Iceland, Pt. 3

Thanks to jetlag and crummy weather we took it easy and tried to recharge. We started at Sandholt Bakery with a coffee and pastry, then made our way toward the National Museum, peeking over the stone walls at Holavallagarður. We spent the rest of the morning continuing our education in Icelandic history.

There were many beautifully crafted artifacts – jewelry, carved benches and chests, etc. There was a cool exhibit about the exhumation of a Viking-age grave that talked about the archaeological tools and methods used.

The story of the Icelanders is at turns inspiring and sad. It was a poor country for much of its existence and they were subjected to religious reformations, the regimes of multiple kings, and troubled at one point by bloody in-fighting. Two plagues swept over the island 50 years after the continent experienced the bubonic plague. Add to this the harshness of the land and the scarcity of resources and it became apparent how much they had struggled simply to stake their own claim.

There were bright spots. Religion preserved the Icelandic language – how else would you distribute religious texts without a written tradition? One bishop in the small hamlet of Holar was convinced the language was as important as Greek or Latin and acquired a printing press. That’s just one example of how Icelanders maintained their identity and pride.

Eventually the island won independence in the 1940’s (which, after everything they’d been through, was itself a contentious issue among Icelanders, many of whom had long left the island for greener pastures in other countries).

On the way out, we enjoyed a photography exhibit emphasizing how industrial life is changing in Iceland.

Later, we went down the tourist drag to do some more gift shopping and to treat ourselves to some cool Icelandic sweaters. We had hot dogs for lunch, and, appropriately (or not?), visited the Iceland Phallological Musuem. With its wide array of penises from animals around the world – although, conspicuously lacking any human contributions – it certainly has earned its reputation as one of the most novel museums in the country. While I had seen some effusive recommendations for it, and it was indeed interesting, it really was a lot of phallus to take in at once (that’s what she said).

We put on our nice clothes for our fancy dinner reservation at Matarkjallarinn. The waiter greeted us saying, “You’re missing the game!” Turns out we were ignorant of the soccer match that evening between Iceland and the Netherlands – that was why the downtown square was packed. And though we weren’t sports fans, he brought us complimentary shots of birch liqueur (Björk) when Iceland won the game.

With an early morning ahead of us, we took a cab back to the hotel, and happily crashed there, slightly overfull and drunk.