Who is behind the attacks on the figure of light Ken-Guru? The question opens old wounds between the northern Norwegian cities of Harstad, Tromsø and Narvik.
For the second time in a short time, Harstad’s new celebrity – the light figure Ken-Guru – has become bruised in the night gloom and darkness.
– Someone has attacked him. Now he is standing crooked, and the wires have been damaged, so he hardly has any light left in him, says Linn Hvattum when she meets VG.
DOWN FOR THE COUNT: This is what Ken-Guru looked like earlier in December. Now the figure is attacked again.
Photo: Sveinulf Frantzen
Hvattum is general manager of Harstad Sentrum, the association that owns Ken-Guru. He became a national celebrity last year, after Harstad’s center association ordered a light-up horse, but ended up with one kangaroo by mistake. The kangaroo immediately became a hit for the small town in Sør-Troms.
This year, the announcements have been of the less cheerful kind, as Harstad has now woken up two weekends in Advent to the sight of a Ken-Guru down for the count.
DAMAGED – AGAIN: Ken-Guru mother Linn Hvattum asks people to be fair with the kangaroo in the center of Harstad.
Photo: Hallgeir Vågenes / VG
– Someone who has been out drinking is behind it. People are welcome to take selfies with him in town, but leave him alone!
– Put Harstad on the map
Mayor Kari Anne Opsal (Ap) despairs over the attack on the city’s kangaroo.
– He is our biggest celebrity. Here we have stood on the mound so as not to be some invisible small town in the north. Then he became the Ken-Guru rescue that put us on the map.
HARSTAD’S PRIDE: Mayor Kari-Anne Opsal says that Harstad has tried a lot to get on the map – and that the solution was a kangaroo.
Photo: Hallgeir Vågenes / VG
– Then it’s broken that someone comes and destroys it, she says.
The mayor has no doubts about the background of the culprits.
– It cannot be a Harstad weatherman who is behind it. There must be someone who is envious. Therefore, there is guaranteed to be a Tromsø ring that commits vandalism, time and time again. They can’t bear to see Harstad on the map, she says.
Rivalry between Harstad and Tromsø Show more ↓
Tromsøværings and Harstadværings have been fierce enemies for a number of years. This has been expressed in a number of biting comments and remarks. Like these two, reproduced by humorist Peter Wessel Zapffe in 1974:
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A man standing trial in Tromsø was asked how old he was. Yes, he was 25 years old, he explained. “But it says that you are 30 years old in the papers”, objected the judge, and got the answer “Yes, I don’t count the five years I lived in Harstad”.
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A few years later, there was a battle at the county council between Tromsø and Harstad. They disagreed about where the psychiatric institution in the county should be located. Both cities wanted it to be placed with them, until a person from Harstad spoke up and said “No, when I think about it, I think it should be located in Tromsø. Just think of what we save in transport costs!”.
– As deserved
Tromsø mayor Gunnar Wilhelmsen (Ap) snorts at the claims from Sør-Troms.
– It is a petty comment. Kari Anne and Harstad get what they deserve when she makes such remarks, he says to VG.
Wilhelmsen almost categorically rejects that a Tromsø ring could be behind the attacks.
Men:
– There is one person from Tromsø who has moved to Harstad, he says:
– I have Tone Marie.
INNOCENT: Tromsø mayor Gunnar Wilhelmsen strongly denies that Tromsø is guilty of the attacks on Harstad-Kenguruen.
Photo: Terje Bringedal / VG
“Ho Tone Marie” is Tone Marie Myklevoll, Harstad municipality’s new social manager. For a number of years, she has been one of Tromsø’s leading Labor politicians. But earlier this year she did the unthinkable for a drumming:
She moved to Harstad.
– It could be that in a moment of frustration – that there is not a single cafe that is open in the center of Harstad after ten o’clock – he struck down. If there is a Tromsøværing that is behind it, then it is Tone Marie, Wilhelmsen reasons.
– You are not particularly impressed by the nightlife on offer in Harstad?
– I could buy a pub in the center of Harstad for five kroner. Add another five, and I would have got the Harstad sports club included in the purchase, the mediated politician answers bluntly.
Against the rumours
Tone Marie Myklevoll has been presented with the statements from Wilhelmsen in Tromsø. She denies that she is the Kangaroo-Quest.
– It is not me who is behind it, says Myklevoll to VG.
– Those who manage to get so worked up over paper towel dispensers or decorations that they have to have a physical outlet have one thing in common: They are men.
Myklevoll says that the people of Tromsø have reason to be envious. She says that Harstad has recovered this year end a large creature of light – “Elgantus” at the Kanebogensenteret.
ELGANTUS: Tone Marie Myklevoll shows off Harstad’s new pride – so far unscathed. The elk is so big that it makes Han Ken-Guru look like a small fellow.
Photo: Hallgeir Vågenes / VG
– That means we have two – and Tromsø has none, she says with satisfaction.
Despite the envy, she believes the Tromsøværings are innocent in this matter. She believes that the perpetrator lives in another northern Norwegian small town:
Narvik.
– They want everything that big brother Harstad has. They have a bit of gigantomania, they always have. They want all the power in the whole country for themselves, to build new industry. Then they can’t bear to see our success in lighting up he Ken-Guru, she says, and asserts:
– The culprit must be from Narvik. It’s probably him Rune.
NEVER IN YOUR LIFE!: Narvik mayor Rune Edvardsen (Ap) says the Narvik people are innocent – and could never harm Ken-Guru.
Photo: The Labor Party
– Biggest since Sophie Elise
– What are you talking about? Is that your wrongly ordered kangaroo?
Narvik mayor Rune Edvardsen is devastated by the accusations from Harstad. He says that his city sons and daughters are innocent. No Narviking has laid his hand on the Ken-Guru, he claims.
– I can guarantee that. We treat Harstad to their kangaroo. They must have something worth seeing over there. We could never have sabotaged it.
– The kangaroo is the biggest thing that has happened to Harstad since Sophie Elise. So we treat them to both that and all the electricity they manage to use to light him up. But they hardly have electricity for two!
– They have also got a glowing giga moose.
– No, you can tell. If they continue with these animals, they risk the entire city being blacked out.
PSSST: It is not only Ken-Guru that has put Harstad on the map in the past year. One inflamed cock conflict in the municipal council has ridden the city like a mare. It happened after an FRP politician demanded an apology from the deputy mayor, who called his political opponent a cock and “an ugly fucking fuck.”
2023-12-21 21:51:10
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