Olympic Spirit

I take the train into Oslo again. The morning sun hangs low on the horizon. The sky, after days of rain, is clear and refreshingly blue. The temperature has dropped. Leaning back into my seat, I settle my hat over my ears and huddle into my coat. My fingertips are cold.

My time in Norway is running out like a shaken hourglass; too quickly. Though not regretting any of my forest walks or quiet days, I’m suddenly wondering if I should have done more or gone further. No, I think. More things would have been great adventures of their own, but this time, here, the way I’ve done it has been perfect. And today, look, I’ll do more, I’ll go further. I’m going.

The pressure of checking off all the items on my Oslo Day Trip To Do List bites at my heels and tells me to quicken my steps as I walk out of Oslo Central Station. Don’t dawdle. While constricted by closing times and the sunset, my plan is as follows: Holmenkollen Ski Jump and Museum, Frogner Park, The Munch Museum, and, if I time it right, a boat ride. Sunset will happen at 3:28 P.M. Closing time in winter for nearly everything is 4:00 P.M. Much of my time will be spent in transit.

My Oslo Day Pass in hand, I take the westbound metro to the Holmenkollen stop. I follow a gaggle of tourists up the hill and into view of the Holmenkollen Ski Jump. It’s shaped like some Willy Wonka elevator-turned-slide. I dawdle a little to take some pictures of it and then to turn around and take pictures of the Oslo Fjord where the sun is making gold of the water.

A thin layer of snow lies over the sidewalk. I step around glinting patches of ice. The way goes up and upward. Then, there I am at the ski jump and arena. It’s the only steel ski jump in the world. A sign tells me that but neglects to say what all the other ski jumps are made of and why this one gets special steel treatment. Nevertheless, I’m impressed. While this site has been used for ski jumping competitions since 1892, the actual jump has been redeveloped and rebuilt multiple times, 18 times, in fact. This jump that I’m now admiring was completely rebuilt in 2010, steel and all. My host had told me that the view from the top of the ski jump is possibly the best of Oslo. That, more than anything else, is why I’ve come. But I’d been even more enticed when I’d looked it up and read that Oslo—with Holmenkollen as one of the event venues—had been the host to the 1952 Winter Olympics.

I do like the Olympics. The Olympics Games, for me, represent hope, potential, dedication, pursuit of perfection, excellence, the trials of life, sorrow and pain, thrill, the truth (that I want so badly to believe in) that hard work always pays off, and the joy of existence, of existing. Look at what the human body can do. I like the Olympics for showing the human capacity for doing the impossible and making it look easy. So easy that sometimes when watching I can’t help myself from thinking, “I could do that.”

Standing on the steps that run along one side of the stands, I look around.

So, the 1952 Olympics Games were played here, I think.

Skinny, silver pipes are spitting out snow over the arena and the jump’s slope. In this mild and beautiful fall, it’s finally cold enough to make snow. I take some pictures and then put my camera away. I slide my right hand glove back on. I can’t linger forever watching snow collect, I have to keep moving.

Showing my Pass to the museum staffer, I head inside the Ski Museum. Glancing sideways at old snowshoes, a stuffed polar bear, old sleds, old skis, a stuffed moose, and pictures of Nordic trekkers, I follow the signs that point me to the ski jump tower. Trailing just behind another visiting couple, I join them in the elevator-—the man holds the door for me—and we ride together straight up to the top.

Out of the elevator and through an automatic door, I’m back in the open air and approximately 1400 feet above sea level.

Facing the arena, I stand with my shoulder against the railing and look down. The jump slope is nearly vertical. From here, it doesn’t seem as if the landing slope is long enough. But, on television, I’ve seen winter sports athletes stop on a dime in the snow. I know it’s possible. I myself have reached a very basic level in skiing which means I only know just a little bit, and I’ve stopped myself before. Not on a dime. Not from a speed of 52 plus miles per hour. Not from any slope this vertical. But I have stopped. Even so, the landing slope doesn’t seem all that long.

Standing in a position that’s almost close enough to let me feel what it might be to have skis on my feet and be the next one to go down this insane jump, my blood shivers with thrill, with terror, with joy. What an exhilaration that would be. What an ecstasy it would be to fly. For a moment, I think, if I’d been in a place to do winter sports as a child…. I let the thought jump. I smile. I would have been good. I would have been fearless. I would have ski jumped. I’d have skied downhill. I’d have ridden the luge. I’d have been a speedskater. Of course, in reflection, in what ifs, I could have been anything, I could be anything.

