Faroe: islands' splinters
Some splinters & chips from my time in Faroe Islands:
1. Torshavn
2. Faroe' Fairytales
3. Waterfalls of birds
4. Geographical
5. Driving roads
6. & how we're supposed to live?...
1. Tórshavn, FO
Faroe Islands capital city Tor's Harbor (counting 13.000 humans) founded in 9th century by Scandinavians
painting most houses red as it was the most affordable paint of the time
Settlers brought with them custom of getting together once a year to solve all their problems, later those meetings become ting, today they call it parliament. Therefore it is considered the oldest working parliament of Europe
Which is not exactly true. Parliament supposed to be counsel of delegates to whom people temporarily gave their rights to decide political and economic issues. Ting was the meeting of all people and they discuss not only laws and politics, but everything: all kinds of disputes - from domestic situations to international affairs; here business deals were made and announced publicly; here you could learn about last wills, marriages, babies born etc.
From 11th century to year 1814г. Faroe sometimes formally, sometimes absolutely were Norway's property, after Kalmar Union they got under Denmark ownership.
Today Faroe kinda still under Denmark but have so called "home rule": there is that their own parliament (33 members for population of +-49.000 people), their own money - Faroe krona; quite wide rights in economy and politics (for example, they decided not to enter EU when Denmark did - smart move). Nevertheless, they are not an independent country and home rule could be revoked any second by Danish crown. Faroe's twice tried to become independent which Denmark simply ignored, although in both referendums more than half of Faroe' population voted for sovereignty and separation from Denmark
Having seen other Faroe towns I can say that Torshavn is a real islands' megapolis LOL! all the other towns here are just few houses spread on rocks and the gas station.
Funny thing: they accept international delegations in the skansen-museum (although it will be hard to see difference between houses there and houses in Torshavn or other places on the islands)
Public transport is free in Torshavn - or you can just walk around, it is really small town
People and other inhabitants are friendly here
At bus stop near our place we had chocolate bar with notice from time to time
and the day we moved in to our AirBnB our lovely host baked a cake!
They do have great beaches around town - and even swim there because if you will wait for warm weather and not so cold water - you will never get swimming ;o)
I've just sunbathed with my anti-freezing clothes on
2. Faroe' Fairytales
* The Witch and the Giant
Funny couple lived once on the islands: the Witch and the Giant.
Some day they decided to get more land for themselves as Faroe islands are small and barren. So they looked around and without getting far torn the big piece of land from Scotland. They brought it back home to Faroe but the land proved to be as poor as their own.
So next time the duo went farther away and rip up the piece from Ireland - and that one they liked much more: green fields were exactly what they need.
Happy with their self-service purchase the twosome went again to get more land from Ireland - and they did although Irish people tried to protect their land as hard as they could.
Brave Irish fight them with weapons, with magic, with all their wits - but nothing was stronger than the Witch and the Giant and their land was torn apart more and more.
When the fearful couple came back again desperate Irish fall on their knees and pray for help as their last resort. The God seeing their plight had mercy and cleared up the sky letting sun to burn these two to the stone. And since then the Witch and the Giant stay together petrified forever, but few pieces of Irish land are as well still with Faroe. At least they did not steal anymore, here they are:
** Nix
There are many strange creatures live in a cold waters of northern ocean and one of them lives next to Faroe Islands: the magic horse ghost. It is snow white, very tender and playful, it comes to people without fear and offer its back for a ride.
Many people were spellbound by the horse and climbed up for a ride. But on this very moment the horse ghost stormed away with the rider - to the ocean' depth and there was no power to free the rider from the horse. Riders were glued to the horse by some charm and could not escape their sad fate.
Once some kids were playing on the beach and snow white horse come to them shyly at first. Then it started to play with the children gently obeying their commands, running around and jumping cheerfully. Kids happily get on the horse back except for the smallest one who could not get on. At the moment when children were up, the horse reared high up and started to run to the ocean taking the kids to the cold waters.
