Fashionable folk?

Talented, fashionable folk! A happy night with friends, January 2006.

I like listening to the radio. I remember well Karen sitting in the wooden summer-house style room in the west of Reykjavík that we lived in consecutively listening to late night shows from an opinionated old guy. I should find out what that is - maybe I´d get some more of it now. My Icelandic is still less well tuned .. I listen to RUV 2 and Bylgjan, equivalent to BBC Radio 2 and Forth FM, and try to understand repetitive song lyrics and adverts for special deals at Bónus. Don´t eat the special offer meat.. just a warning.

I heard a few days ago on a very straight-laced radio program, Woman´s Hour, to which I am a devout expat listener, that folk music is fashionable. I tune into it to get a taste of home and intelligent (sometimes) conversation or when I need to just get a background noise that is relaxing. . translating ads occupies too much of my brain for a sideline activity. It is truly the best place to hear about women´s rights, medical scare stories, old fashioned recipes and excuses for sticky puddings and very proper, slightly blushingly announced, discussions of rather intimate matters!

So, folk music is fashionable.. never thought I´d be a particular fan of fashionable music. Actually, I thought folk was somehow independent of fashion, routed in the past, yet still alive, never really likely to go in phases of popularity like mini skirts or shoulder pads. But now folk is blending so much more with other types of music .. my all time favourite ceilidh band, The Cutting Edge, for example, skillfully plays traditional Scottish folk with a salsa beat.

The Cutting Edge, men in kilts for felis!

Six months ago or so a friendly Icelandic girl asked me which Icelandic music I liked. I was embarrassed to admit I only knew three bands.. not counting Björk who is really less well liked here that in the UK.. 1. Bubbi Morthens, one the nation´s most famous singers, more favoured than Björk at home. His songs are the ones that many people listen to but don´t admit to and they are always the ones people sing when drunk at the end of parties.. 2. Hjálmar, a Swedish-Icelandic reggae band (not joking) and 3. Jeff Who? who are poppy-indie stuff with english lyrics and I mainly remember because I once lived round the corner from the guitarist who stopped me in the street to promote a gig.

Since then I´ve explored a bit more and living with a fiddle player introduces you to more music, though definitely with a folky slant and an awful lot originating in Ireland, Scotland and Nova Scotia rather than in Iceland. The bothy ballads (e.g. The Barnyards o Delgaty) I grew up with, which are proudly attached to a small agricultural heartland in the north of Scotland, are played here with Icelandic lyrics. Iceland in many ways reminds me of Buchan in its fishing and farming heritage and perhaps the songs fit in as well in both homes. I wonder whether they came from north east Scotland or if the Norse left them there on their route north and westwards.

These day in Iceland folk is very alive and blends seamlessly with other influences. There are so many unsigned bands here playing in bars and clubs and living rooms around the town it amazes me. And so many are so good. So, for those of you interested in the Icelandic music scene, have a look at these folk (now try not to read anything into the names, be thankful there's nothing dangerous in there like trolls, Christmas lads or hidden people):

Ljótu hálfvitarnir, the ugly halfwits.. a play on words, I´m told.
Hlynur Ben
Papar, the Irish monks, the Icelandic-Irish folk band
Búálfar, the leprechauns, of course!
My Summer as a Salvation Soldier
Hraun, lava

Small world

"It´s a Small World", photo by "BubbaTrout"

It is a small world. Óli met someone recently whom I already know, through a completely different connection. Turns out he has shared links with my sister and we probably know many of the same people in a different city, in a different country. I like this. Everyone is somehow linked to home perhaps.. perhaps everywhere is home. This is probably not news to any Icelanders who can trace their routes back to the settlers, to each other, to kings and princesses in Scandinavia and Ireland. It is special to feel a touch of it as a foreigner. Scattered friends and friends still to be met .. we´re not so far apart.

A nice cup of tea

Fljótshlið from the air, Eyjafjallajökull and Mýrdalsjökull in the background.
Picture taken by Jónas Gunnlaugsson

Coffee is a big deal in Iceland. One of the oldest coffee shops in town is still open, Kaffi Mokka, and it is by far the most relaxing and best place to spend a Sunday afternoon eating Belgian waffles, drinking hot chocolate or coffee and talking to people as they pass. It is a nice social place and it has regulars like Old Mens´pubs at home do.

