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 Iceland. A small country in the N-Atlantic where roughly 330000 people (No, you read that right) cling to the coast of one of the more volcanically active islands in the world. The weather system is insane. Biggest desert in Europe, as well as having the largest glacier. Home to one of the hardest and most obscure of the Germanic languages, of which its inhabitants are immensely proud and work hard to keep relevant. A country that in the early 20th century was one of the poorest of Europe and in the latter part one of the richest. A country settled by pagan outlaws, pioneers, idealists and tax-evaders 1100 years ago and governed by a unique form of democracy until its death due to political maneuvering and bloodshed, then returned to democracy thanks to the Nazis. A country which 50 years ago was one of the most backwards in matters of gender and now scores among the highest in rankings of equality and justice for women (and men). The land that gave you Björk, Sigurrós, Of Monsters and Men (I know them dudes) and many other, more obscure bands. Smallest independent currency in the world. We also eat sheeps heads, compressed puffin testicles and fermented shark, to name a few local delicacies. And we're apparently very pretty (no I won't post a picture). And the Gyrfalcon, that lil' dude in the post icon is our national symbol. Just thought that was amusing. Now, I'm not sure what people might ask here but the post that made me do this thread had a few: Bloodnose posted:You should start an Ask Me About Iceland thread. I find Iceland really interesting for a lot of reasons. I'm from Reno, Nevada. It's a small gambling town in the high desert mountains of one of America's least populous states. And yet, there are more people in the Reno-Sparks Metro Area than in Iceland. Who decided you people get to be a country? Also I studied linguistics in college and I think Icelandic is a fun language. So yeah, do that. So we're a fairly unhappy colonial possession for a couple hundred years. Nothing too much to write about, I feel. Norway joins in political union with Denmark, the two states are later broken up after some war or another that the Danes lost but they do end up with us. A bit after this, Romanticism and Nationalism start taking root in the country. We start making up a bunch of national traditions, try to find whatever traditions are left and being petitioning the king for independence. We badger him for a while and eventually he becomes sick and tired of our whining and sick burns and signs a treaty that makes us de facto our own country, in personal union with Denmark. Some people wanted true independence though, so when the Nazis invaded and took over Denmark we declared independence unilaterally. Then the British invaded. And then the Americans. Yeah. Thanks for that. Only country to attack us since the Ottoman empires Barbary Pirates. hitension posted:Deceitful Penguin This is really out of the scope of the thread, but I'm still not clear on Icelandic naming conventions after reading Wikipedia. The proper way to refer to the PM of Iceland is just "Jóhanna" with no title? Are there many unique given names in Iceland? It seems like it could get very confusing using only first names. Between the fact that you have occupation (like Teddybear mentions), middle names and increasingly the name committee is allowing more, unorthodox names, it's not been a big problem, at least thus far. The thing being of course that unless your dads also have the same name the names are different and even then most peeps have middle names. Mine is "Bearlike", btw. We also have a word for people with the same name to refer to one another, that being "Nafni", which I often use with my friends that share my name or "Ská-Nafni" or step-nafni for those that share one with the same linguistic root. I forget if I got that approved by the word committee though, it might not be kosher. Jóhanna would then just be Jóhanna. Or some derogatory nickname the right has for her. The only one that you're "supposed" to use the near-extinct honorific for is the president, you could call him "Mr President" but I know him and he's a poo poo so I call him Óli. If you wanted to be formal you'd call her Prime Minister Jóhanna or her full name. The fact she is the daughter of Sigurður doesn't really factor into her name except for if you wanna count back to see who your closest shared ancestor is but that's old fashioned as gently caress and you can just Use the app for that anyway. Teddybear posted:The way I understand it, Iceland is primarily a given-name country. The phone book is sorted by first name, with patronymic and occupation to differentiate. It would in fact be Jóhanna, or Prime Minister Jóhanna. Calling her Ms. Sigurdardóttir would be wrong-- both because the first "d" should be a character I think is called a thorn? and because that's like calling the leader of North Korea Mr. Jong-Un. And yeah, they both frequently gently caress up the spelling of names and the name order. Ya just learn to deal wit it. Thorn, Þorn, is Þ.  If you have any questions, I'll answer them to the best of my ability (and those I'm willing to pester) and encourage any Icelandic posters to jump in if they want. (I know there are a few, like Freudian Slippers around). Edit: I just noticed the gently caress-up with the thread title. Genius. Go over the post 3 times, miss the goddamn title. Bloody possessive comma!  Edit 2: The thread is a bit long now, so a few things: A lot of cool stuff can be found in the Grapevine, an English language paper we got here. They have an online edition too, where you can also search for good eatings. And we also have http://statice.is/ where you can get all sorts of statistics about Iceland. It has answers to practically every statistics related question you might have. I would write about how things have changed in the OP but it's too depressing. At least the right-wing parties are having a bad turn too. Deceitful Penguin fucked around with this message at 16:00 on May 4, 2015 |
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Apr 26, 2013 00:50
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cafel posted:So I've heard that a lot of the traditional Icelandic dishes aren't that appetizing and in many cases based around trying to make what food is around last the longest, which you kind of alluded to. As a result now that other ingredients and cooking styles are readily available traditional Icelandic cuisine is pretty much dead. Is that really the case or are the dishes actually tasty despite their slightly weird nature? It always seemed strange to me because I really like sampling food from other cultures and the histories of each dish and outside of what I've been told about Iceland I've never encountered a culture that was willing to give up its cuisine in that way. Stuff like easy and cheap or high profile foreign food will displace native cuisine, but not just the quality of the food. So while the younger generation might not care too much for compressed puffin testicles, or be able to afford the sour whale, it's not dying out by a long shot. The subject of evolving Icelandic cuisine is another topic, and one I'm frankly not that much involved with. I know its there and there's plenty of people involved with it but I prefer Asian food myself. (Indonesian is my favourite) cafel posted:On a completely different note, is Iceland very involved, or looking to be very involved in the rush to claim previously international areas that are now free of polar ice? If so is it just about the resources or is there a nationalist bent to it? dongsweep posted:Is hooking up with a relative really a concern?
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Apr 26, 2013 01:36
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hitension posted:Hey, thanks for the detailed response! hitension posted:Name committee? Does this mean in the past only certain names were allowed? What about immigrants? In general how are immigrants treated, it seems like with a population that small things could get cliquish real fast. Immigrants used to have to take up an Icelandic name (My old french instructor Cherard had to take the Icelandic version "Geirharður", for instance) but nowadays they're allowed to keep them and they can even keep using their family names. I like them being able to keep their first names but wonder if there might not be problems about the family names later, but I'm sure we'll deal with that when it becomes an issue. Foreigners is a big issue to discuss though. On the whole, you have the pre-crash and post-crash view to consider, as well as the different types of immigrants (W-European proffesionals and spouses being one, refugees (First mostly Vietnamese but later more varied, with Palestinians being prominent), Asian immigration and finally mostly recently E-European pre-boom workers. Iceland does have a problem with immigrants, but it's definitely one that's being tackled very hard. Before, the problem was mostly that people assumed things were fine, while reality was different (I can bring up a few stories of racists both making GBS threads on me as well as some foreign friends of mine) but with immigrants getting a stronger voice and becoming a larger part of society, there has been a move towards improved integration and acceptance of different cultures and poo poo. The problem of it being ignored was pre-crash, but post-crash it first got a hell of a lot worse, but that also meant people couldn't ignore it as much. Tied into this is the problem of class, most of the Asian and W-Europeans had a far easier time because they weren't in much competition with the existing structure while the E-Europeans especially had a hard time with some workers and post collapse there were a few tricky spots. Things are getting better now, but I still think there is a drat long way to go yet. (I may be painting a bit too dark a picture here, but I'd rather be too negative than too positive, yanno.  )hitension posted:Also, do you guys (normally I wouldn't feel comfortable referring to the entire population of a country as "you guys", but it seems OK in this scenario) know Michael Corgan? One of my old professors, the only American specialist on Iceland to the best of my knowledge. The answer to every bonus question was Iceland And you should use a gender-neutral one rather than just guys.  Amused to Death posted:Why is Iceland trying to ban pornography? That seems oddly out of place for it. The more recent thing was forbidding online violent pornography, which was both just a suggestion, although one that was being considered seriously, but also pretty much in line with already existing legislation. I don't see why it seems out of place to try and ban the consumption of a product that is pretty drat exploitative in the best of cases and in the worst is down-right abusive and vile. Not to say there isn't good porn between two consenting adults with no coercion, just that it's very much the exception.
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Apr 26, 2013 02:00
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Pretty cool that you guys are OK with calling your elected officials by first names even in the media.
