Djaddasaga

The Vatnsnes peninsula

2008-11-09T18:12:00.008Z

Vatnsnes is a small peninsula a few hours away from Reykjavík, on the way to Akureyri. It only takes an hour or so to drive around it, yet I can't seem to find many people who've been there, even Icelanders! Rather weird.

The peninsula has a few attractions. The first one is Borgarvirki, an old abandoned citadel. It's very small and located on top of a hill. There aren't many records of it in the sagas apparently... Yet it's there. The rock has been dug out in the center to give it that cozy citadelly feel.

Another attraction is the very weird looking Hvítserkur rock, which looks like some sort of mythical creature formed by the constant wind and water erosion. It's about 15 meters tall. Finally, there are seals on the West side of the peninsula, though they're not right by the coast so you need good binoculars.

A rather weird mountain along route 1. Kinda looks like a sleeping person with a very sharp nose.

Borgarvirki

The rocks look pretty cool... Kinda Kjarvalesque

The fortress has a nice view of the mountains

And it also has a good view of the areas beneath it

Jó inside the fortress. It was very windy up there.

The mighty Hvítserkur. Possible the coolest looking rock in Iceland.

Shells by the shore

This is at a farm that's trying to get some seal-viewing business. It's a 10 minute walk from that point to get to the seals.

Jó imitating the baby seal :)

So those whitish spots over there are the seals. Yeah, we could've used some binoculars.

Caution: flying seals!

Snæfellsnes and Hótel Búðir

2008-11-06T23:07:00.002Z

For our two-year wedding anniversary, we took a trip to the Snæfellsnes peninsula. This is where the Snæfellsjökull glacier is located, on perhaps Iceland's most famous mountain.

We had already been to that peninsula twice (and I blogged it once), but it's such a beautiful area that we just had to go there again :). We also stayed for one night in Hótel Búðir, and had great food at their restaurant.

Along the way, we stopped on a 'secret' natural hot pot (it's not marked and difficult to get to if you haven't been show the way by somebody else). It's basically a hole fed by hot water to a perfect hot temperature, and we've never seen anybody else there. It does belong to somebody, but we just use it when we're going North :).

We also peeked inside a very narrow ravine named Rauðfeldsgjá, and followed the stream that flows through it until it got too risky :).

Finally we wandered around the very cool formations next to Arnarstapi. Lava had cooled pretty quickly from the water, and took the form of lovely basaltic columns.

A snow-topped mountain along the way

The way to the secret hot pot... Slightly tricky

The hot pot and its surroundings

Clothes on the side

A cool looking mountain

The view from Búðir

The ravine Rauðfeldsgjá

Frosty

Inside the ravine

The mighty Snæfellsjökull

Looks like chocolate cake with powdered sugar to me

Rhyolite mountains

Bent basaltic columns

Jó in her seal/dog hat

I managed to climb into that hole

And on the way back from it. It was tricky since the seaweed is slippery, and the water is several feet deep in spots.

A nice frame

Tiny snails in the rock

Kirkjufell, Grundafjörður's distinctive mountain

Slátur

2008-10-26T19:53:00.008Z

(This post is not recommended for squeamish people, vegetarians, and especially squeamish vegetarians)

Iceland is a lovely country with a uniquely beautiful landscape, of course, but there's more to Icelandic exceptionalism than nature... There's food too! :).

As you may recall from this post, traditional food is lamb-based. Well, here's some more lamb-based traditional food! :).

Today's menu is Slátur (which sounds like "slaughter" for good reason). It consists of sewed sheep stomachs filled with a mix, and boiled. Pretty close to Haggis, overall.

There are two mixes: Lifrapylsa, mostly consisting of ground liver and chunks of solid fat; and blóðmör, consisting of sheep blood and fat (yes, you just buy a bottle of sheep blood). In both those mixes there are ingredients such as flour, etc.

So, at Jó's aunt's, we sat down, sewed some stomachs, filled them up, boiled them and ate them! The food tasted fine, although it was a bit of a strong taste (especially the blood sausage) so I didn't feel like eating too much of it.

Anyway, here are the pictures.

The stomachs

Sewing

Nice little pouches...

Filled with liver and whatnot

And now, the blood-fat mix

Sewing the blóðmör

Ta-da!

Boiling

Dinner is served!

You know things are bad...

2008-10-08T23:35:00.004+01:00

... when instead of people in Iceland asking you about the situation in Lebanon, it's your family in Lebanon asking about the situation in Iceland.

So yeah, Iceland is in deep trouble. The banks had grown so much in the last few years, borrowing money left and right, expanding into foreign markets, and whatnot. And with the credit crunch... It all fell to pieces. The main 3 banks in the country are pretty much failing, and the state is taking over. However the liabilities of the banks amount to 9 times the country's GDP (!!) so that's not reassuring at all.

Everybody knows that the party's over in Iceland, and that hard times are coming. But no one knows how bad things will be, yet.

The ISK (Icelandic Króna) was trading at 60-something to the dollar a year ago. It reached 120/$ the other day. The government has tried pegging the currency but it has failed to do so... Today's displayed rates have varied between 90 and 140, and apparently real market rates have been much worse. So... hello inflation!

Otherwise, not much is new, except that the weather has been getting colder. But there's still light on my way to and from work, so the onset of SAD will not happen for another couple of weeks...

Berjamór

2008-09-30T00:03:00.011+01:00

Alright, now that we're not out of the city on every weekend, it's time to catch up and post some pictures! There are plenty of pictures from the summer, so there will be more blog posts to come..

Anyway, this post is about a Berjamór. That's a berry picking trip. Though Iceland may be mostly treeless and not very hospitable to agriculture in general, large swaths of it are covered in berries by the end of the summer. The most common is the humble crowberry. It's not too tasty on its own, but mixed with skyr (the Icelandic better-than-yogurt dairy item) and a bit of sugar, it's great in the morning.

But you can also find blueberries. This particular trip was all about blueberry picking since we had a decent stock of crowberries already. We went to Þingvellir national park, found a spot, and started picking! :)

Later, we went to a nearby hot river for a dip. Technically it's water pumped up from the depths of the earth to produce power in the Nesjavellir power plant. Part of that water goes to Reykjavík, and part flows next to the station... So you get inside that flow and swim in the very warm water! Highly recommended. Be careful though, the current is quite fast...

Lake Þingvallavatn

Ropy lava at the edge of the lake

In fact there were lots of mossy areas... You could walk on them and feel a bounce

The blueberry plants were turning red

Blueberries!

And crowberries

Green

No berry is too elusive

Jo picking

We saw some mushrooms too

Posing with the catch

The hot river

Handball news

2008-08-27T20:26:00.003+01:00

So, you might already know this, but Iceland won the silver medal in the Olympic Handball championship! Pretty impressive for such a tiny country. In fact, for something to be considered a true achievement here, it has to be a per-capita world record. And Iceland is allegedly the smallest country (population-wise) in the world to get a medal in a team sport at the Olympics, so there you go!

The final was on Sunday at 7.45am, and I joined the rest of the nation in getting up early (despite a party on the previous night) and watching the game. Unfortunately France proved to be too strong a foe.

Note that this is the only medal Iceland got in these Olympics. Which is approximately the same number of medals won by Lebanon (it's just one less medal for Lebanon...).

Anyway, today as I left work I walked by Kjarvalsstaðir, a nearby art museum which contains some paintings of Iceland's most famous painter, Johannes Kjarval. On the side of the building I saw three guys (all with the same blue shirt) peeing on a side wall of the museum.

Now, public urination is pretty common here on weekend nights, when Icelanders metamorphose from quiet distant folk to loud drunken party animals. But during the day? It's pretty uncommon.

A woman who was not too far from these guys (and must have seen them pee) told them as they were done, "Til hamingju með það", a form of congratulations. It struck me as a bit weird that she would congratulate them for peeing, as she did not seem sarcastic and one of the guys politely thanked her. But as I made it to the front of the Museum, I saw a bunch of people grouped there, including policemen and whatnot... And then it clicked, those guys were some of the handball players, and there was a celebration of sorts! In fact, I had read that they were going to receive some awards with elaborate names from the state, such as Order of the Falcon and Knight Grand Cross. Fancy.

As I inquired there, I found out that they were gearing up for a celebration party downtown. I continued walking home and by the time I reached Árnarhóll, the grassy knoll next to Lækjartorg, lots of people were heading there and watching a big screen, while sellers on the side were lining up Icelandic flags and t-shirts. As I walked into Vesturbær (the Western part of town) people were walking opposite me and towards the knoll... They must be getting ready for quite the party!

Indeed as I turn on the TV now I see the president being interviewed. About the Handball team. Well this is Iceland, it's not like there is much happening here otherwise! :). And now, he's making a speech - live - in front of the players... And he just said, "Er hægt að vera Íslendingur, og að vera bestur" which translates as "It's possible to be an Icelander, and to be the best". And he's handing out the awards.

Alright, enough with the live blogging of the handball celebrations. It's time to go to the gym to get in better shape, and possibly become the best!

Hiking the Laugavegurinn trail

2008-08-09T02:05:00.011+01:00

Well! We're already in August, and the summer is starting to slip by... And what a nice summer it's been. Plenty of beautiful weather, including the day with the highest recorded temperature ever in Reyjavík (26.2 degrees Celsius / 79 degrees Fahrenheit!). It's almost too good, for this place.

Don't be fooled by the lull in posting, we've been doing plenty of stuff this summer :). And there will be other posts after this one detailing our activities.

But this post is about hiking the Laugavegurinn trail. In mid-July, we decided, along with 4 friends of ours, to do this hike. It's a 3 day hike, 55 kms (34 miles) long , which takes you from the rhyolite mountains of Landmannalagar, through geothermal areas, to fields of obsidian rock, to a black sand wasteland, and finally through a real Icelandic forest (birch trees) with a great view of several glaciers. Oh and along the way, there are several unbridged glacial rivers, which we had to cross by foot. It was a seriously intense experience for me... As I'm sure Jó could tell you.

We camped for two nights, and carried all our stuff in our backpacks (which weighed close to 14 kilos / 30 pounds). The last day was particularly intense as we had to catch a bus by 3.30, and Jó had to soldier on through her 7-8 blisters to get there... But we made it! And as soon as we did, it started raining, after 3 days of great weather. That's luck.

