FAR6.1: Celebrations

This weekend was excellent. The Salvation Army band at the corps in Tórshavn was 75 years old and a whole heap of things were planned to mark the occasion!

The excitement started on Thursday 23rd October, the actual day of the anniversary, where after a short march from the hall, we played outside the town hall and had breakfast with the Mayor of Tórshavn. (The Salvation Army, and particularly the band, has a very high profile in the Faroe Islands, playing an important part in the national day celebrations every July).

Getting ready for the march (at 8.50am – how hardcore!):

At breakfast with the Mayor: Following the breakfast, six of us went to the radio station Rás2, where the bandmaster and the bass player were interviewed, and we played four tunes live on air. Those who were interviewed did a fantastic job and made the most of a real opportunity for witness. The DJs had really done their homework too! This is just before we played on air (I always get a little overexcited... Although radio is actually a bit of a step down for me ;) ):On the Friday we had our first rehearsal with our guest from Norway, Major Jan Harald Hagen, head of music for the Norwegian Territory (The global Salvation Army is divided into territories for administrative purposes. The Faroe Islands are part of the Norwegian territory, together with Iceland... And Norway, but you probably got that). He was a great bloke and we had a good time together – although the language situation got somewhat confusing!*Saturday was marked by more rehearsals with Jan Harald, followed by a very nice meal at a hotel in Tórshavn for members of the band and their families.

Sunday night was the music festival, which we had all advertised by putting up posters around town, and we really hoped the turn-out would be good. It was fantastic – there were over 150 people there. The evening was excellent – a lot of humour, the band played really well, there were testimonies, vocal items, etc. – and although the band was the main feature for most of the night, no-one in that hall could have gone home without knowing they had been in Church and that the sole purpose of everything we do is to further the Christian message. Apparently an awful lot of the congregation had never been to an Army meeting before. Good stuff!

On two occasions during the meeting, we looked at a few photos from the band’s history, right up to the present day (I was even on some of them!) – it’s fairly unusual to be looking at photos of the old days and be sitting in a band that is bigger now than back then... (I’ll write more about the Salvation Army here in a future post).

It was a fantastic weekend, and a real privilege to be a part of it. I timed my stay pretty well, didn’t I?

As I said, the radio DJs had really done their research, and they spoke all about the Salvation Army and its history, and even played a recording of William Booth, the founder of the Salvation Army, speaking in 1910. It was fascinating to hear. I’ve listened to it a lot now, and I’m fairly sure I have the subtitles right – enjoy:*Seriously, it did my head in: Jan Harald is Norwegian, and spoke, as you would expect, Norwegian. The Faroese can all speak Danish and understand Norwegian – many of them speak Norwegian too, so they used Danish, Norwegian or a mixture of the two when speaking to, or in front of Jan Harald, but Faroese to each other and to me. Now I understand Norwegian, and speak Swedish – Swedish and Norwegian are close enough that one person can speak Swedish and the other Norwegian, and have a decent conversation. So I spoke Swedish when speaking to or in front of Jan Harald, who would reply in Norwegian, but I spoke Faroese to everyone else. Towards the end, I got completely confused, and apologised to one girl for speaking to her in Swedish, when I was in fact speaking Faroese.