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Kung Food posted:What holidays do you observe and how do you celebrate them? Also, did the the whole bankruptcy thing that happened a few years ago affect you or anyone you know personally? We have all the Christian holidays, like Christmas and Easter, but we put our own flair on them. There was a drat fine thread in GBS around Christmas by Rulebook Heavily about that, it was Goldmined and Here's the Link to it, there's more to it but this is honestly a pretty big question so I'm trying to cut down my work, ne? Continuing on that theme, the Grapevine is an English language publication which also has this article on Bolludaginn, Sprengidaginn and Öskudaginn. Those are Childrens festivals, purely so, unlike some of the others. Easter is mostly similar to European tradition, with the hiding of large chocolate eggs maybe being somewhat different? Called "Páskaegg", they come in sized from "Rather small" to "This will kill your child if it eats all of it". I heard some people go to church then, but I've never met any of them. What else. There's May Day, celebrated on the first of May with parades and poo poo? A bit like the national day of independence, which is the 17th of June, just not as fancy. That one is a lot of parades, balloons, candyfloss, the whole shebang. Not a lot of fireworks though. Those are saved for the last day of the year. There's Verslunarmannahelgin, which is the weekend before the Free Day of Traders, which is the first Monday of August, which is when the whole country holds music festivals and gets drunk. A special mention to the last day of the year, uhh, New years Eve, when we blow up enough fireworks to make it possible to sit outside and read for 5 minutes (I tested this out the once, for a lark.) There might be more but if I'm forgetting them they aren't too important. I can give more detail about each of them, if you want. As for the financial collapse, ooh, boy. I don't think there was anyone who was completely untouched by it. My family was lucky in that we'd just finished paying up our last loan before it all happened but a few others weren't so lucky and had a rough time before the current left-wing government managed to fix a lot of that but, ooof. Liar posted:Is your country worth taking a vacation in? If so what do you suggest people check out? Liar posted:Also, since it always comes up in the "ask me about my country threads", what do the people think of Americans? Some along the right are hard in love with the whole shebang and a lot of people (including me ma) were educated in the States, which gives a general positive view, with the Chicago school leaving a pretty infamous legacy due to the fact that a lot of the guys involved with the crisis were educated there. You did invade us in WW2 but you gave us money (Marshal aid, yo) and bubblegum so we were OK, then you refused to leave but you did pay for the airport, our idiot prime minister joined the coalition of the willing but then Dubya recalled all the soldiers so the army base was abandoned, eh. There's a lot of recent history, some bad, some good. Mostly it depends on how much they've interacted with yanks and their political leanings. Generally we're ok with you in person but don't like the country much. gggiiimmmppp posted:What are your thoughts on the huldufólk? Are they a menace, or merely a nuisance?
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Apr 26, 2013 02:36
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Bloodnose posted:Thanks for the thread! I hope I get around to visiting Iceland sometime. You guys are pretty far north, but are you north enough to have a weird day/night cycle with a midnight sun and all that? North enough for northern lights? I've never seen those. They only found him four hours before the concert was supposed to begin, completely and utterly blitzed to hell. It wouldn't be dark until a month after he left. Bloodnose posted:Can I ask about your occupation? Are you a longboat oarsman or a farmer or a vice minister of geothermal energy?  Bloodnose posted:I actually don't understand how Iceland became such a rich society. I can't think of any Icelandic products I've ever bought, or Icelandic resources used in products I buy. I've never heard of having a secret Icelandic bank account for offshoring my precious Jew gold. Are you guys one of those European societies where you work like ten hours a week and then the government forces helpless job creators to pay you US$70,000 a year?  So we have the money from fishing, but the reason we were able to fish a lot were numerous: Firstly, we were white and European so no-one wanted to oppress us too much, second, we were able to join in on the oppressing of the rest of the world, thirdly, and this is important, we kept the the Danish constitution and copied the nordic social welfare system and democracy pretty much wholesale. This didn't make us rich, but meant that we wouldn't end up poor. As for work, well. We work fairly hard and long hours, but we also get good vacations and a lot of people work more flexible hours. How we became rich, at least in the current state, has a lot do to with financial wizardry and neoliberalism, but I hate dem dudes and they also made us bankrupt now. The main modern money is in tourism, which brings in big bux, but the core remains fish. Bloodnose posted:Your English seems pretty close to native level, at least in writing. Do most Icelanders speak perfect English? Do you have English medium instruction in public schools?  . We learn it from an early age and more importantly, we don't dub our television except for only the youngest. So we watch English television, American television, Danish television, French, whatever, in the original language. This helps a lot. You can be pretty sure every person you meet in Iceland can speak English. My maternal grandad grew up in a house with no running water or electricity and still could speak a bit of English, bless him. Everyone is at least capable of some conversation and most are fluent, if somewhat accented, with a lot of people being quite good. I'm a bit better than most though. Bloodnose posted:Do you have any Jews? Wikipedia says there's like ten of us in Iceland. I wonder why a Jewish community was never successfully established there. Serious though, Iceland was just to small for there ever to be a Jewish community and the one time, during WW2 when we mighta have been able to host Jewish refugees, the dude in charge of immigration just happened to be fascist. So to our shame, we turned them away. There's actually a few amusing things about Jews and Iceland though, in that one of the big companies in Iceland, Eimskip, used to have their logo as a Swastika. It adorned their main building near the centre of town and was the source of a few amusing misunderstandings. That and the fact that due to a bit of a mix up and several sold menorahs back in the day they're now a traditional Yule ornament. So we'd have people who'd come around Yule, see a huge swastika adorning a building, a bunch of menorahs around and they'd draw their own conclusions. They've taken it down now, I think. Oh, and there was a great article in the Grapevine about Jews in Iceland, [urlhttp://www.grapevine.is/Features/ReadArticle/On-The-Frontier]Here it is.[/url] Bloodnose posted:What's the general opinion of Icelanders toward Europeanism? I was surprised to hear you're still printing your own money. I would've thought you'd jumped into the Euro a long time ago. As for the EU membership, people are divided. There is a strong push by the largest left wing party to join, with some support from factions of the Right and centre. This is being opposed by both the Right parties (sadly the largest in Iceland) and the Leftist Greens, for actually noble reasons. On the whole though, Iceland is waiting for the negotiations with the EU to conclude so we can see what conditions they'll offer us on the deal. The Euro is obviously attractive for the financial stability it would gain us, but there is some nationalistic sentiment behind the whole "Smallest independent currency in the world" thing. Our Republicans have talked about suspending negotiations and they're so stupid they might if the get elected next Saturday but most have adopted a "Wait and See" approach. I have, especially after seeing how the EU has handled their crisis. Bloodnose posted:I've got too many questions about Iceland. I'll leave it at that for now. Amused to Death posted:Wait how did this work? I thought Iceland had not standing military besides a few coast guard ships? Let me just fetch this fine clip from Americas Finest Journalistic Show to show you how wrong you are: http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/tue-january-22-2008/operation-deserter-storm-pt--1 EDit: Haha, part 2 here: http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/wed-january-23-2008/operation-deserter-storm-pt--2 Jokes aside, yea, Iceland, in declaring everlasting Neutrality, also said that it will never have a standing army. We do have a SWAT team, which has some guns, but they were the pet project of an idiot minister with a hard-on for guns and the only people are supposed to have guns in Iceland are the coast guard. Our neutrality is somewhat undermined by our NATO membership though.  A lot of people were very angry when we joined them and still are. Personally, I'm against it, as are a lot of people but most don't think about it too much. Does mean that most Icelanders only understand the army as something from movies or games though. Deceitful Penguin fucked around with this message at 04:38 on Apr 26, 2013 |
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Apr 26, 2013 03:26
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Sheep posted:How do Icelanders see Greenlanders? I believe Greenlanders tend to be more of the North American Native stock versus Icelanders being mostly Nordic immigrants. You both were (effectively still are, in the case of Greenland) part of Denmark/in union with the Danes for a long time - is there any sense of shared history with the Greenlanders, and if so, what's it like? Sheep posted:Also how are your views on the Swedes/Norwegians, and also the Sami and Finns? I guess the Finns and Sami being not-totally-Nordic culturally but still part of the Nordic Union muddies things a bit, but it's all terribly interesting. How about the Faroese? We also share a lot of history with the Faroe Islands, as another Danish colony and we kinda look at like our younger, bit backwards brother we still love. We have some very strong bonds with them and our languages are almost mutually intelligible, while Norwegian is just a bit too far away, even though they stole a bunch of Icelandic when recreating nynorsk. Sweden, eh. Ikea, good people, someone to look up to and compare yourself to. They're a successful, multicultural society and we wanna emulate that. At least those of us on the left~ The Finns, well, they're also a bit on the outside like us. The buggers don't like us calling ourselves Scandinavians ('cause o' geography) but we're still all Nordics and they make good vodka. I've only met a lot of the Finlendings, or the Swedish speaking Finns in the North, so I don't know enough about them as a whole to make any sweeping judgements. As someone who has actually traveled and stayed in all of Scandinavia thanks to our friend towns many times, my ideas of what the people are like is usually just grounded in the people I met rather than any stereotypes though, so I'm giving maybe more of a personal opinion. I might ask around tomorrow though. Sheep posted:Since you're part of the Nordic Union, have you noticed any sort of increase in emigration from Iceland to Scandinavia recently? I'm curious as it how much the financial issues might have encouraged people to head abroad, expensive though that can be, or if there might have been some kind of stronger feelings towards staying put. Hell, as a matter of fact I'll be working over the summer in Norway, as a painter. Got the job through my uncle. I'll be coming back when school starts. This is not that unusual, because Icelanders have always been travelers. Sheep posted:And last question, how does the average Icelander feel about the Danes in general, and the prior union with Denmark? You mentioned yourself that you were part of the last generation to be raised on Danish, which suggests that there may be a move towards strengthening feelings of independence, but that kind of runs counter to EU integration as I understand it. Most young people don't like the Danish because first we learn about in history class how they were total dickbags, then we have to learn Danish which is way harder than English and a lot less useless (Them and their drat dialects! I was in Jutland and I couldn't understand a drat word!) but most of our educated elite back in the day studied in Denmark and we got a lot of good out of it too. Adults usually think kindly towards Denmark and people still go there to study (like my cousin) or to live (like a friend of me ma). Sorry if I ain't givin', like, amusing stereotypes and whatnot. I know a few general ones but I'm not sure if they're specifically Icelandic or not. Sheep posted:Edit: I lied, one more question: what sector seems to be the new up and coming thing for Iceland? Technology? Was (is?) geothermal power ever considered as a major export possibility? You mentioned refined aluminum exporting, which I had no clue about. Any other major things like that Iceland is involved in or has future plans to promote? Geothermal is actually somewhat dwarfed by Hydroelectricity when it comes to power generation, we have considered trying to export the "clean" energy to Europe but with current methods it just wouldn't be cost effective. So we've made ourselves attractive to energy intensive industries like aluminium smelting to export it indirectly. Too attractive really, we got a raw deal and a lot of people are unhappy with it, including me. We shouldn't damage our nature just for a bit of transient blood money from some of the worst companies in the world. Oh, and we may have oil. May. We're still looking into it. And if the Arctic opens up we're in a fairly good position for increasing our freight business. It helps we have a free trade agreement with the Chinese, unlike some other nations~ Sheep posted:And last, how do immigrants seem to be taking to Icelandic? It seems like lots of the Germanic countries suffer from the problem that the natives are all pretty drat good English speakers, especially the younger generation, which would seem to be such an easy crutch to fall upon that it might hamper a lot of first generation immigrants picking up the language. English is often an unfortunate crutch yea, but one thing is that a lot of the time, they aren't that great at English anyway. A lot of the E-European immigrants, for instance or the Asian ones didn't speak such great English and for them, learning Icelandic wasn't that different from having to learn more English. Amused to Death posted:I love that you linked this as I'm watching tonight's episode of The Daily Show Maybe I should send them a book. Something anti-war, that they wouldn't understand anyway. Eugh, why do I never notice it's 4 in the morning until it's too late? drat Deceitful Penguin fucked around with this message at 05:02 on Apr 26, 2013 |
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Apr 26, 2013 04:38
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Sheep posted:Nah, I understood what you meant perfectly, it's just that my English is terrible.
