6 posts tagged “akureyri”
I figure it's time for an update. So my week on the farm went by very well. I stayed with a very nice icelandic couple out in the east fjords. I helped feed the sheep, mark the new born lambs, and even helped a few enter this world. It was actually kind of enjoyable. Slow paced, simple, a tad smelly...but nice. They didn't speak any english which was actually kind of great. I came back by car with a friend of the family, Þráinn. It took us around 12 hours to drive from Egilsstaðir to Sandgerði, but it was nice to see more of the country. We stopped at quite a few places on the way home. One of the coolest stops was at Jökulsárlón, the glacier lagoon. It is literally this lagoon that is full of icebergs that break off of Vatnajökull, the largest glacier in Iceland and all of Europe. It is a really neat place.
Last week my mom came to Iceland for a quick 4 day visit. I showed her around sandgerði and keflavík. Of course we went to reykjavík and the blue lagoon, a place I would love to go to again. It's a good thing she wasn't an exchange student here this year, I don't think she would have ever been able to pronounce anything in Icelandic right (just joking mom :Þ). We drove up to akureyri for a one night stay. We even found the christmas house! It's this shop that looks like a big gingerbread house and sells christmas stuff all year round. It's fun and full of candy. We spent sunday night in reykjavík and went out to eat with some other exchangers: Ann-Sophie, Ollie, Rebecca, Bilge, and Taylor. It was nice to see them one more time before our departure camp. Then monday we shoved as much of my crap into her suitcase as possible before she flew home. It was a weird feeling saying goodbye. I don't really have an accurate way to describe it. It was confusing. I almost cried. I don't really cry much, not in these types of situations.
And so, on thursday my family and I went on a little trip. We spent a night in Þjórsádalur at my grandparents summer place. And then we went to Þykkvabær, a little town where my uncle owns a summer house that he let us borrow. We drove quite a bit and visited a couple interesting places. A ghost center among many other things. It was nice to spend some time with my host family before I leave, you know all of them without appointments and engagements getting in the way. We got home today.
I have already sent a box (weighing in at 14 kilos) home by ship. And am going home with two suitcases (both may be up to 23 kilos); for some reason icelandair flights to america allow economy class to have two bags where passengers to europe may only have one, doesn't make sense but doesn't stop me from taking advantage of it (shipping is expensive!!!).
The next days are already planned. Monday, technically today, I'll probably sleep in a bit and try to pack some things. Decide what clothes I'm throwing out or giving away and figure out what all fits in my big black suitcase. Tuesday is the 17th, or sautjándi júní, which is Iceland's Independence day. Much celebrating to be had! Wednesday is obviously more packing and possibly saying goodbye to some people. I am also hoping to possibly meet up with alessandra and manu for dinner. Thursday my host family is throwing me a goodbye dinner. We're going out to eat at a well known Indian restaurant in reykjavík. Víst ætla ég að gráta. Friday is the longest day of the year and the sun never sets. I think we'll be staying up and watching the sun not set nor rise. Saturday is the beginning of the end (one of my favorite oxymorons). All exchangers meet at the AFS forest in Heiðmörk at 10. We plant a tree, families are welcome to stay for that, but then we leave and they are forbidden to see us again (could prove difficult for me, alessandra, and manu, considering the camp is in keflavík). Sunday is the last day. Most of my friends have morning flights and have to arrive at the airport around 5 (except for Bilge, who has a flight out at midnight the day before). I don't depart until 17:00, or around there. The waiting will be frustrating.
I am, honestly, ready to go home. Ready to have my friends, non-bland food, my room, my dog, real trees, thunderstorms, my family, and everything again. But it doesn't stop me from hating having to talk about going home, or trying to deny it as much as possible, or being quite sad about it. I am going to miss this place soooo much, miss speaking the language, miss my host family, and a ton of other things. I know when I say goodbye to them on saturday morning I will cry, or try so hard not to. I won't be sleeping much friday night (longest day of the year and all) nor saturday night (what sleep? and miss all of my friends going to the airport for their early morning flights to europe? no effing way!!) and probably not much sunday night (get home 3 am iceland time, 11 eastern, for a 3 hour drive home) and monday i have to go out and buy some essentials (a phone and some new clothes to make up for the bunch that I'm not taking home). I am going to be tired, emotional, happy, sad, confused, and will probably accidentally speak icelandic to people. I look forward to it.
