Reykjavík Grapevine - 07.01.2011, Síða 28

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The Reykjavík Grapevine
Issue 1 — 2011 Christopher Peterka was a panellist at YAIC 2010, and he made
some damn fine points!
By Guðrún Eva Mínervudóttir
Illustration by Inga María
Brynjarsdóttir
The perfect gift was a personal one,
Aldís believed, but not too personal.
A gift that showed the giver knew
something about the receiver’s tastes
while at the same time providing an
unexpected addition; something that
would expand his world. A luxury
item, but in a price range that would
not betray any ulterior motive.
Aldís strolled up Bankastræti
and Laugavegur in the pleasant fall
weather, treading by clothing racks,
clearance sales and food stands. The
colourful crowd of people was shaded
in certain places by yellowing tree
crowns, some of which towered over
the houses.
Excuse me, she said as she bumped
into a black-haired woman who
pulled a cart of handmade candies.
She paused and watched the cart as it
delicately wobbled with the woman's
every step and she considered how she
usually wanted things that perished.
Soaps, cheeses, coffee, candles, oils
and spices. But that sort of gift was not
suitable now. In this case, she did have
an ulterior motive, something beyond
that pure warmth of friendship which
in her mind characterized the perfect
gift. Aldís wanted to give something
that would serve as a reminder of her
own existence. She wanted to occupy a
space in the recipient’s mind.
The gift was intended for a man
named Ben who worked with her
in the sorting facility. Along with
a few others, they oversaw an army
of youngsters that sorted recyclable
consumer plastics into seven different
categories based on the small
embossed markings they bore.
Ben was talkative and boisterous,
short, portly, with big hands and a
quick laugh. Aldís had been in love
with him ever since he began working
at the plant. He had a girlfriend at the
time. He had broken up with her and
started seeing another, and now he
was newly started on the third.
It was Ben’s birthday next week.
The new girlfriend would probably
give him something well thought out
and perfect. Aldís shook her head and
tried to divert her thoughts by focusing
on something neutral. The sidewalk.
But the kerbstone indirectly reminded
her of Ben. Because of a news story
that he had read out loud for her on a
coffee break, about how city officials
had been criticised for leaving stacks
of loose kerbstones beside a freshly laid
sidewalk. They were said to be inviting
danger by leaving ‘potential blunt
instruments’ lying around for anyone
to pick up and use, and what's more,
so close to the city’s watering holes,
whence intoxicated crowds f lowed after
nights of heavy drinking.
Ben thought that mentioning
this was an embarrassing affront to
humanity’s unspoken agreement to
pretend civilization was more deeply
rooted than it actually is.
Have they gone mad? he had
laughingly exclaimed. You can’t say
that sort of thing out loud! We need to
keep on pretending if we are to keep
our faith in democracy!
Aldís couldn’t speak, she was
laughing so hard. Ben’s news
commentary always made her
laugh. She even laughed now, as she
remembered it. At the same time,
she felt a familiar jab of nervous fear,
something she had inherited from her
conservative parents. The inheritance
she was continually trying to exorcise
away. She wanted to believe that all the
exotic people who surrounded her were
trustworthy, but she could never get
rid of the feeling that people in general
were merely a rabble, and even if they
temporarily toed the line, that didn’t
mean everything was safe.
Still, she could never envision
turning back the developments of the
last twenty years or so. She shuddered
at thought of how her life would be
if three million “new” Icelanders
suddenly moved away and left her in
the bland, inbred homogeneity. She
remembered it as worse than boring.
It was a watery soup of over-used genes
and paranoid politics. It was not just
dull and grey, but positively unhealthy.
Nothing came out of it other than
narrow-minded bullying disguised as
“common sense”.
Twenty years ago, her weekends
had consisted of endless drives
cruising down Laugavegur with her
girlfriends. All of them sporting fresh
driver’s licenses, all of them referred to
as “ham”, because they were pink and
they glistened. Laugavegur had long
since been turned into a pedestrian-
only street, and the ham-look had
transformed into a fringe culture
mostly connected with prostitution
and drug abuse. Reykjavík’s main
shopping street, which used to be
quiet except for special occasions, was
now teeming with life every day of the
week, and the merchandise on offer
crowded the sidewalks and f lowed into
the side streets.
