From sheep to sovereignty

On Saturday I went on an excursion including a Rettir, or sheep round up, and the golden circle tour. As you can see, it was a very good time:

From right to left, those are my friends Laura, who goes to the University of Minnesota, Debbie, from the UK, me, and a Swedish girl I met on the trip who mostly complained about someone having stolen her seat on the bus.

There are more pictures in the gallery below to accompany my recollections. In case you are wondering what exactly a sheep round up entails, it’s the day at the end of the summer when all the sheep are collected from their grazing places in the mountains and sorted by owner according to the tags on their ears. In case you are wondering why I am straddling a sheep in the first picture, that’s the traditional way of dragging a reluctant sheep to its proper place. The event supposedly includes lots of Brennevin, which is a not-very-good-tasting Icelandic schnapps, and festive dancing, but for the couple hours I was there, it was down to business.

After that, we went to Gulfoss, an incredible waterfall whose scale I’m not sure can be quite captured in pictures. For that matter, I’m not sure any of the Icelandic landscape can be properly portrayed that way. If I had to sum up the countryside in a word, I would easily choose “vast.” Before I went out to the waterfall, I ate a couple heaping bowls of traditional Icelandic lamb stew, which was amazingly delicious if somewhat bittersweet for having just come from playing with thousands of sheep.

After the waterfall, we went on to visit Geysir, the oldest known hot spring in Europe and the namesake for geysers everywhere. Apparently, it ceased regular eruption roughly twenty years ago (perhaps related to Iceland tapping an increasing proportion of their geothermal resources for energy and heating?), but a neighboring geyser, Strokkur, continues to erupt reliably. After watching a few cycles, I decided to climb to the highest point I could see, a la Myrtle the Turtle, and the view was breathtaking.

Next we visited Thingvellir, the site of Iceland’s ancient parliamentary gathering, dating back to 930. Iceland’s Althingi is the first modern parliamentary democracy. However, I can tell you, after reading one of the Icelandic sagas, that the conduct was anything but civil. Sure, there was a ceasefire for the convention itself, but most of the matters addressed concerned unwarranted beheadings and the like. Decisions were generally decided by who could amass the largest army of supporting vikings to impress his point on the group.

There are no buildings to mark the area, as it was a seasonal and transient affair. But it was pretty obvious, in my opinion why the site was chosen. The majesty of the cliffs, clear water, and clouds rolling over mountains in the distance was pretty breathtaking. The cliffs mark the border between the European and North American tectonic plates–Reykjavik is technically in North America from a geographic perspective. Our tour guide gave us a stirring speech about the importance of Iceland retaining its independence from the European Union, drawing on the site’s significance for the country’s early glory and as the location where independence was lost to Norway in 1271, not to be regained until 1944.

Culture and broken stereotypes

Well, I’ve been a little lazy for the last week and a half, so I’ll try to summarize some of the highlights of my intervening experiences.

I just got back from taking in a free performance of the Icelandic symphony orchestra (apparently quite good; they won a grammy last year). They were playing with some Russian masters. It was enjoyable, though it might have been better if I wasn’t so congested. I’ve been pretty sick for the last week. While on the subject of free cultural experiences, I went to readings as part of the literary festival the last couple nights, where I saw David Sedaris among more highbrow choices. That one ends tomorrow, but not to worry! The film festival began tonight.

Monday night I went to a cafe with an Estonian girl at my dorm to meet up with some Icelandic couchsurfers. After waiting a few minutes, I approached a couple people that we thought might have been them. It turned out they were from Holland, but we got to talking and the night turned out well. That was my attempt at an anecdotal representation of the sort of international experience it is to live here. People living at my dorm represent countries all around the world, and it’s pretty cool to feel like a cultural ambassador from the US… not that culture varies very much around the world these days. I’ve actually been told several times that I’ve defied people’s American stereotypes. I’m never sure whether to take that as a compliment. I find that I tend to take a more defensive stance about the US than I ever do at home, especially when my home country is criticized in classes.

In terms of my Icelandic stereotypes, I’ve been surprised at how little environmentalism permeates mainstream culture. We basically had to fight to get a recycling bin in our dorm, and recycling is generally not very popular here. People drive everywhere and almost exclusively, and there are lots of large trucks around: land rovers, hummers, etc. Although there are also plenty of small European-style cars, too. The geothermal energy is just about the only thing that makes Iceland green, and even that is mostly put to use on aluminum smelting. But as with most places, there seems to be more of an environmental ethos among young people.

I just got a free bike from the Fulbright adviser. It’s in the shop now, but I’m very excited to ride around in the Icelandic blizzards. So far the weather’s been pretty mild, so I hope it’ll be sunny for the drunken sheep round-up I’m doing on Saturday. Check back for some pictures of that later on!

The view from my dorm room. Stupid Hallgrimskirka is being renovated!

