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Rolf
Rolf Larsson was born in 1938 in a small town in Sweden called Surahammar. From a young age he had a deep interest in nature, birdwatching was one of his favourite activities to do with his friends. He also picked up an interest for maps by joining his dad in orienteering games as a child. Rolf went on to study geography at university level and he graduated with a doctorate degree in Physical Geography. He went on to work as a cartographer, photographer and teacher, taking part in different projects all over the globe, in Africa, Central and South America and Asia. In addition to his international work he worked as well for his own aerial photography company that he shared with his wife in Sweden.
He and his wife spent a lot of time working in Ethiopia and it was there that they met a local woman called Yenenesh and as their friendship grew she became like a daughter to the couple. One of her wishes was to improve the lives of the people in her community but she didn’t have the means necessary so Rolf and his wife helped her organise and fund the production of 10 000 mosquito nets and during five years she travelled around Ethiopia distributing those nets to the locals to prevent the spread of diseases and therefore improving their lives significantly. After that project was over they also helped her starting a school in her village.
Nowadays Rolf lives alone in the middle of the forest in the North of Sweden in a town called Lannavaara. He chose this place to retire after his wife got sick with Alzheimer’s, he knew that she would pass away soon and he wanted to choose a place where he could spend the rest of his retired life. Many years before, Rolf had come across this town surrounded by old growth forests, hills and lakes when he was on a nature photography trip with his wife and they both fell in love with it, and that is why he came back one day and decided to build a house there.
One might think that living in the woods alone can be very lonely and boring. But that is not how Rolf feels, after he moved he started getting a lot of local and international visitors, that is because a lodge was built in the town and hundreds of tourists come visit the town every winter. Rolf is the nicest old man I have ever met, he is very kind, funny and smart. He is the only person in Lannavaara and probably in the whole country that you can visit without him even knowing who you are. His door is always open for everyone who wants to meet him and talk. He told me that people in the North used to have a custom where visitors could just come inside the homes without knocking, they would sit on a chair next to the door and wait for the owner of the house to appear and to this day he tries to keep this custom alive. He is by far the most extraordinary person I have ever met and he is one of my dearest friends and certainly the wisest one.
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