Oh, the cabin at the end of the trail sells hot dogs. After three days of freeze-dried food and whatnot, those were the best hot dogs I've ever had.

And, now, the pictures. Many thanks to Jó for taking most of them! We had to do with the small camera, as the nicer one would have been to heavy to carry on the trip.

Pretty mountains in Landmannalaugar

Steam in a lava field

The erosion is taking out this mountain's burnt cover

Notice the almost bluish spots in some of the mountains

Rugged

The view of the first campsite, surrounded by shiny obsidian rocks

The snow looks like rivers between the mountains

A geothermal stream. Some spots even had boiling water!

The best view of the trip... Álftavatn lake viewed from a mountain 500 meters above it.

A mountain in the sunset, around 11pm.

Crossing the long black wasteland. People call it a desert though it's technically too wet to be a one, but it has almost no vegetation.

The glacier, always showing us the way

A (luckily) bridged river crossing

We had to go up and down so many mountains...

A very red field

The birch forests of Þórsmörk

On the way back, the bus had to cross some rivers too...

Vík - in motion

2008-07-01T23:34:00.002+01:00

Here are a few extra pics from the black beach in Vík.

When a wave recedes, the water that is absorbed in the black sand takes on a nice color, a kind of silvery-blue:

Advancing

And receding

Otherwise, here are is a sequence of a few shots taken of me as I was trying to avoid an advancing wave. I look like I'm dancing (badly) :)

Jökulsárlón

2008-06-28T16:10:00.001+01:00

Jökulsárlón is a glacial lagoon, where icebergs break from a glacier and hang around for a few months before making it to sea. Since it has a mix of salt- and freshwater (from the melting glacier) it does not freeze in winter. Except, apparently, when they temporarily shut down its outlet in order to freeze it for a James Bond film.

We took a trip in an amphibious boat that went around the lagoon for half an hour or so, and got to admire all the different shapes.

Bunch of tourists :)

That's ash from past volcanic eruptions, apparently

A bird pecking a mushroom

A left hand

Framing

Tilted mushroom

A narwhal chasing a pig

Zoidberg from Futurama, on the left

A glacial tongue

A nicely eroded mountain

A lot of the south coast is like this.. The melting glaciers erode everything in their paths

Close up of the glacier

Animals

2008-06-24T23:32:00.006+01:00

And here are some animals we saw along the way :). A lot of sheep, of course, since it's Iceland, but there are a few more animals...

Grazing

Reflecting

So, when lambs are suckling, their tiny tails start wagging extremely fast... It's very cute

A seal, in Jökulsárlón (the glacial lagoon)

A couple of ducks, also in Jökulsárlón

Langoustines! Not so cuddly, but very tasty...

Waterfalls

2008-06-24T23:08:00.006+01:00

Here are some of the waterfalls we saw along the way. I am not including the ones in Skaftafell since I just posted them the other day. The top picture is from a waterfall by Kirkjubæjarklaustur; there were several more waterfalls there but I didn't take pictures of them.

Regarding the rainbow picture, it was taken by Skógafoss. When I got very close to the waterfall (and quite wet!), I could see this very strong rainbow, in a full circle all around me (with a diameter of a few meters). And whenever I moved the circle would move with me! Pretty cool for an optical illusion :).

Skógafoss...

And its rainbow

Seljalandsfoss, from the front...

And from the back! (you can walk behind it)

Gullfoss, from the front...

And from the side, a clearer view of the lower falls

Reykjavík midnight run

2008-06-24T01:36:00.006+01:00

Well, I seem to be making up for lost time by posting a lot these days :). There is more stuff to go from the trip we took, however I want to post some pictures from last night. We went for a "Midnight run" - it's a once a year run (3k, 5k and 10k) that happens late at night around the solstice (the summer solstice, in case you needed to ask).

Jó ran in the 5k, and I walked the 3k since my knee won't allow me to run. I must've been the only person there in jeans :).

The run actually started at 10:10. However I took some pictures after that, by the Viking ship statue, and later at sunset (at 12.03am).

Jó after the run

3k race winner - Jeans and iPod division

Viking ship

The sun, around that time

A very angular sunset

Snæfellsjökull, in the distance

Skaftafell and Svartifoss

2008-06-23T21:51:00.007+01:00

Continuing on the previous post, our trip took us to the Skaftafell national park, in South-Eastern Iceland. Apparently it's the largest national park in Europe, though we only stopped there to see the lovely Svartifoss waterfall. It's visible after a short hike up the mountains.

I found the hike to be disorienting at first, and even a bit claustrophobic, because I was not used to such amounts of vegetation and trees any more! You'd think you were in Europe while climbing, and not on this barren rock. But from time to time there are views of the sandur (a black sand desert formed by the melting of the glaciers and the erosion that they bring), so then it feels like Iceland again :).

The waterfall we saw is surrounded by black basaltic columns and is quite beautiful. The name Svartifoss means "black waterfall".

Trees!

More trees!

A cute waterfall

Boundaries

Very green...

At least the sandur is still there

Another waterfall

Finally, Svartifoss appears

Columns on the side

Jó by the water

This is what happens when you drop the camera lens cover

Vík

2008-06-23T01:01:00.007+01:00

My parents, sister and aunt visited us last week :). We took a 4-day trip to the South of Iceland (where we had amazing weather), from which I will show pictures in this post and the next few ones.

This set is from the Vík area, with its basaltic columns and black sand beach. Unfortunately the Dyrhólaey area was closed because of the birds' nesting season, so there were no puffins on this trip. Apart from the one on my plate at Lækjarbrekka later that week, I guess.

Field of rocks

The lovely basalt columns

If it's climbable, she will be there :)

It almost looks like a Rosetta stone

Fallen basalt

Sharp

The usual arm-length self picture

A cedar tree...

And a pseudo Baalbeck. I guess I was feeling patriotic!

My mom and aunt, lost in an Icelandic forest

My dad, looking very wise and spiritual (I think he was looking at some rocks)

Jó running up on a pile of small rocks

Tracks on the beach

Dyrhólaey (the Icelandic Raouche) across the beach

Water moving in and out

Hítarvatn

2008-06-05T23:54:00.008+01:00

A couple of weeks ago, we went with some friends for a trip on a Saturday. We drove up to a lake named Hítarvatn (aka "hot lake", but don't let the name fool you). The lake is nice though not particularly remarkable. However, the rocks on the road to get there have some of the most amazing colors I've seen. They're volcanic and very light, and come in colors varying from ochre to orange to red to purple, and even some blue and gray.

The day was rather cloudy, so we continued to a "secret" natural hot pot. You basically have to know where it is to find it, and the water in the tiny pool (about 1 meter in diameter) is at a very nice temperature, perhaps 40-42 degrees. We managed to cram in there, all five of us :).

Now that's a mountain with character

Our little car fording a creek

Road cut through the moss-covered lava

Colors of volcanic rock

Typical Icelandic scenery

Mingling

Cool erosion on this mountain

Peaks

A small dam, by the lake

Tracks

A very well defended post

The edge of the lake... and of a small pond to the right

Layers

Ominous duck

Lots of small lambs at this time of year

Running of the sheep (it's fun to honk at them)

The view from the secret hot pot

Earthquake!

2008-05-29T23:36:00.002+01:00

So we had an earthquake today. 6.1 on the Richter scale, with the epicenter 50 km East of here. There's some minor damage around the epicenter area, and a few light injuries, but it's certainly not that bad. I was in the office when it happened, and it took me a few seconds to realize what was going on.. Then it ended!

Hopefully there won't be any bad aftershocks. But so far, the most interesting part is seeing the Earthquake plastered all over the international news. Yet all the pictures they have are of broken dishes and a tear in one road.. Somewhat anticlimactic.

Now, I wonder if this is a prelude to some volcanic activity. Wouldn't that be cool? Assuming it's a little bit out of the town, of course...

Nice day in town

2008-05-29T00:08:00.006+01:00

Last Sunday, the weather was pretty nice, so we decide to hike... All the way from our house to downtown! :). Ok, so that was not a very long trip, but it was a good way of enjoying the pleasant day. We ended up going to the Sandholt bakery on Laugavegur, which is probably the best bakery in town. They make bread, sandwiches, pastries, cakes, ice cream, and chocolate!

Here are some pics from our walk and from the bakery itself.

The catholic church, hiding behind the bushes...

Summer is coming! People are laying down in Austurvöllur again

The bakery

Some of their chocolates

A nice sandwich

Our desserts (I took the picture one minute too late, apparently)

A cat under a car

A duck crossing the road

Jó in the Reykjavík sun :)

A house in the pond (it's part of the art festival)

This bird kept flying into the wind, and managed to stay stationary for a bit while doing so

Tulips

One of my favorite houses, Túngata 20

The Reykjavík Zoo

2008-04-24T18:55:00.006+01:00

Yes, Reykjavík has it own zoo! Except that, it's more of a petting zoo than a real one with lions and whatnot. Unfortunately, there are no Polar bears either.

However there are plenty of farm animals, and some wilder ones too. It's a good place to take the kids. Since we don't have any yet (and we won't for a while, mom, OK?), we ended up going there when our friends and their daughter were visiting. Here are a few snaps of the animals..

Seal. I want one as a pillow!

Synchronized sealing

In memory of a cow...

Piggies!

They seem to enjoy sleeping

Lots of ducks and geese

Baby fox

And chicken. Will the fox start eating them when he grows up?

A bored deer

Hippie goat

Baby goat

A dog on a horse. I wonder if it's a modern art installation.

Glymur

2008-03-30T13:51:00.006+01:00

Last weekend, we decided to go for a short hike and to take a look at the Glymur waterfall. It has the biggest vertical drop off of any waterfall in Iceland, however it is not as impressive as other waterfalls because the river itself is quite small.

The waterfall is found near the base of Hvalfjörður. Which meant that for the first time we drove on the edge of that fjord instead of taking the Akranes tunnel.

When we got to the end of the road, we started hiking. Unfortunately we had no map and no real idea of where the waterfall should be, so we wandered around aimlessly for a while until we found the right river. We were not able to see the waterfall since we ended up at a point quite downstream from it (it's a well hidden waterfall) and the sun was starting to set. So we'll have to go again later and find the damn thing next time :). But it was a nice little hike anyway, and the weather was quite nice. Here are some pics!

Uphill skiing?