Kids were terrified but could not get down from the horse ghost. The small one was left alone on the shore and started to cry in horror: "Nix! Nix!!" - he was calling his brother Nicklas like that because he was so small he just started to talk and could not say his brother name properly.
and then strange thing happened: the horse ghost stopped and let the kids go. The creature told kids Nix was his name and anyone who names him - take away the magic. Frightened children run away from the ghost to the village and told people the story. That's how we learned the horse ghost name and how to free yourself if you are taken.
*** Seal Wife
In olden times there were magic seals near Faroe Islands shores. You could rarely see them though but once a year they come out to the beaches, shed their seal skins and become human. That one night in a year the seals in human form were dancing till the morning, singing strange seal songs and making merry among rocks. With first sunrays they took on their seal skins and swim back into the ocean.
He hide the seal skin in the chest, locked it and keep the key always on the string around his neck.
They lived together for several years, had a few kids and everything looked like a happy life.
Once farmer went fishing and at the sea found out the key is not with him. He rushed back home but it was too late: the chest was open, the seal-wife gone, he was left with the kids and an empty house.
The farmer had nothing else to do but continue living and raising the kids by himself, yearning for his seal-wife. The kids were missing their mom, but otherwise they were fine: grow as strong and healthy humans, only difference was - they had membranes between their fingers and toes.
Once the farmer got lucky on the hunt: he catch several seals, brought them home and feed own kids, and neighbors as Faroe people usually do - the islands are not rich in food supply and such a lucky hunt always was shared.
At night though his house doors were broken up and his seal-wife run in in rage: the seals farmers were eating were her entire family....
She cursed the farmer, and the village, and the whole island and said that their lives would be miserable until as many people die on the island as needed to surround the whole island (this is how seals were hunt in old days: people surrounded herd of seals and kill them).
And so it was: fishermen didn't come back from the sea, children were dying from disease, farmers were falling down from slippery cliffs and the rest had nothing to eat and die of hunger.
3. Waterfalls of birds
Faroe called islands of 1000 waterfalls - there are always 1000 of something in tourist brochures.
There are indeed many waterfalls here: the islands are small and pointy so water has no other way but fall down to the sea from many cliffs from one side of the island or the other.
The islands are halfway from Scandinavia to Britain or from Europe to Iceland and further to Americas and back, so having islands with fresh water on the way made it visiting point for migrating birds long before migrating people.
It is written that there are 357 types of birds live in Faroe permanently and more kinds stop here on seasonal migration.
There are tons of birds here surely - only seagulls are hundreds of kinds it seems.
Famous puffins are not so visible: iconic birds of Faroe were eaten by Faroe people almost to extinction. Today puffins are in red book and protected by all means despite locals' appetites.
There are couple of places on islands where noone can enter, not even locals - the puffins breeding grounds. Although it looks like puffins are not eager to breed: they mostly just sit there enjoying peace and quite instead of wild unprotected sex.
With so many waterfalls here are many water power plants of course, the oldest one is still in action - since 1921.
Faroe uses mostly renewable electricity sources: not only there are water plants on rivers/waterfalls, but underwater in fjords too. Wind turbines are here in plenty despite the fact that often wind is so powerful that no wind turbines can stand it.
The wind could be extremely strong here, so even waterfalls "fall backward" as on this youtube video:
They have as well diesel electro generators for emergency cases (with hospitals for example), but these are seldom in use.
4. Geographical
t̶h̶e̶ ̶o̶r̶b̶ ̶o̶f̶ ̶e̶a̶r̶t̶h̶ ̶i̶s̶ ̶c̶u̶t̶ ̶b̶y̶ ̶f̶j̶o̶r̶d̶s̶ Faroe islands pop into existence around 55 millions years ago, then during next 5-6 millions of years they were forming and forming until they formed completely.
Those were the times when Atlantic ocean didn't exist yet and Greenland, Iceland and all the islands around and in between were still part of Europe.
Then it come the time to say goodbye and Greenland float to Americas, Atlantis drowned to give its name to the ocean (we were told), volcanos torn the earth apart making islands and in general geography behaved wildly.
At this point Faroe decided to get the hell out of the violent neighbors and keep it to itself.
All these left deep traces on islands surface, as well as several ice ages: you can see lines of different ages at the same level on every rock of Faroe islands
̶i̶s̶l̶a̶n̶d̶ ̶i̶s̶ ̶a̶ ̶l̶a̶v̶a̶ islands consist mostly of basalt:
there are few anthracite coal pools and even rare relic petrified wood from forests which managed to grow in between volcanic eruptions.
