My camera does not have this power

The northern lights are really strong tonight, but my camera is not good enough to show you. This is the best that it can do:

Hmm. 

Missing Photos

My camera has returned safe and sound, so here are some photos from the weekend in the súmarbústaður.

Near Húsafell

Pointing out the mountains.

Up near Surtshellir

Some sort of hole in the ground

Exploring the caves

In front of Hraunfossar

Hraunfossar

Barnafoss

Looking up river from Barnafoss

Down river

Anarchy

Best Icelandic Food

Luckily people in Icelandic do not really eat þorramatur so much, except at þorrablót parties or as an act of bravado. Also a lot of stuff described as "Icelandic food" I would just call "food" - for example, you often see "traditional Icelandic pancakes" advertised in cafés. These are just pancakes, almost exactly the same as the ones in Britain or France. Yes, they are different from what the Americans call pancakes, but I don't see anything specifically Icelandic about them. You would be familiar with about ninety percent of the contents of an Icelandic supermarket - most of the food is imported anyway, from the USA or mainland Europe. However, there are some things that do fall under the category of genuine Icelandic food, and some are really good and they should get them in other countries. Here are the best ones:

1. Lifrarpylsa 

The only slátur worth bothering with, in my opinion. This is a boiled liver sausage, sort of greyish brown in colour with dots of pure white fat. I know, sounds amazing, right? But it actually is. I would describe the taste as livery, but then again although I don't especially like liver I do find lifrarpylsa delicious, so there must be something else involved. Traditionally Icelanders eat this in rice pudding (with cinnamon sugar and raisins no less), but that's obviously mental so I don't do that. I keep it in the fridge as a cold meat for lunch and snacks. It is very cheap, which also appeals to me. 

2. Skyr

This is technically a sort of cheese, but it looks and is used like a yoghurt. It is made of skimmed milk and rennet and is very high in protein / low in fat. You can get all sorts of flavoured skyr but I tend to just get the plain one. It tastes somewhat similar to Greek yoghurt, sour and creamy, and I eat it with muesli for breakfast, although it is also a good snack with fruit or sugar. It's a bit much to eat it by itself I find, although the flavoured ones are obviously fine.

3. Flatkökur

These are amazing! I'm not even sure what they are made of, but they are a sort of stone-baked flat bread. They taste great with butter and are better than normal bread. I try to limit my consumption to two a day, but I could happily eat way more than that. They have somewhat replaced toast for me. Once I found two in my cupboard that I had forgotten about and they had literally turned to dust, which was weird. There are only four in a packet, though, so it is usually easy to finish them in a couple of days. Or like fifteen minutes.

4. Harðfiskur

Delicious dried fish, usually haddock but occasionally you see catfish as well. I have brought this to people in Britain that haven't enjoyed it, and I have no idea why because it is incredible. Especially spread with butter like a sort of fishy biscuit. It just tastes of fish, basically, but a more concentrated flavour - just like the difference between fresh and dried fruit. The texture is flaky and chewy and harðfiskur has a tendency to create a lot of fishy powder, which on no account should you allow to spread itself around a car, for example, because the smell is potent. I would eat this a lot more often, but it is quite expensive so I have it only occasionally.

Life continues as normal

Well, looks like I didn't write anything here for the whole of August. The fact is, living in Iceland no longer seems like something novel and worth writing about - it has just become my daily life. Therefore I find myself considering most of it quite unremarkable and of interest only to myself and those who are sharing it with me, plus close family back in England. Just like I never felt any urge to write about my pre-Iceland life on the internet, although it was eventful in its own quite ordinary way, I don't really feel like anything I'm doing now is internet-worthy. Although god knows you can find some bollocks on the internet.

I just remembered this site today because I am supposed to be doing work for university (oh hello internet procrastination, how I've missed you!), and also because I've been reading my cousin's blog about her recent relocation to the Netherlands. Which I highly recommend if you've enjoyed this blog because we have a similar sense of humour I'd say, and she writes very well. It made me think of a lot of funny things that I have experienced as an expat. Is that what I am now? I suppose so. So I decided that some sort of update was in order, although I have no expectations of writing that regularly on here any more, and neither should you. 