Small stream

Jó sinking into the hay

The waterfall is somewhere along that ravine to the right

Looking down onto the river

Some basaltic columns

Hvalfjörður, before sunset

Páskaegg 2008

2008-03-24T22:26:00.006Z

In a similar vein to this post from last year, here is the deconstruction of 2008's Páskaegg.

Just like last year, I got a Páskaegg at work. A páskaegg is a chocolate easter egg, which is hollow and filled with various candies inside. Once more, I got the Nr.7 Nói Síríus behemoth, with 750 grams of sugary goodness. The egg also comes with a málsháttur, which is a proverb or saying. Think of a Chinese fortune cookie, except that in this case adding "in bed" at the end makes no sense.

We're over 2/3rds done with the egg and candy. Luckily the dentist's appointment is in a few weeks, and we are currently are going to the gym, so that should mitigate the effects somewhat.

Cutting the egg open

A look inside

An emerging chicken... Wouldn't it be cool if they maybe had a chocolate dinosaur inside, just like in a dinosaur egg? No?

The sugary innards

The saying: "The river stops at its mouth". Sounds pretty obvious to me.

More Northern lights!

2008-03-23T17:00:00.005Z

Last week we got another SMS notification alerting us to the appearance of the Northern lights :). This time we drove to the Western end of the city, near the Grótta lighthouse. Since there are no houses in that area we had a better view. And indeed there were already several cars parked there and people watching the lights!

Unfortunately when we got there the lights were starting to dim, but we still got a couple of shots.

Filling up the sky

A view of Esja at night, thanks to the long exposure

Hamborgarabúlla Tómasar

2008-03-09T15:19:00.013Z

Hamborgarabúlla Tómasar is a small (or even tiny) burger place by the harbor, about a 10 minute walk from our apartment. Whenever I feel like having a burger, that's where I go. In contrast to the usual international fast food chains, that place has a lot of personality. And good burgers!

The decor is very eclectic, with random signs, children's drawings, movie posters and whatnot pinned all through the place. Plus it has its own street sign, "Burgerjoint"!

Seen from outside

This is where you place your order. Notice all the signs.

Kids' drawings

This is my favorite one: "Bonbon" is on the left and he is lost; an endless rainbow is in the middle (complete with the infinity symbol) and a dog is on the right. The arrow pointing to the dog simply says, "You"

The big table, with a view of the boats

"Dish of the day"

The restaurant opened in this location on April 10th 2004, which happens to be the exact day Jó and I got together! We're a match made in ground beef heaven.
A burger, a few bites in. Notice that the meat is a bit undercooked. It's always the way there, which makes it a bit tastier and also gives an added small thrill as you risk illness for the burger

Yep, it's still snowing...

2008-02-28T18:28:00.006Z

Last weekend, we were invited by friends to a "Summerhouse". A summerhouse is basically a house in a non-urban area outside of Reykjavík, with a distinct 'wooden' look, and includes all standard amenities such as a working kitchen, a TV... And a hot tub! Many people own such homes, but work unions also do, and they rent them out to union members for cheap.

We enjoyed the stay very much, and socialized and soaked in the hot tub at night for a couple of hours while the snow was falling softly on us. Classic Icelandic stuff :).

On our way back, we decided to stop by Gullfoss since it was quite close to the summerhouse. It looked quite nice, with the snow and ice on the sides. As you can see from the rest of the pictures, the dominant color here is white. That's because it's been snowing quite a bit this winter, and we're getting a bit tired from that... Anyway, on to the pictures:

Maybe I should Photoshop these tourists out...

Closer

And even closer

A very bundled up Jó

I could make this my secret lair

Snow covered lava fields

The sun managed to pierce through the cloud cover at times

Lots of horses

The wind was pushing the snow over the road, making for a cool effect

Reminds me of a chocolate cake covered in powdered sugar...

Northern lights!

2008-02-06T21:51:00.000Z

Well, I had to wait until the end of January, but I finally got to see the Northern lights in Iceland. I had seen them in Tromso, Norway in October but not in Iceland... I was considering filing a formal complaint to the tourist office in Reykjavík for false advertising.

But last weekend, as we got clear weather and the coldest temperatures yet this winter (it dropped slightly under -10 at some point in Rekjavík, I believe), I finally saw them! I got a phone call from a friend alerting me to the appearance of the lights (yes, I am on a call-when-Northern-lights-appear list) and I managed to take a few pictures as we were on our way out of the house. You'll have to excuse the blurriness because I did not use a tripod, and it takes a long exposure to get a picture of the lights. Note that the lights appear a bit brighter in the pictures than they do in real life, but not by that much.

They might look still in the pictures, but they move pretty quickly, like sheets or curtains. They can change in intensity quite quickly also, so if you know they're out there, don't wait :).

We also saw them the next day on the drive back from Stokkseyri (45 minutes SE of Reykjavík, with the best lobster restaurant in the nation!). We had the advantage of the open sky and very little ambient light, so it was great seeing them playing around in the sky. According to Inuit beliefs, the Northern lights represent your ancestors playing with a ball of yarn. I like that interpretation. Although I think I would substitute giant invisible metaphysical cats instead of the ancestors, but that's just me.

Þorrabloated

2008-01-29T23:35:00.000Z

One of the famous Icelandic events is Þorrablot, a tradition from viking times, where people eat "old-time" food. However "old-time" food in Iceland, is, well... hmm...

Let's just say that it's a good thing this country has evolved :).

We got some of that food at work (in celebration of Bóndadagur aka farmers' day or men's day). We also got invited to Jó's aunt's, who introduced us to some more of that food.

Here are some of the foods:

Svið: singed sheep's head, blow torched to burn the hair before being cooked. The food that looks you back in the eye.
Sviðsulta: bits of meat from the svid, pressed together, in gelatin.
Súrt slátur (lifrarpylsa and blóðmör): two types of soured sausage, one made out of liver and the other a blood sausage kind of thing.
Hrútspungar: soured sheep testicles, pressed in a gelationous matter. Was available at work but not at the dinner, so no pics unfortunately.
Hákarl: shark meat buried raw in the ground for several month, then hung to dry. Smells like stale urine because of all the ammonia in it. The smell sticks to your clothes for a long time too. Hence the closed box in the picture.
Lundabaggar: roll of lamb meat, soured.
Saltkjöt: salted lamb. Very salty, but quite nice.

And here are the pictures...

Clockwise, from the top left: lifrarpylsa, lundabaggar, sviðsulta, more lifrarpylsa, hákarl, and blóðmör

Saltkjöt

Svið. The tongue tastes Ok. You eat the skin too.

Baked brains with peanuts, and ice cream. Ok, ok, so that's just an apple bake :)

Many thanks to Jó's aunt for providing us with this food :)

More snow!

2008-01-26T18:17:00.000Z

So we keep getting more and more snow. We're not talking about massive amounts, but still on many days we get a few more inches.

After getting up late from bed on a lazy Saturday, Jó and I went for a walk on the SW coast of Reykjavík. We ended up by a spot there with some disused buildings, that were once used for drying fish. There were also pulleys and tracks leading to the sea, to pull boats/fish.

Small tree

Snowy yard

Abandoned Christmas tree

Abandoned equipment

Pulley

Tracks

Shacks

Nets

Looking in

Corrugated iron, graffiti, snow

Angelica, from above

The popular neighborhood ice cream store. They have two vanilla flavors, "Old" and "New". Notice the line of people. And the snow.

A couple of geese we saw on the way back

Our gloves, made by Jó's aunt :)

Snow!

2008-01-15T22:26:00.001Z

For a place called Iceland, you'd think we get a lot of snow. But while it snows sometimes, it's usually a light coating, and it disappears quickly. Or it turns into very slippery ice (the temperature often oscillates around 0 degrees, so the ice melts and refreezes).

But not last night! We got a pretty decent snowfall, maybe 6 inches. So Jó and I did what we had to do... A snowman!

Our car was getting covered pretty well

The snowman! The pink background and slight fuzziness is due to the lack of flash. Trust me, it was dark.

For an idea of scale, here is our lovely model Jó (sporting an Inuit hat) beside the snowman

Isn't he just likable? I think he has a very approachable smile.

It will only get better from now on

2007-12-22T22:43:00.000Z

December 22nd: a magical date.

Why? Well, because it's the winter solstice: the shortest day of the year! As you can see from the chart below, the sun today rose at 11:23 and set at 3:30, just above 4 hours of (alleged) sunlight. This being my first winter at this latitude, it's been difficult getting up in the morning at times, to say the least. But from today and for the next 6 months, each day will be a bit longer, until we hit the summer solstice and its 20+ hours of light goodness.

4h 06m 45s

Of course, by Monday we will already get 10 hours of daylight and temperatures as high as the hottest summer days in this fair town (19 degrees!). But that's because we will be in Beirut for two weeks :)

In the meantime, Jo and I would like to wish any readers of this blog Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays!

There's a tree behind us, I swear

The downtown Christmas tree, an annual gift from Norway, located by the Parliament

On an unrelated note: does this hat make me look Amish? Because that's not my intention...

Christmas stuff

2007-12-16T21:16:00.000Z

A few weeks ago we went to a store and bought a Christmas tree. I grew up on plastic trees, but for the first time in my life, that was a real tree! :) Of course we got all sort of decorations for it too. It certainly helps having a nicely lit tree when it's so dark outside in the morning.

We also went to the nearby town of Hafnarfjörður this weekend. Jó had heard about a Christmas village, which turned out to be a stage on which some kids were singing / playing some music, and about 10 or so booths selling ornaments and other things.

And in one week, we will be leaving for a two week trip to Lebanon! I haven't been there in 2 years, so I'm very much looking forward to it :)

Captive tree

Decorated!

The kids choir, in Hafnarfjörður

There were plenty of trees there, of course

Skyr ornaments

Those dogs are more fashionable than I am...

Of course, we just had to take a picture :)

The sun was setting... I think it was around 3pm

I like the angle of that picture

Summertime...

2007-11-18T21:57:00.000Z

So, we currently have about 6 hours of sunlight a day, and it's been often cloudy or rainy. And a bit cold. Therefore, I don't have much in the way of new pictures from the country to post here.

Thankfully, my procrastination can come to the rescue! I still have pictures from this summer that I have not posted yet. So I will post them now :). These pictures were taken in July/August, when Jó's aunt and her husband were visiting us.

