Reykjavík Grapevine - 06.01.2012, Blaðsíða 4

Dear Grapevine,
my name is Fabio, I'm from Italy.
A few days ago I was in Reykjavik with
Alina and Elena, two colleagues
of mine. We are librarians and we were
at the University of Reykjavik,
attending a workshop.
Before coming to Iceland I had sev-
eral prejudices about. Will I find trees?
(Not a forest but I saw several) How
many meters of snow? (none!) Have I
to buy snow clothes? (it doesn't mat-
ter) So, I filled my luggage with gloves,
wool scarf and cap. But I didn't use it.
The weather was not so bad and the
only problem was my lips broken by a
cold wind. Lip balm was the right solu-
tion.
Another question was about the
light. At the end of october, how many
hours (or minutes...?) of natural light?
Ok, it was nice. Volcanoes were quiet
and we had magnificent days of sun-
light we used to have daily trips around
Reykjavik.
The city is incredibly peaceful. in Italy,
what a mess!
People is really polite and we, tourists,
were not so many.
Elena and I stayed at the same ho-
tel, so we were togheter a lot of time. At
the end of our stay I called her my "fake
wife". We joked a lot and we had a won-
derful impression of our workshop and
stay in Reykjavik. What could we desire
more?
Well, on friday morning, the 22nd
of october, may be 9.45, as usual, we
went to the University library on foot.
It was raining slightly so we had an
umbrella. We were at the cross between
Egilsgata and Barónsstígur, near the
big church. Suddenly, while we were
talking, a young girl asked us for per-
mission and took a picture of us.
The road was almost deserted and it
was so unexpected that we didn't leave
her our email addresses.
Elena and I live in different towns so
we thought this picture would be a nice
postcard from Iceland to hang next our
desks. But how to retrieve that?
Could Grapevine help us?
Thanks anyway. Iceland is so beautiful.
My best
Fabio Zauli
Italy
A second letter:
I committed an error. That friday was
21st of October, not 22nd.
Secondly, ok, *people ARE really po-
lite*.
Dear young girl on the street who took
a photo of Fabio and Elena on that rainy
Friday morning on October 21 a little
after 9:45 as they crossed Egilsgata and
Barónsstígur, near the big church,
if you’re reading this… please get in
touch with us so that we can send that
photo to Fabio and his “fake wife” who
attended a workshop at Reykjavík Uni-
versity.
Best of luck to you, Fabio and Elena!
Dear The Reykjavik Grapevine.
At first, I am sorry for bothering you
with this sudden e-mail.
My name is Yuu Noyama, an university
student in Tokyo, Japan.
I want to explain about the circum-
stances of Japanese the mass media at
this E-mail.
There was the practice of demonstra-
tion against Fuji-TV, 21 August, Tokyo.
Today, I tell the practice of demonstra-
tions in Tokyo, Nagoya, Osaka from 16
Sep. to 18 Sep.
In Tokyo, We did the demonstration
against Fuji-TV and the major sponsor
of him, Kao.
Participants ordered quitting the spon-
sor quickly to kao,
The assertions of participants of dem-
onstrations against Fuji-TV at three cit-
ies are below.
"Apologize for doing indiscretion
behavior to victims of the 2011 Touhoku
earthquake."
"Shorten televised hours of Korean
drama shows."
"Make more Japanese musician's book-
ing to music program."
"Broadcast about this demonstrations
at TV news."
And, demonstration in Nagoya,
where's hometown of Miki Andou, Mao
Asada, there was such assertions.
"Quit malicious editing at sports news
programs and play-by-play broadcast-
ing of skating events"
"Reform an denial behavior of program
against Japanese skater, especially Mao
Asada."
But, Fuji-TV hasn't remarks the state-
ment to show the apology so far.
This company's making the drama
show forward October,
An Korean actress Kim Tae-hee, whose
behavior have many diplomatic prob-
lems, will play
the leading part at this drama show.
And there is an indefinite plan to
the third demonstration in Tokyo at Oc-
tober.
To know deeply about this question,
You should search the information pe-
riodic.
Dear Yuu Noyama,
Thank you for your sudden letter! We
strongly support your desire to have a
fair and balanced media. As journalists
for this magazine we strive to maintain
that standard of excellence. We’re not
sure that we can make it to the dem-
onstration in Tokyo, but perhaps our
Tokyo-based readers will go. And best
of luck to Mao Asada in the upcoming
blading championships!
Hello,
The difficulty to learn Icelandic lan-
guage for foreigners is as known as The
Northern Lights.
One of the cause for that is a short-
age of good quality learning materials,
like easy reading online texts of current
news, similar to www.8sidor.se in
easy Swedish.