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Apr 26, 2013 16:13
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Averrences posted:I would be interested to hear your opinion on this article: http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2013/apr/26/iceland-elections-voters-fear-eu The old chestnut just goes that Icelanders are loving stupid. You just vote "What dad did" and don't think too much about it. The article hit all the main points, especially with the media pandering to the right but a lot of it just that there hasn't been a viable alternative for right wing people to choose from, aside from the Pirates or "Right Greens" and haha, what a loving joke they are. So you have the polls shifting away from the Old ruling party, The Independence Party to the formerly agrarian socialist party, Framsókn, now Neoliberal shitbags indistinguishable from all of their ilk the world over and these dumb motherfuckers decide that "Hey, these guys will solve our problems!". I'm not even gonna list how all their campaign promises gently caress over the poor and help the rich, that's just obvious, par for the course. I'm hoping the polls are wrong. I'm hoping that people aren't massive retards. But political literacy in Iceland is sadly pretty poo poo and it's gonna stay that way if a Left government can't stay in charge long enough to reform the education system. Or I suppose they could help themselves and actually remember further back than 2 weeks but, hah! Fat chance of that happening. Averrences posted:Also, I was wondering how Iceland developed under Norwegian and later Danish rule - so could you expand on what you were mentioning earlier with the whole 'being a colony of Norway' thing? I mean, we weren't originally a "colony" in the traditional sense that we were founded as an extension of an existing country, so much as we were free Norsemen fleeing political repression or just wanting a change of scenery or a better life. We were our own complex little society until we were vassalized under, Harold the Fair-Haired if I remember right, and after that we were mostly just quiet. There was some internal poo poo, at one point we were banned from having weapons, probably after a couple of massacres or battles but I'm just not an expert on this period so I'd have to look it up and for that it's good to have more specific questions. This is probably the area I'm worst at actually, 'cause I'm fairly good at modern and founding history, just not the parts inbetween. I hope you manage to come! It's a very unique country, albeit somewhat expensive. Not many people regret coming. Alterian posted:What months would be the best to visit if I want to do more backpacking/nature type of stuff?  I have some weather stories from when it first started getting more extreme but eh. Rockzilla posted:I heard talk of Iceland wanting to ditch its currency and switch over to the Canadian Dollar around the time of the financial collapse. Is this still being talked about and what kind of effect do you think it might have on the Canadian and Icelandic economies? Canada and Iceland have some informal connections, due to the relatively large amount of Icelandic immigrants in a few places with Gimli and Iceland has hoped to foster stronger relations with Canada, with many going there for work as the bubble collapsed. It's not a strong bond, like with the Nordics however. Economics wise, little connection, we're both export nations but not to each other. Politically we're turned towards Europe while they're turned towards the US, especially after Harper got his claws in. Yeah.
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Apr 26, 2013 18:35
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Byde posted:What happened to the bankers there after the economic meltdown? Sadly, the status quo wasn't shaken up as much in the economic realm as the political one. We were working on getting through legislation to finally gently caress them over and some better regulatory framework was put into law but not enough, in my mind. Still, just the fact that we're charging them is a hell of a lot better than most.
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Apr 26, 2013 18:55
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Radio Talmudist posted:Are Icelandic children taught Norse mythology as kids? Is Viking history a big part of Icelandic identity? Radio Talmudist posted:Also, do you have a state church that everyone pays for via taxes?
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Apr 27, 2013 01:12
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Byde posted:How do they teach politics in Iceland that make its people so dumb about it? Byde posted:About the crowdsourced constitution that was ultimately pushed aside, where's the official text for it and what was it like? Byde posted:How bad, specifically, is the Pirate Party in Iceland? Is it just like any general internet-based libertarian party, or is this incarnation special? They're too far to the left on environmental matters and social justice poo poo to be real libertarians, but there are turds like that skulking in their ranks. They're obviously mostly a party of nerds focused on internet poo poo but they certainly aren't the German Pirate party, with their MRA forum or solving their differences by watching My Little Pony. Byde posted:The reason I brought them up is because of this article I found a while ago where a Pirate Party suddenly formed after the constitution was removed from the political agenda (which is weird since I though they already have a branch there). She, alongside Smára McCarthy (no relations to the senator, I think) founded the Pirate party. All in all, they stole a bit of votes from the left but I'm hoping they also stole from the right. As is, the lack of a reputable alternative for sane right wing Icelanders means that most returned either to the bosom of the bankrupting parties or just switched from one neoliberal to another. And tomorrow we vote. May the Gods have mercy on our pathetic souls.