I only started drinking coffee because of my links with Iceland. A overly kind and welcoming farmer in Fljótshlíð invited my field assistant and I in for dinner (delicious poached haddock with boiled potatoes.. shame she was allergic to fish) followed by coffee (shame I didn´t drink coffee). We both politely ate the meal and sipped the coffee and were shocked, slightly awkward and rather bowled-over by the situation. In fact, we were a little scared by being two young women stuck in a middle aged man´s house being offered dinner and free accommodation. We dashed off so quickly afterwards without trying to seem impolite that we abandoned our spade against the garden fence and never found the guts to go back and get it.

I´ve since learnt that this offer of dinner and coffee was a traditional country welcome and that this man had no history of strangeness or of abducting young women. He has since though married a nice foreign girl somewhat younger than him. She perhaps saw his kindness and friendliness in a different light and certainly she has a good traditional cook to live with.

So, out of politeness I began drinking coffee. I found myself many times sitting in queues in offices and stopping off in gas stations and reaching out for a shot of free, strong and bitter coffee. I wouldn´t say I was addicted but I have at least developed a taste it. Before that I was a tea addict, still am... a nice cup of tea and a sit down. Mmmm.

The British tea council announced last autumn that this is no problem (they are of course perhaps not so objective) and that drinking four cups of black tea is proven to significantly reduce stress levels. Scientists at UCL published results in the journal Psychopharmacology that showed that 50 minutes after an allocated stressful task, cortisol levels had dropped by an average of 47 per cent in the tea drinking group compared with 27 per cent in the placebo tea group. Can we assume these scientists were non tea addicts and therefore unbiased, I mean, isn´t is quite well known how lobby groups can try to influence scientific studies. Anyway, I like the results.. tea is good for me.

Being a tea addict in Iceland is a problem. Melrose´s Tea is the main brand here with its distinctive red packaging and distinctively bad, rather fishy taste. Tetley is gradually infiltrating. Twinings Earl Grey is the answer. I am forever buying Hagkaup out of its Earl Grey supply and am wondering if it is time to make a deal with the importer. Last summer I ordered 20 or so packets of tea from an online supermarket and had it delivered to my parents before they made their annual Landrover and ferry pilgrimage to Iceland. The supermarket didn´t have enough. A day beginning without tea is a tough day.

When my grandfather (Papa) died I inherited his little metal tea pot and it is one of my most treasured items. It came to Iceland with me and has since travelled with us to summer houses around the south and west of the country and even came on the mystery adventure to Viðfjörður and to the rather luxurious mountain hut at Básar in Þórsmörk. I give Papa a happy thought every morning.

Papa´s teapot on holiday at Seljalandsfoss, April 2006

Next time any of you drop by lets go for a tea and waffles at Kaffi Mokka... or we can stop your coffee shakes and try some heavy duty Icelandic coffee. Today though I am sat at home where I can always have a cup of tea to hand and the biscuit box next to me while writing .. for once both papers and blog.

Reykjavík weather

Today in Reykjavík. Blue skies and sunshine. Veðurstofa Íslands, the Meteorological office have a webcam at their office on Bústaðarvegur and update the picture every 5 minutes. Check before packing your bags, but remember weather can change every few minutes so you might miss the snow storm between two images. Webcams for road conditions are available from Vegagerðin, the Roads Administration.

Apples, oaks and (mis)translations

Ever tried translating sayings into another language? Imagine from the point of view of a non-native English speaker (sorry all non-native English speakers but this is to make a point): Picture the scene and translating this:

Poor, withered old codger, he popped his clogs and they all thought it was just old age. His old lady though knew that the others were barking up the wrong tree. You see, his niece had this butter wouldn´t melt in her mouth look. She was sweet, pretty with big blue eyes and an innocent air but somehow the old lady just never took to her... just said "I´m not going to bother beating around the bush at my age, she´s not my cup of tea and thats that". Maybe when you are someone´s niece you have some sway with the will-writing plans and this idea just wouldn´t budge from the widow´s head. But would anyone believe her, an old lady, slightly not there in the head, long since lost her glow? She didn´t think so."Lost the last of her marbles with grief and years of bottled up jealousy" they´d say. That girl was going to run off with all the gold and get off scot free.

