Rotten Apples and Extra Shoes

Rotten apples may be a little bit of an exaggeration. Maybe I should say SEVERELY bruised. Like so bruised the whole thing feels squishy like rolled up socks. That's the kind of apple I have taken to eating. I guess it shouldn't come as a surprise that apples in Iceland would be a little beat up given the journey they must have undergone to get to my local "Bonus" grocery store. I can't actually read where they are from since everything in the grocery store is in Icelandic, but I'm pretty sure they aren't from within a "local" radius... Because I have become an extreme value shopper to save money (especially now that the kronur is gaining strength due to the demise of the government), I buy bags of apples. I would say that maybe 1 out of 3 is firm like a normal apple, and then the other two are as malleable as all get out. When I press my thumbs into the sides to check the firmness I leave two, defined fingerprints. Not a good sign! At first, I was a little grossed out, but because I don't want to waste any of my precious fresh produce, I just chomp them down. I think it may be an acquired taste, because I just polished one off without blinking an eye! This is a skill that will serve me well for many years, I do believe!

I imagine that everyone reading this blog knows just how much I like to be scolded. I've been told that I used to tear up when a complete stranger would kindly tell me to be careful with something in a grocery store when I was little and I can't say that my skin has gotten much thicker. I've lived my life attempting to do the right thing and never really struggled with it until now! Doing the right thing is made much more difficult when one cannot read the signs! I can't seem to go into a locker room or gym without doing something that is deemed worthy of a scolding. My main issue appears to be with shoes. Before coming to Iceland, it never occurred to me that it would be looked down upon (and against the rules) to wear the shoes you were planning on working out in to the gym. The other day, I walked into the gym wearing my workout clothes (and shoes) and was chased down the hallway by a lady who appeared to be eager to inform me that it was NOT okay. I felt terrible, but hadn't thought to bring an extra pair of shoes. She reluctantly let me continue, but not before making me vigorously wipe my feet on the shoe mat. I think it is important to note that because it was snowy outside, even before wiping my feet my shoes were pristine. Not a spec of dirt to be seen on the soles. Ah well. Learning this rule did explain why there was always a huge pile of shoes outside the locker room doors. I guess I should have put two and two together earlier!

The locker rooms at the hot pools are also filled with mysterious rules. There are VERY specific places you are supposed to stand to dry off and an order of events that is still somewhat beyond me. My first time at the pool, I made the mistake of putting my wet swimming suit on the floor by my locker. It wasn't long before an agitated lady with a mop rushed over and informed me that swimming suits are not to be put on the floor "because it might kill someone." I can definitely understand wanting to keep the floors dry, but it is a difficult thing to accomplish when you are wet from the pool! I am confident that I will figure out the etiquette someday, but it might take awhile. In the meantime, I get to work on toughening up and livin' on the edge.... hahahhahaa.

Rotten Shark! (Hakarl)

Last night, one of the political parties of the student council, Roskva, put on a party at one of the bars where they provided some of the most disgusting traditional Icelandic foods. When we got there, quite a bit of the food had already been swallowed, but there was plenty left for us to experiment with! On a tray lay two lamb heads, little tins of Hakarl (the rotten shark meat), little white cubes of sheep testicles, little brown speckled cubes of sheep liver, and some unidentified yellow paste. Minutes after we began surveying the scene, an Icelander came over to the table and began to viciously pry one of the eyes out of the lambs head with a toothpick. Once he had it skewered, he handed it to Dom, telling him that it was one of the prime parts of the head and that it tasted like jelly. After a few moments of hesitation, Dom popped it into his mouth and began to chew. It wasn't terribly pleasant to watch, but it was certainly better than eating it myself!! After a little while, other people in my group started to get brave and eat tiny portions of the delicacies. Watching their faces and hearing their descriptions made me want to go hide in the bathroom, but I knew that I would regret it if I didn't at least give the foods a bit of a go. Libby stabbed a little chunk of the rotten shark and handed it to me. I held it for awhile and made the mistake of smelling it. Why I thought that smelling rotten shark would make it more appetizing, I do not know.... I was struggling to take the final step and put it my mouth, so Libby counted down from five and I managed to pop it in! I was SUPER tempted just to swallow it, but decided against it. I felt like since I already had the stuff in my mouth, I might as well experience it. I gave it a couple of tentitive chews and was not too distressed. On my third chew and a little bit of a swallow, however, my opinion rapidly changed. I couldn't BELIEVE the taste! I couldn't imagine anything more foul... It basically tasted like really, really old, strong flavored fish that had been soaked in horse pee. Blechnum! It gives me shivers just to think about it!! Because my mouth had already been adulterated with unfortunate flavors, I decided to quickly grab a chunk of the sheep testicle before losing courage. It wasn't quite as bad as the shark, but certainly nothing I would ever want to place in my mouth again. The texture was very, very strange-- sort of a creamy, crumbly deal. The piece was too big to swallow quickly, so I really got the opportunity to experience it to its full extent. Luckily, I had brought along two pieces of strong gum, so I was able to eliminate the flavors fairly quickly. A little bit later, I was sort of cornered by these two close talking Icelandic boys who were passionately talking about Icelandic and American politics. Although the conversation was interesting, I was a tad bit distracted by their awful smelling breath and the little bits of spittle that kept landing on me. Needless to say, they had both had plenty of rotten shark and Brenavin (the traditional drink one is supposed to have with the shark-- apparently it tastes like cumin)...

