Birthday fun.

My birthday was good! News leaked throughout the group; we wound up meeting in a square downtown and then continuing to the cheapest beer in town. Namm! Eventually we stumbled about in the drizzle and, of course, I wound up at Prikið so that I could rape myself with an overpriced Corona.

I haven't got any really funny anecdotes for the evening, other than that my sole present was a great jar of caviar from my Dutch housemate, Guus, who I'll introduce later in another post.

I do, however, have a few pictures.

My card and caviar. Thanks, Guus and Nils!

This is Alice, from England. Thought-provoking company; very feisty.

Jakup (spelling?) from Poland; Laura from Germany, and her German friend. Great folks, all.

Despite the good cheer and birthday elation, for some reason I'm beating myself up about a lot of things these days; I did, though, come to Reykjavík to be introspective. I'll let you know when I quit singing "Low Five" under my breath...

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I'm on Yello's website! :D

Awesome. This is the bar, Bar Yello, that I went to on my first full day in Keflavík! These pictures were posted on the website belonging to the bar.

OK, I don't surf or anything, but I had to do SOMETHING foreign.

These are the Icelandic guys I met.

This guy was amazing!

I couldn't stop looking at this girl, but I didn't have the guts to talk to her and I doubt she'd've been interested.

This whole practice of making customers famous online is really cool. Hopefully I'll turn up on more Icelandic websites in the near future! (Though considering today is my birthday I think there's a good chance I'll be in some rather incriminating ones this evening.)

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Muh birfday. (Afmælinn minn!)

So, today's my birthday. We'll see if that's cause for free drinks in Iceland.

I had a rough time getting up. We had a faux 4th of July picnic last night. Discussions of Judaism and sexual adventures ensued. More on this later. Let's just say that somethign about Reykjavík seems to lend itself nicely to the intelligencia's musings of trivia over beer.

Here's me this morning. Shut up. Stop laughing.



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For Sony!

I took this picture in Keflavík. +20 internets to the person who can tell me why it made me miss my Sony chums! (lolz) ☺





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Declare Independence!

Declare Independence! Don't let them do that to you! ... Raise your flag! (Higher, higher!)

- Björk

Jesus, how trite to quote Björk in Iceland, but it is, after all, American Independence Day, and I'll be doing my best to not come across like a typical rudely patriotic American and just lay low.

I will admit, though, to being quite sad at not having been able to attend the Rash family's annual BBQ in Modesto. I look forward to that ever year and have since I was about 6 years old!

☺☻♦☺☻

It seems I have a curse. I break everything and disaster follows me.

Yesterday I saw a cat run over by a car. In public. Girls gasped and cried. The cat's front legs were crushed and, with an unmistakable pet collar jingling with it's convulsions, the maimed cat fought desperately to stand up, writhing, frothing...

My action was to just turn around. I felt mute. I didn't know how to dial emergency here in Iceland. I didn't even know if anyone would come to help the cat -- who seemed clearly doomed though alive through the pain.

I returned home and fried my Korg beatbox; I had forgotten to check that Icelandic wall current was much stronger.


Fuck the beatbox. I can't stop thinking about the cat.

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On to Reykjavík! YOSH! ... er... how do you say "yoshi" in icelandic?

Frankly, enough has happened in Reykjavík now that I may lack the fortitude to describe it. I will do a brief survey of matters, thematically orchestrated, of course.

Bustle

Arriving in Reykjavík actually meant bussing back to the airport and then taking another bus ($15!) into the capital, where I transferred again and was finally dropped off right at the campground. Wonderfully, it turned out to be the same place I'd stayed last time -- but in the winter, of course, no one was camping!


It's definitely nicest hostel I've ever been to; and, despite staying in a tent, I was free to use the kitchen, internet, and so on. Instead, I jumped over to a local pylsa (AWESOME Icelandic hotdogs) stand and bummed around in another swimming pool.

My travel to meet Guðrun, the contact from the University, was less fun. I was already doubling over from worry-pukiness about my money and my language ability; I missed the bus stop and had to walk quite a long way to the bus terminal where I was to meet her. But, shit, at least the scenery was great.

