Reykjavík Grapevine - 01.07.2011, Blaðsíða 9

Reykjavík Grapevine - 01.07.2011, Blaðsíða 9
Kraum of the crop A shop dedicated to the best of icelandic design. OPENING HOURS Week days 9:00 - 20:00 Saturday 10:00 - 17:00 Sunday 12:00 - 17:00 Kraum is in the oldest house in Reykjavík. Aðalstræti 10, p. 517 7797, kraum.is 8 The Reykjavík Grapevine Issue 9 — 2011 Back in January I wrote an article for The Grape- vine about the bank- ruptcy of the fish factory in Flateyri, a tiny village in the West- fjords of Iceland, where I happen to own a house. At the time there was a lot of drama: Distress flares were being fired from the dock. To some, it felt like this was the first village to be sacrificed to the kreppa, an entire community on the verge of being abandoned by a cost-cutting government. Not much has changed. Needless to say the village is still there, and so are its people, for the most part anyway. Some fish processing has resumed, albeit there is a protracted and com- plicated legal battle ensuing between Lotna (a company allegedly backed by Gylfi Sigurðsson, the Bundesliga foot- baller), another fish processing com- pany from Reykjavík, and the regional development agency. It is a pretty much unwanted and uninteresting saga, which the Icelandic newspapers have for the most part given up on reporting. But the situation is no less serious. What it means is this: In a village of 170 people, eleven are currently employed in the fish factory. Last Friday, nine of the eleven were told that they would be made redundant next month. As re- cently as five years ago, 120 people had jobs in the fish factory. A large propor- tion of the inhabitants of Flateyri have been unemployed and on benefits. Ev- ery couple of weeks there is another meeting about 'the situation in Flateyri', but there is a feeling in the town that nothing is being achieved. The villagers I spoke to fear another attempt by the authorities to close down the village school, following the recent closure of the care home in the village, making yet more people redundant. My neighbour once told me that the school is the heart of the village. I never understood what he meant until I climbed to the top of the mountain above the village and looked down. In the silence of the fjords you can hear every sound, and the sound of the kids playing reverberates around the fjord, amplified by the wind and echo- ing against the mountains. The school is the heart in the sense that it pumps new life in to the village, and makes life here possible. No normal person is going to want to bring a family up in a remote, isolated settlement that in- volves a twenty kilometre drive through a mountain to the nearest school, no matter how beautiful that place is. If the school ever does get closed down, the village will become little more than a few abandoned buildings and a collection of summerhouses, like so many other abandoned places dot- ted around the Icelandic countryside, and particularly the Westfjords. Flat- eyri is not by any means unique: It's the same story across many of the tiny fishing villages of Iceland. This is what is going on in the Icelandic countryside today. The death of Flateyri would be the end of a whole village, a whole culture, a whole human community that was until recently home to over 500 people. And the crazy thing—from an out- sider’s perspective—is that there is no obvious reason why this should be the case. There's a lot of fish in the ocean. Indeed, the fjord has some of the best fishing grounds in the whole of Iceland, that is why hobbyist sea anglers travel from all over the world come to the vil- lage to fish there every summer. But the village economy has completely col- lapsed because the fisheries manage- ment laws (the dreaded 'quota system’) prevent people, for the most part, from making a living from fishing in the sea. And there are huge vested interests amongst the largely Reykjavík-based fishing industry in protecting the cur- rent legal position. It's a uniquely Ice- landic problem, and exactly the fight that is currently being played out in the intractable, untranslated, battles of the 'big' fisheries management bill current- ly being considered by the Icelandic parliament. That is what is going on be- hind the scenes here, and it's a matter that is of absolutely critical importance to the future of towns like Flateyri, and of Iceland itself. Neil Holdsworth owns an apartment in Flateyri, which he rents out when he’s not staying there himself. Read more about that here: www.westfjords.wordpress.com Iceland | Small Towns The Fate Of Small-Town Iceland: An Update From Flateyri Words Neil Holdsworth Photography Neil Holdsworth Special | Best Of Reykjavík - Best place to enjoy a Zen moment Reykjavík's Zoo: Unexpectedly Fun One of the first things you learn about things to do in Reykjavík is what isn't available. You can't buy beer in the su- permarket. You can't attend a boxing match. And the city zoo doesn't have any jungle animals. But don't let a lack of tigers and elephants dissuade you from visiting the capital's zoo (actually called Hús- dýragarðurinn, which refers to domes- ticated animals rather than wild ones). For those raised in the city, seeing pigs, cows and the Icelandic horse for the first time can be fun. My personal fa- vourite place, though, is probably the birdhouse. Chickens are hilarious. Kids will of course enjoy this place, and not just because of the animals. There are a few carnival-esque rides across this sprawling estate, none of them too scary or outlandish for even the smallest kids. You can take a little train that snakes its way through the grounds, or you can also take a little boat around a pond on the grounds, or relax with some grilled lunch at the nearby café. For the nerdy child of all ages, there's even a science tent, re- plete with physics-based games such as that one where you stand on a disk while holding a spinning bicycle wheel. The seals are probably the main ani- mal attraction at the zoo, and they seem to be flourishing so well that they're actually running out of room for them. But if the mayor gets his wish, and po- lar bears are moved in, maybe that little problem can be solved the natural way. The zoo is a great place to go alone, with friends, or with your kids. Don't let it be said it's not a “real” zoo. You get the zoo experience, and a lot more. Húsdýragarðurinn Laugardalur, 104 PAUL FONTAINE JULIA STAPLES
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