And, haven´t you always wondered, what was the "best thing before sliced bread?"

In Iceland you can say "Ég borga bara með reiðufé" mistranslating to "I will only pay with an angry sheep", "Hver á þessa bók?" being "Hot spring river this book" or "Hann stóð á öndinni", "He stood on the duck". In Iceland also no apple falls far from the oak tree! Apparently. But then apples are giant heavy American ones with little taste and oak trees are few and far between.

Here is the ever-present issue about how much one understands as a foreigner in a country. I always wondered if many foreign students I met were desperately shy or had little sense of humour but I realise being in Iceland and often being lost in conversations that it is really hard work listening to a foreign language you are not fluent in. Add sleepiness or background music and it is virtually impossible. So.. one can easily become quiet and drift off in conversations to a dreamy world of ones own and rarely will you laugh at jokes or crack your own. It takes a determined and outgoing person to avoid this trap. Things get better though and after a phase of being silent as your learn some words yourself, feeling lacking in a sense of humour and being really frustrated, once in a while you'll laugh out loud at something or answer wittily to some over-blunt Icelandic comment and my, it is nice to feel more part of things. It is like being released from some sort of cage.

"Epli og eikur" (apples and oaks) is a new musical production from the theatre group Hugleikur, written by Þórunn Guðmundsdóttir. I went with Óli to the premier last Friday. It is a twisty-turny story of love and confusion and criminal activity.Even foreigners can follow the plot and get at least one pet worm joke. Many of the songs and jokes are constructed on plays on words so that is difficult, but very funny if you get it.. and if you don't there are always the slap-stick moments and the musical interludes that will keep you amused. If you can go, do.. Möguleikhúsið near Hlemmur for the next few weeks. This is of course a blatant plug for a play with my boyfriend and the two English gentlemen in so I´m not particularly objective. But it is fun. Truly. The music is fun and the acting is really professional. They are another bunch of super-talented musicians and artists, jacks of all the entertainment trades (almost) and masters of many. Möguleikhús is really intimate so you feel like you are in someone´s living room. It´s cosy and nice. I´ll go again.

Untamed beauty

Beautiful. This image of a woman’s eye was photographed and titled by her 15-year-old granddaughter. JENNA KARLSBERG

Icelandic women are famed for their beauty. Icelandic men, for reasons I just don´t get, are not. But then I like men with beards and character and fall head over heels for musicians. In this country you are outcast if you can´t play requests straight from memory on at least one instrument. Or thats how it seems. I am making a rushed attempt to learn some Scottish folk songs before it is time to reapply for my residence permit.

Beauty pageants are something I always associate with America and prom queens or swimsuit beauties from the 1970s. I think of myself in a swimsuit at my most sleek and still see a different creature from the high heeled, long legged beauties of pageants. There are giraffes and then there are Scottie dogs.. it takes all types. But then, I like being my shape and size and not having to discuss world peace. Sure, we´d all like it but it is most likely virtually impossible and chocolate cake is so much more attainable. Perhaps I am the shallow one.

Anyway, Ísafjörður in the northwest of Iceland has a different take on the value and definition of beauty and I was most impressed when I first heard of the idea of Untamed Beauty, bizarrely on the world service radio show the other morning. I haven´t spoken to anyone in Reykjavík yet who has heard of it , perhaps in the city they prefer the high heels and swimsuits .. and Ísafjörður is admittedly rather remote and windswept. It has its own untamed beauty I´m told and I really want to go there. But I like windswept, in landscapes and people. Maybe foreigners are more romantic about wilderness and the untamed? This is the land of the superjeep after all.

Time will tell. It is not too late to enter, just register before April 11th. You can be male or female, must be over 20 and are not encouraged to loose weight for the event. Don´t make too much effort with your hair either .. the west of Iceland is windy. They state that they want to celebrate wrinkles and timeworn hands as stories of your life and this idea really appeals to me. I hope I will be a wrinkly old grandmother with sparkling eyes and tales of wonder to tell. Perhaps I´ll wear purple. I found my second white hair last week.