On an entirely different note, I am beginning to think that Icelanders don't sweat. All of the good running places have been covered with ice and a slick layer of water for much of the last week, so I've had to resort to exercising in the gym. Because ellipiticizing or riding on the stationary bike for an extended period of time is incredibly boring, I have plenty of time to look around at the other people in the gym. I can't tell if I am just going harder than most people, but somehow, it always seems like I am drenched in sweat while everyone else remains completely dry! I don't get it! I have made up all sorts of theories as to why that might be the case, but none of them seem particularly plausible. It makes me feel super awkward though, because there I am, red faced and pouring sweat in my workout clothes while everyone else looks completely composed in their stylish (of course) workout clothes. Actually, their clothes are another point of interest for me. Not many people seem to wear shorts to the gym. Instead they wear these bloomer looking things, sort of billowy material to the middle of their calves and then a tight elastic band. Other people wear normal looking pants, but then have long socks pulled up over the pants. I'm not sure I understand the functionality of such an outfit. Ah well. I thought that maybe I could at least fit in in a workout type situation, but apparently not. Such is life!

It looks somewhat less slippery and windy today (the last couple of days we have seen consistant 68 km/hr winds-- sometimes I could just stand there and glide across the ice with the support of the wind) so I think I may attempt to run to where I think there might be an indoor track. We shall see!!

An Expedition to the West

After a somewhat hectic week, we (meaning the core group of people I hang out with on my floor and three others from a different building) decided that we wanted to have a little bit of an adventure on Sunday and get out of Reykjavik. Reykjavik is a neat city, but I think all of us were feeling ready to see a little bit more of Iceland, especially the beautiful countryside to the west. We had heard that you could rent cars for the day for a pretty reasonable price, so we rented two little cute, round cars (that are not designed for ice, we learned) for ~9000 kr (90 usd) each. Not bad when we split it between 5 people per car! We left at 9:00, which, for most people, seemed super early. It was dark when we left, but as we drove out of the city, we got to watch the sun slllooowwwlly rising behind the mountains. It was magnificent. Everyone was SO excited to be seeing more of the country. We were absolutely in awe.

We had planned a grand adventure with many stops, but because of slow driving and unexpected hikes, we wound up only going to the highest waterfall in Iceland (Glymer, 198 m), some super hot and vigorously steaming and bubbling hot springs, a pool in the town of Borgarnes, and a Filipino/Icelandic restaurant. Additionally, we got to see a ton of the countryside while driving all about.

After almost not being able to negotiate a necessary turn because of CRAZILY slippery roads (terrifying at moments, for me anyway) we made our first stop of the day at the trail head to Glymer. We hadn't realized that it was a hike, but I was really excited to get a chance to get off the main roads. We were initially paranoid about following the little painted yellow rocks that marked that trail, but eventually excitement and enthusiasm took over and the trail was completely abandoned. As we walked through the most amazing country I think I have ever had the chance to be in, everyone was just BEAMING. We all had purpley faces from the cold, but none of us could stop smiling. We saw a roiling boiling blue river that was flanked by outrageous ice formations, caves dripping with icicles, snow, sun, a blue-grey ocean, cute little trees, tiny footprints, and so, so, so much more. We wound up hiking up to the top of one of the snow covered mountain ridges to see the falls, which gave us a spectacular view of everything around us. Because of the lack of large vegetation, one can basically get a great view of something from anywhere. Additionally, the openness allows one so much freedom to explore, because there is really no concern about getting lost or losing one another. I guess that would be different on a snowy, cloudy, rainy day, but we lucked out and had stunning weather. We had debated not going because the forecast looked so dismal, but I guess the weather changed its mind and decided to cooperate beautifully. I wish that I could describe the feeling I had while looking out at everything from the top of this ridge. I will include some pictures in this post which might give you some idea of what we were seeing/feeling, but they really don't do it justice. After diddling around up on top of the ridge, we began to get really cold and decided to head back to the cars. We scrambled down from the ridge, making a little detour to walk through a small stand of tiny spruce trees. If we crouched down, it sort of felt like home! The joke "If you get lost in an Icelandic forest, just stand up" is so very true.