The above pictures are arranged so you get an idea of the various oblique travels I've already been through.

Bar Life

Reykjavík partying is famously... enthusiastic. While having a smoke at my old favorite haunt, Prikið, I wound up in a very odd situation that involved: a drunk and seemingly half-crazy Icelandic girl (who was, confusingly, also way pretty) hitting on me very directly, a somewhat jealous guy whom was maybe not from Iceland (though he was fluent) continually criticizing my hair (bad move), me being accosted of Americanism by someone who claimed to be of Native American descent, stolen tuna sandwiches, middle aged ladies offended at a word that apparently means "soaking wet" (as in, you know, down there), and finally a hurried walk home to get away from it all.

I've also finally been to Sirkus, a famous bar favored by Björk and featured in her videos. It definitely felt like I wasn't cool enough to be there. I also purchased there the most expensive pack of smokes I've ever bought in my life (thank you, exchange rate).

I've yet to party with the local enthusiasm as I haven't got the local bankroll, nor have I got the guts to risk sleeping through class after an 8-hour barhop.

The Program!

The usual makeup of people, though there seem to be a few more respectable minds (graduate students and whatnot) involved. I've had a great chat with a Ph.D. student about leisure time and how it figures into construction of identity. I live with a guy from Holland, Guus, and the non-voiced sound that begins his name is really got my blushing in embarrassment as I can´t seem to pull it off. He and ostensibly all the others are polyglots par excellence. It's exciting to not be bored with the intelligence of those around me for once (chances are that does mean you, sorry!).

So far the coursework is simple but informative. I worry about people maybe just wanting to party and not wanting to learn; the only real issue I take with this is that I don't want to look like a dick when I tell people I'd prefer to stay home sometimes. If they buy the drinks -- sure, I'll party it up quotidian-stylez... but I don't see it happening.






The faculty are all very nice so far. As you can see here, the lecture halls are total philomath sex -- wired and connected and ready to colonize our minds.









I can't help but be reminded, for better or for worse, of my life-changing times in Fukuoka, Japan. I know this month will impact me greatly, though I can't imagine it having the magnitude of the six I spent in Fukuoka.

Anyway! The great hunt for booty (and not in the monetary sense) seems to have begun already. I think it's going to be a long month. And this trademark morsel of TMI would probably be a good place to close this post, but not without a brief picture dump of a few shots I won't explain but will instead leave to you to work out -- though I would like to add that the three outdoor shots below were taken around midnight.

Við sjaumst!

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I want to know how to survive in the Nightlife.

Right, so, it's not really nightlife per se at the moment, but... well...

After a nice dip in the sundlaugar, I went back to my tent for a small nap. I awoke much later than I had anticipated, prettied up (as best as I could in a tent), and set off to knock the Icelanders dead with my incomparable wit and bang-up debonair. Or: something like that.

My circumnambulation about town made it very obvious I was útlendigur. In Keflavík, it was explained to me, everyone knows everyone, and, nevermind my individualized image, I was simply not familiar to anyone -- and thus attracted a nice number of stares and wondered if any of them were actually good.

I wound up at a fantastic place called Yello. Make sure to keep checking that page (or, better, I'll alert you!) as they took several pictures of me and tend to post them up on the bar website.

I encountered a nice guy named Róbert. He told me I looked lonely; thus, him and his knockout girly companion taught me some Icelandic and bought me a drink. He introduced me, then, to a chum of his, who soon related a nearly disturbing taste for Blink 182. When I told the guy (whose Icelandic name I've now forgotten), he immediately asked if I was from San Diego. He then asked if I knew Encinitas. Encinitas?! How'd he know that? Well, through Blink 182´s bassist, of course. I told him I lived two small towns south of there... only a few minutes by car... and his eyes bugged out. The ensuing discourse over Víking beer and horrendously priced Camels taught me a lot about the youthful Icelandic mindset. His main goal of the evening? Convince these two girls at the bar to engage in a threesome. Classy.

At least I know there isn't a lot of petty thievery in Iceland; despite the obvious distaste for my foreignness, some Icelandic guys at least returned my camera (or, rather, Michelle's camera!), which has fallen from my pocket. They did, of course, have to take a picture of their own, first:

Útlendigur! Farðu!!!