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Apr 27, 2013 01:30
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Voted today, then had to rep the post-election party places and enjoy the free waffles and talk politics. Byde posted:So basically like the American education system? I'm only just now learning the specifics of how the U.S. government works from school and I'm a sophomore in college for Christ's sake. By the way, can you give me a rundown on the Womens Party a bit? The Women Party (or list) [Icelandic: Kvennalistinn] is one of the most resounding victories for women in Icelandic politics. The year is 1983. While women have had suffrage for a while and sometimes been included on lists of political parties, they've always been placed too low to get in. (In general. There were a few notable exceptions like our current PM Jóhanna) The Red Socks have mostly disbanded following their creation of a firm policy. Women have been shown to have power, with the Womens Strike in 1975 and the the election of Vigdís Finnbogadóttur as president in 1980 being prominent examples. In 1982 there had been a smaller, regional elections womens candidacy in the both the north and south but this year there are parliamentary elections. So they found the Womens List (or party). This was a cross-political non-hierarchical organization of women for women, firmly based on second wave feminist ideas and intent on getting womens matters to be an active part of politics and to get more women into parliament. Aside from obviously fighting for more political representation of women in politics, they also fought for issues that had been overlooked by the male dominated political apparatus, like increased access to kindergarden and increased wages for lower class women. They won 5.5 of the national vote and gained 3 senators. While their ideas nowadays are somewhat problematic (they had that strong second wave idea of the genders being intrinsically different and essentialized them) they are the main reason why Iceland is now among the top of charts related to womens freedoms and rights in the world. It makes me proud to say my ma was a member and that I was taken to their meetings as a kid. Byde posted:I do remember something about property within the amendment that people found wonderful, and as an ameteur socialist I want to know if it's anywhere near what I hope it is. After my semester ends I have the summer off, so is there any sources for teaching Icelandic? I'm going to spend the time reading stuff like Marx and doing some carefree programming, and, considering how boring I am, learning Icelandic just to read a document isn't the worst thing I'll ever do. Good on reading Marx! I did so as a teen and while I've forgotten some of the details, the analytical framework and critical way of thinking has been useful ever since. Byde posted:That's the deal with libertarians in general. They generally have some good things going for them, but they are usually more reprehensible than anything. They seem to have this whole "The Internet will fix everything" attitude and that annoys me, even if many left-wing news outlets now are online-only. Byde posted:I wish mercy on your country as well. Good luck. Don't turn into our mess of a country. artichoke posted:I visited Iceland with a friend in the summer of 2007, right before the banks went belly-up. Hotels and guesthouses were quite expensive so we mostly stayed in hostels (which were really nice, actually). We ate in 9 out of the 10 nights. I think our simple restaurant dinner cost just over 100 USD. Overall, the prices for staying aren't that much improved, due to vastly increased demand (One of my jobs was organizing our guests into rooms and there were not many empty days), but hostels remain a cheap choice and if you check around you can often find cheap hotels. To be honest, you missed the cheapest time, which was a year or so after you left, but things will probably never become as expensive as they were when you were here again. Obdicut posted:What American writers, if any, are popular in Iceland? Or that you like? But yea, we read a drat lot of American books, watch American movies and consume american cultural products like vidcons or pornographic pogs. Obdicut posted:Have you seen the movie "Cold Fever"? Obdicut posted:How much of a problem is there with neo-Nazis in Iceland, or others of their ilk? Obdicut posted:Can I come to your apartment and hang out drinking until about midnight, and then we could head out to a bar? RapturesoftheDeep posted:I just wanted to say that if that were my country, I would want these words in the national anthem because they made me feel so RapturesoftheDeep posted:How did you meet the president, and how specifically is he a poo poo? (knocks when he already know's somebody's in the bathroom, etc.) Seeing as Iceland is such a small country, what other famous Icelanders have you met? I've met plenty of famous people, not just Icelanders. But if there's one thing Iceland does, is make you somewhat uncaring for celebrity or obsessed with it and I'm in the former group. The only one I'd care to mention offhand is some of the peeps in "Of Monsters and Men" 'cause Kristján was a classmate and friend and worked with Arnar (we didn't get along) and talked into some of Árnas cartoons as well as use his studio for something or the other. RapturesoftheDeep posted:I guess what I'm trying to ask is, what is Bjork like? I have no idea, never really talked to her. MassaShowtime posted:How many times have you been to the world's largest dick museum? MassaShowtime posted:Do you believe in elves and if so what are they like? If not, why have you forsaken your heritage? As for what they're like, they mostly keep to themselves and so do we. I suppose they might watch television a lot or play games, if they never leave them hills. Deceitful Penguin fucked around with this message at 20:43 on Apr 27, 2013 |
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Apr 27, 2013 20:38
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Obdicut posted:Cool about the neo-nazis being so heavily sidelined, along with racists in general. I've been to Iceland two times and had a loving amazing time each time. I want to create a country that's Iceland on one side and Costa Rica on the other. It would rule. Tropical vikings, man. It'll be where it's at. *During one of Costa Ricas colder winters. Obdicut posted:A friend of mine was staying at a hotel-- this was eighteen or so years ago-- and thumbing through his Icelandic phrasebook at the front desk every day, trying to ask about taxis and exchange rate and suchlike. The guy would patiently wait for him to ask the question, and then slowly tell him the reply so my friend could figure it out, or he'd just point on a map or give him a phone number. Obdicut posted:And yes, watch Cold Fever. Excellent movie.
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Apr 27, 2013 21:19
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Obdicut posted:It's about a Japanese guy who has to go to Iceland to perform the Shinto rituals for his parents death. He speaks no Icelandic and almost no English. He nearly dies a few times. It's great! Griz posted:Reykjavik elected a joke mayor last election, how's he doing?
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Apr 28, 2013 04:14
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Mustang posted:How is the population spread out in Iceland? I'm from a metropolitan area that's much smaller than your country yet has roughly 4 million people. While Iceland isn't that big of a country it seems like a huge area to have just 300,000 people. Does the geography make it somewhat difficult to get around the island? The geography isn't as difficult as in Norway, but there are still a few hurdles in some of the more isolated fjords. There have been vast improvements by digging out tunnels in much of the country but there are still a lot that still need them. But it wasn't so great a problem back when travel by sea was more common. Kopijeger posted:That is impressively far off the mark given that he lived more than 300 years previously. The king in 1262 was Håkon Håkonson (Hákon gamli Hákonarson). dougie posted:Two of my favourite things are from Iceland, EvE online and Sigur Ros. Oh, three things, Eidur Gudjohnsen
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Apr 28, 2013 15:49
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Mustang posted:With so few people is it easy for people to trace their family history back? Or was that info not recorded anywhere until recently? Or does the use of patronymic names make it more difficult? I just think it would be cool if some people could trace their family back to close to the founding of the country. So you might be able to do it. Here's the article I usually link when people ask me about Íslendingabók, said website. ecureuilmatrix posted:Is it wrong that I (as a Canadian) find this adorable? Politically? I'm not in the capital so I don't play very close attention to inner city politics, but his direct democracy initiatives have been very popular. He's also very active in repping the good fight, whether it's asking no army flights be allowed in Reykjavík Airports (unless its an emergency) or voting as a Jedi (to show opposition to the Sith who won and that even though the left has been struck down it will only return stronger). I could ask my aunt about it, but, looks like she isn't online. Ah well. The sister party of the Best Party, Bright Future, in turn got six senators, so that's good. Of course, with the right back in power (possibly), things might not be going too well, but who knows. Kopijeger posted:So Håkon's immediate successor Magnus Lagabøte doesn't matter even a tiny bit, even though he reformed the legal system?
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Apr 28, 2013 23:45
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Bloodnose posted:I can't tell if you're from an influential and well-connected family or your whole damned country is just that small. I keep reminding myself that this place is smaller than my hometown, in population. It's tough to wrap my head around, because Iceland isn't one of those joke countries like Luxembourg (more people than Iceland), Andorra, Liechtenstein or San Marino. It's a country that does things and matters and people know about. It still baffles me that Hong Kong has more than 23 times as many people. Maybe I'm too hung up on this population thing. But haha, not really. Give it another generation and I'd be really entrenched. Iceland runs on guanxi, more so than most western countries and if you wanna have a say in thing you gotta have friends and favours, you know how it is. My folks are high up, mostly on skill, but good people get good friends, yanno. And you learn to network. It's been my consistent failing to not keep that up well enough, but ehh, I'm young yet.The population thing isn't that much of a deal. The stage is smaller but the rules are the same as anywhere. Maybe change is a little simpler, but it's offset by how much a few personalities can control their reaches of the board. It evens out. Bloodnose posted:I like the Icelandic language a lot. If I wasn't busy learning six other, much more economically and politically important languages, I'd probably take the time to study a bit. I like the word Eyjafjallajökull. I listen to the audio edition of the Economist and back in 2010, I got such joy out of hearing that poor British woman from Talking Issues say Eyjafjallajökull like six times in one article. Now I know a lot of reporters struggled through it and ruined the pronunciation, but the Economist is old school and hardcore, so this woman had carefully practiced and been properly coached on how to pronounce the ridiculous name of this volcano. And sure enough she painstakingly read out that name again and again. Bloodnose posted:This List of the tallest buildings in Iceland is adorable. Bloodnose posted:Do you guys have skiing in Iceland? What are the most popular sports there? I'm an avid skier. I'd like to ski down an active volcano. I'd ski Eyjafjallajökull in a heartbeat, and call out its name on the way down. Popular sports include most of the ball sports, with football (not american) and handball most prominent. Icealand is OK at a bunch of minor sports, but shines in battle sports and I think we're fairly high up in Judo. In my favourite badmington we're sadly only mediocre, but eh, what can ya do? You can find almost any popular sport around and even a few unpopular or hella regional ones. Japanese ones especially. And if you're gonna ski on a glacier I've had good times trekkin' over Langjökul. That's skitrekkin' though, actual skiing on glaciers is, not a good idea unless you find the idea of falling down a crevasse. Teddybear posted:Hey, just saw this! LGBT people had it pretty bad back in the day but things have been steadily getting better since the, gently caress, lets say early 1980s, a bit after the "Samtökin 78" were founded. (Their website) There's still some homophobic poo poo in adolescent culture but we're working on that and if you keep that up when you get older you'll get ostracized by most. The people with the most worries nowadays are the trans* mostly, because there hasn't been enough education on they thangs and there isn't a special part of the law to protect them from discrimination but the general ones still protect. One of the most famous and popular pop singers in Iceland is openly gay and has been for as long as I remember. Good god, I can't believe he's 43 and still looks so great. Have one of his more recent and popular love songs. Danced to this a time or two~ Deceitful Penguin fucked around with this message at 05:38 on Apr 29, 2013 |
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Apr 29, 2013 05:33
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Bloodnose posted:I forgot to mention I saw Iceland's elections on the news here in Hong Kong last night. I was at the gym, so it was muted TV news and I have no idea what was said or how it was played, but the fact that Iceland made the news here made me smile. It was TVB Pearl, though. English-language broadcast station, so I don't know if it would've shown up on the Cantonese programming. Maybe! But yea, the amount of electoral coverage we gained in foreign media is really rather staggering. Most of them rather puzzled with how we voted. Ahhh, democracy.