But they are scarce, each such found is unique, usually just a piece of stump or short branch. One of such branches is in Torshavn museum as a serious exhibit. In some places there are swamps with some kind of swamp oil or so - there were several excavations on islands and around with aim to find oil but all in vain.
Air and water formed Faroe rocks into strange forms of many caves, folds and wrinkles
Lowest level here is the sea level and highest is mount Slættaratindur (flat peak): 882metres. It is not exactly high but because islands come straight out of the water they seem to be higher.
There are 18 islands in Faroe or if count everything what is sticking out from the water - 779
All together islands cover 1411 km2 (slightly bigger than Madrid).
There are about 50.000 people live here and more than 70.000 sheep.
Before people come, there were only birds living on the islands because there is almost nothing growing here. Apart from subarctic climate islands are constantly blown round by strong ocean winds which bring salt and make it hardly possible for plants to grow.
People' attempts to grow any food here usually fail: it is mostly rocks; and where soil could be found - it is as a rule some salty mix or swamp turf.
That is why there is no trees and not even bushes on Faroe, only in the end of 19th century here finally got some trees planted, but they need constant attention or otherwise they will die. Taking care of parks here is a hard work and you will not find any gardens on the islands. Only rich farms could afford to spare their people time to have couple of trees grow on the land.
People were trying to bring animals as well of course - with the same success as with trees. It is a serious endeavor to grow some food for animals too therefore the only ones who survived in a wild were sheep, hare and mice. Domestic animals here are completely dependent on people and are very few
5. Driving roads
The roads appeared on Faroe just recently: before locals were simply walking as only few could afford the horse – horses require grass / hay whole year around and these are not grow here in such quantities, besides you'd need to store hay during winter and it is another problem over here as the only available building material is stone – wood is hard to find on the islands. Stone constructions are no good for keeping moisture away so all your hay would be spoiled.
So for ages roads on the islands were dirt paths winding between the rocks.
During 2nd world war when Denmark was occupied by Germany the British forces landed on Faroe: Britain was already under bombing and they needed to place their aviation somewhere safe. So they build an airport here and some paved roads too, after the war all was returned to Denmark.
Denmark in its turn understood that remote islands are not just a useless number of rocks but actually is a strategic territory, so they started to build modern infrastructure here: roads, ports, airport and so on. To keep locals from protesting they build some hospitals, schools and other institutions too (right after WW2 Faroe people organised a referendum where most voters demanded full independence, which Denmark simply ignored). Since then here was Danish navy military base established – we saw 3 of theirs ships during our trip.
Danish engineers decided that it is easier to dig underwater tunnels than build bridges and so now you can easily get from island to island through the tunnels. There are tunnels dug through the mountains as well and for today every remote village and farm is connected by the road.
Although the farms' tunnel roads are narrow – for one car only. Some of them have wider space in the middle where two cars my pass each other for which sometimes you need to drive backwards to get to the spot. For some narrow tunnels there are traffic lights and for some – nothing, so you'd need to drive backwards all the way out to let other car pass by - scary as shit this places I had to say.
Some roads are as narrow as tunnels and build on the edge of the cliffs with no railings because there is just no space for any safety structures. Pass by the lorry or the bus on such roads is pure adrenalin ride.
The tunnels here are of all sorts: long and short, windy and straight, and some have crossroads, and one even with roundabout – yeah! The figures on the roundabout are all these dead people from fairytale about seal wife – exactly what you need when you drive through underwater tunnel, aha.
In some tunnels they put rim lights on the underwater road section – first time we almost shit ourselves because it does looks like the tunnel is transparent and you drive through the water, it's a pity you cannot see this on video.
The tunnels are not free (which is normal in Europe), the great thing here is that there are cameras on each tunnel which read your registration plate and send you the bill once a month, for tourists – you pay when you leave. Gasoline costs here is the same as at home (CZ).
