Night Life

I wrote this as an email to a few people but thought I could just post it here since it's a good update on today...

It's about 3am here, and it is full-on party mode in downtown Reykjavik right now. It starts at 2am. I was out earlier to see my friend play in a show. It is electronic music and it was really great. After their set I sat and watched the people for quite a long time, until I couldn't take it anymore. It's insane. The favorite thing to do is go out in the street and break pint glasses on the sidewalk. Lots of screaming, chanting, and group sing-a-longs as people walk around. And sometimes people black out right in their chairs. One young boy blacked out with his legs crossed, and a woman came over after about 20 minutes and switched his legs and then walked away. A bunch of people tried to wake him up but he didn't. Eventually he did though, and seemed better. My friend also blacked out in the chair in front of him for a few minutes. My friend who is in the band, Siggi, was sitting there with me and I was watching this passed out kid, feeling kind of worried but also amused. I asked Siggi (who is an urgent care nurse at the hospital) if he was ok, and he got a good laugh at my culture shock- not being used to seeing this kind of drunkenness. This is the kind of thing that we would call an ambulance for in the States. He told me that once an American tourist came to the ER where he works and was telling them to hook him to an IV and he needed care because he was too drunk. 'you don't need help. You're drunk! You need to go home and sleep!' They laughed him out of the hospital. I guess this type of thing is common in some countries. personally I am not used to walking on streets that are littered with broken glass (all over!!) and vomit. It's not bothersome, just different. At least it is very safe to walk around despite all of this. Occasionally people get into fights but I have yet to see any. However, I have not been able to stay out past 3am yet, and they all stay out until 6 or 7am, when the bars close. So who knows. Gulfoss and the Geyser were amazing. We met up with our hitchhike drivers today too and hung out a bit at a vegetarian restaurant. We were sad to see them go. At the table today was this arrangement of people: American (southern), Australian, American (northern), French (living in Iceland), and Danish. It was quite an interesting group, and many different accents. Language is a popular topic of conversation. My friend from Melbourne is leaving tomorrow to hitch up to the north of Iceland. I am also leaving this house and going to the squat, but there is also a spare room in a new radical house that I can use. So I might do both. I've been making friends, but it is a bit difficult as the Icelandic people are rather reserved and shy. And they work a lot so they don't have much time off. Also, having no phone is terrible. There is only one pay phone in Reykjavik (which costs 100kr per call!) and places are reluctant to let you use their phones...or they just don't have them. So that is inconvenient. I have to make plans to meet people, and if something changes, well...we are just out of luck. It happened about 3 times just today. But it always works out, you know. I am not on any timetable so I can spend days doing a lot of nothing and it's fine. As for the computer, the one in this apartment is not very good. Also, I am leaving here tomorrow during the day and won't have access like I have now. I have been uploading my photos at the library which has a very fast connection. It does cost 100kr per half hour though so I can't hang out there for very long. The library here is really nice. Today after I uploaded photos I looked around on the 5th floor and there is a small room filled with seats and a medium tv screen. It's a mini movie theatre. They were playing Charlie Chaplin films so I sat and watched one. Pretty cool. I've never seen a Charlie Chaplin film before.

Now I'm off to bed. I got nothing on these Icelandic partiers.