We went to several places with Jó's relatives, and I also got Thai cooking lessons several nights in a row :). They also brought us many bottles of contact lens solution, as our guests often have to do when they visit. You'd understand if you lived here.

You can walk behind the Seljalandfoss waterfall

A comfy rock, somewhere around Seljalandfoss

Getting a bit too close to Skógafoss

Jó by Dyrhólaey (or for Lebanese people, Raouche-in-Iceland)

Interesting rocks around that area

And Puffins!

And of course, who can forget the sheep

In front of a (dirty) glacial tongue

Stained glass window at the national museum

View of the city from the top of Hallgrímskirkja

Boiling mud at Krísuvík

Nice colors

Don't dip your toes in there...

[PS: Note that I don't put pictures of people other than Jó and myself on the blog, as a matter of privacy. However if you are fine being on the blog, send me a message :)]

Food blogging

2007-11-05T19:40:00.000Z

Two quick and easy Lebanese recipes.

Hummus

1 can of chick peas (16 oz)
2 tbsp olive oil
3-4 tbsp lemon juice (I had a bit less than that in the picture since I ran out of lemons)
1 1/2 tbsp tahini
1/4 tbsp salt
2 cloves of garlic, smashed (or 1 if you have to meet people afterwards)

Put all the ingredients in a mixer, and mix till smooth! One word of warning though, leave some of the liquids out at first, then add them gradually until it reaches the right consistency. Once you've put too much liquids into the mixture, you end up with watery hummus... And that's not good.

The ingredients

The final result

Kafta patties

Usually these would be made in the shape of a hot dog and grilled over charcoal, but I don't have a grill. You can make any shape you want, of course.

Ingredients:

This is one of those recipes that I don't really measure.. So the numbers here are approximated by looking at the picture after the fact :)

One onion, finely diced
700g ground meat (lamb or beef)
2 tbsp Lebanese 7-spice mix (very important!)
2 tsp salt
1 tsp cayenne pepper
2 cups chopped parsley

Mix all the ingredients well, and form into the shapes you want. Heat up some oil in a pan and fry the meat for a few minutes. Then transfer to a heated oven (at, say, 200 degrees Celsius) and leave it there for 15-20 minutes.

The ingredients
The raw patties
The end result

You can eat the meat in pitas, with hummus and slices of tomato inside. Or just use them as meatballs. It's all good!

PS: The 7-spice mix is a pre-made mix of different kinds of pepper, cinnamon, cumin, cardamom, coriander...

Morning commute

2007-11-04T23:17:00.000Z

In the mornings, I walk about 10 minutes from home, then I take a bus that drops me off near work (except when the weather is bad, then I just take a bus closer to home but with a much more winding route).

I took these pictures last week, when the sun was rising by the end of my commute. By now, it's obviously darker, as the sunlight keeps receding until the winter solstice.

For the commute, I could shave a few minutes by walking along a main street of the city. But I'd much rather walk in quieter and less polluted areas, so I end up going through courtyards, alleyways and a cemetery parallel to the main street.

Oh, and it had snowed a bit the previous night.

Obviously, I wasn't the first person to go to work that day

Snowy leaves

Red Nintendo mushroom graffiti guy

Green Nintendo mushroom graffiti guy

Tree, stone, and former prime minister

Snow on moss

Leaning tree

Brave flowers

Cemetery alleyways

Graves here often have professions listed on them. This guy was a doctor.

The sky was looking slightly ominous

The university library, built to look like a fortress (complete with a moat around it)

Strætó

Sunrise

Esja in the pink light

Florence

2007-10-24T23:27:00.000+01:00

For the last few days of our trip, we went to Florence. It was almost a shock to be back in a somewhat crowded, polluted and noisy city after being in Iceland for a while. But it was fun! :).

We walked quite a bit in the town, and saw galleries and museums too. We also ate nicely and had plenty of wine with our food during our trip. It was so cheap to do so, compared to Iceland, that we just couldn't stop ourselves :). I assume that's how Icelanders always are when they are traveling abroad.

Here are the pictures:

We stopped by Pisa on the way, and ordered this massive 'Tuscan Sampler'-like dish at a restaurant. Tasty!

They're not waving, they're doing the 'look-I'm-holding-the-tower' picture

The Arno river

The Ponte Vecchio and other bridges, as seen from the Uffizi gallery

The obligatory several-animals-in-a-row picture

The non-obligatory that-is-a-big-rat picture

Detail of the outside of the Duomo (cathedral)

The marble floor inside the Duomo

The golden doors of the baptistery

By the river

Coffee!

It's been a long time...

2007-10-24T23:08:00.000+01:00

But I'm back :).

The last month or so has been a bit hectic, so I apologize for not posting more frequently. I have pictures from Norway and from some trips in Iceland too that I will be phasing in later. But for now, I will post the pictures from our most recent trip, to Italy (for our first wedding anniversary!).

We first went to an area called the Cinque Terre first, a group of 5 villages on the Northwest coast that seem to hang off the side of mountains. Very picturesque. The weather was great (we had our warmest temperatures in over a year, given the cool Icelandic summer). We even managed to swim in the sea! We had forgotten to bring our swimsuits, but thankfully we did not forget to bring underwear. So we used that.

We stayed in a room with a view of the harbour of one of the 5 villages, hiked on the path between the villages (there are no direct roads between them, only hiking paths), and took a cooking lesson. And just relaxed.

Here are some pictures from that trip.

The view from our room in Manarola

The view of the same town from the harbor, where we went for a dip

The hills looked a lot like Lebanon

Corniglia (that town on the left) from the South

Jó enjoying her seafood pasta there

Corniglia again, this time from the North

Vernazza

Narrow streets in Vernazza

The obligatory cat picture

Jó modeling for some mushroom pictures

Chopping onions

Fresh pasta with mushrooms... Mmm...

Snæfellsnes

2007-09-19T23:06:00.000+01:00

We finally managed to make a trip to Snæfellsnes last Sunday. I don't have much time tonight.. So, here are some pictures!

The glacier

A closer view

If you've ever read about the lifting stones at Djúpalónssandur.. You'd realize I'm not made to be a fisherman

Climbing Jó

Bárður the giant

The lave fields coming from the volcano are quite impressive

We had coffee at Hótel Búðir, which was very nice

Jó... doing something

You can never have enough lava fields

Pretty mountains

Berries

Réttir

2007-09-19T22:56:00.000+01:00

We made a quick stop by a réttir (annual sheep round-up) the other day. It was a tiny round-up (and it was mostly over by the time we got there), but here are a few sheep pictures, of course.

Packed sheep

Into the van

Little lambs

It's the 2nd sheep from the right, officer! I'd recognize him anywhere...

We wanted to hike, and went to Hveragerði...

2007-09-16T01:47:00.000+01:00

But the weather looked like this.

So we stopped by the greenhouse / tourist trap that is Eden, and I got to hug a giant puffin.

Jó was able to make a friend too.

We'll have to come back another time for that hike, if the weather improves.

Golden circle snapshots

2007-08-28T23:28:00.001+01:00

Rock, Barnafoss

Burrowing Jó, Þingvellir

Jó and I, Haukadalur

Tourists and rainbow, Gullfoss

Sheep, Iceland

Menningarnótt

2007-08-19T14:59:00.000+01:00

Menningarnótt stands for "Culture night". What started as a day with some artsy events 10 or so years ago has turned into a day filled with all sorts of events (artsy stuff, concerts, random stuff, etc). The program for that one day takes up 4 pages or so, with up to 30 different events or so happening every hour (from the morning until 11pm). The events are spread all through downtown and a few neighboring spots.

We noticed some noise in the morning under our windows. It turns out we're on the path of the Reykjavík marathon which occurs on this day. Judging by the people we saw running it must've been the 5k event.

We then left the house and basically kept wandering around town until past 11pm. We had some free waffles (that were being offered at people's home), and we got sidetracked for a while in the 12 Tónar music store, which it turns out has an annual sale of about 50% on all CDs during that day (tip for next time: browse at the store a few days before menningarnótt, then on that day go in the morning and get all the CDs you want before they get sold out!).

Along the way I also got some free soup (well, it came with some environmentalist spiel) and had a sandwich at the Sandholt bakery (we had to wait 20 minutes to get the sandwiches because they insisted on giving them to us in a plate with a fork and knife, and they were out of clean plates..)

We even stopped by the national museum for a "Coffee tasting" by Kaffitár (rather underwhelming), a church with a classical music concert (including a harpsichord), and after 9pm went to Hressó to listen to a fun dixieland jazz band. Finally we went closer to the harbor by 11pm where a DJ was wrapping up his act, to look at the fireworks show.

Running by our window

Other mammals can participate, apparently

Yellow house, yellow car

In a house by Hallgrímskirkja where they were serving free waffles (mmm, waffles)

Bee

Jó enjoying some fox fur from the expensive Greenlandic store on Skólavörðustígur

People on Austurstræti

Somebody's idea for a Reykjavík metro, apparently

A slightly gloomy view from the pond

Two

Pseudo-sheep, by the Nordic house

A nice blue house on Tjarnargata

This is only funny if you've been in Iceland for the last couple of months

The city's best hot dog stand (that's what it's called)

Ein með öllu (one with everything). Unfortunately everything does not mean Dijon mustard, so that could be improved. But overall, gotta love the Icelandic lamb hot dogs.

The dixieland band

The red lights in Hressó's garden, with Eymundsson's coffee shop above

Some DJ towards the end

Fireworks

Reykjavík gay pride

2007-08-12T19:29:00.000+01:00

So, as it turns out, the gay pride parade is one of the biggest events of the year in our little city. 50,000 people were there yesterday on a beautiful summer day to watch it go through downtown! The parade was also followed by a concert with many artists.

You'll have to excuse the quality of the photos as they were taken from a sub-optimal spot (lighting-wise) and with a small camera. Also it's not always easy dodging the heads of the people in front of you.

Crowds!

The head of the parade

Interesting look

Arab costumes (there is a belly dancer behind them)

Woolen bikinis???

A lot of balloons

The omnipresent Páll Óskar, Iceland's biggest DJ and most famous gay personality

The Páll Óskar boys

Pro-gay rights dog

Freeing the balloons

The end of the concert, with the participants from the parade on stage

Whaling ship

2007-08-12T19:06:00.000+01:00

An unused whaling ship is moored by the old harbor, and you can just get on it and look around. We went there recently and Jo took the following pictures.

