Reykjavík Grapevine - 07.05.2010, Blaðsíða 10

10
The Reykjavík Grapevine
Issue 05 — 2010 The very talented Inga María is filling in for Lóa this is-
sue, as the latter is currently on tour with FM Belfast.
Egill Helgason is a man of many talents, in case you were wondering. Besides
running a political talk show on Icelandic State TV, he a also runs a literary pro-
gramme there. And he blogs a lot for web-site Eyjan.is. Kudos to you, Egill.
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EGILL HELGASON
jULIA STAPLES
ILLUSTRATIONS BY INGA MARíA bRyNjARSDÓTTIR
Analysis | Egill Helgason, Political and Social Commentator
The twofold catastrophes of financial col-
lapse and volcanic eruption:
When I was young, Iceland didn’t
make world news a lot. Sometimes you
would stumble upon funny news items
about beer being prohibited in Iceland,
about there being no dogs in Reykjavík
or about the rampant inflation in Iceland
(which often surpassed 100%). But in
general, Iceland was usually not in the
sights of the world media.
All the same this has been described
as a period when Iceland was a relatively
great power, as great as a densely popu-
lated island far in the north can get. This
was due to the enormous strategic im-
portance of Iceland in the Cold War, as a
place to monitor naval and air traffic in
the Northern hemisphere.
A byword for catastrophe
Icelanders soon learned to use this po-
sition to their advantage. The running
threat was to withdraw from NATO and
close down the large US military base
in Keflavík. This was even used to pres-
sure our Cold War allies into buying fish
that would otherwise have been unsel-
lable. After we engaged in the so-called
Cod Wars with Britain, Henry Kissinger
wrote of Iceland: "I sat there in wonder-
ment. Here was an island with a popula-
tion of 200,000 threatening to go to war
with a world power of 50 million over
codfish… I thought of a comment by
Bismarck over a century earlier, that the
weak gain strength through effrontery…"
Nowadays nobody knows what NATO
stands for, and the military base in Kefla-
vík is a ghost town.
But Iceland is in the news on a global
and most unprecedented scale. It seems
we have become extremely good at ex-
porting our disasters. Iceland has be-
come quite famous in the last two years,
but this fame is admittedly a dubious one
– in a way, the country has become a by-
word for catastrophe.
“I hate Iceland!”
Last month, images from Iceland were
televised all over the world. They seemed
to show a devastating volcanic eruption,
whole regions enveloped in volcanic ash,
people wearing masks to avoid inhaling
poisonous fumes, suffering animals. At
the same time, ash emitting from the Ey-
jafjallajökull eruption interrupted flight
traffic on an unprecedented scale; air-
ports from Britain to Turkey were forced
to close down. Millions of passengers
were stranded. A video of a young and
angry Scottish man became a hit on You-
Tube. "I hate Iceland!" was his message.
News reporters, specialists in catas-
trophes, descended on the country, with
their cameras and satellite discs. This
was the second time in little less than a
year that they had been to Iceland. The
first time was when the Icelandic finan-
cial system collapsed over the course of
a week in October of 2008. It was noted
at the time that some of these reporters
came directly from Afghanistan and
Iraq—thus Iceland became the disaster
area du jour.
Media interest in the “catastrophe” is
high; they just don’t seem to get enough
of this admittedly picturesque story. As a
result, I have talked to a lot of foreign me-
dia. For example I've been interviewed at
least seven times by the Japanese press
(big in Japan?). But the most desired
interlocutor of the foreign press—our
Prime Minister, Jóhanna Sigurðardóttir,
being media shy, and, admittedly, a bit
boring—has been president Ólafur Rag-
nar Grímsson, a consummate political
survivor who’s career reaches back into
the sixties.
“You ain’t seen nothing yet”
Just after the eruption Ólafur, a man who
relishes the limelight, gave interviews to
international media—most notably to the
BBC—where he basically said that people
outside of Iceland hadn’t seen nothing
yet in terms of the island’s potential to
erupt (thus paraphrasing one of his most
famous utterings about the Icelandic
banksters in their golden days: “You ain't
seen nothing yet”). There was another
eruption coming, and this one would be
much bigger. “Be afraid, be very afraid,”
was the gist of Grímsson's words.
This caught on with the foreign press,
in part because the name of the volcano
Grímsson was talking about is so much
easier to pronounce: Katla, instead of Ey-
jafjallajökull. Katla is admittedly an active
volcano which is due to erupt sometime
in the future, but it is difficult to say when
or what the impact will be, and the Presi-
dent certainly is no geologist, just a politi-
cian with a love for the spotlight.
In the following weeks, the tourist
industry fell into a state of total gloom.
Not only were tourists unable to come
because flight problems, bookings also
fell to an all time low. The centre of Reyk-
javík, heavily dependent on tourism with
its souvenir shops full of stuffed puffins,
suddenly looked quite empty. And this in
a year that was supposed to be the best
ever for Icelandic tourism.
For the crisis (kreppa, as we call it) has
been quite beneficial to the tourist servic-
es. Iceland, formerly the most expensive
country in Europe, has become—well,
not dirt cheap—but relatively inexpen-
sive for those who make an income in
Dollars, Pounds and Euros. One can even
witness German tourists buying more
than one beer at Icelandic restaurants.
At the same time, after the collapse of the
Króna, it has become impossibly expen-
sive for Icelanders to travel abroad. There
are still strict currency restrictions in
place.
We are not drowning in ash
What was not reported in the foreign
media was that almost no ash from the
volcano reached Reykjavík and the most
populated area of Iceland in the South-
west. The place of real impact is actually
very small, compared to the size of the
country. My son and I conducted a small
experiment one night, leaving a white
dinner plate outside in our garden on a
night Iceland’s meteorological office had
predicted ashfall in Reykjavík.
In the morning there was absolutely
no ash on the plate. However, we live in
the centre of Reykjavík, and this being a
weekend, the town was full of cigarette
butts— and ash.
A different kind of tourist has been
around since the collapse of the banks.
These are people who are owed money by
the Icelandic financial institutions. Ap-
parently the amount foreign creditors lost
on the Icelandic banking system is about
five times the nation's GDP. So there has
been a steady stream of lawyers and other
interested parties to the country, even a
conference of alleged Russian oligarchs
and kingpins in 101 Hotel in January of
2009.
But there are also lone individuals
such as the Dutchman Gerard Van Vliet,
who put the funds he intended to use for
relief work in Africa into the infamous Ic-
eSave accounts of the now defunct Lands-
banki. Gerard has come to Iceland repeat-
edly, in hope of getting his money back.
He probably won’t, but he has become a
known and well-respected figure in the
country and is even considering writing
a book about the experience.
Van Vliet will have a lot of material
to work with. On April 12th, we saw the
publication of a long awaited report on
the collapse of the banks—nine volumes
totalling at over two thousand pages—
written by a special committee, nominat-
ed by Alþingi. The report describes gross
negligence and incompetence by the po-
litical class, regulators and officials, and
probably criminal activity by the manag-
ers and owners of the banks. It seems the
Icelandic legal courts will be totally inun-
dated in the near future.
But so Iceland is again connected
with disaster. In October of 2008, our
friends in Greece contacted us, asking
“Are you OK?', offering to send us some
food. This April, after the eruption of Ey-
jafjallajökull, the Greeks—who now have
their fair share of trouble—contacted us
again, repeating their message of food
and aid. Exporting Our Disasters