The thought of which made
Aldís aware that she had been
wandering around for half an hour
without entering a single shop.
She was mesmerised by the vibrant
atmosphere. And the omnipresent
smell of food, which nowadays brought
to mind actual big cities. It made her
feel almost happy. A little girl, holding
her mother’s hand, smiled to Aldís and
Aldís smiled back.
A freestanding sign pointed to a
lamp store on the second f loor, above
a small but popular falafel hut. She
squeezed past a roomful of patrons
waiting to be served and climbed up a
narrow staircase in the back.
The shop was roomy, but the
space appeared cramped because
the selection of lamps was so
overwhelming. There were lava lamps
surrounded by crystal chandeliers.
Antiques mixed with new items.
Lampshades of silk, leather, vinyl and
glass. At the back of the store a woman
sat behind a small counter.
Can I help you? she called out in
French-accented English.
I don’t know, Aldís shouted back.
I’m just looking for the perfect gift, she
added and gave out an embarrassed
laugh.
Who for? asked the woman?
A friend, Aldís replied and
approached the counter, where the
woman sat with a cup of coffee and a
tablet computer. The woman, who had
appeared quite plain from afar, was
wearing a tight, low-cut one piece and
was heavily made up, as if she had just
stepped off some stage. She wore fake,
glittery eyelashes.
Aldís became unnerved. She
pointed to a lamp at random and asked:
How much?
7900 Euros, the woman replied.
That’s too much, Aldís responded.
The lamp was made of glass, shaped
like a mushroom, the amber hat
covered in coloured gemstones like
cake sprinkles.
The stones are semi-precious, from
China, the woman remarked as she
nodded to Aldís. Carefully, as if she
were worried about her eyelashes or
lip-gloss. A lamp makes a beautiful gift
for a friend. Symbolic.
Exactly, Aldís replied and feigned
an interest in the lamps surrounding
her as she made her way towards the
exit.
This one is only 1500, the woman
said and pointed to a lamp of white,
sandblasted glass.
Aldís thought her voice sounded
curt and angry, but maybe the woman
had only raised her voice because Aldís
was now further away.
She hurried down the stairs and
was glad to be under the open sky
again. She felt as if she had been
exposed. She saw herself all too clearly
now; a petit-bourgeois wannabe
cosmopolitan. A pathetic and scared
little person looking for the perfect
birthday present for a man who was
almost certainly at this very moment
doting on his girlfriend—without
ever considering that Aldís might
have a life outside of the workplace.
She went limp, she couldn’t move or
decide whether to soldier on and keep
searching or give up and go home.
A Thai ladyboy gently grabbed her
arm and to her abject horror offered
his services. Hi sexy mama, he quietly
said. Want a date?
By Haukur Már Helgason
Illustration by Lóa Hjálmtýsdóttir
– Clubs and bars in Iceland have
always been run by members of the
Progressive party.
– Dad!
– Listen, this is important. Your
mother thinks you're too young, but
it is important that I tell you about
these things early enough. About
management. You will not learn
this at school. The Progressive party
has always been concerned with
the preservation of our nation. Like
all regulation, this management is
achieved by controlling what is open
and what is closed. Open. Closed.
Farmers once took care of these
things. What have I told you about all
things on earth?
– All things on earth make sense.
– That's it. There is always a reason
why things are the way they are. No
one profession realises the significance
of leading a cow under a bull as
naturally as farmers. What today is
seen as chaotic outbursts of 'violence'
in the city centre has never been in the
least chaotic. That so-called 'violence'
is a vital part of a delicate set of
manoeuvres and interferences during
negotiations of possible procreation.
This history has not been written, and
possibly it will only ever be passed on
as oral heritage. So listen carefully—
one day you will want to tell your
children this story, and hopefully you
will have your own chapter to add to
it. Now, at the 20th century county
balls, informal groups of attentive,
unselfish guardians of integrity took
care that no undesired goo would be
mixed in our genetic pool. In a rare
display of national solidarity, men
from all classes, all families, with all
sorts of different background, kept
the least fortunate bulls away from
our most precious cows. This is our
most valuable natural resource, the
gene pool. When foreign elements
tried to spoil it, men would take care
of it. That goes for the lax, liberal
periods. Different circumstances call
for different measures. In the 19th
century when hundreds of people
gathered to form towns for the first
time, this was met with an absolute,
nationwide dance-verbot—which
lasted for a hundred years. When that
ban lifted, our sages banned alcohol.