Hvalur = whale

On the deck

There are several ships moored together, some have been repainted perhaps to be used again?

Looking up

And down

The steering wheel

Masaman curry

2007-07-22T02:26:00.000+01:00

It's been a while since the last recipe... Last time it was a Lebanese recipe, this time it's a Thai one (to celebrate Jó's half Thai-ness! :))

So, Masaman curry:

It's tasty
It's pretty easy to cook
So try it!

I got the recipe from this page, though I've made some minor changes to it. I've only done this with chicken, though the recipe calls for beef, and I'm sure lamb would work well too.

Ingredients (for four meals):

2 tbsp Masaman curry paste (which you can buy from Mai Thai near Hlemmur, and store in a freezer)
A cup of coconut milk
One pound of meat cut into 1 inch cubes
A couple of large potatoes, cut in 1 inch cubes
An onion, cut in 8 chunks
1/2 cup of cashews (peanuts should work too)
1 tbsp salt
3 tbsp sugar

Also, I've added 1/2 tbsp of tamarind powder, 1/2 tbsp of cinnamon and some bay leaves, but you don't have to add those.

Heat up the coconut milk and curry paste over med/low heat for five minutes or so, and mix well. Add the meat, and some water (enough to cover up all the meat) and the spices / salt / sugar.

Stew for half an hour or so, then add the potatoes, onion and cashews. Cover and simmer for another half hour, adding water if necessary. When the potatoes are soft enough, you're done!

Note that the flavors in the meal take some time to come together, so you should cook this meal one day before serving it, and reheat a day later. Serve with rice, and enjoy!

There's a good recipe for a cucumber salad on that same page I linked to, you can look it up. Oh, and you should serve this with Rambutans and Longans for dessert, to complete the Thai experience :).

Móskarðshnúkar

2007-07-22T01:48:00.000+01:00

Last weekend, Jó and I went for another hike on Esja in the lovely weather. We didn't take the main hike (from the bus stop) which we took last time, but rather decided to avoid the crowds and go on another spot in the moutains. We settled on a hike going up to Móskarðshnúkar, a set of 3 rhyolite peaks in the south-east of Esja. We hiked the middle peak (a bit under 800m of elevation).

The hike was quite interesting, especially towards the top where the slope is quite severe and where stepping through the rhyolite stones feels like getting trapped in glassy sand. Rhyolite is a light, almost glassy volcanic rock that can take on yellowish colors. Those three peaks are a typical example, the amazing Landmannalaugar is another.

Little flowers

Rhyolite!

So... there should be a mountain right in front of us!

Near the top

The peak

Summit self portrait

Jó and the tabletop mountains behind her (you can even see a glacier from that spot, though not in this picture)

A snack on the way down

A cute waterfall with basalt columns

-watching trip

2007-07-15T12:51:00.001+01:00

Well, it was supposed to be a whale-watching trip, but there were no whales...

On Thursday we went on a whale-watching trip (departing from the old Reykjavík harbor). Neither Jo nor myself were hugely interested but it was cheap! (1000 ISK/person). The trip took about three hours, and the boat went around the Faxaflói bay trying to find some whales. It made a stop near "puffin island" and we got to see some flying puffins, unfortunately the boat could not get very close to the island (shallows?) so we didn't get a good view. But hey, we had close encounters with the orange-beaked birds last weekend so it wasn't a problem.

On the way to the boat I had seen a sign that promised a 97% success rate for whale-watching trip. I guess we were in the unlucky 3% then! Unless the numbers were a bit fudged. Still, it was nice to be on a boat trip, in the end. Takes you away from the city.

Luckily, I was able to spot a part of a whale yesterday. It was a few meters inland, in a plastic bag at the Sægreifinn restaurant by the harbor. So I bought it and cooked it, and it was quite tasty.

Vestmannaeyjar

2007-07-10T23:50:00.000+01:00

Last weekend Jó and I took a trip to Vestmannaeyjar, aka the Westmann Islands. These islands consist of one main island, Heimaey (13.4 square kms), surrounded by smaller islands. Only the main one is inhabited (about 4500 people), although some of the other islands are used for raising sheep.

The islands were mostly created 12,000 years ago as this is a highly volcanic spot. The latest addition was in 1963, when the island Surtsey emerged from the sea during a volcanic eruption. Notably, a volcano basically appeared on Heimaey in 1973 and destroyed one third of the houses in town.

Alright, enough with the trivia :).

Overall, Heimaey is a cute island, kind of a mini-Iceland. You can walk from the harbor through the town to the airport in 30 minutes. There are some very imposing cliffs and rocks on the north side (I would not try to climb those), and two volcanic cones you can climb (they're not very high, around 220 meters each). We climbed Helgafell, the older cone, but I'm sure we will go over Eldfell (the 1973 cone) if we return.

The people on the island are supposedly friendlier than mainland (main island?) Icelanders. In fact, a random person nodded to me as our eyes met at one point, which confirms that people are indeed friendlier. On the downside, the buildings in the island are slightly run-down, and the harbour area has a pretty bad fish smell (I assume it's from drying fish).

The town has a lot of puffin-inspired names, paintings and merchandise (even the street signs are shaped like puffins...). However walking around town you don't see any puffins, which is a bit annoying. But! Go to the cliffs, and there they will be... Plenty and plenty of puffins! They look quite cute and they are entertaining to watch as they fly from and return to their cliff spots. Moreover, as I can attest from my last meal in the island, they're quite tasty. Their meat is quite dense and dark, somewhat like whale meat, but much tastier. Puffins: cute and tasty, the perfect animal! (well, I guess lambs too fit into that mold).

And now for the onslaught of pictures:

Volcanoes and lava

Walking on the 1973 lava

The lava stopped by this water tank

The 73 volcanic cone, as seen from the older volcano

Animals

Puffin group

"Don't look to your left, but I think somebody is watching us..."

How YOU doin?

Fulmar in flight

The mascot shark of the football team. At least it didn't smell like urine

Close encounters of the sheep kind

Cliffs

Rock face

Jo v/s the cliff

How do you get to that building?

How do you get to that building? Part 2

Do you see the elephant?

Miscellaneous

On the ferry

Jó's flowery socks that I had to wear when I found out I forgot to bring any extra clothes (and my socks were wet)

A view of the town, from the old volcano

A fishy mural

A monument to the 200+ Mormon Icelanders that left for Utah in the 1800's.. For real!

A plane taking off from the local airport

Midnight sunset

2007-07-02T01:25:00.000+01:00

The view from our window

And from down the street

Bjalli

2007-07-01T14:49:00.000+01:00

Last weekend, we went inland to a farm named Bjalli to meet some of Jo's relatives. It's just under a two hour drive from the city, and a world away.

The family farm isn't constantly inhabited anymore, but it's still visited quite often. Right next to the house are the remains of the sod houses which were inhabited a century ago.

The farm has a great view of Hekla and of a couple of glaciers.

Hekla is a very photogenic mountain, rising alone from the ground. It also happens to be Iceland's most active volcano, having last erupted in 2000. During the middle ages, it was considered in Europe to be one of the entrances to hell. Now that's notoriety!

That weekend also included Jónsmessa, which correlates with the longest day the year (near the summer solstice). So it's traditional to have a big bonfire, which was quite fun :). We were about a dozen people, and we went through a large pile of wood. Which, I found out later, was the remains of a horse stable there that was destroyed in the 2000 independence day earthquake.

We camped for the night in our new tent, and drove around the area the next day. We stopped at the local cemetery. I don't know, why but there is something strangely low-key and comforting about Icelandic cemeteries. Maybe it's the not-too-fancy plaques and the disorderly grass. I wonder how they will look in the winter though.

Hekla

The farm

The sod houses (the grill is a later addition)

Wife and volcano

Running towards the glacier

A little stream

Warm...

My face 2 seconds after having a swig of whiskey from a bottle that was passed to me

Midnight light

The road to hell?

Birds...

... And sheep

Kindur undir jökli (aka Sheep under glacier)

A cemetery with a view

Amiina

2007-06-24T22:18:00.000+01:00

Last Thursday, Jó and I went to an Amiina concert downtown. They're a bit of a quirky band, made up of four women, with a long list of instruments that includes saws, glasses filled with water, an old casio mini-keyboard, bells... Oh and string instruments of course.

Despite this anything-but-the-kitchen-sink aspect, their music is not gimmicky but rather charming and dreamy. They seem to fit in somewhere between Múm and Sigur Rós, while having a feel of their own.

The concert was for the release of their first full-on album. It was at Iðnó by the pond. There were close to 200 people perhaps, unfortunately... there were less than a 100 chairs (and at least a quarter of those were reserved), since the room was not even half filled with chairs. So we ended up watching the concert standing up, which had its upshot in that we were about 10 feet from the stage, on the left side of the room.

The concert was a bit unpolished in parts (some technical problems, and the girls got confused a few times) but otherwise it was great. It's pretty cool to watch and hear the different instruments they played.

Here's a YouTube video from another concert.

Oh and I managed to get a poster at the end too.

No flash during the concert => blurry pictures

At the end

The poster

A row of 8 birds by the pond, at the end of the concert

Sautjándi júni

2007-06-24T22:04:00.000+01:00

Sautjándi júni (June 17th) is the Icelandic national day. Since there's often a one week gap between events happening and them ending up on the blog, now is the right time to post about this :).

The weather was quite nice, so unsurprisingly there were a lot of people in the streets. Plenty of games for kids, and free concerts (mostly for teenagers, it seemed from the audience). And lots and lots of Icelandic flags.

Actually the only thing that was as omnipresent as the flags was the candy. This nation has one massive collective sweet tooth.

Crowds

A play for children (I managed to understand most of what was going on)

Us by the pond

Ducks in the pond

It seems as if there were a fourth target but it was taken off. I wonder who that was...

Jó in a rare moment of nationalistic pride

A cat we saw along the way. I like cats, as can be deduced from this picture.

Esja

2007-06-18T00:39:00.000+01:00

Last weekend, Jó and I managed to get out of the city and hike on Esja. For those not in Iceland, Esja is the mountain north of Reykjavík. And luckily for us there's a bus stop at the base of the mountain, so off we went!

