Of Monsters and Men - Little Talks

Reykjavik 101; a Swan Song.

Today, on my last day in this Fine Land, I went to what might be Europe's finest record shop, 12 Tonar. They serve you coffee while you make your selections. Being that Iceland has very limited releases, the owners are very knowledgeable as to what a person might like. I think this 'stream-lined' decision-making process is part of the appeal of Iceland to my weary noggin.

Tonight I had a really nice night in Reykjavik, save for some rough mulled-wine at Kaffibarinn. It's funny, everything I try that's Danish (here's looking at you, mulled-wine) seems to suck.

Oh well, it was a really nice day here, activity-wise. Weather was frigidly cold, but that's alright.

I ate some superb noodles, which oddly enough, were advertised as being 'with' MSG. They were quite proud of this. The cook even double-checked with me, but I said 'sure, go nuts, if it's called for in the recipe'. Tasted good, but I felt a little dehydrated afterwards.

I finished the evening by walking on the Tjorn, which is now fully-frozen, save for one end, where they pump hot-water in to keep some ducks and swans happy. I also stumbled upon the Canadian Embassy, which is always neat. Foreshadowing, if you will.

Semi-frozen Tjörn.

Sleeping Rough.

Ug, I'm having a solemn, reflective time at the moment. As one is wont to do when leaving such a great place. Coming home. The Rat Race. Rejoining such pursuits. Frankly, I can't imagine it. I just came from some farewell pints with 'The Old Boys', a group of 'Founding Father' hockey players here...who I should have been playing with the whole time. More my speed, on all levels. Less testosterone & pressure, more relaxation & casual drinking after an hour of skating. I even scored two goals, one of which was on an end-to-end rush where I was looking pass the whole time, but saw no options, so just had to go Roof-Daddy.

Anyhow, fookkit, I'm coming home for a spell.

This is my favourite cafe in Akureyri. Kaffe Kolt. The owner, Magnus is what I would consider to be a Kindred Spirit. What he thinks is nice atmosphere (coffee, apple crumble, vinyl records & candles), I also consider to be Most Excellent. Yesterday, he gave me a free smoothie. The closest thing they have to Booster Juice here.

I will work at Kaffe Kolt if I come back to Akureyri. Magnus has assured me of this, for my post as Senior Contributor on TripAdvisor.com shot Kaffe Kolt up to #2 of 14 restaurants in Akureyri. Magnus was overjoyed.

Switching gears...

Josh & Lars at a pretty stellar supper/Wii night on Saturday. Lars & Helgi drank a litre of Reyka vodka. Ugh. I took it easy, as did Josh, for he had an important exam the next day. Egyptian Hieroglyphics.

Chef Helgi. Taking a swing at golf. We played Augusta National. 9-holes. Casual, you know. I shot 50. Josh shot 38, and won. Helgi and Lars both shot 52, but they were partaking in the vodka, as described above.

2-tie, all tie, I say.

Jola. Christmas. They do it so damn well here.

As a North American, it is odd to see multiple Santa's in one place. We are raised to think there is only one. He lives at the North Pole.

Here, however, there are 13. These two were singing at the local mall yesterday. It was pretty cool.

This chap. The Mailman, as he's known locally. Only other guy who regularly sports a mustache, regardless of time of year.

According to Chef Helgi, he got the name "Mail Man" a couple of Christmases ago, when he was hired as an extra worker at the post office to deliver the large volume of Christmas mail. Trouble is, sometime in February, the police opened his trunk & found 10,000 pieces of undelivered mail. He went to jail. Several months, I'm told.

I don't know his real name, but every time I went out here, he would eventually find his way into the establishment I had chosen to give my custom to that particular evening.

Penultimate Practice.

Good ol' Herman has my stall now, and I think that's great. He is a young player who has come a long way this year. He started playing for the 'B' squad, but is now a solid top-6 defenceman for the Vikings.

This little guy came with me to Iceland. If you look closely in the background, you can see a tiny heart in the hills. The heart is, in person, quite huge. They put it on the side of a mountain to buck people up during the winter.

Which is good, because the sun has been coming up around 10:30am, and going down at 3pm or so.

This is the view of 'downtown' Akureyri from the apartment I painted.

The aforementioned apartment.

A slightly better picture of The Heart.

The Spirit of Jola

is alive and well. Today, they had the unveiling of the Christmas tree at the town square.There was also this weird animal there. I don't know what it is. The school-children also descend upon the town centre to 'chase Santa' out of his hole.

This is what the movie theatre looks like at the moment.

This is the referee-scheduler, Siggy. We ran into each other at Gotobarinn last night. He's a nice chap.

Steinar is my best pal in Iceland. He was in fine form last night.

Keeping it classy.

Steinar's sister, Sylvia.

I really like this fishing boat. It's been docked here for quite some time.

The weird black-cat.

Orri enjoying a 'jolabjor' after my last game as an IIHF referee in Iceland.

The carollers below were awesome...and they didn't come around looking for money either, which was neat.

Enjoy!

Arion Banki - Icelandic Bank Adverts.

Apparat Organ Quartet.

This record just came out here. It kind of sounds like a Nintendo game, but I like to think this is tongue-in-cheek, in keeping with Icelandic humour. Jon Johansson, the founder of this band, joked that it took them three years to come up with a debut album because they had to 'invent their genre'. The genre, of course, being four dudes playing used-keyboards purchased at flea-markets or generally discarded. Interesting.