All the pictures can be found in my head
On an early June day in 2023, our car pulls into a driveway in the village of Badje Sohppar / Övre Soppero, Sweden, where Britta Marakatt-Labba lives and works with her family.
Text by Anne Sommerin Simonnæs
We have travelled by plane from Oslove / Oslo to Evenášši / Evenes in the far north of Norway, then across the border by car, along narrow roads that are gradually surrounded by lofty mountains and by what seems to me like a desolate, windswept landscape. We pass by a series of large, white windmills on our right, while a steady stream of trailers drive past on our left as snow and bits of ice constantly fly off their roofs. At Giron / Kiruna, the home of the world’s deepest iron ore mine, the terrain flattens out somewhat, and the northbound road is full of near deserted stretches full of trees and possible encounters with reindeer, moose, and foxes. When we finally reach the Marakatt-Labba property, about twelve kilometres or so northeast of Giron, my colleague Randi Godø and I receive a warm welcome, even as spring can barely be glimpsed in the greenish buds of the surrounding trees. We are soon ushered into their cosy kitchen, where we are served a delicious reindeer stew and feel truly at home.