In July, Benny Ljus, webmaster of the Lekvattnet homepage, and I met him at the Gardemoen airport. It was the first time John had visited Europe. After wishing him welcome to Scandinavia we drove towards Sweden. By midnight we arrived at Bodil and Göran's cottage in Vittjärn, which John had rented for two weeks. The following day at 10.00 AM I picked him up and first on our agenda was walking up to Lyssjötorp by lake Lysen, where his ancestors had lived. To find the very place was more easily said than done, which we at the time were happily unaware of.

Along a winding path, in pouring rain, we started out on our walk to lake Lysen. Getting there was no major problem. According to Jossi's book Ödetorp i Lekvattnet the croft Lyssjöberg should be situated by the northeast side of the lake and the path had gotten us to the southwest side. We just had to walk around the lake and stay as close to it as we could manage. When we finally reached the northern side we were pretty exhausted. We didn't know where to start searching so we agreed upon trying to get in touch with someone who could tell us how to find the remains of the house.

The next day we walked the Seven-croft trail in blazing sunshine together with Benny and Eva Lena. John had a very special feeling about walking on the same paths as his Forest Finnish ancestors. Astonished, he noticed that one could just walk across the border to our neighbour country Norway. He had a good laugh when he got sight of a Forest Finn sample of erotic art on our way between Lebikko and Kissalamp.

On the next day the haymaking at Ritamäki took place. That was something John had been looking forward to. Two haymakers, Lars Inge Nilsson and Ivar Holter from the Gunnarskog folkassociation, showed us how to use a scythe. At Ritamäki John met Brita from Kissalampi who visited Ritamäki in order to see John. They are both descendants from the Finnish family Orainen. John was also, for the first time confronted with the dish motti (oat porridge) and pork. Eating as much lingonberries as motti he seemed to enjoy it. After the haymaking he joined Bodil and Göran at their smoke house in Svartbäcken/Mustapuro. There he learned both how to play boule and how to play the card game Chicago. After sleeping at their smoke house John "made Lekvattnet", going on a tour by Cadillac with Benny and Stanley. They went all around the beautiful lake and up to the Burkberget mountain.

Then they attended the afternoon service and the minister of the region, Keinth welcomed John to Lekvattnet. After the church service John was allowed up into the church tower and then he was invited to have fish, caught in the Pägertjärn, at Keinth`s place.

On the following morning, John and Benny came to my house in Torsby. After having morning coffee, we went to the Centrum of Forest Finn culture to watch the exhibition Nitaho, which shows the Forest Finn's culture in a very educational way. Tellervo Zetterberg gave us some documents about the mill by lake Lysen. The mill burnt down in the 1930's .We must have passed the remains on our walk to the lake. For lunch at my home typically Swedish summer courses were served; herring, cottage cheese, chives, boiled eggs, fresh potatoes, tomatoes, cucumber, hard crisp bread, cheese and radish. Raw fish was not among John favourites but he still enjoyed his lunch. John was surprised when he noticed that I sort the garbage. Sorting garbage seems to be an unknown concept in Alaska. Neither did he know anything about getting heat for your house out of the ground.

Then it was time for John to be interviewed by a reporter from NWT, Värmland's newspaper. John told her about his search for his roots in Lekvattnet. The reporter, Sara, wanted a photo of us taken by lake Lysen and we promised her to return with the photo she wanted. In the afternoon we visited Oddvar from Knappåsen, who is well known for his breeding of wolfdogs. John and Oddvar had a lot to discuss. The grandmother of John's dog Raven was a wolf. On our way back to Torsby we ran into the worst storm ever remembered. Even a citizen of Alaska found it a heavy storm.

Then, on the next day, we tried again to find Lyssjöberg, together with Keinth. It was a very hot and sunny day. Keith had found ruins of a croft when he spent some time at lake Lysen with a group of confirmees and after searching for a while we found both the remaining stonework and the root cellar and what was left of the outbuildings. One could make out two walls of the main house in the moss. It was a strong emotional experience for John to stand by the ruins of the croft Lyssjöberg, which once was owned by his great grandfather and his family, an experience which also affected Keinth and me. John had brought some stones from his home in Alaska and from the farm in Minnesota where descendents of Jan Olofsson Orainen live. He placed the stones on the old dwelling place and picked a few from there to bring home. The visit was concluded by a short devotion. Keinth and John made a joint decision to spend a night there during John's next visit to Sweden! Back by the lake we had coffee and some sweet rolls baked by Keinth's wife. Delicious! Keinth took some photos to be published in NWT. Sad to say, they did not turn out well, so we had to return a third time.