We hadn't hiked much lately, but we had gotten new equipment (mostly, hiking poles) so we were looking forward to this. We headed towards a summit at an altitude of almost 800 meters, but only made it to around 600 meters before heading back down. We had to catch a specific bus, otherwise it would be two more hours till the next one (We had to stop by relatives of Jó who were having a graduation party for one of their kids. Oh, and some guy at the party offered me a job selling Pylsur [hot dogs] at the van in Lækjargata at night. Tempting... but I'll stick with my job so far. Anyway...).

It was a nice hike, easy in parts and a bit more strenuous in others (though we didn't do the hardest part, at the top). The weather was overcast but warm by Icelandic standards (at least at the base). We later got a hiking map showing many different hikes on the mountain, so it will be fun to try some of those later.

And now, the pictures!

The view from sea level

Hiking Jó

Hiking me

Green

Purple

Cloudy

The shoreline from above

A self awarded victory cookie for reaching station #5

Við erum þetta fólk

2007-06-16T22:19:00.000+01:00

It took less than 3 months, but we're now certified front-cover Icelandic celebrities. We're on the cover of a newsletter named Fólk! It's the publication of the Alþjóðahús, the Intercultural center. It comes out a few times year, and it's distributed for free.

Over a month ago they had an event where they were selling t-shirts with slogans (in Icelandic) such as "I am 'those people'", "I am of foreign descent", "I am the workforce", etc... This was pre-election time, after the debate on immigration had gotten a bit sour, so they were doing this as a kind of "immigrant pride" thing.

We went there because Jó wanted to buy one of the t-shirts (they had beer specials too, since it was in a cafe). So at one point they asked all the people who got shirts to go outside of the cafe for a minute to take a group picture. I was dragged along despite telling them I had not bought a shirt, and a few pictures were taken.

Then last week we saw this cover. We're in the low right corner! It's pretty easy, I'm the one with a different shirt and Jó is next to me :).

Of course, we won't really have made it into Icelandic society until we make the cover of Séð og Heyrt*.

* that's Iceland's #1 gossip magazine

Summertime

2007-06-12T23:19:00.000+01:00

So today, the boss let us out a 1/2 hour early from work, to take advantage of the great summer weather!

Great being sunny, low winds, and 15° C (60° F).

So I did what everybody else does here, went straight downtown and laid down on the grass in Austurvöllur square where Jó met me. We enjoyed the sun for a while, but eventually retreated to a cafe to do some reading.

Festival of Nations in Hafnarfjörður

2007-06-03T16:10:00.000+01:00

The good people at the Alþjóðahús (literally all-nations-house, an association that helps immigrants in Iceland) were organizing a Festival of Nations in Hafnarfjörður yesterday. This consisted of several booths, each for a country, where people were dressed in local clothing, and had food samples, brochures and whatnot. There was also a stage in the middle of the location where many groups took turns showing off dances and whatnot. Pretty cool stuff!

And, just to state the obvious: free international food is good :). Amal, a Palestinian woman who works at the Alþjóðahús, was telling me to start a Lebanese stand next year :).

After sampling all the food (best stuff: Thai chicken curry and Indonesian lamb on a stick) and watching some performances (best stuff: the dancing Cuban dude) we headed out and walked a bit in Hafnarfjörður. The weather was warm enough that for the first time since coming here 3 months ago, I was able to be outside in just a t-shirt! I asked Jo for a picture to commemorate the momentous occasion.

We stopped at a coffeehouse named "Súfistinn", aka The sufi. Unfortunately the coffee was not brought by whirling dervishes, which would've been quite cool (another unfilled niche!). Finally we took the bus back, stopped by Kringlan to get some food, and headed back home.

On to the pictures (many thanks to Jo for taking most of them, including the harbor pictures from the previous post!):

Thailand reprezent!

Cuban dancing

Indonesian food

Just a T-shirt!!!

The lovely Jo :)

DJ Jo spinning those discs

At the coffeehouse

Almost home

Seamen's day

2007-06-03T14:51:00.000+01:00

Given the seminal importance of seamen in Icelandic culture (sorry...), it's not surprising that they have a festival for them here. Jo and I walked to the nearby harbor yesterday and wandered into a tent full of kids drawing and painting, along with some booths related to the fishing-industries (one had a couple of dead fish laying on it. Educational and smelly!). There was also an old school accordion band playing there, and even a few amusement rides placed outside!

Of course there is more to the festival than this, but that's all we've seen when passing by. Many restaurants have special menus for this, but the prices approach 80$ per person so that doesn't strike me as a great deal... Maybe I just haven't stayed here long enough.

Old school accordion band

Amusement rides

Harbor statue

Not Westfjords!

2007-05-25T00:05:00.000+01:00

Ok, so we just checked the weather. We might not be going to the Westfjords anymore since it's gonna be cold with rain/snow/sleet. And we were thinking of doing it as a camping trip.

The car was booked, but only Icelandic style (i.e. they took Jo's first name only) so I assume we can back out it with no problem.

Hmm, what to do... Maybe a one or two day trip somewhere else. How about the Vestmanneyjar?

Westfjords!

2007-05-24T21:07:00.000+01:00

We have Monday off next week (Whit Monday. No, I don't know what that means). So we're taking advantage of the long weekend and going on a trip to the Westfjords tomorrow! We rented a car, bought a road guide, and charged the camera battery. Winding and occasionally unpaved roads, here we go!

(I guess we still have to pack and figure out where we will be visiting, where we will be sleeping, and which direction we will be taking. Details)

Belgian Beer

2007-05-24T20:59:00.000+01:00

And now, on to cheerier stuff. I wrote this last week but forgot to publish it. Also, note that this post might be boring if you don't care much about beer :)

Over the last couple of years, I have gradually gotten into good beer, often Belgian. Philly might not be the greatest city (sorry, Philly-lovers), but it is blessed with two Belgian food and beer places (Monk's and Eulogy). After trying some of the beers there I was hooked. Unfortunately, laws in Pennsylvania mean that buying beer by the bottle is quite difficult, so you end up having to buy it by the pack (6) or case (24) depending on the availability. And with those beers costing up to 5$ a bottle (sometimes more) at the store, getting a case would be too expensive. Plus it would take quite a while to go through.

Luckily, I had found a place in Maryland (only 45 minutes away from my former residence) that sold all kinds of good beers by the bottle, and I made several trips there and tried lots of good beers. It was great!

Coming to Iceland, things went downhill on the beer front. All the alcohol has to be bought from the state store (Vinbuð), including beer, so at the store downtown they seem to have about a dozen or so different kinds of beer, most of them being the typical pilsner kind (think Coors / Miller /Bud from the US, Viking / Thule / Egils from Iceland). So, few good options. Moreover, beer (as well as any alcohol) is expensive here, so buying it from the store ends up being about 3$ a bottle (for a basic beer).

However, the other day I stopped by the Vinbuð store in Kringlan, and walked around the aisles... Till I found.. Belgian beers! Now admittedly, it's not an amazing selection, but they had at least 10 different kinds of those. Plus a few interesting non-Belgian beers.

Also, the prices ranged from 200 to 350 kronur (3 to 5.5$) which is the same as I would pay in the US for those beers. Since drinks here seem to be (highly) taxed by alcohol content instead of by price, most beers end up within a narrow price range regardless of their original pre-tax price. This makes a good beer a better value in comparison to a standard one. So a Miller (MGD) would cost 3$ (compared to 1 or less in the US) while a blue Chimay costs 5.5$, about the same as the US.

Cheers!

Good stuff

Sumar á Líbanon

2007-05-22T23:25:00.000+01:00

Well, it seems that just like last summer, this one is shaping up to be a bad one (or a 'hot summer' as people say in this case). Just two weeks ago, Jo and I were still thinking about going there this summer to have a wedding celebration there, with all my family (following the civil wedding in State College and Thai wedding ceremony in Seattle last year). But two weeks ago, my parents told me to postpone the plans, because things were unstable. I knew they were right, but I was a bit upset nonetheless.

Over the last few days, troubles erupted in North Lebanon, in and around a Palestinian camp. An extremist militia, after a botched robbery attempt, attacked army posts and killed about two dozen soldiers that day, so things got fucked up very quickly, and they have been involved in a fight with the army till now. Now, Lebanese politics are very complicated (seriously...), so I can't explain it in depth here... But let's just say that for each act, there are tons of different conspiracy theories that could actually be true. So it's often hard to know the real causes and motives. But, personally, I suspect at least a partial Syrian involvement in this stuff. We'll see.

Two days ago, a bomb exploded in East Beirut, near a shopping mall. Yesterday, I got a call from my parents, telling me not to worry... as there was a bomb 300 meters from our house (in a neighborhood named Verdun). This area down the street from us was targeted with a car bomb, and a whole building burned.

Now, there has been shit going on for the last two years, but when it hits your neighborhood... It's different. It's scarier. And it angers/hardens me in ways that I don't like. But that's the way it is (Interestingly enough, my mood at such times often oscillates between black humor, anger, fear and sadness).

I've felt this way last year too, during the summer war between Israel and Hizbollah. Though the whole thing was very stressful, the damage and/or destruction of familiar places (beaches covered in oil, bombed roads and bridges) always hit me very hard. But still, that would be nothing compared to loved ones being hurt.

Anyway, I really hope things don't continue on this path. This is not what my neighborhood is supposed to look like.

Reminders that I'm in Iceland

2007-05-21T10:34:00.000+01:00

1) It's currently snowing.
2) After staying for a few hours in a dimly-lit underground-ish club last night, I got out around midnight and it was light out. Went out to another place, got out at 2am. Still light.
3) They had cars and buses overturned and split last week, and it was part of an artistic event, not due to accidents or bombs.

I kinda like this place.

Turkish coffee

2007-05-13T21:13:00.000+01:00

As an embodiment of our exciting lifestyle here, Jo spontaneously grabbed a camera and started documenting my first cup of Turkish (or Greek, for some of you out there...) coffee in Iceland.

Boiling...

Have a cup!

Voting twice a day

2007-05-13T19:32:00.000+01:00

Icelanders yesterday had two elections they could vote in. In no particular order of importance, the elections were:

1) The parliamentary (Alþingi) elections. The 63-person parliament is re-elected in its entirety every 4 years. This is basically the most important election in the land, since the government is formed by a majority coalition in the parliament, and the president is mostly just a figurehead.

