheists on board. It wasn’t always so – Scandinavian Lutheranism was once very strict. In Iceland all dancing was banned for +200 years and the Church tried to ban non-religious singing!
From 1550 to late 1800’s the Church in Scandinavia was very much against the idea of people having fun. Of any kind. This explains a lot about Scandinavians, I recon. Anyway, so what were we all waiting for in silence on the radio? The church bells!
Yep, just before 6 pm the radio came back to live with the sounds of the bells in Reykjavík Cathedral. Still, we as a family did not yet break our silence if it could be avoided. We just sat there listening to the Church bells on the radio. In silence.
On the stroke of 6 pm the bells stopped and the announcer went: Útvarp Reykjavík – Gleðileg jól (Radio Reykjavik – Merry Christmas). Finally, everyone in the family now all went and wished each other Merry Christmas, with a kiss, as is (or at least was) customary in Iceland.
We left the radio on and let the mass from the Reykjavík Cathedral play out loudly over in our case, this family of atheists. You just did that. We sat down over the most beautifully decorated dinner table ready for Christmas dinner. For kids the wait was though not 100% over.
We wished the grown up hurried up with the dinner but they didn’t seem to be in any rush! And my mother then insisted that we would sit down and open all the Christmas cards first and read them out. Finally once we read out all the cards, the moment had arrived!
Me and my brothers could dive into that huge pile of Christmas presents! By 10 pm we were exhausted. If not already asleep, mum would then just send us all in front of the TV to watch the mass (the same we heard on the radio earlier!). Now that usually put us to sleep!
That was in the 1970’s in country Iceland. You could call it Christmas in #Isolation – something that way too many people have to experience now in 2020. But as the story shows, you can still make it memorable. With this little story I wish you all a Merry Christmas.