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Apr 29, 2013 05:54
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JULIAN ASSANGE posted:I spent 13 hours in Reykjavik during a layover from Toronto to Paris last summer. Ate sheep's head jelly. Weird stuff. Not bad, just utterly, utterly alien to my palette. Everyone there seemed to own a pet cat. Their houses opened directly on the street but they still put their cat out, so there were tonnes of cats on doorsteps. It was really cute. Your weird daylight hours meant I had three straight days of sun and no jetlag. Thanks, Iceland.  ) but the surrounding areas are more dog territory (boo, hiss). I have a cat, who is fat and orange and old and attacks children, it is the best. Good you enjoyed the sun, we have a lot of it even if it isn´t always so warmþJULIAN ASSANGE posted:When you walk down the street, is it normal to recognise most of the people you pass? JULIAN ASSANGE posted:What percentage of your GDP is EVE's economy worth? That's actually fairly impressive for a single company but when you're competing against some of the most valuable fishing grounds in the world and vast quantities of aluminium.. That don't factor in Fanfest though. And GDP is somewhat, eh, as a measure. Still, it's a neat company. I keep intending to go there and ask if they have a job for my yank friend too, keep forgetting when I'm in the capital. Byde posted:How are Iceland's political cartoons? First up, from DV; Gula Pressan. Pretty equal criticism on all parties, made bad by their usage of shittily shopped pictures.  Not gonna bother translating that, is tripe and the people voted against them anyhow. Then we have Halldór, from Fréttablaðið; I can never tell if he's leftist because our right are so dumb.  "First you look to the right, then look to the right again. Then we cross over and hope for the best." The labels on the zebra crossing are: "Tax Cuts" and "Heavy Industry", the two things the XD circlejerks over. There might be on in MBL, or Morgunblaðið, the paper edited by a literal financial and war criminal (he joined the coalition of the willing) but gently caress if I can find it. The Grapevine also has some cartoons, with the most recent resident cartoonist being Lóa:  Yes. Not much to say there. CupcakePrincess posted:I'm going to Iceland this summer (late June/early July) with my boyfriend and we're pretty much broke from booking flights and hotels. What can we do and what can we eat in the capital that's really cheap? If it helps, we booked here: Hotel 66, Grensasvegur 14, Reykjavik, 108 Iceland. Please save us from spending 6 nights stuck in the hotel eating instant noodles, thanks! Let's see. Your hotel isn't listed for some baffling reason in Já.is, but let's check who else is on that address. A classical dance academy? Good enough. Allright, this is where you are: A bit long non-hyperlinked. Near there you have, a good Chinese place and Pizza place. Like, literally same street. I'm going by memory here but neither is very cheap. They are very good though, so I recommend them. On the other hand, a bit down the road from where you at, is Metro, our knockoff McDonalds. They're not too bad, pricewise. Here's their exact location. And here are their budget items. Near there is a KFC and opposite that is a healthy chicken place if you cravin' sum dem nuggits though. Ahhh, KFC.  My favourite Thai Noodle joint is Here and it is pretty drat cheap and good. and if you feel up for a visit to IKEA, they have probably the cheapest food in Iceland and it's actually pretty good too. It would be a bit of a trip though, if you actually want to, I could draw you a route. Forgot they closed the other one, the only one still open is in my town. If I had been in the country, that is where I would have taken you, btw. Cheap but full of personality and you can get free refills of the Dew of the Mounains, which I'm sure would have made you feel at home. And you'd be able to walk through the lava fields and residential areas, with a bunch of very interesting houses including the one of yours truly (or his family rather). Otherwise, eating out is pretty drat expensive. So I'd suggest you pick up small things in Bónus, the cheapest store in Iceland. Here is the one closest to you. You can grab some sammiches there and bottles for filling with tap water, which is exactly the same as the water they sell in bottles, because they're both spring water. It always breaks my heart when I see tourists buying water, when they could have spent that money on something else, like alcohol or men/women of Iceland. Travel is simplest by bus. Well, not really, but it is cheapest behind walking. Looks like you could take 17 down to Hlemm, the central area. Here are the schedules and timetables. Fee is 350 isk btw, which adds up quickly, but you can buy multiple tickets at the bus and at Hlemm. There's also day cards, 3 day cards and other ways. Or you can walk! The weather is usually alright at the time you're staying. This takes a lot of time though, 'cause you ain't in the exact center. As for what to do that is cheap, I'd suggest trying out our fab swimming pools, for one. Closest one is one of the best, Laugardalslaug and if you walk (you should) you can go through a lovely park nearby, Grasagarðinn. You could also check out Húsdýragarðin, which is somewhat like an Icelandic petting zoo, only you don't get to pet the animals unless you catch the cats. Here that is, right next to Grasagarðinn. Uhh, word of warning about the showers, you're supposed to shower naked in them, but I think we might have added curtains in that one for the muslims. You can probably use them, but I haven't been for years in that one so I can't vouch for it being there. Oh, and it looks like there are two museums just around the corner from your. About Elves and Folklore. Do that when you're hung over and don't want to go far one day, maybe. Catching an Icelandic movie might be fun. Don't know what they'll be showing in June but it would be an experience regardless. This site lets you check for movies, concerts, theater pieces and even sport events and order thangs online. Other than that, I'd just suggest that you go visit tourist information and talk to them more in-depth about what you want. I worked out in the country so I don't have price listings for any of the museums and whatnot, which they do. The ones I like the most are This one and This one. They'll be able to help you some more. Have fun in Iceland!
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Apr 29, 2013 18:57
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Bloodnose posted:Oh does Icelandic McDonald's have any cool special menu items? In Hong Kong, for example, they offer the Prosperity Burger every Chinese New Year, which is like a McRib but made with beef or chicken and covered in Chinese sesame sauce. Do they have like a super filet o fish with fish heads and something spelled with a bunch of runes? It was actually because we weren't allowed to use local materials that they left, it just became too expensive to import. I don't go there often though, not when there's a KFC and 2 pizza places like, literally right next to it, so I was never a regular and even less so nowadays. (Oh KFC, why did you have to discontinue the Meltz?  ) Bloodnose posted:Your language is adorable. "Fyrst" "aftur" "besta". Now I see why historical linguists love Icelandic.
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Apr 30, 2013 03:42
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CupcakePrincess posted:Wow I was not expecting such a long and helpful post - thank you so much! I clicked on the site of the knockoff McDonald's and almost had a heart attack, so the suggestions for cheap food are really useful. CupcakePrincess posted:If you were to recommend one day trip, what would it be? We were planning on seeing the Blue Lagoon; are there any other must see sights that are not in the capital that's worth us paying to see? Aight, so the one day trip that provides the best snapshot of Iceland is without a doubt The Golden Circle. You're coming here at peak season but even then there are so many companies doing this that you can probs find some drat good offers. This is what I usually do with my foreign friends if they don't have a lot of time, although my way also includes our summer house and a meal. Tragique, blame the very economy that allows ya to visit, as I'll be workin' in Norway most like. Price figure I got quoted for that was around the 630 HKD each. That's, really not that much for the experience. You can probably find better prices if you look around and if our government turns idiotic and relaxes capital controls, it might be even cheaper. The other two are more of a "Spend the day doing something Icelandic as heck and see the people and culture" kinda thing. Both require at least moderatly good weather, one more than the other. You'll have to find the weather forecast the day before, because Icelandic weather doesn't care about petty things like "predictions" or "forecasts" further than maybe 3 days ahead most of the time. Remember to buy sunscreen at home, surprisingly many tourists forget that and end up lobster faced while wearing their heavy clothin' So, Scenario 1. This works best on the weekend, but if it's not workable that way you can skip that part. So, you wake up, fresh and rested in the pure inner-city air of Reykjavík. Maybe you have some breakfast. Some nice bread with hangikjöt and butter maybe, that poo poo is good stuff. I'm gonna assume you are the "wake up relatively early and bright" types here, otherwise this might be a bit tight schedule and you're here to chillax, not follow some dudes schedule. A little past 10 works fine. Grab your swimming gear and a towel. So you go just outside your hotel and find the the bus stop. All roads lead to Hlemm, after all, but you're going past that, to Lækjartorg, by takin' the number 14. Right next to that is one of the tourist info places I mentioned. If you haven't been there already, now is a good time, 'cause the first attraction doesn't open until 11. After conferring with the wise peoples of TI (or not) you can waddle down to Bæjarins Bestu. This is the most famous Hot Dog stand in Iceland. It is the archetypical, the ideal form of the Icelandic Hot Dog. Bill Clinton had one once. They are good. They are ok priced and it's not a real visit to Iceland if you don't have one. While munching on it you can look towards the sea and see the Harpa music hall. Some people say that is the incarnation of our financial folly. I think it's rather your eventual destination. Regardless, it should hopefully be after 11 now. The place you're going now is the Kolaportið fleamarket. There, you can find all kinds of neat stuff, some of it tourist but most of it meant for Icelanders. If you ask nicely the dude that sells the shark might let you taste it. They enjoy the reaction. Lots of nice thangs there, but I'd suggest at least buying some Icelandic candy. Icelandic Liquorice is widely considered the best in the world. If you're like me, you may also want to get a book. Now, a crossroads. If it's late in the day, weather has turned colder, you might wanna go visit the Reykjavík art museum close by. They sometimes have some cool thangs there. If it's still early, only around 12-13 or still warm, it's cool. From there, it's a short walk up Laugaveginn, Icelands premier shopping street, full of tourist goodness. This place is worth a walk or two through. But