So today I went to Reykjavík for an art field trip. I just found out about it yesterday. I love that. We went to this gallery in Hafnarfjörður and then we went downtown for lunch. My friend Berglind and I went to Asia for the lunch buffet. It was okay, but a tad European not so much Asian. Then we had spare time to look around the shops and we bought some ice cream before heading to the Listasafn Íslands (the National Gallery of Iceland). I had already seen all of the exhibits. I went there with Ollie when he visited two weekends ago. But, it was still fun to look around again.
This weekend I'm going to Akureyri for the söngkeppni framhaldsskólanna, it's the song contest between all of the secondary schools in the country. I'm going up tomorrow by bus and am coming home Sunday. It's going to be so much fun! Akureyri is going to be full to the brim with framhaldsskóli nemendur (students) and a lot of other exchangers are going. I'm going to stay with Ollie for the weekend. The contest is Saturday and after it is a ball, which should be packed and tons of fun. I can't wait!!
I'll begin this post with my fantastic Easter break. In Iceland there is a national religion, it happens to be Lutheran, so Easter break is quite nice. I had over a week off from school and decided that it would be a good time to visit Rebecca. Every year over Easter Ísafjörður, the "capital" of the West Fjörds, about triples in size, for good reason. There is a big skiing festival there, called Skíðavikan, and of course the rock festival Aldrei Fór Ég Suður. I had a flight scheduled for thursday the 20th but due to some inclement weather I didn't make it north until friday. The first thing I noticed when stepping off of the plane was the mountains. They were everywhere. This probably shouldn't have surprised me, since Iceland is full of mountains, but it did. "My Iceland," in the south, does not have mountains. Yes, they are there, but in the distance. You never actually get up close and personal with them. It is not quite the same in the north. Up there they are scary big. After getting settled at Rebecca's house in Bolungarvík we went to the pool. It was so nice to sit in the hot pot and be surrounded by big mountains and piles of snow. After that Rebecca's dad, who works as a news man (I can't think of the exact word in English), came and picked us up. He was heading to the Skíðavikan to interview some people so we tagged along. It would have been more interesting if we could have actually gone skiing, but it was still fun. Then we had a nice dinner with some of the family and after that we went to Aldrei. Aldrei was held in this old fishing warehouse on the harbor in Ísafjörður. That night we saw Morðingjarnir (actually got one of the cds they tossed out into the crowd), Skakkamanage, Hjálmar (great reggae band), Megas, and Mugison (the whole festival came into existence because of him). It was quite awesome. Becca and I managed to be quite close to the stage the entire time. Around 1 we went home, watched some movies, and ate some delicious Swiss chocolate.
On Saturday we woke up not having any real plans for the day. We thought maybe we would go down to the beach but other than that nothing definite. Instead after breakfast Rebecca's dad and uncle decided we would go snowmobiling. It was pretty much the most amazing thing. Ever. We spent around three hours going up and down mountains and around fjörds. The West Fjörds were carved out by glaciers so the tops of the mountains are all flat. This makes it quite easy to get around by snowmobile. It's hard to tell that you're on top of a mountain because it just looks like a big icy, tundra field. I wasn't really all that scared. It was just really really fun. I have a DVD of the whole thing, thanks to Rebecca's dad, if anyone's interested. It's actually quite funny to watch. My legs were so sore after the fact though. That night we went to Aldrei again too. It was the last night and stopped at 2 in the morning. We stayed pretty much the whole time. We saw Sprengjuhöllin, Eivör (an amazing Faroese singer), Dr. Spock, and lots of other artists that I can not remember off the top of my head. The place was packed, but it was still quite awesome. We didn't make it home until around 4 and by then we were pretty beat.
On Easter Sunday we woke up quite tired and sore from the day before. The morning began with a search for our Páskaegg (Easter egg). In Iceland they don't have easter baskets, instead they have easter eggs. Basically it's this big chocolate egg filled with candy. And basically I got way too many of them. I already had brought two with me, one from the parents and one from the grandparents, and then Rebecca's parents got me one. I was very appreciative, but really it was too much chocolate. We spent the afternoon walking along the beach. It was really nice and relaxing, but a tad smelly. We had a really good dinner and then jetted off to Ísafjörður to see Menntaskólinn Ísafjörður's production of Rocky Horror. It was really hilarious and I wanted very badly to sing along but I didn't know the words in Icelandic. That night there was a ball downtown but I decided to be responsible and not go. My flight home was really early the next day and I knew I would need my energy. Instead Rebecca and I watched movies and ate more Swiss chocolate. Early Monday morning I drove to the airport with Rebecca and her dad. There were tons of people flying that morning and luckily I reserved my flight beforehand. Mamma picked me up from the airport. It was good to be home in the flat flat flat south.
