Reykjavík Grapevine - 26.08.2011, Síða 6

6
The Reykjavík Grapevine
Issue 13 — 2011 Do you wish he were YOUR mayor? Why/why not? We have a
fully functional letters page for you to tell us all about it.
Reykjavík | Welcome to!
Dear reader,
Welcome to Iceland. Whether you’re
here for fun and travel or for business, I
hope you’ll enjoy a good time here and
will get to know some locals. I would
also like to make a special request that
you spend a lot of money throughout
the duration of your stay. Do not save
on dining and drinking. Allow yourself
some luxury. You deserve it, and it is
good for the economy. I ask that you do
not visit the retail outlets run by the Sal-
vation Army (Garðastræti 6, 101 Reykja-
vík) or the Red Cross (Laugavegur 12,
101 Reykjavík). Even though they are
fun shops, they are rather inexpensive.
You should rather visit more expensive
shops.
A lot of tourists that visit the country
wonder why it is called Iceland, be-
cause—despite what the name might
indicate—it isn’t at all cold here. The
average temperature in Reykjavík is
1°C. Nowhere in the world has bet-
ter summers than Iceland. It might
snow in the month of June, however.
That is called ‘a spring snowfall’. July
is the hottest month. When it comes
around you better have a t-shirt handy,
because the temperature can reach up
to 20°C. Weather.com often states a
temperature followed with a “feels like”
temperature. When the heat in Reykja-
vík reaches 20°C, they will often say it
“feels like” 15°C. That is probably due
to something known as ‘the wind chill
factor.’ No Icelander understands this.
If we had this “feels like” feature in our
weather reporting, we would say that it
“feels like” 40°C whenever the temper-
ature reached 20°C, without exception.
This demonstrates the importance of
‘mentality’ and ‘attitude.’
But how can it be that such a warm
country came to possess such a frigid
name? Yes, the explanation is simple:
MISUNDERSTANDING. Ingólfur Ar-
narson, the first man that found Reyk-
javík, wasn’t on his way here at all. He
was en route to the United States of
America, to buy grapes and other fast
food that grew wild there in those days.
He was very interested in food. And
also homicide. On his way he noticed a
cloud of smoke ascending to the heav-
ens from an unknown country. His cu-
rious nature got the best of him, and he
changed his course and set sail to Reyk-
javík (Reykjavík literally means “smoky
bay”!).
As he disembarked his ship, he saw
that the smoke was in fact steam ris-
ing from Reykjavík’s many swimming
pools. He was therefore quick in tearing
off the suit of armour that he had worn
in case he’d encounter some Native
Americans while picking grapes, and
jumping into some swim trunks. After
swimming a good 500 metres he sat
in the hot tub and relaxed. After a fun
chat with the locals he had forgotten all
about America. Who needs to travel all
the way to America to pick grapes when
there’s a shop on Laugavegur called
Vínberið (Vínberið literally means: “the
grape”)? Ingólfur decided to settle here.
He rented a small apartment along
with his wife, Hallveig Fróðadóttir, who
many claim was the daughter of Frodo
from ‘Lord Of The Rings,’ Nothing has
been proven about that, however.
One day Ingólfur and Hallveig were
taking a stroll around town. They were
walking their dog, who was called Plútó
and was a Great Dane. It was a sizzling
hot summer’s day. It was long before
the t-shirt was invented. They were
both dressed in full suits of armour,
with swords and shields and helmets
and everything. They stopped by at Ís-
búð Vesturbæjar in Hagamelur to get
some ice cream and cool down. The
story goes that Ingólfur asked the clerk
whether she knew what the country was
called.
She thought it was called Thule. In-
gólfur felt that was a stupid name.
“No country can be called Thule,”
he said.
Outside the ice cream shop, a crowd
had gathered. They had heard that
foreign visitors were in town. A lot of
those people were elves. Ingólfur then
approached the crowd, raised his ice
cream cone aloft and shouted:
“Henceforth this country will be
called Iceland, because one can get the
world’s best ice cream here!”.
Today we have a statue of Ingólfur.
The statue depicts Ingólfur dying of
heat, leaning on his dog.
Don’t be a stranger, be like Ingólfur!
Best regards,
Jón Gnarr
Mayor of Reykjavík
Mayor’s Address:
WELCOME TO REYKJAVÍK
Reykjavík | Housing
Iceland’s housing market is picking up again
A BOOM AND A BUST?
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357.4
The Reykjavík
GRapevine
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The Reykjavík Grapevine is published 18 times
a year by Fröken ltd. Monthly from November
through April, and fortnightly from May til
October. Nothing in this magazine may be
reproduced in whole or in part without the
written permission of the publishers. The
Reykjavík Grapevine is distributed around
Reykjavík, Akureyri, Egilsstaðir, Seyðisfjörður,
Borgarnes, Kef lavík, Ísafjörður and at key
locations along road #1, and all major tourist
attractions and tourist information centres in
the country.
You may not like it, but at least it's not spon-
sored (no articles in the Reykjavík Grapevine
are pay-for articles. The opinions expressed are
the writers’ own, not the advertisers’).
Iceland too had its housing boom. As
you may observe in the accompanying
graph, housing prices were fairly stable
between 1994 and 2000, they increased
gradually between 2000 and 2004 and
then BOOM, they took off between
2004 and 2008. Then came the finan-
cial collapse in 2008 and prices dipped,
with the index falling steadily from
357.4 in January 2008 to 304.9 in Janu-
ary 2011, but seemingly not much given
the magnitude of the financial collapse.
Now, contrary to The Central Bank’s
predictions that prices would continue
to fall through the year, prices have
been steadily climbing in the capital
area since January with the index peak-
ing last month at 320.8 (not seen since
March 2009). A real estate agent that
the news-site Eyjan.is interviewed in
July noted that there hasn’t been this
much movement in the market since
the crash. In other words, the housing
market seems to be recovering quickly.
Yet it seems strange that prices are
rising as a greater number of individu-
als are reportedly defaulting on their
loans and declaring bankruptcy (which
is not surprising given the rate at which
loans were given out during the boom).
That same real estate agent who spoke
to Eyjan speculates that the Icelandic
banks and the Housing Financing Fund,
which own thousands of apartments in
Reykjavík, may be steering prices by
keeping their properties off the market.
If this is the case, you have to won-
der whether the strategy is sustainable
given reports that the Housing Financ-
ing Fund claimed 1069 apartments last
year (three times as many as the previ-
ous year) and housing loan payments
90 days past due now make up ten
percent of its loaned funds. The State
Treasury has been injecting cash into
the Fund, but surely it’s not limitless.
Speculate we can, but really only time
will tell if Iceland has in fact seen the
worst of the housing bust.

Cover by:
Bobby Breiðholt
www.breidholt.com
ANNA ANDERSEN