you're going to Hlemm for a reason. See, from Hlemmur, there's a special bus, number 19. It ends up in a place that I think is the real embodiment of our financial crisis. That place is called Nauthólsvík, and there you find the Ylströnd, or "Warm Beach". This place is literally a transplanted tropical beach, where we pump warm water into the sea to keep the water around 19° warm celsius. Only charge is 200 for a locker to keep your thangs and 300 if you wanna rent a towel. Free hot tubs, warm pool and shower. Open from 10 to 19. You can chillax on the beach and work that tan and watch the Icelander in his natural environment. There's even a boat renting place nearby but those fuckers are almost never open when I'm there so I don't know if you can go there. If you do, don't go in an easily flipped boat with a kid that enjoys tumbling it over until you're half full of seawater and throw up until you flip it over before he reaches it and sail it away for five minutes until you feel bad, get him back, only for him to flip it again. Uhh, yeah. Oh, and if you take pictures you can later have your friends guess where you are and they'll never get it right. I did this when I was at the beach in Switzerland. Good times. And after that you can go to Perlan. It's hard to miss and pretty neat. Everything is really expensive there though, so don't buy anything. This is a fairly good day schedule, as you can then take the 19 straight back to your hotel or take it into town, grab some grub and then do whatevs~ The second one is simpler. You just take the Bus number 57 from Ártún (not too far from your hotel) to Esjan, a mountain. You then climb that mountain, like every Icelander has done at least once. It's a nice mountain, not too high, with a great view and decent paths and plenty of places to rest so even if you aren't a mountaineer like myself you can still enjoy it. This only runs you the cost of the ticket to get there so it's pretty drat noice, money wise, as well as letting you climb a drat mountain. We may not have tall buildings, Bloodnose, but how many mountains do you have in Hong Kong?  Just remember to bring some lunch, 'cause while there may be a cabin it's way overpriced. If you make good time, you might even consider going to Akranes, a nearby small town, and check out the whaling tours there. Whale-Watching tours, sorry, I think they discontinued the ones where they then kill the whale after finding it, the tourists kept scaring the whales away with their flash photography and it made the whalers mad. Or you can return to the capital, stopping at the delectable KFC on the way. (Or Hróa Hött, they have some nice Pizzas and aren't far off from there and right next to a Bónus~ CupcakePrincess posted:It's too bad you won't be around - if you ever come to Hong Kong, give us a shout! Oh, and how you can bring in some dry food as well as a certain amount of alcohol, a liter of strong stuff (My recommendation, you can then mix it to your delight here with Icelandic soft drinks), a liter of weak stuff or 6 liters of beer (why would you do this). 'cause drinking out is crazy mad expensive, yo. If you have any more questions, I'd be happy to answer. Deceitful Penguin fucked around with this message at 15:56 on Apr 30, 2013 |
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Apr 30, 2013 15:53
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Guy DeBorgore posted:I'm so glad you made this thread! I've been a bit of an icelandophile for ages, and it's at the top of my list for vacation destinations. Byde posted:How does Iceland's citizens generally feel about Wikileaks? Iceland's actions regarding Wikileaks have been generally favorable as of late. A minister denied aiding the FBI over an investigation, and the Supreme Court kept the Icelandic branch of Visa from prohibiting donations to the site. I also believe that Bradley Manning was nominated twice for the Nobel Prize by Iceland. There is a fairly large minority though that's very interested in this sorta thang, like the 3 senators of the Pirate Party show. One of them, Birgitta, was fairly high up in wikileaks or something like that. The FBI thing, jesus loving christ. That incompetent loving jackass has no loving right to work with foreign goddamn organizations to spy on Icelandic citizens. Dude shoulda been fired on the spot. And Valitor being forced to pay almost 3 years late, ehh. The courts are always too loving slow. But it's still promising. So I'd say that the feeling was general apathy, with a significant minority caring a lot but no-one being against them. Gleri posted:Being originally from Newfoundland - another cold, sparsely populated island in the North Atlantic - Iceland is really, really fascinating to me. In the past, especially before 2008, it was held up as a model for economic development for Newfoundland. There are obvious differences (sovereignty) between the two. But, I'm interested in what you think might be responsible for the impressive level of economic development and diversity in Iceland given the paucity of natural resources. I mean, if you imagine any given city of 300,000 people in North America it wouldn't likely be as productive as Iceland. I don't think so, at least. Is just effective governance or cultural or what? Gleri posted:I'm also interested in the fishing industry in Iceland given that, as far as I know, you mostly fish for Atlantic cod. Is that still true? North Atlantic cod stocks collapsed off Newfoundland to truly disastrous effect in the early 90s - due to colassal mismanagement and climate change. Do you think there's a danger of overfishing in Iceland? How is the fishery managed? The other problems are loving terrible though, here's yet another succinct Article from the grapevine if you can tolerate the "whimsical" style, it rubs some the wrong way. In brief, the quotas ended being just another money making scheme for some rich fuckers to the detriment of the people as a whole. We're hoping to reform that, but we faced a lot of paid opposition. How it goes now is anyones guess. Deceitful Penguin fucked around with this message at 16:57 on May 1, 2013 |
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May 1, 2013 12:38
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Bloodnose posted:Subway is the only source I know for a sub in HK and they've got a promotion right now for 25 HKD. But those are lovely and small sandwiches. I usually have to spend more than 40. Western food is generally more expensive here anyway, but yeah our cost of living is definitely massive. My last apartment, just over 700 square feet, cost 18,000 HKD a month. Housing is the worst here. Bloodnose posted:Uh, only a metric fuckton. Hong Kong is also crazy volcanic, except our volcanoes are all dead. It's extremely mountainous terrain though. Good hiking options. Bloodnose posted:Do I know you? You don't have a post history. You should hang out with Hong Kong goons. And drat, never thought making this thread would make me want to go to Hong Kong.
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May 1, 2013 15:14
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CupcakePrincess posted:Again - wow thank you so much. The suggestions all sound amazing; I'll be doing more in depth research after exams are over and I'll be sure to bother you some more if I have any questions. Your posts have really made me look forward to my trip! CupcakePrincess posted:Nope, probably not, since I only joined less than a year ago. My boyfriend has been on SA since 2004, and this account is one of the first gifts he got me (romantic). Is there a regional HK thread? breathstealer posted:I don't think we actually have one for Hong Kong And how romantic.  I'd never be able to do that 'cause I can't resist trolling half the time. A bad habit to have on SA that I just can't shake, alas. breathstealer posted:I'm the other beneficiary of your wonderful advice! Thank you so much - I'm sure our trip will be a lot better with your help. Is there an address we could drop off a couple HK souvenirs for you? PM me! And I can't PM ya, lost PMs a while back but you can throw me a line at malcowitz at gmail.com if you really wanna exchange info. So if you two need any mo' info, I'm at your disposal.
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May 1, 2013 21:23
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cafel posted:So I'm not sure if you'll have an answer to this one as it's a bit technical, but how extensive is your fishing industry? Is it just catching the fish or is most of the processing done in Iceland as well? I ask because here in California we have pretty ample fishing, but our canning industry in almost completely gone. It's cheaper to ship the fish caught off our cost to Chinese processors and have it shipped back because the cost of fuel doesn't outweigh the cheaper labor. You only make a few extra cents per ton, but in a year that's millions of dollars for the industry. You've been talking about the free trade agreement with China and I was wondering if the fishing industry happened to be included in any major way in that agreement. The insane way our planet, especially the United States, consumes sea food has always fascinated me. The same conditions for easy export of fish do not apply to a country on the other side of a continent from California, which adds at least a bit more miles to the trip. And for outsourcing in general, with the closest possible places for outsourcing being possibly S-Europe or Africa, which simply isn't that profitable in one case or in possession of the infrastructure for it in the other and the quota system, which at least to begin with, was designed so that you could only land the fish in the port/town it was assigned to. While this changed later, to the detriment of our countryside, it's still far easier to land fish here than export. I don't know enough about the actual fishing part processing, as I'm a filthy landlubber, but I know that the fisheries work landside is kept cheap by using foreign labour as much as possible. This is one of the things that make me pretty drat angry because they're mostly foreign women who are underpaid, don't know their rights and are made to do backbreaking repetitive labour at much lower wages than they deserve. It's pretty galling, because the fisheries used to be the engine of social advancement in early Iceland, where poor people could go and slave away but still earn more money than they would otherwise, especially back when there were literally no other source of social advancement. My ma ruined her wrists working there as a kid but she still made money, which was more than she could have done working at the farm. I keep intending to get in touch with the Women of Foreign Origin org here but poo poo keeps getting in the way. Eh. whiteshark12 posted:How badly would not being able to read Icelandic be a detriment in a workplace? Long story short I have a UK degree in geology with emphasis on seismology but the UK is loving dead in regards to seismic activity, so I was looking at moving abroad for work, and since Iceland is in the EEA there aren't any insurmountable obstacles to immigrating like going to the USA.  ) you'd pick the basic work vocab up quickly enough. So it's a demerit and it's not like we lack for well qualified geologists here, but there's still hope. My suggestion, unless you have contacts in Iceland, is to check This website to see if there are any jobs in your field. Not a lot else I can do for you on this end.