That Friday my friend Ollie, from Australia, stayed the night. He was in Australia over Easter break for his sister's wedding and he needed a place to stay before getting his flight to Akureyri. Around 1 am we picked him up from the airport. He had spent around 40 hours in different airports the past two days and was understandably quite tired. We woke up Saturday morning and drove into Keflavík to catch a bus to Reykjavik. We spent most of the afternoon wandering around, shopping, and drinking coffee. We went to Hlemmur to catch a strætó to the airport where we ran into two other exchangers Mod (Thailand) and Jelena (Germany). I thought we needed the 15 bus but Ollie said we needed the 19, which was currently driving away. After a quick check at the sign he started running after the strætó and I of course followed. We made it, laughed quite a bit, and got to the airport safely. We exchanged quick goodbyes, as we would be seeing each other the next weekend, and then I left to go the bus depot. The next day I was really sick with a stomach virus that I got from Gunnar and I ended up not going to school on Monday. Ollie apparently got it as well.
Last Wednesday I went on a school trip to Geysir and Gullfoss (I'll post pictures tomorrow). It was fun but the weather was kind of icky. Then this past weekend was Menningar Helgi (AFS culture weekend). We got to do lots of cool things that I'll be updating about tomorrow. It was great to see everyone again, but it's also a little sad because the next time we're all together is the departure camp. This weekend I'm going to Akureyri for the framhaldsskóli söngkeppni (the high school song contest) that Manu is competing in. It should be a lot of fun. I'm going to try to update about the AFS weekend and my trip to Geysir and Gullfoss tomorrow.
So, before I begin this much anticipated update I'm putting up the video of Manu's performance at the song contest. He and Davið Már (the other boy singing with him) will go on to perform at the national song contest in Akureyri on the 12th of April. I'm really hoping I can go.
Most of the day I hung out with Ollie, the Australian, and Ann-Sophie, the Belgian. They live in Akureyri so I just went to school with them for a bit and chilled downtown. Mainly at this one café, the Bláa Kannan, something like the blue teapot in English. They showed me around Akureyri and we just hung out. Around 4 we went to meet the other exchangers who arrived by bus, the French-speakers, Daniel (Switzerland, his dream is to move to Texas and become a cowboy, I am not lying, he's hilarious when you get him to talk about cheese), Thomas (France, I run into him all the time in Eymundsson, this bookstore in downtown Reykjavík) and Hélene (Belgium, she had, and still has I believe, a broken arm this weekend as the result of a skiing mishap so she couldn't go in the hot pot with us). At one point Bilge (Turkey, had her birthday this past week, I love talking about Turkish food with her, I am most definitely visiting her and gorging myself on simits and apple tea) and Juho (Finland, his name is pronounced like 'You hoe!' which has led to some...funny misunderstandings). We all gathered at the Bláa Kannan, where we were joined by the other volunteers and Nick (Switzerland) and Lelenia (Italy), they both also live in Akureyri. We talked and chatted and then headed to the pool, where we chatted in the hot pot. It is most definitely an experience; going into a hot pot while it's snowing and with snow all around you. After we dried off we headed to Strikið, a restaurant, where we were joined by Rebecca (you should know what country she's from by now, her flight from Ísafjörður to Reykjavík was cancelled so she had to drive down so she could catch a flight to Akureyri, thus her late arrival). We hung there for awhile and then headed to the movies. We saw Juno, which was just as hilarious the 2nd time as the first. Then we headed to our 'houses' for the night. I was at Hafrún's (a volunteer) house with the other girls, Hélene, Bilge, and Rebecca. We were up most of the nice just talking which is always fun.