Upon returning to the cars, we munched chocolate chip cookies that Allie and I had baked on Saturday (We made ~130 and then delivered some to each floor in an attempt to make more friends) with frozen lips and hands. I don't think it was actually THAT cold, but the windchill made it feel pretty biting. Because we were so cold, hot springs sounded pretty good, so we set out to find them! When we got to the ones we had been looking for, we discovered that they were WAY too hot to swim in, but we huddled around them for a little bit, admiring their forceful bubbling and loving the heat that they were transmitting to the air. After driving around a bunch more (now watching the sun set beautifully), we wound up in the town of Borgarnes. We got to the town pool an hour before closing and had a pretty amazing swim/soak. It felt soooo good to thaw out our toes in the hot, hot water!

After swimming, we found a quaint Filipino/Icelandic restaurant. I guess they weren't expecting any customers at this time of year, so a few minutes after our large group descended, the cook came bustling in the door. After we finished eating, the cook/owner came and sat down at our table with us. She wanted to hear all about our impressions of the Icelandic students at the university and whether or not we thought they were still super nationalistic like their parents. She had immigrated to Iceland 21 years ago from the Philippines and had a lot to say about her impressions! We eventually had to cut the conversation off because it was snowing harder and harder and we still had a long drive home!

On the way home, we got to drive through the tunnel that goes beneath one of the bays on the west coast. It was pretty eerie to know that we were underneath the ocean!!! We got home at around 11, satisfied, tired, and excited to go on many, many more adventures! We were all so happy that we had taken the initiative to get out of town. It was a great reminder that there is so much more to Iceland than Reykjavik.

I have included a few pictures. Who knows where they will turn up in this post. I seem to struggle with the placement. I'm off to continue the battle with figuring out logistics! I don't think it will ever end!!!!!!!

Snippings

One more thing that I forgot to mention (by the way, I am at home now and ON THE INTERNET!)...

On Friday night, before we went out on the town, we all took turns cutting Sam's hair! Sam is one of the boys who lives on my floor. Here are a couple of pictures of his neatly trimmed hair (truly!) and all of the hairdressers!

My Heart is Singing!

Ok... I am having some difficulties with the pictures, but basically, it doesn't matter when they are from, they are all in the Reykjavik area from the last 3 days or so!

I think I am going to get internet today!!!! I can't believe how excited this is making me! After anxiously waiting to see if they would have my username and password ready by today, I got it and now have access to Ugla! If all goes well, my ethernet port should be activated by this evening! Yayayayayay! Having access to Ugla is such a relief because it means that I can actually access everything that I need for my classes. I get to do homework tonight! I can't wait! I finally feel like an actual student at this university.

