Iceland review - 2014, Page 26

24 ICELAND REVIEW
on immigrant issues.” Paul became the
first foreigner to take a seat in iceland’s
parliament when he stepped in as an
alternate MP for the left-Greens in
2007. “it was kind of a novelty for peo-
ple. What i did notice, though, is that
when the discussion involved foreign-
ers in some way that people were on
edge just because there was a foreigner
in the room ... We really need more
foreigners getting involved in politics.”
cHAnGinG AttituDEs
While there is more information and
support for immigrants in iceland
than when Barbara first moved to the
country in 1991, attitudes, she says,
haven’t necessarily changed for the
better. “When i arrived, immigration
was so new that there weren’t really
any negative feelings about it. People
just thought ‘how weird, why would
she want to live here?’ but i never
really felt like ‘there are too many
immigrants here, we need to close the
borders now’ which i sometimes feel is
the case now.”
anti-immigrant sentiments rose to
the surface ahead of the municipal
elections in late May when a candidate
for the Prime Minister’s Progressive
Party in reykjavík, Sveinbjörg Birna
Sveinbjörnsdóttir, reignited the debate
on the building of iceland’s first
mosque, stating that the allocation of
the plot of land should be canceled.
Support for the party soared resulting in it securing two
of the 15 seats on the reykjavík City Council—instead of
the zero predicted by polls prior to the statement.
Juan shares Barbara’s concerns. “People are still afraid
of changing too fast and i understand this fear of losing
roots or traditions. i also notice that there is a lack of
knowledge on multicultural issues and understanding
‘the other.’ This was visible, for example, in the mosque
issue. i see this as a huge challenge because when you
combine lack of knowledge and fear of change you get
hatred and prejudice,” he says.
There is little tolerance for genuine racists, though,
Paul argues. “icelanders don’t like being told what to say,
they don’t like being told what to do or what types of
humor are acceptable or offensive … on the other hand,
icelanders have a big allergy to open racists. icelanders
reject extremism,” he says. Paul points out that the root
of the icelandic word for stupid, heimskur, implies that
an individual rarely leaves home and sees no further than
their front yard. “i think ther’s is a lot of truth in that,”
he says.
Whether or not reykjavík is a multicultural city
depends on your definition. edda maintains that it is.
“reykjavík is a multicultural city for sure—there’s no
question about it. around 10 percent of the city’s popula-
tion is now born abroad.”
Paul is more hesitant in his response. “it’s becoming
more multicultural in the sense that you see more types
of people on the street … but i think we have a long way
to go before we have genuine multiculturalism here. But
i think that is in part an organic process that comes from
sheer numbers. i jokingly refer to the end of austurstræti
as the arab quarter because there is ali Baba, Kebabhúsið
and around the corner there is Habibi. But we have no
Chinatown, no little italy, no little Saigon, no little
Warsaw or little Bangkok.” *
“People are still afraid of changing too
fast and I understand this fear of losing
roots or traditions.”
mULtiCULtUrALiSm
- Juan Camilo Román Estrada.