Saturday morning we enjoyed a great breakfast from Hafrún's mom (at least, I assumed it was her mom). Then we contacted Ann-Sophie and agreed to meet up downtown. So after we were all dressed and ready Hafrún dropped us off downtown. We got some tea and relaxed. Around 2 we had to go meet up with everyone else at this one museum. We went and looked around and then walked and got ice cream at the best ice cream place in Iceland. It was good, but I don't know if it's the best ice cream I've ever had. Then we headed to the summer house. It was outside of the city and had a great view. We got settled and then a group of us headed out to the hot pot. We had to wear hats so our hair wouldn't freeze. After that we waited for dinner to arrive, so we played spoons (a hilarious card game for those of you who don't know). After dinner we just hung out and talked together until around 4 or 5 in the morning. Then we decided we should probably go to bed. That was difficult. We had a Mothman scare which left most of us unsettled for a while. It was funny nonetheless, but after the fact.
Sunday we all woke up grudgingly. Bilge and Juho both had early flights so they had to be up first. The rest of us slowly enjoyed breakfast and cleaned up the house. When we were done we went to drop off Hélene, Daniel, and Thomas at the bus station. Rebecca and I had late flights that evening. Ann-Sophie, Ollie, Becca and I went back to Bláa Kannan and talked for quite a while. After that we went on search for dinner. Ollie and I got some grub at the Indian Curry Hut. The chicken vindaloo was actually quite delicious, which just reminds me of that one Ramone's song. Then we walked around while Ann-Sophie and Becca decided what they were hungry for. We decided to go to Búllan, a burger joint, so that they could get some fries. While they waited in line Ollie and I sat in the kids section and read Bushisms from a poster on the wall. While they were eating their fries a fire started in the kitchen. The fry cooks tried hard to put them out but nothing was working, after a while it looked like they were pouring water on it and my first thought was Are they pouring water on a grease fire??!! so we decided to go outside and wait for the fire to stop. After awhile the alarm went off and we sent Ollie inside to make sure everything was okay. Thumbs-up, we returned and finished the fries. Then we decided to chill at a café downtown, Café Karólína. A volunteer came and picked us up when we had to get to the airport. Our flight was scheduled for 21:10 but not long after we go there it was delayed until 22:25. We didn't want to wait that long in the airport so we decided to go back downtown. We went back to Karólína and talked some more. Around 22:00 I got a phone call that went something like this: Halló? Is this Allison? Yes. Where are you? Who are you? This is the airport. Oh, I'm at a café... What are you doing there? Everyone is on board. EVERYONE IS ON BOARD!! WE'RE COMING! Then we all ran into the car and drove like 80 km an hour to get to the airport. The guy was waiting for us outside as Rebecca and I quickly said good bye and ran to the terminal. These air control guys motioned us outside and we start running towards the plane, which turns out to be the wrong one so we start running towards the other one. Luckily we got seats together so we just walked quickly to our seats and threw ourselves in them. Have you ever had a whole plane waiting for you? It's not the best experience, but it took all of our self control to not start laughing our heads off. And that pretty much sums up the essence of the Akureyri Weekend, it shall never be forgotten.
Going back to school on Monday was tough. I kind of just wanted to be with all of the other exchange students again. Last week I was kind of in a bad mood. On Thursday I went to see the school musical with Mamma. It was called Sjénsinn, which means like No Way. It was actually really funny. It was all ABBA songs with different lyrics. Then on Saturday I went into Reykjavík. Ollie and Ann-Sophie were down for the weekend because Ollie was flying home to Australia on Tuesday for his sister's wedding. I went down with Pabbi and hung out with him for the morning. That weekend was Samfés, which is when all of the youth groups across the country get together for this big thing. On Saturday they had a song contest so I got to watch the warm-ups. I even got to see Haffi Haff (singer and just media figure in Iceland, see his entry for Eurovision here, I wanted him to win, but he didn't make it to the finals), he was there as a guest performer. Then around 1 I met up with Ann-Sophie and Ollie, who were at KFC. We walked to Kringlan, the mall, and shopped for awhile. I actually found jeans!! For just 7,000 kr.!! Anyway, we met up with Taylor and Andrea (two other exchangers from the USA and Italy) and went downtown with them. Taylor and Andrea went and got hot dogs and then we looked for the piercing place because Ollie wanted to get something pierced, I think his lip. They were all closed though, but we ran into a girl I knew from school who dropped out to move to the city. We chatted for a bit and hung out with them at Hressó. Then Ann-Sophie and I went to Café Paris for dinner and chatted. Pabbi came and picked me up.
