Stúdentablaðið - 01.04.2002, Síða 26

AN EXCHANGE STUDENT'S PERSPECTIVE ON ICELAND
l've been asked to contribute an exchange student's per-
spective on lceland to your student paper. I think l'm ex-
pected to lightheartedly make fun of the lcelandic
customs, mating rituals, bureaucracy and the massive
amounts of alcohol that you all seem to think that
lcelanders consume. I'll try not to disappoint.
Like all good Christian nations, your beer
commercials encompass everything that is
Icelandic. Ekkert mál fyrir Jón Páll! Whenever I
stray a few feet from my friends in any bar in
Reykjavík, the Thule guys seem to show up and
give an excessive display of Icelandic hospitality,
ask where I'm trom but don't listen to the
answer, then go on to tell me pretty much
whatever happens to spill from their booze-
numbed lips. This weekend, for instance, I
watched as my Canadian friend was taken into
the bathroom of a certain Irish pub by a heathen
stranger to drink his moonshine on Friday night.
On Saturday, at a house party, I was invitcd by a
guy to come to his house, have dinner with him
and his parents, drink his landi, sing with his
cover band, sleep with his sister, take his car, and
declare myself king of Iceland. Fuck all the for-
eigners who say that Icelanders are hard to talk
to!
I don't know ifyou've given this any thought,
but there's a few common reasons why someo-
ne from outside of Scandinavia would want to
spend half a year or more on this rock. I have
found that expatriate students tend to fit into
several categories: 1) They're geologists, and
Iceland is certainly a wonderful playground tor
people who like rocks, fire and ice. 2) They have
Icelandic heritage and want to be able to talk to
their grandparents in their mother tongue. 3)
They consider themselves to be pagan, want to
be able to read the Eddic poetry in old Iceland-
ic and to learn which types of sacrifice are prefer-
red by Thor, Oðin and the rest of the gang. 4)
They can't really deal with the rest of the world,
and feel that they're better off on a sparsely
populated island with a stoic Scandinavian
population.
I have to admit, I'm a member of the last of
these categories; I needed to escape my life for a
little while, and go somewhere where I was wit-
hout responsibility and didn't have to run
around all the time. For my purposes, Iceland
has fit the bill rather well; I came here to get
away from my everyday life, sit in my room and
read books. This was not hard to do, especially
when I arrived in January and the oppressive
dark and wind made home a very good place to
stay. Of course, I also spent a good deal of time
exploring your country in a tumult of rented
cars, windstorms, boiling water coming from the
ground, watching a German guv slide slowly,
feet first on his belly, down a glacier into a
crevasse (ekkert mál!), changing a fiat tire in the
west fjörds, getting stuck in a vchicle bigger th-
an God Himself in the highlands, and drinking
from the still waters of the drowning pools at
Þingvellir. This was my other goal in coming to
this country, to experience vast amounts of not-
hing.
Other foreigners have, unfortunately, taken
offense to certain aspects of your islaiid.. the
nighdife is silly, that people are unfriendly to
strangers, and they have barely met any Iceland-
ers in their time here. I say poo-pooh to these
t\’pes. Poo-pooh! I don't buy it; I've met plenty
of Icelandic folks without going out of my way
and had some lovelv nights on the town. You're
all bcautiful, don't let anyone tell you otherwise.
I'11 sign offwith a list of things I've learned in
my time in Iceland:
_You can never be too old and senile to teach
at Háskóli íslands!
_A horse is not a horse unlcss it wears a mul-
let (Rock'n'Roll hair!)
_ Never trust anyone who gives you a cube of
flesh on a toothpick (held far from his nose) at a
fish market and says “try this.”
Contrary to the mvths I heard back in
Canada, Icelanders do not grow bananas und-
erground, their DNA is not owned by an Amer-
ican company, and there's more to eat than just
sheep guts and burnt wine.
