Reykjavík Grapevine - 08.11.2013, Blaðsíða 27

Hafnarhús
Tryggvagata 17,
101 Rvk.
Open 10-17
Thursdays 10-20
Kjarvalsstaðir
Flókagata, 105 Rvk.
Open 10-17
Ásmundarsafn
Sigtún, 105 Rvk.
May-Sept.:
Open 10-17
Okt.-Apr.:
Open 13-17
One Ticket - Three Museums
Open Daily
Guided tour in English available every Friday at
11am. in June, July and August at Kjarvalsstaðir
www.artmuseum.is
Tel: (354) 590 1200
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tel. 578 8555www.gamlasmidjan.is Lækjargata 8
Opening hours:
mon-thu 11:30-23
fri 11:30-06
sat 12-06
& sun 12-23
Heavenly pizzas!
Home delivery
See our menu at www.gamlasmidjan.is
Reykjavík · Engjateigur 19 and Laugavegur 20b · Hafnarfjörður · Strandgata 34 · www.glo.is
This is Solla Eiriksdottir, the winner
of Best Gourmet Raw Chef and Best
Simple Raw Chef in the 2011 and
2012 “Best of Raw” Awards. Come and try out one
of her great dishes at her restaurant Gló.
Anna Andersen
27 Opinion
So, Like, There's No Sun Up
There In The Winter, Right?
Karen Pease is a computer programmer and card-carrying
nerd who moved to Iceland with nothing but the clothes on
her back, a plane ticket, a few dozen large tropical plants, a 12
meter shipping crate, a plug-in hybrid car, and a talking parrot.
It seems that nearly every conversation I have with over-
seas family and friends this time of year where Iceland is
mentioned ends up with them saying something along the
lines of, “Yeah, but it's dark all the time there now, right?”
It becomes clear that they picture it such that, for three
months of the year, Iceland is the land of the Mole People,
with its human residents stumbling around in pitch black-
ness or shining flashlights to keep the grues away.
The Reality Is Surprisingly
Complicated.
Most people from lower latitudes picture
distinct time periods, “day” and “night,”
and think of the transition time as relative-
ly insignificant. They also tend to picture
day length by season. But neither of these
concepts really apply well at a latitude of
64 degrees.
First, to go from “constantly bright”
to “lots of dark” over the course of a year,
day length has to change fast! In early
November, we lose nearly seven minutes
of direct sunlight per day. It's enough that
people with punctual schedules and a
south-facing window can readily notice
the decline every day. One starts Novem-
ber with eight hours of direct sunlight,
but by the low point in mid December, it's
down to just over four. But then by the
end of February it's over 10 hours. So sim-
ply talking about how much light there is
in the “winter” doesn't give a sense of how
much it varies, even day to day.
Then Comes The Issue Of,
“What Do You Mean By
'Dark'?”
Just because the sun is below the hori-
zon doesn't mean that it's suddenly pitch
black. Now, if you live in a place like Mi-
ami, sure, there's not even half an hour
between “it's bright enough to see what
I'm doing” and “the sun is blazing in my
eyes.” But up here near the Arctic Circle
the sun doesn't go as much overhead
as take a low broad arc. In the summer,
it arcs all the way around you, rising in
the north and setting in the north. In the
winter, it barely pops up in the south and
sets again just a bit further west in the
south. That “in-between time” gets really
stretched out.
Day and night are divided into differ-
ent categories based on how low the sun
is and how much light is out: astronomi-
cal twilight, nautical twilight, civil twilight,
and direct sunlight.
Astronomical twilight is where there
is not enough light in the sky to see much
of anything on the ground, but it lights the
sky a little bit and blots out faint stars like
having a second moon up. During the sol-
stice, Seattle and Paris get about 12 1/4
hours that are this or brighter. Reykjavík
gets just under 11 hours. That's right, the
night sky at the winter solstice is com-
pletely dark only 10% longer in Reykjavík
than in such cities!
Nautical twilight is where it's bright
enough to clearly see the horizon, but
not yet bright enough to do everyday ac-
tivities. Seattle and Paris are at least this
bright for 11 3/4 hours, while Reykjavík
has 9 hours of it. So we get over three
fourths as much “horizon glow” at the
solstice.
Civil twilight is where it's bright enough
to do everyday activities but the disk of
the sun is not yet up. Seattle and Paris
have 9 1/2 hours; Reykjavík gets 6 3/4
hours, or just over 70% as much.
Finally there's what a lot of people
only care about: direct sunlight. Paris and
Seattle get 8 1/4 while Reykjavík gets just
over 4 hours, or only half as much. But
it gets worse because while in the for-
mer cities the sun rises to an 18-degree
altitude, here even in the southern side
of mountainous Iceland it doesn't mus-
ter three degrees! The most minimal of
mountains can block most to all direct
daylight, while any low clouds can eas-
ily turn the sun into nothing more than a
fuzzy haze. Some small towns in Iceland
get no direct sunlight for months on end.
So to sum up: it's absolutely true that
we don't get much direct sunlight in the
winter, and around the solstice, there's
barely any. But we do get a surprising
amount of “dim.”