School this week was easier and it's a short week. On Monday night I got a surprise call from my contact person. Apparently Asiarpa, an exchanger from Greenland, was flying home the next day and was staying at my contact's house. She invited me over (as well as Manu and Alessandra) to hang out. I had no idea Asiarpa was thinking about going home so it was a bit of a surprise. We spent most of the night talking and eating Belgian candy. On the drive home the Northern lights were out. It was kind of sad to say goodbye. On Tuesday I skipped (shh...don't tell anybody) two of my classes (with my host parent's permission) and went into Reykjavík for the evening. Ollie flew home in the morning and Ann-Sophie didn't fly back to Akureyri until 5:30 so I went to hang out with her. We met at Café Paris and chatted and then walked around. We saw some Japanese tourists, their tour guide was super peppy, like obnoxiously. We got really hungry for cheeseburgers so we looked for the McDonalds that was marked on Ann-Sophie's map. Unfortunately it had been torn down awhile ago so we had to come up with a new place to eat. I called Pabbi, but the place he recommended didn't have sit down service so we searched a bit and ended up going to Bátar, a place Pabbi had recommended to me a long time ago. We got cheeseburgers and fries with spice. Oh, it was good. It was the first real cheeseburger I'd had here and it was worth it. After we were done we headed up Laugavegur and browsed. We ended up going into Mál og Menning, the bookshop, and sat in their café, drinking tea. Around 4 we decided to go to Hlemmur (the strætó depot) to find out when Ann-Sophie had to catch the strætó to the airport. On the way there we walked past Páll Óskar! He's pretty much the most popular dj in Iceland. It was pretty epic. I wanted to stop and get a picture but he kind of gave me this look that said 'Don't you dare make a scene,' and he was talking to someone so I decided to just walk on. Ann-Sophie and I almost got on the wrong bus because you have to make sure they're going in the right direction. It might be the number you need but it might have already gone past your stop. We made it to the airport and waited for her plane. Ann-Sophie really doesn't like flying so she was a bit nervous. It was kind of sad leaving. I've seen her so much in the past month, but luckily there's an AFS camp on April 4th so I´ll see her soon. After her flight left I headed to the bus station, BSÍ, and waited for the bus to Keflavík.
Tomorrow is the last real day of school before Easter break, or páskafrí. We have off until the 26th. Friday we don't have classes, instead it's this day called Starfshlaup. Everyone in school is on a team, I´m on yellow, and together you participate in different tasks. It's kind of like a school wide relay race of sorts. Some of the tasks are academic like French, English, Biology, and some are not like swimming, etc. Basically which ever team competes the best wins. I'm not actually doing a task; I´m in the clapping section, but it should be fun anyway. I'm glad I have a yellow backpack.
After the Akureyri weekend, I came to the realization that...I don't want to leave these people. I mean, Rebecca and I have a Europe tour in the works for the summer of '09, but it's going to be really hard to go home. Tomorrow begins the 100-days-left marker. It leaves me speechless.
So, Monday was Bolladagur. It was quite a delicious day. Bolla are very similar to cream puffs. You put a little bit of jam and then some cream inside and cover it with chocolate icing. I ate around 6 bollur on Monday. After school we went to Pabbi's parents (Amma Dísa og Afí Ólí) house for bollurkaffi. Basically a get together where you eat bolla and drink coffee. They were yummy.
Yesterday was Öskudagur where Icelanders celebrate in a way very similar to Halloween. Júlíus went to school dressed as an Ork of sorts. Kids go around from business to business and house to house singing for candy. I didn't go out and sing or dress up but I did get Subway for lunch, where I saw a kid dressed up like Hitler and Napoleon's secret love child. He had the mustache and a three corner hat, or perhaps he was trying to look like a prudish pirate? I always thought Hitler's mustache looked a little prudish, don't you?
Okay, enough philosophical waxing on the mustaches of crazed totalitarian dictators. I am now, for sure, going to Aldrei Fór Ég Suður (I Never Went South), the Icelandic music festival that takes place in the northern town of Ísafjörður. I'll be staying with my good friend, Rebecca (the exchanger from Switzerland) who lives in the neighboring town, Bolungarvík. The festival takes place over Easter and I'm excited! Although, I might be making another trip up north before Easter. There's an exchange student weekend in the "capital of the north," Akureyri. They're allowing other exchangers from around the country to come as well and I'd really like to go. I have friends that live there that I haven't seen since October. And exchange student gatherings are just plain fun. Crazy as well. So, it's possible that on the 29th of February I'll be hopping on a plane and jet-setting across the country. You know this blog makes my life seem much more exciting than the reality, but perhaps that's a good thing.
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