One of the evenings we were invited to dinner by a friend of mine living in Sunne. It turned out that not only were there Forest Finns among John s ancestors on his grandfathers side, but he is also a descendent of the Höffner family from Lysvik and she helped me translate the history about that family into English.

Except for the visit to Lyssjötorp, visiting Bredsjön and Gräsmark moved John the most. After driving the wrong direction a couple of times we finally found our way to Mariastorp where Johns's great grandfather was born (the family which later moved to Lyssjötorp). We were welcomed by Britta who generously offered us coffee and coffee bread. After she had put on another dress we were allowed to take photos of her. We stayed for a long while in her kitchen, thinking and talking about the different phases of life. We also visited Haikola in Bredsjön . Kristina, the girl who became John's great grandfather's wife on the other side of the ocean, once lived in Haikola. Then it was time to go to the church of Gräsmark, where John's great great great-grandparents once were married. We found a photo of the minister who married them and who baptized their son. Their younger children were baptized in the church of Lekvattnet. Then we had motti and pork in the smoke house at the folkhouse in Gräsmark. There we met the mother of Nisse, the treasurer of the geneology association of northern Värmland. Later that evening John met Jan Sammel at Karmen Kynna, who advised John to go and see Rune Pålsson in Gräsmark. The next morning we picked up Bodil and Göran who had promised to take a photo of John and me by lake Lysen. After walking up to Lysen for the third time (unnecessarily though, because NWT chose to publish another photo), we went back to Gräsmark to meet Rune Pålsson and his wife and their daughter Monika. Monika found the name of several persons who in one way or another were connected to John's ancestors. After two and a half hours of interesting conversation, coffee and sandwiches, it was time to go on. On our way back we passed Granbäckstorp, the beautiful Kymmen and Simonstorp and we made a short visit to the Finnish house Kvarntorp. One of the last days we went to see my cousin Mona and her friend Jonny in Malung. There we had moose beef and a delicious blueberry pie. We had time for a short visit to a renovated melting house there. John was happy to see them and to visit another region of Sweden.

The last day in Sweden had come and, according to John's wish, we spent most of the day in Torsby. At a quarter to eight he knocked on my door. Of course, we visited Kollsberg with the smoke house, the old houses, the amphitheatre and the great view of Fryken. We met Tommy who also has Forest Finnish roots. At the land surveyor's, where John bought maps of Lekvattnet, we met a man who had been to Alaska the week before! John took many photos of the factory and of the Sahlströmhouse and of Heidrun's café too. We had lunch at Pärlan (the pearl) restaurant in Lysvik. We enjoyed the magnificent view and the delicious food before returning to Torsby and the tourist office. John generously handed out gifts to all of us and he bought just as many to bring home for his friends "over there". At the office, he met Pia who also is of Forest Finnish origin from Valkola in Örtjärnshöjden. It became a long day's journey towards night, but we decided to make a second try to find Granälven before we parted in Vittjärn. The Olof Nilsson Orainen family stayed for a short while in Granälven, before they built Lyssjötorp. Unfortunately we didn't find it. John gave me a poem he had written after our visit to Gräsmark...." she has rye in her eyes and sunshine in her hands".. That is among the most beautiful things I've heard "rye in her eyes". Later in the evening John got the opportunity to say goodbye to everyone at the evening meeting at the folk house in Lekvattnet. Early the next morning Benny and Eva Lena drove him to Gardemoen. John felt that he had come home when he walked the paths of his ancestors and he is convinced that he will return, hopefully next year if he can save up for the ticket. He is planning to buy himself a summerhouse in Lekvattnet. After a two weeks stay one might still be in the honeymoon phase so we will wait and see how he feels about it in a couple of months.

At the shore of Lake Lysen

by: Irmgard Henriksson