The speed limit is up to 90km/h, as for me – even 50 would be enough for driving on endless serpentines and gasping at amazing Faroe nature. Besides, all their sheep are wandering on the roads without any concern for cars. People on the other hand obey traffic rules scrupulously, as in other parts of Scandinavia.
And the views – oh, the views here will leave you speechless.
6. & how we're supposed to live?...
I've always been drawn to the remote places at the end of everything: islands, deserts, high mountains and always been wondering how and especially why people live there.
So about Faroe: why they live there I didn't understood most probably it was the usual thing: they were born here and used to live here it is the motherland after all and so on.
First settlers here as per common tale were hermits, mostly Irish. Since islands are on the way from Scandinavia to Europe (& back) and further on to America hermits had visits from Vikings from time to time. It was never a place to get rich of but at least there was fresh water. Sometimes Vikings stay especially when back home there were wars or changes in power. Some of them run away to Faroe as they thought – just temporarily but usually stay forever. And that is how during time the islands were slowly inhabited.
After several unsuccessful attempts with farming people got the idea that nothing will grow here and the only reliable source of food is fishing. Even the sheep – the only eatable animal which manage to survive here – could live on the islands in limited numbers. Here the richest families had only small flocks of sheep because of limited territories for their grazing. Hence Faroes don't give a shit on any fish or whales conservation attempts, here it is really the question of survival. On the other hand, this nation of 53k people kills about 1k of whales in a year – from 100k of whales living around here, meaning they cannot possibly cause any extinction.
Today as it always have been, 90% of Faroe' income comes from fishing. The only difference between today and always are the fishing farms: first one was established by Júst í Túni in 1967 and fishing farms become the only progressive business of the islands (developing “wild” fishing into production – this they did not manage to do with anything else).
And of course any instability in world fishing market brings the country to the edge of bankruptcy. Last time it happened in 1990s, at this period was the highest emigration as well. As the owner of my AirBnB said “it was time to turn off the lights and hung the keys on the wall”. He himself sold the last sheep and got a job at the container ship. Denmark pull the Faroe out of this and later fishing market get back on as well.
Still Faroese kept looking for other means of income and here again Denmark helped although not willingly: in time when Denmark joined EU and Schengen zone, Faroe decided not to and by this become a tax free zone without EU stupidity – lucky guys. Besides Faroese insist on not to support any sanctions against anyone and trade with whatever “regimes”: really awfull ones or just imaginary, the important is – they pay. We may get disgusted by it as much as we want, but their position is used by whole EU, not only Denmark without even skipping the bit: my window was facing the port of Torshavn and everyday there were about 4-5 huge container ships and oil tankers. For the country of 50k people this trade turnover is a fucking overkill, isn't it? Funny thing is – there were about 4-5 huge container ships and oil tankers waiting to reload the goods from “bad guys” onto “good ones” and suddenly – just because the ships were changed the goods and oil become European in an instant. Noone makes any secret of it and noone talks about it either, the strategy works and brings income without hurting our morals – if we'd not think, thinking is always ruin staff.
As for tourism – income from it barely covers damage from it: there are +-100k tourists come in a year (on 50k inhabitants remind you), they do not buy much ('cos locals do not produce much), tourists mostly just destroy nature by their hiking, driving, garbaging etc. Therefore Faroese literally “close” the country from time to time, despite possible loss of money. For a period of a year they sometimes stop giving visas, close hotels/AirBnBs, close passes through their farms and so on. This decision made by common vote by the way, not by some order. They call it “Project Closed for Maintenance”. In such years they repair tourists trails and the whole infrastructure.
With the advent of technology Faroe come out of “stone age” - again – literally. For example, many farms ended up their existence just because they run out of turf on their island. And this was the end: turf used for heating and cooking, the wood is extremely rare here, the only “source” of wood was the ocean, but sit on the shore waiting for jetsam is not exactly the best way to survive. Even when you were lucky and got the wood from the ocean it was a dilemma on how to use it: on house repair? On boat construction? Burn it in stove and finally eat something?
This is how they dry up peat:
Houses were built from stone and were long and low: they had no mortar or anything else to keep stones together so noone risked that sooner or later the second floor would fall on your head.