One page of Grapevine, sacrificed
for short articles (50-100 words) writ-
ten in
easy Icelandic will be a huge help for
those trying to learn this language.
My personal experience is as follow -
with 8sidor I have learnt more Swedish
in 3 months (to be able to read regular
books) what is more than I can do with
Icelandic after 5 years of learning.
Best regards
Chris
Dear Chris,
The non-native speakers of this office
couldn’t agree with you more. Learning
Icelandic is no walk in the park. We’ll
keep this mind in for our summer is-
sues when we have more space and
tourists and stuff!
Dear Line and Queue –
It was so surprising to see you both so
frequently at Airwaves this year that
I thought I would send you a letter to
express my true feelings. Where to be-
gin…
Line, I think you are a bitch. The best
you can do is stick figures. You are end-
less. The only pleasure you brought me
was thinking about how I was continu-
ously stepping on your face night after
night. One could only hope I confused
your face with your nut bag.
And Queue, you’re just a "p" that got
bitch slapped so badly you did a 180.
Somehow you make European sayings
uncool.
Maybe next year your handlers can
keep you in places you belong, like su-
per rad bottle service clubs. You have no
place at Airwaves.
Your NYC Friend of Airwaves
Dear NYC Friend of Airwaves,
thank you for your letter. Unfortunately
Line and Queue aren’t around to answer
you in person (we haven’t seen those
fuckers since October—although we
hear they occasionally drop in at Kaffi-
barinn), so we’ll have to say something
on their behalf.
Now, we’re sorry you’re frustrated
with our good friends Line and Queue
(especially coming from a city where
folks willingly stand in line for up to six
hours just to buy a burger!), and we feel
your pain. However, Line and Queue
have been mainstays on the Airwaves
line-up for almost a decade now and it
seems they’ll continue to get booked to
play the festival for the foreseeable fu-
ture (understandably so: they are really
popular! Everytime they appear, a huge
crowd gathers!).
You’ll thus likely have to learn to live
with those guys if you want to continue
your friendship with Airwaves.
Now, a good trick to avoid them
would be to steer clear of the hyped-up
bands playing the hyped-up venues,
opting instead to attend lesser-hyped
bands playing lesser-hyped venues. A
lot of those bands are really, really good
(some of them suck, of course, but then
that’s life).
You could also try coming a month
early to Iceland and making friends
with all the doormen at the popular
clubs. Those guys are really nice, and
they’ll probably let you slip past Line
and Queue if you develop a real friend-
ship with them.
Alternatively, you could pretend
you’re some sort of music journalist or
record industry executive person (do
either of those still exist?). That has
worked for people in the past (it also
helps you score free records from un-
suspecting Icelandic bands).
In any case, we’re already looking
forward to seeing you at Airwaves 2k12!
You could even drop by our office—
there’s never a queue here.
Say your piece, voice your
opinion, send your letters to:
letters@grapevine.is
Sour
grapes
& stuff
MOST AWESOME LETTER:
MOST AWESOME LETTER
FREE ICELANDIC GOURMET FEAST
There's prize for all your MOST AWESOME LETTERS.
And it’s a scorcher! No, really! It's a goddamn scorcher
is what it is! Whoever sends us THE MOST AWESOME
LETTER this issue will receive A FRIGGIN GOURMET
FEAST FOR TWO at TApAS BARINN.
Did you hear that? Write in and complain about something
(in an admirable way), win a gourmet feast at one of Reykjavík's finest? THIS IS THE DEAL
OF THE CENTURY IS WHAT IT IS!
What's in a 'lobster feast'? Well, one has to assume that it has lobster-a-plenty. Is there
more? Probably, but still... Gourmet feast? Wow! DON’T pANIC if your letter wasn’t picked
AWESOME LETTER. There's always next month!
Now, if you're in the market for free goodies next month, write us some sort of letter. Give us
your worst: letters@grapevine.is
WELCOME CARD
See more and save more
when visiting Reykjavík.
Free admissions and discounts
off tours, shopping and services
for 24, 48 or 72 hours.
Great value for money.
The Welcome Card can
be purchased at:
The Centre, major hotels, museums,
tourist information centres and
Hlemmur and BSÍ bus stations.
WELCOME CARD2009 - 2010
48
INCLUDING CITY BUS TRANSPORT, FREE ADMISSIONS, DISCOUNTS OFF TOURS,
SHOPPING, AND SERVICES
AVAILABLE FOR 24, 48 AND 72 HOURS.
WELC
OME C
ARD
ÍS
L
E
N
S
K
A
S
IA
.I
S
H
B
S
4
85
92
0
1.
20
10
www.visitreykjavik.is
Aðalstræti 2 • 101 Reykjavík • Tel +354 590 1550 • info@visitreykjavik.is