Brits in Iceland and the ex-pat image

A few nights ago I met two fellow Brits. Well, both very polite English gentlemen so not so much my fellows but fellows themselves. I can´t say I felt particularly British until I came to Iceland. I realise despite being a proud Scot I have some of that British reserve and a liking of polite conventions which I´d never even recognised before. I suppose I believed that all those pleases and thankyous were just part of being a good girl and a generally acceptable human being. It turns out I was wrong. Icelanders are great thankers and will thank you many times in a conversation, always thank you for dinner and wish you your good health, say thank you for the last time you met and how good it was to see you but don´t expect to hear please and try not to be shocked by a direct expression of opinion, request for anything or abrupt comment in passing. It is just how things are done here and though perhaps takes a while to get used to .. took me a while to get used to and still I sometimes come away from an encounter with another person feeling like I´ve met the most rude and rough person yet.. in the end anyway, it turns out there are different rules about being polite even in countries just separated by a little bit of warm ocean current and cod-rich waters.

Back to the Brits. I keep coming across them all over the place. Why are we all here? What makes a British person head even farther north? And why oh why don´t we all get in touch? There are times of the year when you want to share Christmas cake, light a sparker to celebrate or otherwise Guy Fawkes´attempts to blow up Parliament, paint and roll Easter eggs and share some haggis when nobody else around quite gets it. I am attempting a blend of Scottish and Icelandic traditions in our household and though nobody quite understands the point of Christmas crackers that don´t explode even half as much as any Icelandic cracking festive traditions, they are all polite and join in, slightly bemused.

Is it the ex-pats in Spain image? Overdone tans and fish and chips? Is that the problem? There is no risk of overdone tans here, at least not naturally and the fish will be so much fresher than anything back home. Iceland is becoming a very diverse society. There are many cultural groups here .. for people from far away and from those as close as the Faroe Islands and Greenland. There is even an organisation called the Edinburgh Society which is a group of Icelanders who have all studied in Scotland. There are both Irish and Scottish themed bars. Icelanders make societies wherever they go, for example the Icelandic Society in London, to stay in touch with each other and maintain their traditions outside of the family home. Maybe the Brits are all here to get away from other Brits. But I don´t think so. I´d say we have a lot of things to share with each other and the varied nationalities here .. start a sausage making club, a morris dancing organisation, a deep-fried Mars bar trend.. I´m not saying lets all go round singing the National Anthem.. who knows the words anyway.. though perhaps Jerusalem or Flower of Scotland or Danny Boy (also a traditional Icelandic song) might be fun. Maybe we are all ashamed about being from the UK; what a shame.

Anyway, nice to meet the English gentlemen. Now, do I want to start the haggis, bread and butter pudding and gin and tonic club in Reykjavík? Maybe a Buchan-Icelandic club would be less offensive. With one Scottish member , some Icelandic ex-Aberdeen students and a few bothy ballads (also locally known as traditional Icelandic songs.. more on that later). All ideas for celebrating British and North Atlantic culture very welcome.

chocyamo

She is so wonderful.. watch their Bernard Drake video

Spring snow

We have snow in 101 Reykjavík! The view from Askja, where I work.

Colours

It´s been dark over winter but on sunny, clear days the colours are so bright and I have to go out for a walk. Amazing to believe that the daffodils and snowdrops are blooming in the UK. The ravens (krummi) are calling but no garden birds and I´ve not seen the redwings for a while. Nobody has eaten the seed balls we left out. I don´t think they know they are there... will make a big sign "Nesti" ("travelling provisions") and paint them red.

Land of Mountain and Flood

Today I went to the post office to collect a parcel waiting for me. It is always a special day if it starts with a brown paper parcel. I can usually tell from the writing who it is from .. or in the case of my sister it usually has special tape sealing it shut. There was a phase of yellow tigger tape and then also some holographic shiny tape. This parcel I'd been looking forward to arriving since I'd heard about it being en route to me. I couldn't wait until I got to work to look inside so sat inside the car ripping open the brown paper like a child at Christmas .. and just like a child I have kept the bubble wrap in my desk drawer for a moment where popping bubbles will add light to my mood. I look forward to that delight and am keeping it until later. Inside the bubble wrap was a new, shiny, beautiful hardback book "Land of Mountain and Flood: The Geology and Landforms of Scotland" Thank you Sarah at Birlinn.