Then electricity came to the rescue – heating and cooking was not an issue anymore. Luckily (and luck is a rare thing on the islands) tide generation plants and lots of waterfalls and mountain rivers allow for limitless electric power. There are few wind turbines too but they mostly stay unused because the wind here is too strong.
We got to talking with one farmer here, 35y.o. Guy he left the islands only once: when he was at school they visited Copenhagen (Danish do this to Faroese to broad their horizons and prevent from being total islanders) – he didn't like it at all. He said that he even wasn't going to school often (yeah, Europe of 21st century, aha): there were no school on his island, no tunnels were built at that time so he had to go 2hours to the other side of the island for the ferry to the bigger island where school was. He didn't like it at all and his parents didn't insist either: the way was slippery and windy and it's better to have alive uneducated kid than educated body crashed on rocks somewhere. He was very excited when tunnel was built though: he was 17 then and pretty much willing to have sex and in his village there were 4 families only and all of them related. So he was enthusiastic to get to the other side of the island for bigger village with ferry or to the other islands ̶t̶o̶ ̶g̶e̶t̶ ̶a̶w̶a̶y̶ ̶f̶r̶o̶m̶ ̶t̶h̶e̶ ̶s̶h̶e̶e̶p̶ And you are complaining in your metapolicies that it is hard to meet someone...
Somehow there were always more man in Faroe than women. Lately it become popular to get a wife from Asia, especially Philippines and Thailand, for today these are the biggest minorities on the islands.
Internet helped Faroese even more than electricity: apart from love life, they got online schooling long before COVID. They somehow missed out on all this phone-mobile madness (mostly because of terrain and weather) so with internet communication become a thing on the islands. Funny perk is with GoogleMaps by the way: instead of people or cars they use sheep for mapping by placing cameras on their backs. Internet here is everywhere and you can pay by card, by phone, by all kinds of money transfers or bitcoins/chaincurrency etc. You can do it in any village however small or remote, pay for any fees, tickets, restaurants or taxes.
Speaking of restaurants – sometimes you may starve there: couple of times during our stay the restaurants told us they run out of food for today so we had to find another one. Once it was fastfood fish&chips, the other – pretty expensive restaurant in Torshavn centre. It is not that Faroese dying of hunger evry other day, we got food in another places – just note this is happens when fish catch is low, so sometimes if you come late – you got nothing.
Traditional dry mutton skerpikjøt is delicious! It is produced like prosciutto or jamon: it hangs on in specially made huts where ocean winds dry it. Same way is used to dry whale meat – this I did not like. I've never chew on old dirty socks but have a feeling that it is exactly the teste you get when you eat it – fuuuu. Faroese love both and chew their jerky with pleasure. We didn't get a chance to try seals, the animals learn not to come close to the islands, as anyone who wasn't careful enough was eaten. From vegetables you can get local potatoes and rhubarb – both very expensive; the rest of the vegetables are even more expensive because they are imported.
Faroese are pretty normal people, in their way of living I'd say even very kind and cheerful. For example near our bus station some chocolate was left on the bench with the note “pass it on”. In Torshavn public transport is free for everybody.
There are usual number of “free” social staff like education, medical care, retairment pensions etc. (“free” means of course you pay for these in taxes). But this is normal for most of Europe too. Denmark gets school kids on excursions not only to Denmark but anywhere in Scandinavia, they can get scholarship to any university in EU. I haven't seen beggars or homeless people on the streets, or prostitutes (it is legal here but they say they do not have any now). There is no police in Faroe, in all the islands there is only 1 police station in Torshavn and it is Danish police. There is the lowest crime rate in Europe: it would be difficult to run away from the islands besides, everyone knows everyone else from birth (amazingly – they do have AA here somehow...). There is no prisons in Faroe and never been – before convicts were taken to Denmark.
All in all that's what I learnt here. Well plus that Faroese live without weapons: there are no dangerouse (or any) animals, no mad neighbors (or they are far-far away) and from rare pirates attacks locals usually run away into mountains. Only once in time of Ost-Indian companies the pirates' attacks become frequent and Denmark sent 15 (!) people with arms to protect the islands. And it helped. But locals never got weapons in their hands – these were danish guards.
Einki er so ilt, tað er ikki gott fyri okkurt.
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