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May 3, 2013 18:30
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Bloodnose posted:So what's the ownership of the fisheries like? Do you have a cabal of shadowy super-wealthy fish oligarchs?  Ooooh, boy. The fisheries aren't where the main money is. The real money is in the quotas for the fish. See, thanks to our Chicago School of Economics educated ministers, they decided to let the invisible hand of the free market dictate how best to allocate fishing quotas in the country. Fast forward a few years and you have a bunch of Quota Kings, with insane amounts of money they got from it while everyone else was various degrees of hosed. Some of these kings were close friends to said ministers and members of the same political party, which I'm sure was a complete coincidence. Then these geniuses decided to play financial tricks with their quotas, ending up in a lot of "debt" while their real money is working they tan in Tortola. Shadowy ogliarchs? Oh how I wish they stayed in the shadows. Instead, LÍÚ, their lobbyist group pretty much managed to 'cause a huge amount of unrest and lose the left the election with constant sabotage, lies and media manipulation. There was supposed to be a reworking of the quota system. Fat chance of that happening now under the coming right government. Alterian posted:Have you been to a banana farm or is that a myth? Did visit a lot of strawberry greenhouses when I was working near one of the bigger operations though. Gods, that was the best. Deceitful Penguin fucked around with this message at 17:49 on May 5, 2013 |
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May 5, 2013 17:16
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Alterian posted:I guess it is sort of a myth. I've always heard that Iceland is Europe's main source of bananas and one of Iceland's biggest exports. Actually looking it up, it seems to be a joke about us being a "Banana Republic", what with the army base and being in the American pocket rather than something serious. But hey, apparently the Banana place also grows figs and coffee. Now I want to taste Icelandic coffee, dammit.
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May 5, 2013 19:56
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Bloodnose posted:How are Iceland's universities? I've never heard of anyone going to Iceland for school. And did you say you went abroad yourself? Do businesses prefer to hire people who have studied overseas? For a population 321857, that's pretty good I'd think. And the Uni of Iceland doesn't do badly in the rankings, if you think they're an indicator of anything worthwhile. (I don't.) Do you know a lot of geneticists? Geophysicists? Seismologists? Vulcanologists? Nordic Studies people or Nordic History specialists? While we get plenty of people coming here to study other things, the sciences Iceland is at the forefront of are Genetics and Geophysics, with a focus on renewable energy generation through geothermal energy and of course the whole "Sitting between two continental plates" thing. Everything else, ehh. You get the odd prospective teacher, philosopher, lawyer, doctor and whatnot. Helped some philosophy students translate poo poo back when I studied that. Just not as common. I did study abroad, that was pre-Uni though. Half a year in Germany. Hah, orderly fuckers and overly strict, but then again I'm a free spirited man among irreverent people. Being 17 didn't help. Still, was a good run, just wish I'd had the sense to socialize more. Alas, alas. And unless the degree they got overseas is especially prestigious or specialized, probably not. Unstated question but most aren't going Stateside either unless it's on Fulbright or something similar, with most heading towards Europe and especially the other Nordic countries. There's a rich history of Icelanders going to our old overlord Denmark and studying there, for instance. Few sane or not rich goes to the US or to a lesser degree Britain without some support, though it's been known to happen. Edit: England, rather than Britain, I always forget Scottish universities run on a different system. Deceitful Penguin fucked around with this message at 14:37 on May 6, 2013 |
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May 6, 2013 04:35
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CupcakePrincess posted:Will email you in June, thanks : ) CupcakePrincess posted:There are seven universities in Iceland? HK has ten universities, and our population is 20 times the size of yours. CupcakePrincess posted:Have you ever ridden an Icelandic horse? I just watched a video of Icelandic horses tölting (is that grammatically correct?), and it is adorable. Icelandic uses a pretty different grammar system from English, so mixing the two usually doesn't end well. Að tölta is the Icelandic form, but don't sweat it. And yeah, the Iceland pony is a well known adorable horse, second only to the Shetland pony or so I'm told. CupcakePrincess posted:Also, have you ever visited the Icelandic Phallological Museum? For reasons I cannot fathom, my boyfriend really wants to see lots and lots of penises.  Haha, but seriously, I haven't really had the time or inclination to go there. Usually either doing dumb thangs or working, but I hear its quite interesting.
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May 6, 2013 16:48
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Rashomon posted:My wife and I are going to Iceland in mid July. I've gotten some advice from other American friends who have been there. We're starting in Reykjavik, doing the close stuff like the Golden Circle and Blue Lagoon the first couple days, then hopefully going up to stay a night at Hotel Budir and explore the Snaefellsness area (did I spell that remotely right?), and then driving up to Akureyri for a night, and then returning to hang out in Reykjavik a couple more days and possibly do a day trip down to Vik. Any recommendations for must see stuff along those routes that the guidebooks might not mention or emphasize? I got family from the North, and I'd say that if you're in Akureyri it would be a shame not to visit some of the smaller places around there. Siglufjörður is especially picturesque and on the way there you'd pass through what is beyond a doubt the most beautiful vale in all of Iceland. (This may be slightly tinted by nostalgia and good times) Otherwise, you can usually rely on guidebooks for things like landmarks and natural beauty, which are the main attractions outside the city. Rashomon posted:And, more importantly -- any amazing shops in Reykjavik or elsewhere that sell clothes, music, English language books, art/paintings/prints, etc that we might be into? We're both artistic people and pretty adventurous. As for art, there are a few galleries around but it's not a world I'm part of to any great degree. I was working at the gallery because of my linguistic skills and ability to keep myself from going mad staying in a place with no internet. If you like things like comics and that, Nexus is a good place for that. Eymundson is the big book chain, but there are a couple of smaller ones around. Skífan is the big movie/music store but if you wanna support a smaller, local shop then Geisladiskabúð Valda (Valdis' Cd-Shop) is a nice place to check out. For clothes you're out of luck, I mostly just buy that in the mall. Odds are you'll find it if you look though.Kolaportið, the flea market I mentioned before is actually a pretty interesting place. It means "Coal-port" and it's an old coal warehouse re-purposed into its current incarnation. You can find books, clothes, candy, fresh taters, fish and shark there, as well as other things like toys or thai cooking supplies. You can try bargaining but it's very unlikely to work, there's not much tradition for it here. Get the Shark btw. It will put hair on your palms and cure dyslexia, as well as kill your nose. This is part of the Icelandic experience. If you do not get it before leaving they will not let you re-enter the country, unless you are vegan/vegetarian in which case an acceptable substitute is snorting ammonia.
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May 18, 2013 15:54
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Sorry for late reply, was out enjoying Denmark.Popcorn posted:When I was in Iceland I met a girl in a cafe who told me she found Bjork very irritating because she perpetuated this image of Icelanders being these quirky fairy mentalists. Then she did an exaggerated Bjork impression and it was disturbingly accurate. Megafonzie posted:I did a quick ctrl+f for 'debt' and didn't find anything, so I figured I'd ask: Now, the coming government promised to get rid of all the loans! Lower taxes! Free money for everyone! This is bullshit and if they try it things will turn to poo poo instantly, because the international creditors won't stand for it, it way disproportionally favours the wealthy and they don't have the money for it. This is because they are liars and idiots and the latter also applies to Icelanders. If you want more specifics on things like foreign loans, the crisis as a whole (oh boy) Icesave (please don't, everyone got so heartily sick of it that you can get beaten up on the street for bringing it up) or anything else to do with that whole shebang, I can start trying to remember the things I blanked out and maybe even dig up some corrections of foreign articles that actually tell it how it was. It certainly wasn't as pretty as the foreign media painted it at times. Kiri koli posted:Nice! Deceitful Penguin fucked around with this message at 00:49 on May 21, 2013 |
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May 21, 2013 00:47
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Quarex posted:All right, I am joining the thread now, and since I got married in Iceland I think I know more than some chump who was just born and raised and still lives there Quarex posted:No way dude, the best things from Iceland are skyr, puffins, and the Hamborgarafabrikkan. Actually I definitely preferred other places I ate, but none of them were called a hamburger factory. Quarex posted:This was probably the only uncomfortable thing that happened to me in the month or so I have spent in Iceland. The time I was minding my own business changing in the Blue Lagoon lockers when like 30 fully nude teenage boys came running at me to use the showers near where I was standing. My wife had a similar experience, though of course I cannot help but have the sexist belief that her experience was still less traumatizing. Quarex posted:Plus you are part of the elite non-Starbucks club as they also withdrew, unless I am misremembering what I learned. Honestly that is the reason Reyjkjavík can probably not be topped on my "favorite cities in the world" list, because you have to work hard to find an international chain. It helps you stay focused on enjoying the local culture when even the coffee shop chains are local to Iceland. I would basically go into a happiness coma right now if I could walk out of my apartment and find a Te og Kaffi down the street. I want to go back to Iceland Quarex posted:MINE TOO!!!! Even in my own country, I get excited when I am going to some region I have not visited frequently, so I can check the grocery stores/gas stations to try to find regional candy or cookies or something, anything to help make the world seem less standardized!  Just came back from a Norwegian store, my bag was full of things I never tasted before. Gonna munch on it while I write this.Quarex posted:Also I like that your first in-city itinerary basically sounds like the routine we ended up stumbling into for every time we are there on a weekend anyway. Kolaportið is like my third-favorite shopping place in the world, and second-favorite of places that are actually open on a regular basis! Quarex posted:So, on behalf of basically every one of my friends who reacts in horror and disgust when learning about pre-alcoholic malt being a beverage in Iceland--do people actually drink it? Or is it like hákarl? (I am asked to relate my story of eating hákarl on at least a monthly basis, I was excited to read [on Wikipedia anyway] that most people who try it involuntarily gag; guess I am not most people :usingthesmugemoticonagain: ) And a pretty drat odd article about it as well: http://islenzka.net/olgerdin/ As for Hákarl, ehhh. People that dig it eat it a lot, there ain't many like that. For others, it's eaten at Þorrablót or when you have foreign visitors over. Winklebottom posted:What the hell is up with you guys and mixing chocolate and liquorice? Not I mind, I've been picking up a couple of jumbo packs of Freyju Djúpur every time I've had a stopover in Keflavík on the way to the US and back, but the only guaranteed Icelandic product I can get in Copenhagen is 5-6 varieties of chocolate/liquorice candy. Also it's hilarious that Keflavík has a danish booze section with Fisk and Gammel Dansk, it's almost as good as coming home And what up Nordic bro, I'm nationally obligated to pretend to dislike Denmark, because of the whole "colonial overlord" thing but I love it in secret. Good peeps, good weather, good parties. Just don't tell the people in the LP forum that though, they think I hate it. And Danish booze is great. Not just the beer, but also the strong stuff. A good friend of mine says it isn't a proper night out without at least one shot of Gammel and I think that's a pretty reasonable opinion. And on a lark I got that Vodka in the aluminium bottle on the airport, that stuff was pretty drat good for a non-slavic vodka. Definetly getting that again when I'm at the airport and feeling like smuggling. Had a great time in Denmark btw, Christiana, boat ride, visiting CBS and wandering the town. Woulda partied but cousin needed to be sober for her studies the morning after. Alas, alas, it had to wait for a better time.