Now, I have a lot to do today.. decide if I have any good results to present at a conference in Vancouver in the summer, decide what they might be, write a draft of the abstract. But first.. just a wee quick flick through my nice new shiny book. I almost never buy hardbacks; they cost so much and are so heavy but they look stunning and I always mentally give them a little stroke when I pass them in the shops, gaze longingly at their glossy covers..

I've not read it yet so this is no book review.. but it looks good, covers geology from the very beginning to some time in the future, says why it is important and interesting to everyone and presents a pretty good case (note that for future grant applications and justifications of why I get paid to do what I enjoy to the next tax payer who asks), has lots of lovely pictures of Scotland, of Edinburgh, of great landforms, of people..

I'm going to put it out of my reach for the day and take it home tonight. I have a lot to learn about geology before the last few million years. I think this might even be the book for me to start going down that road.. minimum of one picture per page, good accessible language, accurate geological facts and explanations. Very happy.. thanks thanks..

Until then.. aerial photographs of Snæfellsjökull.. and applying myself. Ah .. it is so sunny outside, ten minutes ago it was a blizzard.. I could watch the weather all day.. a good cup of tea, my new shiny book and a big window on the world...

Part of a big happy Icelandic family

A lovely picture .. thanks Sigga.

New enthusiasms - dance and blogs

I always wondered what the appeal of this blog-writing thing was but since I finally went for it and made one of my own I have been exploring other people´s thoughts, pictures and stories and playing with my own. Its´s fun. How can it be harder to write a scientific paper with a pre-determined outline with pre-determined language guidelines than it is to write an ad-hoc freestyle piece of prose about something far more personal?

I have the same question about my more long-standing obsession. Disco dances were always a minor trauma in my teenage years and clubs are still almost as horrifying despite now being aged over 30. The idea of having to make up a dance was just too much even when the music was inspring and it was hard to stop your bottom wiggling or toes tapping. Now, ceilidh dances with set steps or even ballroom dancing were more my thing. More recently there is tango which is fairly constrained and mostly it is the man that has to be inspired. But now.. belly dancing and salsa. Have a go girls (or boys) - they are both wonderful. And you can celebrate all those curves or your beautifully flat tummy. And you can improvise, feel sexy and sneak in a bit of exercise into life without really trying.

Maybe by the time I´m 70 I´ll be out there in the nightclubs taking my place on the floor having finally taken to improvisation and spend my days writing stories of all the adventures I´ve had and those I´ll still be planning.

Anyway, what better way to brighten up the long dark nights of winter. It is March now, nights are taking longer to set in but it is still cold and the wind gets into all the gaps between your buttons and into the creases in your scarf. I can see that spring is on its way but it is creeping its green fingers very slowly into the north. Perhaps scared of frostbite.

You can find out more about belly dancing in Iceland here and salsa here. Good dance pages in Scotland can be found through Edinburgh Salsa.

Our family

This is us.. Óli, me and Þór.















Óli is Icelandic, from the east of Iceland and very tall (picture taken in Scotland). He likes playing the fiddle and fireworks. I am from Scotland and normal in height where I come from or rather small here (picture taken in the east of Iceland). I like being outside and dancing. Þór is a Campbells Russian dwarf hamster born in Iceland. He is extremely small but big for a dwarf hamster. He likes eating sunflower seeds and drinking milk.

New blog page

I've been playing with webpages for a while now but never actually put them online so I'm going to start writing little posts with stories and pictures of what I get up to in Iceland and elsewhere. I'll also put old material up here so that some of last year's adventures and the start of my story can be read. We've had stunning weather this February .. sunshine and bright skies. I want to stay here for good when the weather is like this. Step outside though and your ears and nose drop off from the freezing wind.. then I start dreaming of the delights of continental destinations with wonderfully civilised food and prices and the warmth of the sun on my skin. Well anyway, this weekend I got a grant approved so I'll be here a bit longer at least and I hope it is the start of something fun and exciting. More later.