When
Iceland reopened its public swimming pools after two months of closure,
the nation was so delighted that queues formed outside pools at
midnight.
T
Three
months ago in the Icelandic capital of Reykjavík, hundreds of people
queued outside the city’s largest swimming pool under the blueish glow
of the midnight sun. As the date ticked over from Sunday 17 May to
Monday 18 May, the excited crowd counted down until, at exactly 00:01,
smiling staff unlocked the doors.
Instead of going to the pub or park, Icelanders like to gather in their local pool
The festive atmosphere outside Laugardalslaug
pool was repeated around the city. The reason for the excitement was
that Reykjavík’s public pools were reopening after eight weeks of
closure due to the Covid-19 pandemic. The reopening had been announced a
few days earlier on Facebook,
where Reykjavík’s mayor, Dagur B Eggertsson, explained that the pools,
which normally close between 22:00 and 06:30, would open early to ensure
they could accept as many swimmers as possible while operating at half
capacity, per Covid-19 precautions.
“Some people will be tired at
work on Monday – but… first and foremost they’ll be clean and happy,” he
wrote, adding: “See you in the pool!”
The
pool at Hofsós, a small fishing village in the northern part of
Iceland, has magnificent views towards the ocean (Credit: Feifei
Cui-Paoluzzo/Getty Images)
The
scenes were testament to the affection Icelanders hold for their public
pools. Every Icelandic town, no matter how small, has a pool, or sundlaug. Most
are outdoors, heated geothermally, include a hot tub and are open
year-round, allowing Icelanders to enjoy their daily swim no matter the
weather.
“Lounging around in swimming pools and hot springs is a
national pastime,” said filmmaker Jón Karl Helgason. “Instead of going
to the pub or park, Icelanders like to gather in their local pool to get
fresh air, exercise and discuss world matters in the hot tub.”
Helgason grew up accompanying his father to the local pool daily. Now he’s working on a documentary, Swimming Pool Stories, due
for release in October 2020, which examines the culture of public
bathing as an important feature of everyday life. It may seem odd that
visiting an outdoor pool is an ingrained part of a cold-climate
country’s culture, but the pool is as much a social space as a place to
exercise.
Every Icelandic town has a pool that serves a focal point for the community (Credit: Arctic-Images/Getty Images)
“[It’s]
often the focal point in an Icelandic community,” said Helgason.
“Everybody uses it, from small children to the elderly and everybody in
between. Many Icelanders will go to the pool daily, either on their way
to or from work. Schools will use the pools for teaching swimming, while
the elderly can attend water aerobics classes and enjoy a chat and a
coffee afterwards.”
Filming
has taken Helgason to 100 pools around Iceland, where he got to know
the many different kinds of people who frequent them. “Guests come from
all walks of life,” he said, “clergymen, writers, farmers, seamen,
teachers, academics, labourers, politicians and celebrities.”
Functioning as a meeting place for a cross-section of society can have a
levelling effect, he believes; sitting in a pool semi-naked means that
“all the trappings associated with class or wealth through one’s
clothing are gone. Now you are who you are. Nothing more, nothing less.”
Records
of public bathing in Iceland date to the 13th Century. In the west of
the country, Snorralaug (Snorri’s Pool), a small circular pool used by
Iceland’s most-celebrated literary figure, the saga writer Snorri
Sturluson, is mentioned in Landnámabók (Book of Settlements)
and Sturlunga saga. It was in the 20th Century, however, that pools
became a fixture in everyday life, thanks to Iceland’s unique geology.
Snorri’s
Pool is evidence that Icelanders used geothermal pools as far back as
the 13th Century (Credit: Thomas H Mitchell/Getty Images)
“Following
an unusually cold winter of 1918, the population was severely hit by
the Spanish flu,” write University of Iceland professors Örn D Jónsson
and Ólafur Rastrick in their analysis
of Iceland’s pools. The combination of the pandemic and rising coal
prices, due to the war, “had devastating effects on the already fragile
economic conditions in many families”.
To counter the cost of
imported coal and oil, which had been Iceland’s primary source of
heating, the volcanic island began transitioning to alternative energy
by harnessing its rich resources of geothermal power, which were soon
used to heat newly built swimming pools, as well as homes. Today around
65% of Iceland’s energy supply is geothermal.
The emergence of the
swimming pool was dependent not only on the availability of geothermal
power but also, the researchers write, “on the national significance
that became associated with swimming during the formative years of the
Icelandic nation state”.
