Reykjavík Grapevine - 05.11.2010, Page 20

20
The Reykjavík Grapevine
Issue 17 — 2010
Winter | Sanity
There is probably lots of other stuff you can get up to during winter. These are
just some random suggestions. Don't get all whiny if they don't work for you!
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RESTAURANT
VIÐ SMÁBÁTAHÖFINA
OPIÐ TIL 22:00
sushismiðjan
FYRIR2 1AF MATSEÐLI
Í HÁDEGINU ALLA DAGA
Winter is upon us, huh. dark, cold,
wet, dark and dark. And dark. Un-
less you just arrived here fresh
faced, and totally oblivious to the
fact that you are now located on
the dark, cold, wet edge of the
Arctic Circle, you will know quite
well that it entails being engulfed
by dark darkness. Not to mention
coldness. And wetness. That your
beloved tan will fade from pale to
grey to translucent. That venturing
between buildings will be an ardu-
ous task that you will spend more
time dreading than executing. That
you will have a harder time wak-
ing up in the suffocating morning
blackness of winter than you had
falling asleep in the eternal summer
sunshine of a couple months back.

Don’t worry, though. Icelandic winter
with its darkness and coldness and wet-
ness can be hard to cope with for sure,
but this only means that the people that
have had to cope with it for generations
have spent a lot of time and effort learn-
ing how to cope with it, to deal with it,
and finally to love it.
There are tricks, advice and ac-
tivities just for that purpose that have
been passed down by generations. It’s
certainly no coincidence that most
Icelanders make it through the sea-
son alive, well and with most of their
sanity intact. They have come to learn
that there are in fact many great things
about winter on the edge of the Arctic
Circle.
Here are some of them.
TAKING IT EASy, HAvING IT COSy
Fact: You are going to spend a lot of
time in your apartment (or wherever
you hang your hat) over the next few
months. Learn to enjoy it. Make your
home as nice as possible. Clean your
house, stock up on candles, blankets,
food and booze. Board games and
books. Borrow some DVDs. Download
seasons of ‘The Wire’ or ‘Mad Men’ or
whatever else strikes your fancy. Burn
some incense. Bake cakes. Take it easy.
Remember that nothing really happens
in Iceland from around November eight
to March fifth (give or take – save for
the holidays, and some partying), and
be happy that you can relax without
feeling like you’re missing everything.
HAvE LOTS OF dINNER pARTIES
This is what January and February in
Reykjavík are all about. Cook strange
new dishes, have friends over, have
strangers over, play board games, drink
heavily, wind up at some bar or other at
four AM. It’s all in the game.
vISIT FRIENdS ANd FAMILy
Be sure that you are not the only one
that went ahead and transformed their
apartment into a den of cosy excellence
for the winter. Your friends and family
probably did that, too, and most of those
people are really nice! Go and visit all
of them, eat their food, drink their cof-
fee and bask in the warm glow of their
personalities.
dON’T HAvE ANy FRIENdS?
THERE’S ALWAyS THE LIBRARy!
Go to the library. You can get all sorts
of books, comics, music and stuff there.
You can hang out there all day if you
want, or you can get a library card and
check out a stash to bring home.
dON’T LIKE TO REAd? ENGAGE IN
SOME WINTER SpORTS
There is a worldwide consensus that
winter sports are way awesome. Need
convincing? Well, think about it for a
second. There’s skiing, snowboarding,
ice-skating, curling, sledding (includ-
ing bobsledding!), ice hockey, throw-
ing snowballs at people, building snow
men, that crazy sport where you cross
country ski with a rif le, AND MORE!
Now, if your bag is ice-skating or
snowman building (or anything that
doesn’t require a steep hill), you can
do that within the confines of Reykja-
vík as long as there’s snow. The down-
town pond is an excellent place to skate
when it’s frozen over, and there are
also indoor skating rinks in Laugarda-
lur (www.skautaholl.is) and Egilshöll
(www.egilsholl.is). For skiing or snow-
boarding you’ll need to go out of town.
But you don’t need to sweat it. Bláfjöll
(www.skidasvaedi.is) is a mere 25-min-
ute drive out of Reykjavík, and it’s defi-
nitely worth the ride. You can also ven-
ture further out of town, to places like
Akureyri, Ísafjörður and Eskifjörður
for longer trips.
We’re pretty sure there’s no place
in Iceland that’s been destined for bob-
sledding or skiing with a rif le, but why
not use the opportunity and create one?
If you are a tourist over for a brief
visit and you left all your winter sports
equipment back home, remember
that you can rent most of it on loca-
tion (availability permitting – do your
research!). Also that there are often
organised tours for that kind of stuff.
Ask any tourist information office, or
browse through all the wonderful ads
in this very issue.
GO SWIMMING
This is always true, as Iceland’s swim-
ming pools are always lovely, but going
swimming during winter is for some
reason especially nice. Take our word.
Go swimming. Soak in the hot tub. Feel
your troubles and the SAD melt away.
HAvE A GETAWAy, ROMANTIC
STyLE!
If you don’t have someone to engage in
a romantic getaway with, you should
focus on finding someone. That will
be a nice task for the winter, and you
can disregard everything else on this
list (however, having a cosy apartment,
being well read and all active in winter
sports certainly can’t harm your chanc-
es with potential partners). If you do,
however, you’re all set for a romantic
getaway. It is a perfect way to shake of
the winter gloomies and any Seasonal
Affective Disorder you might have ac-
quired.
And you have so many options! If
you are member of a union, you can
likely get a summer cottage with a hot
tub (perfect for gazing at the Aurora
Borealis in) and other niceties for cheap
(make sure to reserve it in time). You
can also get a room for CHEAP WIN-
TER RATES at any of the nice hotels
lining the country (Hótel Rangá in the
South of Iceland and Hótel Búðir by
Snæfellsjökull, for instance).
You could drive to any of the ex-
cellent natural hot pots in Iceland and
soak for the night while gazing up at
stars and Northern Lights (try the ex-
cellent ‘Thermal Pools In Iceland’ by
Jón G. Snæland and Þóra Sigurbjörn-
sdóttir for locations and descriptions
of pretty much all of them). You don’t
even need to spend the night.
Or you could try for a farm retreat
at one of the many farm accommoda-
tion (www.farmholidays.is) lining the
country. They are off-season as well,
and the quality might surprise you.
MAKE SURE TO CATCH SOME
dAyLIGHT
Finally, the gap for catching daylight is
getting shorter by the day (until Decem-
ber’s Winter Solstice, where it will start
getting longer by the day – but by then
the margin is so short that you won’t re-
ally notice) so make sure to get out of
your house or place of employment for
a few hours while the sun feigns shin-
ing over this desolate rock in the North
Atlantic. It will make a difference.
Also, take your vitamins and drink
your lýsi. That also makes a huge differ-
ence.
Winter Is Here – No Need For despair
Learn to love it now. You’ll need to if you want to retain
any semblance of sanity
HAUKUR S. MAGNÚSSON
páLL HILMARSSON