Later, I find out that although ski jumping has been an Olympic sport since 1924, it wasn’t one open to women until 2014 (!). This because for so long, for way too long, it was thought that the landing would be too hard on the female body, too jarring. The idea was that women’s fragile and precious reproductive organs might not survive something so extreme. Well, seems as if the women and their internals are handling the sport just fine. And while the event is still not equal—men get three events within ski jumping while the women only get one—it’s one terrifyingly glorious jump closer.

Leaving history, inequality, the jump, and my imaginings behind, I go to the viewing platform with the sign that says, “Staying on this level is dangerous and forbidden during thunderstorms.” I look up. The sky is pretty clear. Then I look around. Wow. My host was right. The views here are amazing. There are distant mountains in dark blue. There are ice covered lakes frosted over with a light dusting of snow. There are trees. There are the colorful houses and buildings built up the slopes of the blue mountains and built up to the shores of the ice covered lakes. There’s the sun making its low trajectory toward sun set. I check my clock, I look toward the sun. I’m doing good on time, but I do have a schedule to keep.

Down the elevator, down the hill, and back to the station, I take the eastbound metro and get off at Majorstuen. Walking briskly, and only asking for directions twice (I don’t have time to get lost), I make it to Frogner Park and the much visited Vigeland Sculpture Park.

The park contains the lifework of Gustav Vigeland and was designed by Vigeland himself. It’s filled with sculpture after sculpture of the human figure in conflict and at ease. 212 sculptures altogether. I walk down the bridge looking at the statues that line the rail on the near side. They’re a bit disturbing. For instance, there is the figure of a man fending off what appears to be an attack by babies. Three have dropped down on him from above and he has raised his arms, fists made, to swat them away. Another baby has already fallen far enough to be kicked away by the man’s foot. It’s not quite fairytale. Certainly, I’m not familiar with a legend of evil babies. I don’t know a myth of a wicked man destroyed by babies. I’m not sure what wider concept Vigeland might have been trying to exemplify. Does the baby, as an idea, undo a man? Does the man, as an idea, threaten the babies? Does he threaten their innocence so much that they must attack him? Whatever this sculpture is meant to do, it comes off as brutal. 

In contrast to that, on the other side of the bridge is another statue man holding a sleeping statue baby protectively in his arms. He looks off to the side as if to watch for anything that might disturb the child. If alone, instead of one of many strange statues, that one might be a comfort. That one might be a symbol of Father. Of Protector. Of Caregiver. Of Something. The baby a symbol of hope, future, and life.

Stepping out of other tourists’ pictures, I make my way down the bridge. There’s a statue woman caught in mid-running stride, her hands up to her head, and I can’t tell if she’s joyfully skipping or tearing out her hair. Across from her are the figures of a man and woman. The man is off balanced onto one foot as the woman has apparently leaped on him, but for what purpose it’s not quite clear.

Interesting, I think. Strange.

The statues depict something other than the Olympic Spirit which is still filling my lungs. Whatever it is that it is, it’s not nearly as inspiring. If anything must be said, though, the statues make me reflect on the human condition. Not sure I really want to do that at the moment, I make a rapid pass around the park and then head back toward the metro and on to the Munch Museum.

Munch is Norway’s artist. He’s, of course, most well known for The Scream. He’s known for painting scenes with psychological themes. His work is said to have been influenced greatly by German Expressionism.

Maybe because I’ve just come from Vigeland Park and the strange sculptures there have put human conflict on my mind, that’s what I seem to see in the drawings and paintings on exhibit here now. Vampire. The Murderer. The Drowning Child. The Death of Marat. These are some of the titles to some of Munch’s displayed paintings. Again, it feels a blurring contrast from the Olympic Spirit to the macabre. I don’t want to be blurred. Even so, I admire the brushstrokes, the daubed paint, the color, the mood, and then, not wanting to reflect on the morbid any longer, I bid the museum farewell. I bid Munch farewell.

Outside again and after adjusting my hat and scarf, I stand in the brisk air and glance at my clock. Well gosh! I’ve made good time with my day. I’ve even got an hour and a half of sunlight left. Catching the metro again, I go to the harbor.

I’m there in time to take the island hopping ferry around the Oslo Fjord as the sun sets. What a day. What a life. What things the human being can do. What things I get to do. I press my face to the glass and gaze out. The boat crunches through a thin layer of ice. The water looks like molten mercury. After a bit, I go stand on the foredeck with the wind on my face. My fingertips are cold.  

As the ferry goes from island to island and as the sun goes lower still, I glance back toward Oslo, a place I now recognize. What a day. What a life. I sigh with contentment. If only the weeks wouldn’t speed by so quickly. Please, whoever you are that’s doing it, quit shaking the hourglass. The sands are eager enough to fall on their own.