Reykjavík’s Laugardalslaug pool reopened in May after two months of closure due to Covid-19 (Credit: Nordicphotos/Alamy)
Iceland
became a sovereign state in 1918 and achieved full independence from
Denmark in 1944. During this period, attitudes towards swimming changed.
There had previously been little emphasis on knowing how to swim,
despite living on an island surrounded by the sea. However, as Iceland
transitioned from a farming economy into a fishing nation, learning to
swim became viewed as essential.
Lounging around in swimming pools and hot springs is a national pastime
Since
1940, swimming lessons have been mandatory for children. “It's such a
big part of our lives,” said Brá Guðmundsdóttir, human resources manager
for the Laugardalslaug and nearby Sundhöllin pools. “We start swimming
with our kids when they are a few months old, then all the kids start
lessons when they start school.” Weekly lessons, she said, are mandatory
from the age of six until 16, when everyone is tested to prove they can
swim 600m unassisted.
But beyond preventing drownings, swimming
was elevated in the early 20th Century for what Jónsson and Rastrick
describe as its “civilising effect”. It was related to the nationalist
movement, Rastrick told me, “and, most specifically, the patriotic youth
movement (Ungmennafélag Íslands) that promoted swimming… as a means to
develop the physique of the members of the emerging independent
Icelandic nation”. The link between medieval and modern Iceland
was important for the nationalist movement, he added, so this emphasis
on physical improvement linked “the bodies of modern Icelandic men to
the heroes of the sagas”.
The secret to Icelandic happiness
In 1937, the Art Deco Sundhöllin
(the “Swimming Palace”), Iceland’s oldest public baths, opened in
Reykjavík, and, write Jónsson and Rastrick, “was seen as one of the most
impressive symbols of the nation’s self-respect”. If the emergence of
swimming in Iceland helped to foster the newly independent nation’s
confidence, it’s a transformation that is repeated on a smaller scale
every day in the pool as the warm water helps shed the typically
reserved Icelanders’ inhibitions.
“Icelandic winters are long,
cold and dark and our summers are not particularly warm either,”
Helgason said. “This means we’re always heavily dressed, we drive
between locations and there’s little opportunity for leisurely downtown
strolls or public socialising outdoors. All of this makes for a nation
that is reserved by nature. However, once we’ve stripped off those
layers of clothing and entered the hot tub, we become chatty
extroverts.”
That the pool fosters health in mind and body, as
well a sense of equality, might be key to why Iceland regularly ranks as
one of the world’s happiest countries.
In his research, Jónsson asked people how they felt after visiting a
pool. Almost all responded that they felt “revitalised”, in both
body and soul. He added, however, that “there is very little exotic
here, only a quest for comfort [that’s] affordable for everyone”.
The
25m Seljavallalaug thermal pool in southern Iceland is one of the
oldest pools in the country (Credit: Amanda Richter/Getty Images)
Jónsson also found that pool-goers usually don’t become close friends,
“and that is probably the 'secret’ of the popularity of visiting the
pools”. He describes the “thrown-togetherness” of gathering in public
places as a “get-together without obligations” – much like being pleased
to see fellow regulars at the local pub but without feeling the need to
form deeper friendships with them.
Once we’ve stripped off those layers of clothing and entered the hot tub, we become chatty extroverts
The
pool may be an essential feature of the local community, but visitors
are always welcome as long as they respect etiquette. Little chlorine is
used in order to maintain the purity of the water, so one of the most
important rules is to first thoroughly wash, without a swimsuit, in the
communal changing room. The lack of privacy can make foreign visitors
uncomfortable, but it’s perhaps another example of the breaking down of
barriers that the pool facilitates.
Many also talk of the positive
effect of seeing “real” bodies in their imperfect flesh – a sentiment I
recognise. When I lived in Iceland in the mid-2000s, unable to sleep in
the bright summer light, I developed an early morning ritual of
visiting the local pool.
Surrounded by women of all ages and shapes, I felt the insecurities
that come with being a young woman washed away in the communal shower.
Today, having effectively beaten back
the virus, all restrictions have been lifted at Iceland’s beloved
pools. The country is now also reopening to tourism. For those who
visit, Helgason recommends a pool visit, because, he says, “there’s no
better way to get in touch with the nation”.
Swimming
is a huge part of Icelandic culture, and swimming lessons have been
mandatory for children since 1940 (Credit: Alex Walker/Getty Images)
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