So I started my third degree and second MA in the beginning of September - Þýðingafræði (Translation Studies) at the University of Iceland. Things seem to be going pretty well so far, although I've yet to have a grade back so who knows. I'm currently working on a 6000 word translation of a chapter from Tvímæli by Ástráður Eysteinsson, which is an academic publication about translation theory. So that's kind of meta. Last week I was set the task of translating part of a motorbike instruction manual from English to Icelandic, for which I am hopelessly underqualified. I had a stab at it, but basically Grétar did it for me. This was somewhat disheartening, but I shouldn't really have been asked to translate out of my native language in the first place. I am hoping that for more extended pieces of writing, essays and such like, I will be able to get away with writing in English, since although I understand Icelandic I remain fairly poor at producing good, academic standard written Icelandic. 

Autumn is most definitely here - in fact it arrived in the closing week of August. It was as if someone had flipped a switch, suddenly the gales and the cold rain began, the temperature dropped and the leaves began to change. We've had some nice sunny autumnal days in recent weeks, but there's no possibility of going out without a coat these days. The falling leaves have been a source of amusement for Ljóni, who likes catching them and then bringing them inside to "kill" them on the floor. So our flat is full of little bits of torn-up leaf. He is a pest; he is just lucky that he is quite cute.

A few weekends ago I went to stay in a summer house with Grétar and some of his friends. I saw my first northern lights of the season, did some fun recreational drinking, relaxed in the hot pot, visited Surtshellir, Hraunfossar and Barnafoss and ate a lot of meat (both during and after the trip, because in Bónus before we went Grétar insisted on buying a few animals' worth). I would have pictures of some of these things but I seem to have misplaced my camera. I think maybe I left it in the summer house, which means I should be able to get it back because someone must have found it. Investigations on this front are ongoing.

In more distant news, the August trip to France with stopovers in London was a success, although a hot success beset by biting insects who seemed to be particularly partial to my boyfriend's blood. It was good to see the family again, nice that they got to meet Grétar and vice versa, which seemed to go pretty well. I always like going to the French house, it's a particularly beautiful area, although I think next time I'd like it not to be high summer. My poor Iceland-acclimatised body starts malfunctioning if the temperature goes much above twenty degrees. It was quite a relief to get back home after a hot, crowded, busy day in Olympics-ridden London with some old uni friends. Not that it wasn't a good day! Just London always takes it out of me, and the contrast between that and the cool temperatures and low population of Reykjavík makes me so glad I live here and not there. Anyway, here are some pictures from a hotter, sunnier, more wooded, less Icelandic time. If my camera is located, which I have every hope of, I will show you some pictures more in keeping with the general theme of this blog.

Grétar and me on a hay-bale near Château Bonaguil. Outfit coordination was unplanned.

Me up the top of the château.

Mes parents.

My brother and his girlfriend, Alison.

Grétar and the beer fridge!

Otto the dog collapsed in the heat.

Grétar, Otto and me swimming in the Lot river.

How to Behave in Cafés

If you, as it seems is the case with many members of the general public, enjoy the recreational baiting of those poor souls compelled to work in the service industry, here are a few tips for achieving maximum effect:

