Heroine

I normally don’t write about things that aren’t specific to Iceland [unless of course they’re to do with my own navel]... by which I mean I try to steer away from commenting on global events, simply because there are many others that do that much better than I. But tonight I must make an exception because I was absolutely blown away by the interview with Austrian teenager Natascha Kampusch broadcast earlier on Kastljós – the same interview that today is probably being broadcast throughout the world.

In measured words, Kampusch described her ordeal, including her abduction, her underground bunker, her relationship with her captor, her escape, and more. It’s an absolutely riveting story, quite unbelievable. How she could have been kept hidden all those years in total captivity and yet managed to not only survive but actually grow as a human being is astonishing. How she kept her will to live. How she educated herself. How she was able to make sense of her feelings and her thoughts and her existence, as opposed to going insane as others surely would have done. Truly, the girl must be exceptionally gifted – to do all those things, and then at the end to be able to articulate it all so intelligently – it’s just remarkable.

Perhaps most amazing of all, I find, is her ability to articulate her feelings about her ordeal, her captor, all the events that took place. Her narration was interspersed with references to what she had felt, sometimes in minute detail. When describing the abduction she talked about how her gut instinct had told her to cross the street, get out of the way, but she had ignored it, suppressed it. She talked about her rage at being locked inside the bunker immediately on arriving at the abductor’s house, and how she tried to memorize identifying details on the outside of the house, so she could later communicate them to the police. Absolutely heart-wrenching were her descriptions of her desperation when she went outside with her abductor, while being completely under his control. Being in a store, for instance, and trying to communicate a message to the sales clerks or someone else, desperate to shout the truth but terrified of the repercussions if she did.

Yet alas, it appears that her intricate emotional life was also used against her quite shamelessly. Clearly her captor instilled in her an awful sense of guilt and responsibility. Talking about his suicide [he threw himself in front of a train], she almost broke down, saying that he had made her, and the taxi driver that took him to the train station, and the ticket collector, accessories to murder. In other words, his guilt has become hers. His responsibility, hers. She was responsible for his death because she had dared to escape.

Still, despite the paralyzing manipulation and fear of her captor, what a powerful and strong spirit! For one thing, she insisted that he buy birthday and Christmas presents for her – and he did. She also made a pact with her ‘older self’ that she had to stay strong and healthy because one day she would escape. [Imagine articulating it with such clarity!] And she was determined that she would not lag behind ‘the people outside’, so to that end she set about educating herself and doing things like teaching herself to knit. She knew that there would be a huge gap in her development, and she was determined to fill it. Incredible!

It’s clear that the ordeal has left deep scars – the cracks were there, visible, in her composed exterior – but on the whole she must have an exceptionally strong spirit. Even just to have the wherewithal to know that she needed to be left alone by the media immediately after her escape, for an indefinite length of time, until she was ready, showed a maturity that is remarkable given the circumstances. I sincerely hope that this happy ending will be a refrain throughout her life and that she finds all the joy she deserves.

MEANWHILE, BACK IN NICELAND
We have weather. Rainy weather, to be precise. Autumn-like, blustery, rainy, cool. We’re set for storm-like conditions [which reminds me: Storm Large got the axe on Supernova last night while Magni passes through to the finals – yay for the midget state that gets up to vote!] tomorrow. Current temps are 9°C, sunrise was at 06.27 and sunset at 20.23.