Reykjavík Grapevine - 11.01.2008, Side 9

I have never been particularly interested in math-
ematics. However, I am extremely interested in
numbers and statistics. So much so that at times
it borders on obsession. I like to keep track of all
numbers, major and minor. Despite this I haven’t
really been good at feeding the obsession. But
thanks to the digital age making things a bit easier
and my new year’s resolution of 2007 to keep a
detailed account of my life in numbers, I can now
present to you my life in 2007 in digits. Fascinating
stuff I promise you.
I’m on the internet almost 24/7. I surf relent-
lessly. Almost all my digital consumption comes
from the internet: music, movies and what not. My
internet service provider measures my download
from servers outside Iceland. Last year that to-
talled 153.29 gigabytes during an 8-month period.
That’s a whopping 19 GB average per month. Most
of the bigger stuff (movies for example) comes
from Icelandic servers so I think it’s safe to assume
we can triple that amount. That’s 57 GB a month or
57,000 megabytes. Like that guy said: Man, there is
a lot of porn out there. To accommodate this enor-
mous amount of zeros and ones I added a 500 GB
hard drive to the family server space. That didn’t
cut it. This year I’ll need to add an additional tera-
byte of storage. Somewhere, something needs to
be cut down and simplified.
When I’m not scouring the internet, I’m talk-
ing on my mobile phone. During my 8 months in
Iceland in the year 2007, I sent 1098 sms messages.
I received 1308. That is a surplus of 210 messages.
I suspect that most of the surplus is on account of
my bank reminding me of the money I owe them.
They seem really keen on sending me a message
at 5 pm each day containing the total of my debt.
Even so, this is a part of my life where, at least it
appears, I’m winning.
When it comes to banking, however, I’m
losing faster and faster each month. The debts
on my apartment total around 7 million ISK. They
are divided into two loans, one which was origi-
nally for 700,000 and another for 6.3 million. In
January 2007 the monthly payment (number 5
of 480) for the bigger loan was 28,974 ISK. At that
time it would have cost me 6,072,501 ISK to pay
up the loan. January 2008, the same monthly pay-
ment was suddenly up to 30,560 ISK and the loan
now stands at 6,373,335 ISK. That means that my
monthly payments have increased by 1,586 ISK
and the loan (despite my diligent, on time, pay-
ments) has inflated by 300,834 ISK. Obviously, this
is one game where I cannot win. This loan will
continue to expand, making money for some peo-
ple, somewhere. I can understand the laws of in-
flation and interest, but I cannot see the justice in
this monetary system. But then again, who can?
To pay for this, and all the other stuff that
comes with being a highly successful person, I
work for the Nursing Faculty of the University of
Iceland in a 50% position. For that I have been
paid (over 8 months) a massive 738,683 ISK. It is
all gone. Another score for the market economy.
After all, consumption drives this society and I
take my role in it very seriously. One part of this
consumption is drinking my coffee at Hressingar-
skálinn, where a cup of coffee Americano costs
320 ISK. My (slightly incomplete) fiscal measure-
ments show that I’ve paid for this commodity of hot
water and coffee grounds at least 92 times, again
over an 8-month period, totalling around 30,000
ISK. There were some times when somebody else
picked up the tab so let’s round off the number of
Americanos to 120. To keep my sanity I’ve decid-
ed not to calculate the amount spent on beer and
cigarettes at the various establishments around
town. After all, if I am going to keep contributing
to this market carousel, I must turn a blind eye to
at least some of my spending. Otherwise I might
be tempted to cut down and that might spell bad
things for bar owners and staff alike.
Perhaps you are wondering why my fiscal
year is 8 months and not 12 like everyone else’s.
For the first 4 months of 2007 I was travelling
around Southeast-Asia, visiting 4 countries (6 if
you count Stansted airport in the UK and Dubai
airport). During that time I travelled on 8 different
planes for a total of 25,752 km. The CO
2 emissions
from my travels are, loosely calculated, around
4466 kg of CO
2. Maybe if I cut down on the coffee
spending I’ll be able to plant some trees this year
to make up for this horrific number. Don’t bet on it
though.
At the beginning of my journey my personal
weight, sans accessories, stood at 78.3 kg. At the
end of the trip, after living on the finest Asian cui-
sine for 4 months it was 76.2 kg (measured on a
highly dodgy set of scales in a Bangkok back al-
ley). By the end of the year my likeable self had
inflated to 79.5 kg. It seems I inflate in relation to
my debts. This is despite my personal definition
of myself as a runner. You see, back in 2003 I
trained for and completed a half marathon. That’s
21.1 km. It took me 2 hours and 9 minutes of wad-
dling. Since then I regularly deceive people who
ask me about my work-out habits (which, I must
admit, happens much too often, probably due to
my inflating physique) by telling them that I’m an
avid runner – on par with the best Kenyans. In the
year 2007 I went running 7 times for a total dis-
tance of 23.23 km. This is abysmal and must be
rectified this year if I’m not going to resemble the
Michelin Man at the end of this year. On the bright
side, I managed to climb 1 mountain, that’s 1 more
than in the year 2006. It was a climb to 649 metres,
the total walking distance 7.04 km, which took 2
hours. I see a Mt. Everest ascent on the horizon.
But let’s not dwell on personal defeats. The
victories are much more fun. During the year I
managed to add to my tattoo collection 2 times,
both works inked in Bangkok, Thailand. I do-
nated blood 1 time, in a run-down blood bank
in Shianoukville, Cambodia, and managed to
survive my 4-month trip without ever putting on
a pair of socks. It’s the small numbers that give
the most satisfaction it seems. This year will bring
many more of these small victories, I predict. At
least I’ve made it my mission to document the year
2008 in numbers far more thoroughly. For instance
the running total of times I’ve shaved this year
stands at 1. Tonight I’ll add 1 more, trudging along
to a happy and prosperous, numerical year.
Text by Páll Hilmarsson
Life in Numbers
After all, consumption
drives this society and I
take my role in it very se-
riously. One part of this
consumption is drinking
my coffee at Hressingar-
skálinn, where a cup of
coffee Americano costs
320 ISK.
Páll Hilmarsson snaps a photo of Páll Hilmarsson
Photo by Páll Hilmarsson
Article | Reykjavík Grapevine | Issue 01 2008 | 09