Another one from my dorm. The clouds are rolling over the mountains on the left.

This is the view from north of the city. I can't wait to go explore the rest of the island!

Lovely little city

Finally got around to uploading some pictures. Enjoy!

My First Runtur

Yesterday, I moved out of my hostel (no tears shed about that) and into the dorm where I will be living at the University of Iceland. It’s a great location, right on the lake at the heart of Reykjavik and 5-10 minutes from the center, where all the bars, cafes, and restaurants are. My room has a great view of the lake and the city. I’ll try to upload some pictures soon, but I’m writing this at the library because my room does not yet have internet. For that, I need to get my kennitala (national id number), which you need for just about everything in Iceland: buying a phone, registering at the university, etc. I feel pretty off the grid at this point.

Last night was my first weekend experience in Reykjavik, and I have to say I’m pretty impressed. I went out at around 9 to see some live music with a couple people I met at the dorms- a girl who goes to the University of Minnesota, who was actually the first person I met while moving in, a girl from Cambridge, and a guy from Seattle. There’s an acoustic music festival going on, so we saw about six groups play at a cafe until around 2. I hadn’t heard of any of the bands, but they were all pretty good! Of course, there were two other cafes hosting bands as well for the festival. There’s also a jazz festival that’s been going on for a couple weeks, so hopefully I’ll catch some of that tonight. Beyond that, there were probably around 10 other places with live music. I get the sense that there’s at least some live music playing every night here. Not bad for a city of 200,000.

But that was the beginning of my night. At 2, we began what Icelanders refer to as the Runtur, a weekend bar crawl that usually begins around 1 and goes until 6 or later. Apparently, people pre-party until they go out, because alcohol is so expensive at bars. We probably went to 8 different pubs/bars/clubs (generally pretty pricey, although you can get a drink for around $5 some places) and drank, hung out, and danced. Icelandic people undergo a jekyll and hyde-style transformation after midnight, when they switch from being relatively quiet to extremely friendly and sociable. We met a bunch of cool people, and one who felt he had to yell as loud as he could into my ear that there are lots of scandinavians in minneapolis. A guy named Grettar (which he was actually pretty insecure about- apparently it means “pearl of the ocean”) bought us a few beers and told me about how he still thinks about his true love, who rejected him, even though he’s dating someone else now (hopefully she doesn’t read this!) Anyway, it was a great (if ridiculously windy and cold) night. I got back around 5:30 and passed out.

Why Iceland?

I first learned about Iceland through its musical export, Sigur Ros (a great band, by the way). A friend raved about the eccentric and fascinating country from which they hail. Combined with a preexisting love for Scandinavian culture, Iceland became my new whimsical passion. I learned about the country’s near carbon neutrality—mostly due to the abundance of geothermal energy on the volcanic hotspot. As a student of political theory, I was excited by The Economist ‘s ranking of the nation as the most democratic. I was also interested in how this sparsely populated island nation (less than 300,000 people in an area about the size of England) had achieved so much prosperity.

That was before the economy collapsed. Iceland’s financial crisis is complex, but can be mostly attributed to deregulation, culminating in a small group gaining enormous economic power which they wielded irresponsibly. Sound familiar? That’s not the only way Iceland is like America. The country values a sort of individualism and independence rare in Europe, having only urbanized in the past century. Before that, Iceland was a nation of subsistence agriculture and fishing.

But I’m confident that Iceland will regain its economic strength, even though future generations have been saddled with debt. I’m confident because the country has an abundance of what economists call human capital. The population is well educated and has a longer life expectancy than any country besides Japan. Although tourism, fisheries, and aluminum smelting are currently the largest sectors of Iceland’s economy, the nation with the most internet usage per capita is unsurprisingly an increasingly sophisticated participant in a diverse world economy.

But Iceland’s economic strength may be less important than its environmental integrity in the years ahead. Outside of cars, which I’ve noticed approach American sizes, being free of fossil fuels is a blessing for Icelanders. They also have a striking and unique geography, largely in pristine condition (by the way, I just found out there are three ski areas near Reykjavik!). In fact, the professor who wrote my letter of affiliation for the Fulbright Scholarship also wrote a book which discusses the ways in which global warming will likely benefit Iceland’s climate. Funny that, even then, this county has done so much less to contribute to the problem (yes, it is a problem, and I find it hard to believe that mass migration and dramatic climate change will benefit such an economically interdependent country.)

But my focus here is less on Iceland’s natural environment than its built environment. My impressions so far are mostly positive. For a city of only 200,000, Reykjavik is vibrant and cosmopolitan. I’ve spent my one day here so far walking along the main tourist street, so I can hardly speak to the city as a whole, but that’s why I have a year! I’ll spend it enjoying the city’s famous nightlife… and hopefully learning a thing or two from these unique people.