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May 27, 2013 18:57
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Winklebottom posted:I gotta admit (to my great shame) that I've never actually visited Iceland, except on stopovers. What do you guys charge for a drink? I'd imagine Iceland might be one of the only places with higher prices than Copenhagen. Bloodnose posted:What's transportation like in Iceland? I can't see such a little place having a big metro system. Is there a big car culture? For a metro system you'd need way higher population density than we do now. Iceland builds out, not up sadly.
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May 28, 2013 12:18
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Sorry for the late reply! Been busy slaving away in Norway and moving, so I kinda forgot this thread. TerryLennox posted:Most of what I know about Iceland, I learned from reading "Journey to the Center of the Earth". Sollevertu! TerryLennox posted:I have always wondered if you guys imported all your crops from abroad. I imagine farming would be difficult to do in its climate. What about beef? To generalize the question, are there any foods that are difficult/expensive to find? We're decently off re: Milk and meat products: Iceland was long based around fishing and sheep-farming and while of reduced importance nowadays they're still going strong, mostly thanks to protectionism. Beef is produced locally and despite some heavy tariffs you can also usually find imported meat. Problem is usually just the price. Difficult to find, eh. If it's exotic you probably can't get it fresh, obviously. And some is just impossible to find. (My durian! ) There's lots of things that are hard/expensive to get but after a while you just stop noticing it or start shopping online, so it's hard to think of anything but M&M Peanut Butter, which is always sold out when I go to the American store.  TerryLennox posted:What advice would you give to a potential visitor from the tropics? I would like to visit someday as it seems a very chill country. On that regard...how does your country view drugs? On the drug end, know many that peruse the occasional narcotic substance, both in the softer end and the harder. And if you're thinking of indulging, getting the softer stuff, like the ol' MJ isn't too hard if you know how to do so abroad, just a matter of finding the right people and being discreet: the cops usually have bigger things on their minds than busting you but harder things need someone to vouch for you after a little incident a few years back, heh. I can't btw, don't approve of foreign drugs. People are pretty opposed in general to drugs but younger people are pretty open about usage of the softer stuff between themselves. Lots of times someone take out and spread around a joint at a party and no-one thinks anything of it. Harder things, ehhh. It used to be more popular but seems to have fallen down after the crisis. Stopped finding the mirrors at high school and whatnot. CupcakePrincess posted:It's me again! We'll be going to iceland in a week, and we'd really like to leave you something from HK, so please check your gmail! I'm sending the mail in a bit, once I feel I've written it politely enough. One must show essential propriety in private correspondence, after all. Bloodnose posted:I understand whaling is an important part of Icelandic culture or something, to the point that there's some kind of exemption for Iceland from the international conventions against whaling. On that note, how many whales have you personally killed and on a scale of one to ten, how delicious were they? And the IWC, what a gathering of clowns that is. We don't really have an exemption so much as we just straight up told them after the ban: "You know, nah, we still gonna whale" and then joined the club again with a "reservation" that "Yea, we're gonna whale for profit now, but not a lot". They still let us in. Whaling is actually not quite as straightforward an issue as many anti-whalers paint it but I honestly don't see the problem aside from how unprofitable it seems to be, compared to whale watching. Can gawp at a whale a hundred times but only eat it once, after all. That is, until industrial pollution finally finishes them off. But I never seem to be able to get to argue with anyone about it here. drat shame, have fond memories of debating both sides. And I've only killed 2 small minke whales on a lark once after 3 too many jaegerbombs but I kill for the thrill, not to eat. As a vegetarian I can only chew meat before spitting it out, lest I transform into a ravenous wilderbeast who would consume both men and mer, so I can't comment on the taste. I hear from a reliable meat-eater it's like good steak but oily though. The blubber is like blubber, which is usually served soured in acid and eaten while drunk. You can get it near the harbour if you want but it's kinda expensive.
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Jun 17, 2013 21:34
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Quarex posted:Once when I was in Iceland one of the people I was eating with ordered whale. I would not have done so myself, but, you know, it was already there and dead and all, so I tried some. And you just always taste local beverages. Oh, green melon soda, how I long for you~
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Jun 18, 2013 17:19
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breathstealer posted:It's amazing how the important things to ask only become obvious upon arrival. Shut Up Spanish posted:I was in Iceland last October and this thread has brought back many happy memories! And the country is pretty dry all over, only places that even have a hope of humidity are off the coast and most of them aren't really places people go. Great to know you enjoyed Iceland and if you come back try and hit me up so I can show you Reykjavík~ csidle posted:Are you serious? In Aalborg, Denmark, most places will charge you 10-30 DKK for a shot. 93 DKK is insane! What about beer, or a Mokai? As for other drinks, mostly expensive but some bars have offers that are, bearable. Crankit posted:I heard there's a database that people in Iceland have to check to make sure they don't sleep with their own cousins, is this true? Does it bother people there or do they just view it as a part of the dating process?
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Jun 29, 2013 15:26
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LittleBob posted:Being such a small country, what sort of privileges does the President have? Seeing as he was re-elected, I suppose the majority of my countrymen agree with him. Cymbal Monkey posted:I'm a vegetarian and I'd really like to visit Iceland. How practical is this? Vegan is tougher and not really possible outside of the capital unless you cook for yourself or only visit a bit before hitting Akureyri, which I think has a vegan place. Smoking Crow posted:Why are all the sagas in Icelandic? And also because Latin was lame.
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Jul 1, 2013 22:07
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WAFFLEHOUND posted:Literally every linguist would call them "Old Icelandic" which is sometimes used interchangeably with "Old Norse" (the archaic term used by some is "gammeldansk" or old danish, heh.) Bloodnose posted:If I wanted to enjoy an Icelandic cultural product, like a TV show or movie (no Bjeourk please), what would you recommend? Comics wise there's ol Hugleikur Dagsson showing off traditional Icelandic humour, but on shows, hmmm. Most of them are, strangely enough, in Icelandic so your options are farely limited. Children of Nature won a bunch of awards back in the day, Jar City was a decent crime movie and I suppose you may wanna check out 101 Reykjavík. I'm not really a movie kinda guy though. More into books; Of which everything by Laxness is great, with "Independent People" being a very critical look at the "soul" of Iceland and Arnaldur Indriðason making a lot of good modern crime fiction. Skeleton Jelly posted:If you're really too lazy to type it Björk, please, at least go for Bjork. Bjeourk looks just horrible.
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Jul 2, 2013 21:17
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WAFFLEHOUND posted:Í enskt "gammeldanks" er eitt frákendur málið And I thought up more music; Jet Black Joe are great, as are The comedy group Baggalútur, as you'll not find better Icelandic Hawaiian or country music. (Music is to the right on that page a bit down) Retro Stefson have a very interesting sound, while my favourite current Icelandic song is probably "The Ocean is Black" which is about as Icelandic as you get, a dirge about committing suicide. Very traditional. Really though, I'm away from my main playlist, so I have to rely on my terrible memory for Icelandic music, as I don't listen too much to domestic things except on the radio. Skeleton Jelly posted:Yeah, but still, at least for me that looks very clumsy. I'm not Icelandic, but speaking Swedish and Finnish I see more than enough of that from foreigners and while o/a is incorrect, it just looks less... weird. Hämäläinen might not be Hamalainen, but jesus what an abomination Haemaelaeinen is. If Icelanders have a different stance on this I don't know, but you're a broken nation if you prefer those vowel monstrosities. But yeah, I have several language packs and remember the unicode for the ones I don't have (Ü! ) but as we were taught to use "ue" for that one it doesn't annoy me as much as it did.
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Jul 3, 2013 02:02
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Bloodnose posted:Thanks for the links and don't be shy about sharing things just because they're in Icelandic. I think the language is really cool and being in the language makes it sound more authentic. Bonus: The readheaded dude in that sketch is the current mayor of Reykjavík. SEXY Bloodnose posted:It is phonetically correct? I was just being a jerk and typing out a bunch of vowels because I don't like Björk, which made it all the more funny when Skeleton Jelly got mad, and now apparently triple funny that my vowels turned out to be a close approximation. I don't know Icelandic phonology at all.
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Jul 3, 2013 03:06
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