You see: open and close. If you want
to keep a gate, you must first raise
a wall—this is the only secret of
effective management. A wall and a
gate. Ban beer, sell moonshine. And
now that alcohol and dancing are
allowed, smoking is banned. You see
the pattern, right? Now, I have told you
about the Situation—tell daddy what
the Situation was about.
– The Situation was when the
British and American soldiers
lured the weakest among
Icelandic women...
– Weakest how?
– Psychologically
and morally weakest,
lured them into sin, by
offering them chewing
gum, nylon stockings and
cigarettes.
– And what?
– And music.
– And?
– And... money.
– And the
fantasy of a
better life.
That's right
honey. What is that fantasy?
– Daddy, we've been through this
so often.
– That's because it is important
sweetie. What is the fantasy of a better
life?
– The illusion that the world
outside Iceland has better things to
offer than life as it is, the illusion
that happiness is somewhere else and
that it can be achieved by giving in,
through moral laxness.
– Correct. And what does that
fantasy make of women?
– The fantasy of happiness makes
all women prostitutes.
– Perfect, sweetie. An A+. So
now, then, we had the Situation. The
government, of course, demanded that
there would be no Negroes among the
military personnel. That's not racism
but what honey?
– That's not racism, but national
integrity.
– That's right.
Now, the
Progressive
party ran
all the
important
clubs in
Reykjavík
after the
war, and
got things
more
or less
under
control
again,
until
the
early ‘70s. Boy, did things get out of
hand! Not only the ideological invasion
that we have spoken of so often—but
at the same time the U.S. government
gave in to pressure from its media and
opened the gates, our gates, for their
so-called 'mixed races' policy. Which is
precisely not policy, but what? What's
the opposite of order?
—Chaos, daddy.
—Chaos. And at the same time
they re-baptized every ambition for
control and order as 'violence'. All sorts
of derogatory terms were invented
for those of us who feel responsible
for the good of others. Management
escaped into the shadows. Spacious
men's rooms became vital for the
prolongation of our national existence.
Now, darling, if this was an ideal
world, I would not be telling you this.
In an ideal world it is the privilege of
women not to have to fill their pretty
heads with everything that men do
to protect them. In an ideal world
it is woman's privilege to believe in
happiness—and man's duty to play
Santa Claus. Women do not want to
know and they should not have to
know about these things. However,
this world of ours is less than ideal,
I'm afraid. And I am less than certain
that there will always be men around
to keep you from harm's way. Daddy
only wants what is best for you, you
know that, right?
– Of course I do, daddy.
– Now, then, listen very carefully:
when an intruder attempts to seduce
an Icelandic woman, no matter how
polite and gentle, no matter how
humorous and respectful he may
seem, or even genuinely attractive,
such attempts are and always will be
attempted rape. Sexual intercourse
between an Icelandic woman and a
foreign man is rape, no matter how
consensual it appears to both. Not
merely in the sense that the man
thereby exploits the female's lack of
defence and judgement, but more
seriously, on a deeper level, it is the
rape of the nation itself. Such acts
violently rip apart the very material
we are woven of. Penetration, in
such cases, is invasion. It not only
resembles, but fundamentally is, a
terrorist act.
Just imagine, if you had black skin,
brown eyes, curly hair—if your parents
spoke some ali-baba-language, if
Iceland had fallen into the same pit as
our sorry neighbouring countries and
fed you shish kebab for breakfast—you
would not be you. You would not be my
dear little Ásdís. You would simply not
exist. Likewise, had my own mother
fallen during the Situation, I would not
exist. So much is at stake, precious.
And now, we have another Situation.
The enemy is constantly by the gates.
That is what they call globalization.
What will then be our gate policy?
– Keep them closed, daddy.
– Keep your gates closed. That's it.
The world's finest young men are all
right here, born to the world's finest
mothers, bred in the world's cleanest
country. Daddy loves his little Icelandic
angel so much. And one day you
will love your children, too. You just,
you have to take care, when the time
comes, that your children will really
be your children, and not some other
children, alien to their own mother
and her family. You understand?

The Gates
</2010 LITERATURE>
2031