Well. Needless to say I returned to my tent with a mild swagger. At the very least I had my kids to return to, who'd been guarding the tent from killer Puffins and sneaker German tourists whilst their irresponsible father went to booze with the locals.

The next day isn't quite worth writing about. I walked about town, studied some Icelandic near the oceans, and hit up some very cool art galleries as well as a fishing museum before fretting about my small (though complicated!) voyage to Reykjavík proper. Already, though, I could feel a creative haze, some sort of geyser-spewed miasma of mindfood eating (dancing?) its way through my pores. What would lay ahead in Reykjavík? Would the university tell me to piss off for my poor Icelandic? Would the campground I intended to stay at be full?

That's why I'm here. I want to be so disoriented and scared that my stomach never lays to rest. I want my feet to blister. Life in Reykjavík seems to provide just such an impetus for personal growth.
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First Update! Tent-sheltered dreams and xenophobic screams.

Ég gisti í tjaldstæða! (Someone fix that if it's wrong.)

Well, I've just finished my first proper Icelandic class; I was placed into bonehead Icelandic, which is good -- I'm not quite a bonehead but the advanced would've been much too hard. So! Here I sit gobbling some dried noodles I've brought from the States... I haven't even bothered to cook them. Namm!

I would first like to thank Eric, Michelle, and Derek for making my last days in the States memorable and less stressful than they could have been.




Michelle and Eric helped immeasurably with the moving fiasco, as you see here.





And this crazy guy here got my quite smashed before the flight. I couldn't've asked for better pre-flight company! (He also 'Mexicaned' me a glass fish from a coffeeshop, where we only went to sneak into the bathroom.)




And with that, I shall recount some prominent minutia regarding my first few days of being Nightless.

██¦█¦▄¦█¦▄¦█¦▄¦█¦██

I arrived, quiet worried about my lack of Icelandic skillz, at a very penombre-touched 12am. As the setting was certainly not somniferous, I had this fey feeling of having been up like an undead for the duration of a week or more.

I knew from here I had to contact the staff of Alex campground, and have them drive me to the place where I'd be setting up my tent for the next few nights.




With a little shy Icelandic which quickly became English, I managed to get there. I approached the campsite with... trepidation. Now, I'm worthless in the outdoors. I can't really say I'm hip enough to be a city-slicker, but I'm definitely not in my element under the stars (or the midnight sun, as it were). An hour later...

Mission Accomplished!

A brief aside: I look really fat in that last picture, jeez! I think I've actually dropped a few pounds, though, from my disasterous food budget.

*play Final Fantasy sleep jingle*

The next morning I sprung up like an erection at a Garbage concert -- only to hit my head on my tiny tent. My tent kept me warm -- too warm. (Rest assured I'm certainly not freezing here in Iceland!) Unable to sleep any longer, I got up to explore Keflavík, Iceland. I was astounded at the contrast in colors; my last trip to Iceland hid been so wintry that the hoary surroundings would have suggested a nation of sepia sex and monochrome misanthropy.

Here are some of the photos of Keflavík.





Blink 182? I thought his ridiculous, but this will figure into further anecdotes, believe me.








Finding God happens, at least, with some sort of beauty here in Iceland -- not in a converted warehouse or business suite.










This is the view going down the main road in Keflavík. (By the way -- say "KEPP-lah-veek".)











Icelanders have indigenous superstitions about elves, hidden races, and other things sure to wank a D&D nerd.... which, of coooourse, I never was... ahem! Anyway, statues like these seem to be everywhere.











The view from my tent (tent shown below).







Sure, well, did I simply make myself a flaneur about Keflavík? Nei! I managed to get myself into one of the local swimmingþhottub areas in Icelandic (more on these later), and, later on, enjoy some of the bar life in Keflavík; sure, it wasn't smart to pay for a few Icelandic beers that night, but I just had to compare the nightlife there to that of Reykjavík while I still could.

So what happened?

I'll have to write about it after my upcoming seminar.

Until then, I leave you with the sounds of Vikings and Elves and confluences of lines of sacred energy... or maybe just some post-Brennivín babble.

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