Stjarna

A star to sum up the holidays: simple, clean, warm and bright., and a good motto for 2008.

Maybe, as some think, the easy money party is over here in Iceland, like its showing signs of being in the US and UK, but somehow I don't think Icelanders would really mind. I think instead there'd be fond remembrances of these, the good old days, when nearly everyone (not, however, everyone) got a chance to stock up on goodies and toys and luxuries and experiences for a season or two before hunkering back down into survival mode. Remember, its only two decades since inflation here was so high that the krona literally devalued in your pocket, and M&Ms were illegal (red dye#12) and macaroni was the only kind of pasta you could buy.

There's no long-term sense of entitlement here: almost all our money is new money. Some people might even say that kids these days should get a little taste of what recession really means, to give them a sense of perspective and a jolt of respect for what their elders had to live through. Kids adjust fairy quickly, though, to new experiences. It's the grown-ups, the homeowners, the loan-takers, who'd really feel the pain.

Of course there would be a national case of whining and a big dose of panic while all our many loans went into default, but I have a feeling there would be an underlying sigh of relief, because, frankly, being, and staying, prosperous is hard work. Settling back into how life was twenty or thirty years ago when you were a kid, when choices were few and luxuries fewer, is almost just like going home.

Júl

Happy Holidays from Toggi, Maria, Valentína and Óðinn : )

Gingerbread

This entry into the annual Katla Baking Goods gingerbread competition at Smáralind Mall caught my eye because of its originality, and mostly because of the Not Welcome sign at the entrance to the cave. It wasn't until I got home that I realized this is a Seussian scene, and that a cute little marzipan Grinch is stationed by the entrance to the cave.



The infamous Grinch also plays a role in Smáralind's annual Christmas Pageant, and the 2000 movie with, alas, a poor flailing Jim Carrey, was shown on RUV, the national tv station, last night.

Is green the new Xmas red? If Grinch (who turned 50 this year!) and our favorite holiday movie, Elf have anything to do with it, I'd say yes.

Trees

Thanks to all the brave men and women at Reykjavik's Flugbjörgunarsveit, or Air Rescue Corps, for supplying us with a sweet little evergreen for our living room. Though recent dispatches have basically been to retrieve pieces of rooftop corrugated iron from surrounding trees during last week's heavy winds, all of Iceland's Rescue Corps deserve intense admiration for braving our wilderness in the name of saving lives from our island's very fickle appetites.

Frost

A beautiful frosty late afternoon scene from Vífilsstaðavatn just outside of central Garðabær, about a twenty minute drive from downtown Reykjavik.

This nature area has a number of outstanding walking trails, and when you're done strolling through the lava beds and heaths you can pop over to Ikea, just visible as a tiny blue and yellow glow on the central horizon in this shot, for an inexpensive meal of Swedish meatballs and potatoes.

Holiday

'Tis the season...this bell is new, I think, strung up just to the west of the official centerpoint of the city of Reykjavik (there's a plaque in the sidewalk in front of this yellow Restaurant Reykjavik that makes that claim.) I've never been to Reykjavik's very own Ice Bar, located inside this building, nor have I tried their fish buffet, but if you're into that kind of thing you can find this restaurant just across the street from the main tourist info center, the red number 4 on this map.

Palm

I got an odd email the other day, one requesting info on palm trees in Iceland. Here, I'll just go ahead and let you read it yourself:

Hi Maria,
I have been a fan of your blog since last January when I was doing some research for my trip to Iceland. Now I visit your blog and am longing to go back.
I've recently been researching the existence (or possibility) of palm trees growing in Iceland. I saw your photo of people enjoying the outside patio at Sirkus and found it odd that there is a mural on the wall of palm trees.
Do you know of any palm trees in Iceland? I'm having trouble finding some images.

Thank you,
Michelle

I was intending to give Michelle some outdated bla bla about how Iceland is the northernmost banana grower in the world (here's an interesting article comparing Iceland's banana days to Iran's running out of gas) but then I remembered that banana plants are more bushes than trees. I was also going to mention the huge plastic palm at Perlan, but then, on my way home today an amazing thing happened.

Right there, at the end of the Great Wall of China Asian restaurant on Vesturgata, stood a small but stately palm! And I can promise you it hadn't been there only twenty minutes before when I'd walked the same sidewalk in the other direction! There was Michelle's Icelandic palm tree, and all I had to do was whip out my Olympus to snap the shot she wanted. Of course this tree is also not real, but it's Michelle's image conjured up on the snowy streets of Reykjavik like magic.