Without getting in too much detail, the ruling coalition (made up of one large party and a smaller one) saw its numbers reduced from 34 to 32 MPs, giving it the barest of majorities. However it seems that parties here are quite flexible in their alliances, so the upcoming weeks should be interesting. I must confess to being an election junkie (even though I've never been able to vote yet), so it's been fun watching the campaign season unfold here. I'm still a bit unclear about the math behind the allocation of seats in the parliament though, since I can't find much English documentation about it. If any Icelander's reading this, what's the difference between a "Kjörd sæti" and a "Jöfn. sæti"?

2) Otherwise, Icelanders (well some of them) voted in Eurovision too. This is a big event here... Small nation syndrome perhaps? We went to a "Eurovision party" (which I guess was also an "Alþingi party" at the same time) where people were watching the performances and drinking and eating and voting by SMS. This was my first time watching this event... And yes, it's extremely campy. The geopolitics behind the way the votes of one country are distributed among other countries is interesting though. Oh, and Serbia won this time.

Giants

2007-05-13T19:06:00.000+01:00

The Reykjavík Arts Festival was launched this week. As part of it, large wooden dolls (a girl and her father, both giants) were "walking" around town. The whole performance was made by a French group, named "Royal de Luxe" (which sounds incredibly generic in French, frankly...).

I'm not sure what the general storyline was, but it basically involved this giant and his daughter. The giant left a path of destruction in the days leading to the event, which included damaging a lot of car and starting a geyser in downtown. The geyser was amusing, and a stræto bus (city bus) was impressively sliced with a giant knife.

Jo and I went downtown for part of the show, at the center of town. Plenty of people were amassed there, and the weather was sunny (though a bit cold) which gave the show quite the festive mood.

The giant's path: an overturned car...

And a nailed car

Sleeping giant, surrounded by the crowds

Trying to get a good view...

The girl

Her face

You wouldn't want to mess with him...

Scrabble

2007-05-06T21:31:00.000+01:00

I found out the hard way yesterday that if a game of Scrabble ends with a tie, the winner is the person who had the highest score before the points for the unused tiles are added/deducted.

Jo and I have finally received boxes we meant to ship to ourselves from the US (thanks Mike! :)) and we had our scrabble board in there. We can get quite competitive and pouty when playing, which is kind of amusing. Yesterday's game was one where I fell behind quite a bit from the very beginning (and at that point had a goal of not losing by more than a hundred points). However things kept getting better till we got to the very end, and the only play I could make resulted in a tie, and I was on the losing side of that tie breaking rule.

It was epic. The catastrophic beginnings. The constant struggle, and validation that it brought. The taste of victory, so close... And then, at the photo finish, brought forth by the smallest of margins... A tragedy compounded by the hope that had preceded it. You could easily make a movie about it.

Otherwise, before the game, we tried Tommy's hambugers (Hamborgarabúlla Tómasar), apparently a Reykjavík institution, and a 10 minute walk from our apartment. The burgers were quite tasty, if a bit undercooked.

Company outing

2007-05-06T13:18:00.000+01:00

This Friday was different, at work. We were told earlier that week that there would be a company outing on that day, and that a bus would take us from work at 4pm. Further hints were dropped in the last couple of days, but since I don't speak Icelandic most of the stuff escaped me.

Now, for a quick background about my company, it's made up of 30 employees or so. It also belongs to one big Icelandic conglomerate (yes, they have those here too). Of the 30 employees, about 6-8 are in the software group (including me), and that group has been moved to a separate office recently.

So, it was finally Friday at 4 pm. We got on a bus, on which the other two dozen employees already were on. Actually we grabbed beers before we got on the bus. We then went to a recording studio in Hafnarfjörður (a town south of Reykjavík), where we ended up going in the recording room in groups of 4-5 to record songs! The song I sang on was called "Draumur um Nínu" (meaning "Dream about Nina", which a google search reveals is the 1992 Icelandic Eurovision entry). Having not heard this before, I tried to sing as well as I could.. It will be interesting to listen to it when we will be given copies!

After the recordings, the bus drove us West (towards Hveragerði), and we stopped by an ATV course. We put on some outerwear (it's muddy there!) and got on the ATVs, 2 people on each. At first I was in the passenger seat, which was a bit uncomfortable. Halfway through we switched and I was driving... Now that was more fun :). The course wasn't too complicated, though the setting was nice (surrounded by those moss-covered mountains).

After the ATVs, we got on the bus again, and were assigned to each interview our neighbor so that we could do a one minute presentation about them over dinner. The dinner was at a place called the "ski cabin" apparently, in the same area (not that there seemed to be much skiing infrastructure there...). Since there were 30 presentations to be made, that took quite a while. Everything was in Icelandic, so I could only understand word here or there. Thankfully my lessons start in 10 days!

After dinner, the bus took us downtown, and we went to a couple of bars/clubs. The combined alcohol from the trip (plenty of beer on the bus, wine and other drinks at dinner) and from the clubs had the (expected) effect of making Icelanders easier to chat with. People are quite reserved here when they don't really know you... Until the alcohol hits :).

What I did this weekend

2007-04-29T23:30:00.000+01:00

I went to my beloved Vesturbæjarlaug

I sat on a couch in a cafe and continued reading a book

I stopped by city hall to listen to the platforms of the different political parties regarding immigration (in English), then went to a political party's office (the Social Democrats) for free coffee and pönnukökur

And finally, I worked on some Icelandic lessons, mostly online

Horses

2007-04-22T22:49:00.000+01:00

Today, Jo and I went horseback riding east of Reykjavík. It was a trip organized by some group at the university of Iceland, but you didn't need to be a student to go. So we went!

I should point out that I have only gone horseback riding once before, last year in the US. Although, it turned out to be muleback-riding, which I deduced after:

Looking at the animal
Reading the fine print in the stable's documentation, which pretty much stated that any four legged horse-like animal could be called a horse
Seeing the competitors next door putting up posters that said 'No mules here!'

Anyway, horses in Iceland were originally imported from Scandinavia along with the viking settlers. They're small, and shaggy haired. Now, though they may be pony sized, you cannot call them ponies... Icelanders will get upset, supposedly! Icelandic horses also have an extra gait, named tölt. Not that I have any idea what it is like...

I was given a horse named Flugur, which I promptly renamed Flugvöllur. As we went for the trail ride, it wasn't necessarily that responsive (mostly it was following the horse's ass that precedes it) but I was able to get it to walk outside of the line for a bit. At one point, the horses started trotting quickly, which made the trip very bouncy, but still fun.

I'm looking forward to more horseback riding trips in the future, with more independent riding.

On our mighty horses

Multi-toned

Thai time

2007-04-22T21:58:00.000+01:00

Last week, Jo and I went to a Thai festival (Song Kran, the water festival). It was was a fun event, with many members of the Thai community participating.

The festival was quite long, and crammed with events: dancing (mostly by little Thai and Thai-Icelandic girls), singing (a Thai woman from Akureyri, with comically dressed backup dancers), a concert by a band of teenager boys, a beauty contest for teenage girls, and more.

And of course, Thai food. Mmmm (I also found out that people from Isan [NE Thailand] make a spicy Som tam!).

It was quite cool to feel like I was in a different country for a few hours, surrounded by Thai sounds, sights (mostly the dresses for the performers), food and jokes (Thai people tend to be quite laid back, informal, and irreverent; save for certain issues like the king, buddha, and respect for older people and hierarchy).

Also, it was the first time I saw so many half-Thai, half-Icelandic kids. So this is what Jo must've looked like as a kid! :)

That night, we went to a Thai karaoke place with a mixed couple (Thai/Icelandic, that is). Everybody was singing in Thai, but Jo and I sang a few songs in English.

And yes, if any body's wondering, we did our usual duo of "Total eclipse of the heart". Tuuuuurn aaaaaround....

Singing "Proud Mary" in a Thai karaoke joint in Iceland...

Food blogging

2007-04-09T22:02:00.000+01:00

Today I was in the mood for some Lebanese food. This being Iceland, I had to cook it myself. I'm posting the recipes here in case someone else is interested, but also so that I know where to look them up next time :).

So, I had two variations on a main theme: dough + food on it.

The dough is made this way:

3.5 cups flour
2 tbsp sugar
1 tbsp salt
1.5 tsp yeast, dissolved in 1 cup of water + 1/2 cup of milk
1/4 cup vegetable oil

Mix it all and knead well, adding water or flour until the dough doesn't stick too much to your fingers. Roll the dough in a ball and place in a covered bowl, put in a slightly warm oven for an hour or so until the ball has expanded enough. This should be enough dough for rolling 4 personal pies.

Now, 1st variation: lahm bi agin (aka meat with dough)
300 g ground beef or lamb (or both)
2 tomatoes, diced
1 onion, diced
salt, allspice, cinnamon as desired (the allspice I use is a Lebanese 7-spice mix)

Mix it all. This should be enough to cover 3 pies. Put it in the oven at 200 degrees Celsius, for 12 to 15 minutes (at least until the dough is golden). Squeeze some lemon juice on top before serving, add cayenne pepper if desired.

Lahm bi agin

Second variation: Man'ouche (zaatar pie)
Mix zaatar with just enough oil so that no amount zaatar is left dry. Spread over the dough. Cook at 200 degrees in the oven for 12 to 15 minutes. I tend to make mine quite zaatar heavy, of course :).

Man'ouche

The pool

2007-04-09T20:49:00.000+01:00

We finally went to the neighborhood pool today. We sat in the hot tubs (not the 42-44 degree one, but the 38-40 degree one), and swam in the main pool. Life is good.

There is a country beyond Reykjavík

2007-04-09T20:30:00.000+01:00

On Friday, we finally ventured outside of the city limits. We went with some relatives of Jo to her grandparents' old place, a parish named Prestsbakki at the base of the Westfjords. This is where here grandfather, a priest, was posted for 40 years; and where her father grew up too.

Once you get out of Reykjavík (and its suburbs), things change very quickly. You'll find a town every once in a while, but mostly it's just long stretches of road, with mountains visible all around. We stopped by the remains of a volcano and walked around those for a few minutes.

Then we spent the afternoon in the (now abandoned) parish. It consists of: a church, a house, a sheep shed, and a cemetery. It's located right by the water, and far from everything. It's both peaceful in its remoteness, and sad in its abandonment.

