Reykjavík Grapevine - 15.06.2018, Qupperneq 64

L IF E , T R AV EL & EN T ER TA INMEN T IN ICEL A ND
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LAST WORDS
Football
Infection
Words & illustration: Lóa Hlín Hjalmtýsdóttir
I have more than ninety-nine problems, but
the worst one is a severe case of defiance
disorder. It's a common side-effect of having
been a teenager in the nineties. This disorder
makes it extremely difficult to enjoy popular
things like sports, new flavours of soda, and
well-received movies, to name but a few.
That said, the Eurovision song contest sea-
son is easy to enjoy, because it offers a lovely
platform for sarcasm and snide remarks.
Football is not as ripe for the picking. There
is not much to say about the young, mostly
handsome men running around with their
huge thighs glistening in the sun. The foot-
ball rolls this way, the football rolls that way
and sometimes it ends up in the little tent
occupied by a mostly handsome young man
with watchful eyes and gloved hands. Some
people cheer, others boo.
I don't know why I'm explaining this to
you, but you can probably imagine how odd
it was for me when one day I found myself
standing on a hill in the middle of Reykjavík,
doing the god-awful “Viking clap,” blissfully
“húh-ing” with thousands of people as our
little football men returned home after a suc-
cessful run at one of these important tourna-
ments they go to. Even my mother was there
on the hill beside me. I had never even heard
her use the word "football" before. I felt a little
bit ashamed of myself a few days later, and
vowed to never again fall for this cult-like
plague.
Disappointingly enough, several months
later I was standing on my balcony scratch-
ing my head over an IKEA floor-puzzle when
I heard a sound in the distance. I listened
closely and realised it was coming from the
neighborhood football stadium. It was hun-
dreds of voices singing the sappy-cheesy song
they sing when the Icelandic football team
plays foreign teams. The lyrics are about
coming home, and some goddamn glacier
aflame with the colors of the sunset. I fin-
ished laying the IKEA floor with blobby tears
in my pathetic eyes. It was beautiful. I’m wor-
ried I might be in danger of infection once
again. If you see me “húh-ing,” please don’t
judge—like a virus, it’ll pass soon enough.