_ The two best pick up lines cver (I've been
told that these will never fail, though no one had
told me what they mean ]:
„Rosalega ertu með stinnar geirvortur" -
while playing with your nipple
„Viltu sitja tyrir með mér í Bleitt og Blátt?“ -
With Poiaroid camera in hand
Thank you for your hospitality, Iceland.
Whenever I smell boiled eggs, I'11 think of you.
kimm khagram
English Update
You know „lóan“?
Tlicre is a bird called „lóa“ whicli
comcs to Iceland in summer time to
hatch some eggs, raise some little birds
and then fly again to where-ever it came
front. The people of this country really
lovc this bird because it is said to mark
the end of winter. „Lóan“ is usually a
bit hasty in its prediction and often
frcezes to death because wintcr was
indeed not over when „lóan“ decided it
should be. But that doesn’t matter. The
point is that we love this bird like no
other bird because it melts something
within our frozen souls and gives birth
to hopc and we see a glintpse of mcan-
ing in this existence of ours. The British
eat „lóan“ but we love „lóan“. That is,
among other trivial matters, the reason
why we had the „cod war“ you know?
But that doesn’t matter either. The
point is that since „lóan“ is here, most
of you have done your time here on this
land of milk and honey and are most
likelv never to come back. Ifyou come
back, I strongly recommend the Blue
Lagoon.
J.axncss mania and some content
l.ike alvvays, there is some contcnt and
among some stuff that won’t be
mentioned here is an interview with an
Icelandic troubadour called Hörður
Torfa who recentlv released an album
with songs to some ofHalldór Laxncss'
poents. Now you are probably wonder-
ing who the hell this L.axness character
is and the answer to that question is
that Laxness is the dudc on the front
page of this paper. He also wrote sorne
books. We also interview a philosophy
student and a writcr ealled Guðrún Eva
Míncrvudóttir and a man called Hcð-
inn Unnsteinsson who informs us on
prejudice against the mentally ill. We
ask students about the upcoming elect-
ions and also about the infamous Lax-
ness dude that just had his 100 years
annivcrsary. We get an article about the
NATO meeting in May, we check out
the blogging business, the Student
Theatre, Cartoons, documentary films,
some short stories and all the other
usiial stuff. Last, but not lcast, your
man Kimm Khagram tells us all about
his perspcctivc on Iceland.
Have a nice Iife
This is the last edition of The Student
Paper under rny edition and I want to
thank all of the rcaders for the winter
and hope you all had a good time here
in Iceland.
bv
Spurning blaðsins:
Hvar telur þú Osama Bin Laden vera niðurkominn?
Spurt víðs vegar á háskólasvæðinu
Dóra Pálsdóttir, nemi í íslensku: Vanandi
týndur og tröllum gefinn.
Snædís Baldursdóttir, nemi í sálfræði: Ég
held aö hann sé ekki til.
Júlíana Magnúsdóttir, nemi í þjóðfræði:
Ætli hann sé ekki bara í Bandaríkjunum!
Michael Perrin, vinnur að rannsóknum:
Don't know, no idea.
Ingi Björn Guðnason, nemi í bókmennta-
fræði: Einhvers staðar í Austurlöndum.
Þorbjörg Jónsdóttir, mastersnemi I næring-
arfræði: Ekki hugmynd!
Lárus Ólafsson, nemi í lögfræði: Ég heyrði
nú í útvarpinu að hann væri I sumarbústað
einhvers staðar á (slandi, örugglega I pottinum
hjá Birni í Úthlíö.
Berglind Hilmarsdóttir, nemi í hjúkrunar-
fræöi: Ábyggilega bara einhvers staöar í fel-
um.
Sveinbjörg Halldórsdóttir, mastersnemi í
næringarfræði: Ég veit ekkert hvar hann er
niðurkominn karlinn.
Baldur Heiðar Sigurðsson. nemi I sál-
fræði: Ég held að hann sé dauður.