Lava fields

Volcano crater

The church

The parish

Páskaegg

2007-04-05T20:48:00.000+01:00

I got a free páskaegg yesterday. A páskaegg is a big chocolate egg full of candy inside, and it's quite the Icelandic tradition! My company was having some sort of SMS contest where people could win those eggs. Obviously some where left over, so they were given to us.

This egg is from the Nói Síríus candy company (makers of the delicious Opal licorice) and is the Nr.7. The bigger the number, the bigger the egg. I think this one is the biggest one they sell, it weights 750 grams and costs about 30 dollars in the supermarket...

So, here is the egg with its structural integrity intact:

And here it is a few seconds later:

That's quite a bit of candy.

The Grótta Lighthouse

2007-04-05T19:27:00.000+01:00

Today Jo and I took advantage of the first day of the Easter holiday by walking towards the Grótta lighthouse. This lighthouse is at the North-Western tip of the peninsula that contains Reykjavík. It's actually located in a neighboring (tiny) town named Seltjarnarnes.

It's quite a nice walk to get there, by the waterfront, with mountains visible nearby. Today, despite being a bit chilly, was quite sunny and had very little wind, so it was a great time to go there (the wind can be quite rough there at times, since it's basically open on the North Atlantic).

The following map shows the location of the lighthouse (North-West corner) relative to the central pond (in the South-East corner).

The aforementioned map. We live a bit west of the pond.

Jo pondering over the meaning of life

Me posing in front of Esja

A cat we encountered along the way

A fish drying shack

The fish within

The lighthouse

... And Jo

Shells

Pictures from France

2007-04-05T18:50:00.000+01:00

Lyon first

Preparations for the party

The door at my aunt's house

Jo and I at the party

Whispering flowers, on a trip the next day to the nearby park

A lemur in the zoo there

Barbapapa = daddy's beard

Then, Paris

Jo in a Cafe

Me in Montmartre

A close up of the Institut du monde Arabe

Playing with the camera at the Sainte Chapelle, with its large stained glass windows

Many thanks to Jo for taking the majority of these pictures :)

Back from France!

2007-03-31T21:04:00.000+01:00

We're just back from a great trip to France. It was a good vacation in which I got to see my family and relax before starting work on Monday.

My cousins had organized a 60 person surprise party at their place in Lyon, for their parent's 30th wedding anniversary (the dad was in on it, my aunt was not). It was a great night in the end, they had a whole series of skits prepared. Lots of eating (Lebanese food! 8 kg of pastries!) and dancing. We stayed in Lyon for a few more days, enjoy the nearby park, and eating much.

We then went to Paris for a few days, where we proceeded to walk around, eat, visit a few things, eat, etc...

There is a store in Paris that sells wines (some for quite cheap), named "Nicolas". They now have a few "bar a vins" open, where they serve food (mostly traditional French fare) and wine by the glass, for quite cheap. You can also get a bottle from their adjoining wine store and open it over food for a minimal fee. It's not a hugely impressive thing, just a small new discovery that I really enjoyed.

Another discovery I made was that brains are not very tasty. We went to a restaurant where I chose the veal head, based on a French man's suggestion, who said that the cheeks were quite tasty. Somehow it did not dawn on me that the head would include the brains... But I decided to try it anyway once it arrived. The texture is a bit of a problem, it's rather gelatinous; in the end it's edible but not that pleasant. The tongue, however, tastes better. All in all, this is good prep for next year's þorrablot.

The whole trip was very food-themed, come to think of it. In addition to all the great food in France, I got 4 kilos of Lebanese pastries from my parents (mostly for gifts), 1 kg of zaatar (dried thyme and toasted sesame), other spices, nuts, French pastries... Enough to last me for a while and give me more cooking options in Iceland.

The pieces are falling into place

2007-03-22T22:38:00.000Z

So!

I've now selected one of the job offers. It's the one that pays better and that's closest to where I live :). I will be working on websites mostly, porting stuff to .NET technologies. I'm glad to finally work with .NET, since almost every job ad I've seen asks for this.

I'm gonna be working in a small company, about 30 people, a quarter of those being programmers. It implies a bit more responsibility, since I was chosen because of my academic background in part, in order to be able to make some decisions. So that's good. And my employer will pay for my Icelandic lessons, which is great.

We're going to France tomorrow, for a week, to meet my family :). And then when I come back, I start working at the new job. I will now be able to afford meat and wine and good coffee again, yippee!

In other news, yesterday J and I went to a free Tango lesson in Cafe Cultura, downtown. We were the only newbies I think, most people there had a good enough idea of what to do. Tango is not easy, but I'm looking forward to attending more lessons.

Oh, and after completing my medical tests (they wanted to make sure I wasn't bringing Aids or Syphillis or Tuberculosis to the island..) I finally got my Dvalarleyfi (residency permit) stamped into my passport, which I needed in order to work.

Tonight we had another dinner at J's Grandma, along with an uncle and his wife. We ate so much fish and potatoes and cream and jam filled pönnukökur... That was great :).

Alright, time to finish packing...

Bless Bless

Some pictures

2007-03-20T20:40:00.000Z

Mount Esja, as seen from the fifth floor of the city library

A purple house in the west side of town

A bird outside our apartment

Unemployed in Iceland?

2007-03-20T19:13:00.000Z

Not for much longer, it seems... After a few weeks of job hunting, it seems that I might accept a job offer by tomorrow. I have had interest from two companies, and I'm trying to figure out where I should go. The job itself, the location, and the pay are all factors that I need to weigh properly.

Getting a job has been an interesting process. Luckily, Iceland's IT sector seems to be booming, with many companies looking for employees. I started sending my CV around before I even left the US, and continued sending it and replying to job offers in the newspaper. I had a couple of leads that seemed good initially but petered out by the end (some of them I know I will hear about eventually, but I'm tired of waiting at this point). Many people have been very helpful in helping me send my CV and apply to different places. My new landlord even gave me her boyfriend's email since he needs to hire people for his company! A lot of my emails did not get a reply, and many got the "We're not hiring at this point" reply, but in the end there were enough positive answers for me.

As of today, we finally have Internet. It took two weeks and a lot of calls until our provider (Hive) managed to get us connected in the end... Sometimes things here don't seem that much more efficient than Lebanon.

Last week, J and I met some of the expat bloggers in Iceland. It's interesting meeting people after reading their blogs for so long when they don't know much about you (I did a lot of blog reading before deciding to move to Iceland) but they're quite nice people and it was a pleasure meeting them.

We also went to a couple of parties on the weekend, which was fun. The usual socializing and drinking (not too much though, it's too expensive here :)). Being able to walk from downtown to our apartment is a great thing. In fact, we've been walking around so much more these days. Hopefully having Internet at home will not turn us into couch potatoes...

We're leaving on Friday to France, where we will meet my family and assorted relatives and friends. Fun! After we return, in the beginning of April, I will hopefully start working at my new job (wherever that will be) and then start my Icelandic lessons a week after that.

Bless Bless

Settling in

2007-03-20T19:03:00.000Z

(This post was originally written around the 10th of March. Since I did not have Internet access at home then, I simply saved it as a document, and I'm finally publishing it now).

So, it’s been about 10 days in Iceland so far. By now we’ve settled into our cozy apartment, and we have become regular clients at the local supermarkets and bakery. There’s one nice supermarket (Nóatun) and a crappy one (Krónan). We´re going to the second one so far since it’s the cheapest one, though it’s still much more expensive than the US. The bakery (Björn´s bakery) makes pretty good bread.

This weekend, we met an Italian friend of J downtown (a 10-15 minute walk from home). We went to a couple of places and had some beer and chatted with some fellow foreigners in Iceland.

We went to visit the National museum too, which is quite impressive not only in its material contents, but more so in its presentation. It’s right by the University, where we’ve been stopping by almost every day with a laptop to check our emails (we still don’t have Internet at home). We have a TV here that the owner had left in the basement. There are 3 channels available (and a fourth one that needs a subscription). One of them plays the same video clips during the morning / day, and most of them seem to show lots of American stuff, including a lot of trashy stuff such as Trading Spouses, the story of Britney and Kevin, etc.. I did see today some home improvement show (in Icelandic) which was peppered by 5 minutes segments showing people how to clean their toilets using certain brands of cleaning products.

Work wise, I’m still looking around though there is a place I kinda like already. It’s a bit frustrating not having Internet here since it helps with that stuff (and with online Icelandic lessons!)

Velkomin til Íslands!

2007-03-20T18:51:00.000Z

(This post was originally written on March 3rd, but I could not post it then because of network problems)

This Thursday morning, we (my wife J, and I) finally arrived in

Iceland

. After a good week of packing / cleaning / going to work, it was a relief to be finally on that plane. We were unable to ship some stuff on the last day but thanks to an ever helpful coworker we'll be able to work it out soon :).

So.. Iceland! It's still not a huge culture shock since I've been here before and it's quite a westernized country. It's good to be in Reykjavík again, I like this little town.

We've been staying at J's aunt's for a few days. They've been very hospitable (and such good food :)), and the partial immersion in Icelandic is helping me (they usually speak to J in Icelandic, and to me it's 50/50, so I often have to ask for clarification). I've also shown them pictures from Lebanon and prepared a Tabboule salad for them. Intercontinental cultural exchange :)

Two nights ago we met J's grandma, who is our only remaining grandparent at this point. It was good to meet her, and hopefully as time goes by I'll be able to communicate with her in Icelandic.

Today we went to a relative's 85th birthday. The place itself was quite small (maybe 55 square meters) and full of people. There were SO MANY DIFFERENT CAKES. Kannski (= maybe) about 10. Some were really good too. And coffee of course. I'm told this is quite typical for notable occasions in Iceland. And we also signed our names on a guestbook, which had signatures dating back to over fifteen years. Cool.

We have also found an apartment! It's the western part of town, barely still in the 101 postal code. A cozy little place, quite expensive but then this is Iceland. Hopefully we will move in there tomorrow, provided our bed-borrowing plans work out.

As we will be settling in this new place, there are many things ahead of me:

Moving on with the job applications
Finishing my residency paperwork
Getting used to the Icelandic keyboard layout
Figuring out where/when to take Icelandic lessons (according to J, this can be solved by going to eat twice a week at her aunt's place where her uncle will correct my Icelandic ruthlessly :))
Trip to Paris at the end of the month!
Taking pictures of Iceland to justify our recent purchase of expensive camera lenses

More to come,

Bless Bless