• Place your order fifteen minutes before closing time. The more items you can get the staff to use that they already tidied/washed up, the better. Bonus points for insisting on eating your food there.
• Take ten thousand paper napkins. Make all of them ever so slightly dirty.
• Walk past the café and leave your rubbish on the tables.
• Sit down at one of the tables to eat/drink something you bought elsewhere. Leave the rubbish behind when you have finished.
• Address the staff in Norwegian or German. They are bound to understand, you're in Iceland after all.
• Ask about the ingredients and price of every single thing on the menu. After much consideration, either buy the soup of the day or change your mind and leave. Bonus points for doing this while a long queue forms behind you.
• Use plastic cutlery and put your hummus in the little plastic pots, even though you are eating there. Fuck the environment.
• Come in, pour yourself a full glass of water, take two sips and then leave.
• Demand your money back because you do not like your cake/meal, even though you have eaten two thirds of it just to make sure.
• Allow your child to scatter cheerios all over the table and surrounding floor. Make no attempt to clean up after him. That's their job.
• Interrogate the staff on the possible presence of flour in your food, even though you are not gluten intolerant and have no special dietary requirements at all. Flour is poison and if you eat it you will die.
• Ask what the soup of the day is. When told, grimace and say "ugh!" Walk out in disgust.
• Watch as your friend orders something which has to be heated up in the oven or requires preparation. Wait until the member of staff has tidied up after this, then order the same.
• Wait until you see the member of staff start putting your food on a plate / in a bowl before you mention that you wanted to take away. 
• Ask whether the food is nice.
• Ask whether there is meat in the meat soup.
• Ask whether you can have a half portion of everything on the menu.
• Ask whether you can pay in Norwegian krone.
• When the time comes to pay, make sure you are on the phone.

Things

It has just started getting dark again. It's odd to get this reminder that summer is on the wane - you don't really notice so much in Britain, because the difference between summer and winter daylight is not nearly so extreme. There is something a little melancholy about it. It also seems to shift the high point of the summer earlier in the year, the solstice seems more meaningful. I had always considered high summer to be July and August, but here it's more like June. Children are still going to school in June in the UK. I'm still not used to this mindset, and imagine that because it's mid July we still have most of the summer ahead of us, but realistically most of it is actually behind us.

Although I don't actually consider that I've had "my summer" yet, because I'm still waiting for my summer trip to France, in early August. I'm going to be briefly in London for a little on the way there and the way back, first time in the UK since I left in January, and I am super excited to see people and consume some things that you can't get here. Grétar is coming with me, and after I have introduced him to the cuisine of my people (English beer, proper bacon, fish and chips, etc), we are heading on to spend a week with my parents, brother, dog and my brother's girlfriend at the parental chateau (slash house) in South West France. A week in a country where temperatures of up to thirty degrees are quite likely - possibly I will melt. I was on the phone to my mother the other day and I told her that it was a bit rainy here, but really hot, by which I meant fifteen degrees, and she said it was very rainy and rather cold, by which she meant seventeen degrees.

I am a bit upset that we will be missing Gay Pride 2012, which was a really fun day last year, but at least we'll be back in time for Menningarnótt. I'm also having my actual birthday in France, so going to be having a birthday party here in Iceland next week. Then right at the end of August I have my friend visiting from England, which ought to be a lot of fun. Loads of things to look forward to!

Kisi!

Look! We've got a kitten! Well, Ahmad has got a kitten, but I live in the same house, so it's like we've all got a kitten. He is five months old, pretty stripy and really good at pouncing on things. Like your fingers when you're typing for example. His name is Ljóni, which basically means Liony. Undeniably an excellent cat name.

Oh my days, a kitten!

This is my first post in absolutely ages, I know. I have been doing interesting things, but I have not been motivated to share these things with the internet. I am hoping this kitten picture will make up for it. Here is a list also of some of the things that I have done since I last wrote on here, not necessarily in chronological order:

1. Climbed Keilir with Grétar and his friend Davíð, and Davíð's brother Guðni, got a lot of bits of mountain in my shoes.

2. Watched quite a lot of the football in the English Pub and Kex Hostel with various people, saw England knocked out on penalties again, was overcome with apathy.

3. Went downtown to celebrate the 17th June (Icelandic Independence Day, remember), ate too much sugar, felt headachey and unwell, went home to lie down.

4. Went to Nauthólsvík for the first time (where Icelanders go when they want to pretend they don't live in Iceland, they actually live in Spain) and had a picnic, did not swim in the sea because I knew that I was not in Spain.

5. Went round Stacey's house to celebrate the 4th July (I'm sure you know this one), ate too much meat, felt OK after a small rest but didn't want any cake.

6. Tried indoor rock-climbing with my friend Villimey, was not super good at it but didn't hurt my arm muscles, such as they are, as much as I thought I would.

7. Got a kitten!