This weekend was out of control, to say the least. I had been warned that the party scene in Iceland is pretty wild, but I wasn't prepared for the absolute insanity. The streets are packed by 2 am and don't begin to empty until 5:30 in the morning or so. The first night, I didn't have all that much fun because I was so stressed out about the scene. We spent the majority of our time at this Irish pub called the Celtic Cross. People seemed to think I was joking when I said that I didn't want to drink, so it took a ton of insistance on my part to keep them from forcing things down my throat. It turned out to be a really good thing that there was a sober person along, however, because after the bouncer threatened to kick an EXTREMELY drunk boy in our group out of the bar, I was able to get him home safely and make sure that everything was attended to. Other people certainly helped when I managed to get them herded together and out of the bar, but no one else was noticing that there was a serious problem. Earlier in the night, I had been sitting at this table when I heard a loud thump and saw that same boy falling to the ground. He had been punched in the face by this gnarly looking, huge older man who was subsequently thrown out of the bar. He has a pretty huge lip now, but is no worse for the wear. After an EXHAUSTING walk home (the boy is like twice my size and wasn't happy about going in the direction I was taking him) I was super wound up. It was probably about 3:45 or 4 am when we got home that night, but because I was so energized from "rescue" adrenaline, I stayed awake talking to two other kids from my floor, Dom and Allie, until a bit after 6 am. After that, I tried to go to sleep but didn't manage until about noon. It sucked. When I woke up, I looked at my watch and freaked out because it was 8:30 pm!!!! I walked into the kitchen and everyone was up drinking again!!! I felt like we had just gotten home! So, about 2 hours after waking up, we were out on the town again, this time at Bar 11. We stayed there for awhile-- it was a fun, dancy scene. At around 2 am, a bunch of hotdog and sandwhich stands open up around town, selling expensive (but delicious) sandwiches to drunken revelers. On the first night, as we were hauling the drunk boy home, everyone decided that it would be a great idea to stop at the stand and get sandwiches while Alex and I continued to carry the boy home. Luckily, when the boy REALLY decided he wasn't going to go the direction we were carrying him, and I was attempting to wrestle him either home or to the ground, the sandwich group was close enough behind to see the difficulties, so Dom could come help me wrangle him the rest of the way home. What an adventure! The TKE house is NOTHING, apparently. But anyway, on the second night, while Dom and I were walking home, we decided to split a sandwich, to make the cost a bit more managable. It was pretty good, but a little saucy for my liking.

On Sunday, I went down to the Kolaportid flea market. It was quite the scene. Basically like an organized garage sale. Tons and TONS of stuff. There was also a food section that was selling a few notable items like horse meat, dried fish, that rotten shark stuff, Cetraria islandica (packaged lichens, an especially exciting species because over break, I put some of that species into new packets for Daddy!), and hotdogs.

After the flea market, we walked around town taking pictures as it was a GORGEOUS, but frigid day.



Today, there is a beautiful sunny sky, a dusting of snow on the ground, and ice on the lake! It is pretty magnificent. I think I may go do some homework! Hurray!

Blue sky!

Just a quick note...

First of all, those are pictures of my room and the misty view out my window. Hopefully I will have some better Reykjavik pictures after this afternoon.

I am sitting in a little cafe in downtown Reykjavik and I can see a tiny patch (probably a sucker hole) of blue sky! While I was walking back down Laugavegur (the main shopping street) I could see almost the entire flanks of some of the mountains surrounding Reykjavik! First time! I am going to run home and then grab my camera to run to the beach and take pictures! I ran along the beach in the dark yesterday morning, but I am excited to see what it is like in the daylight! ...It just started pouring snow, but I can still see blue sky, so it hopefully won't last long! This is a moment of firsts; first blue sky, first snow, first mountains!

We had volcanology this morning which was pretty hilarious. The Professor, Pall something or other just went through EVERY organization that sometimes deals with volcanology as an introduction. We had it for 2 hours this morning and then in a few hours, we have our practical for another 2 hours. It was so funny to walk to class in the pitch dark. It felt as it we were going to class at 3 am! I was actually really excited (much to the dismay of everyone else...this actually seems to be a common theme, I am gaining the reputation of being the enthusiastic, organized person of the group. For example, the other day we were walking home from the geothermal beach and I remarked, "I LOVE this path!" (It was just a asphalt bike path, but it was along the seaweed smelling beach so I thought it was nice! Dom (an austrailian boy) and Allie (a canadian girl) laughed and laughed and made fun of me for a bit. I didn't get it and Dom said, "Well, I am just not so inclined to profess my love for little paths.) Hmm... this didn't sound as funny as it was, oh well.)

Our professor didn't show up for our next class (Nature based tourism), so we assume that it doesn't start until next week, but of course, no one informed us of this fact...

I wish you guys could see what I am looking at right now. A gorgeous light and dark sky, little twinkly lights on all of the bear trees, blue, red, gree, brown, purple roofs, tons of fashionable people. My oh my.

Christmas Lights and Fireworks!

Oh my goodness. The last few days have been an oddly slow whirlwind, if that is possible. Right now, I am sitting in the cafe of the National Museum (located just about 30 seconds from my dorm) with this tiny, blonde-haired, blue-eyed tyke dressed in a little green sweatsuit clambering around on the chairs next to me. The kids in Iceland are the cutest things one could imagine. Now he is making truck noises and drinking Icelandic chocolate milk!!

An email I sent to my parents yesterday just about sums up the mood of the last few days. My dad suggested I post it, so...

HI guys!! Still no internet. I ahve to be FAST because i have a MILLION things to do, but here we go:
1) Classes start today and we haven't even been registered
2) No one knows what time classes are
3) people are nice
4) I had an amazing run experience yesterday
5) SHould get internet sooommmmee day

asklfhsdlfhglkdjfg;lhisg I am feeling totally wild. But I will try and write more intelligibly later when I don't have all this other crap to do! THIS IS INSANE!!!!!!

Love,
Sara

As the message says, I am still without internet in my room which has been super frustrating. The process of registering, figuring out the time tables, getting a username and password, connecting to the internet, etc. has been incredibly convoluted and slloowww. I certainly will not go into it here, because just thinking about it makes me feel crazy! I think many of the international students are stuggling to adjust to the laid back, unstructured "system" at this university. It is funny, because there are clearly expectations and things that we must accomplish, but no one seems to know how, when, or where to go about these things. There is a lot of "Don't worry, it will all work out, Iceland is a relaxed country" but it is extremely difficult to actually take that to heart. Geology classes started yesterday (before we had been allowed to register AND before the time table had been published), but no one actually told us that they were going to begin. Every faculty at the university has a different start and end date, so even the registrars seem confused about when things are supposed to happen. I think all of this is going to force me to relax and have faith that things are going to be okay, but it is going to take a good deal of practice!

I was feeling pretty sad/homesick the first couple of days that I was here, but I think not eating, not sleeping, and all of the darkness and confusion were huge contributing factors. Since that time, I have made some friends and begun to get back into my eating, sleeping, and running routine. Unfortunately, my body has been insisting that I wake up at 5 am no matter what time I go to bed, but because of the darkness almost no one else wakes up until 10. Most shops don't open until 11, but the streets do start to bustle at around 8. In the few days that I have been here, we have already gained almost an hour of light, if you can believe that! I think the rapid change is going to be a really fun thing to experience.

All of the people I am living with seem pretty cool. Unfortunately, many of them are from North America (predominately Canada), but that is ok. I have many of my classes with about 3 other people on my floor, which I think will be fun! We are excited that we can all figure out where our classes are together! For the most part, everyone seems really eager to go out and do things (after they are awake, anyway!). Yesterday we walked a good distance to a geothermal beach and soaked in this long shallow tub before jumping into the North Atlantic Ocean which was UNBELIEVABLY cold! I was reluctant to freeze my body, but it seemed to be the Icelandic thing to do, so I bucked up and went. This particular beach is free, which is sweet since money seems to be rapidly flowing out of my bank account and into the Icelandic economy.

On my first full day here, I went for the most amazing run. I gave up on trying to run in the few daylight hours and so took off at about 5 pm in the darkness. I didn't really know where to go, as I had yet to see a single runner. It was pouring rain and windy, but that just sort of added to the adventure. I ran along a bike path until I saw a man (the first other runner I saw!) go darting off on a path into this little forest on a hill. I decided to follow him and quickly came across a sign that looked sort of like a park sign. I couldn't read anything on the sign, of course, but it looked like it was showing a bunch of promising trails. As I wound my way up one of the trails, I began to have a sneaky suspicion that I may be making my way up to Reykjavik's elborate water tank ("The Pearl"). After a little while, I emerged from the forest at the foot of the elaboratly lit tank! As I ran onto the platform the surrounds the tank (calling it a tank doesn't do it justice, it has a rotating fannnnnnccccyyyy restaurant on top of the tank) fireworks began to go off all over the place in the lower portions of Reykjavik! I felt so lucky to have happened across such a show! Since then, I have learned that during the week after New Years, tons of fireworks go off every night. People seem to try to cheer up the darkness any way they can-- cute little lights in virtually every window and on many of the street trees, lights on lamp poles, fireworks, etc. Makes sense to me!

This is getting far too long, but I had quite a bit bottled up since I have been virtually incomunicado with everyone back home!

Just one more thing-- as one would expect, all of the hot water in the building comes directly from the ground, so it is both very sulphurous and scalding. One has to be extremely careful while showering because the water temperature tends to fluctuate dramatically. Also, much of the jewlery I have worn in the shower has turn green... ah well, things could be worse!

So far, Iceland still seems like a crazy place. I am sure that I will get a handle on most things some day, but for now, I am content to settle with constant confusion.

Getting Ready!

I am taking a break from packing to create this blog. It is so weird to think that the next time I log onto this website, I will be in what seems like an entirely different world! I guess there really isn't much to say yet... I get up at 3 am tomorrow to begin my grand adventure. I can't believe that all of the preparations actually came together and that the fun (hopefully!) is about to begin!