Ágætis byrjun

My dad once told me that Frisians have always had this special bond with Nordic countries which would accomodate befriending, and would make cultural integration lots and lots easier. You know, when you simply understand eachother without putting extra effort into it. Now I am half-Frisian, and after more than a month in Iceland I think I can say that it is not (half) that easy.

I already stumbled upon hardships caused by cultural differences in my very first encounter with an Icelandic person; someone from the International Office at Háskólinn í Reykjavík (Reykjavik University). I, being a Dutchman, am used to arranging things well in advance; early preparation is crucial in our society. The Icelandic people, on the other extreme, have more of a Spanish-like Mañana, Mañana-attitude; you usually had to wait for at least a week to receive a message that they 'do not have the information available yet' and that 'you don't need to worry' and 'everything's gonna be fine'. When I arrived in Reykjavík, I was going to stay at someone who I met through Facebook; I asked him if he knew of any cheap places to stay and he offered me a room at his place, free of charge. Communication went so slowly that two days before departure, I had no address, no phone number, just a name. Luckily he called me at 01:30 AM, with the question "Shouldn't you be in bed by now?". To this I answered "Yeah, I was... Until you woke me up." Even though it irritated me at that time, they were all right; everything turned out to be just fine.

The people are just way less stressed than we are in Holland; things come when they come, and there's no point in worrying about them beforehand. And if something goes wrong there are a bunch of people out there to help you. Everybody is a lot more focused on the community than on the individual. When I had some trouble at my first address in Reykjavík, (actually in Kópavogur, in the outskirts of Reykjavík) this guy just simply called his whole family to have it resolved. I think that is what you have with small communities (Iceland has only 380,000 citizens).

You also see that in the classrooms, teachers are a lot more personally involved with the students when compared to Holland. The other day, I asked a question to the professor at the end of a lecture, and after that he sent the whole class an e-mail stating "Caspar just came with an interesting question about...", while I was like "...how did you know my name? I never told you my name...". Alternatively, in Tilburg University, I was once in a workshop with a teacher that had been giving me lectures for the whole semester, while I didn't recognise him because I always sat in the back of a classroom containing 200 people. See the difference?

Even though I got through quite some trouble arranging everything with these laid-back Icelanders, my first days went relatively smoothly. I remember the first thing that happened after I got to Reykjavík; I drove with a bus from the airport in Keflavík to Reykjavík, where I was to be picked up by this nice fella who offered me a room. I was so occupied with looking for him that I totally forgot to take my suitcase off the bus, so when I finally found him and he confronted me with "where's your luggage?", I said "It's in the ... ... ... bus." Of course, the bus had already left and I had to wait for half an hour (under the continuous repeating that "it's gonna be OK" by the receptionist, which didn't really make me feel better at that point) until it finally returned with my suitcase on it. Now that's a good start! (or, in Icelandic; Ágætis byrjun)

As we drove down to Reykjavík in a black Cherokee, the orange sun slowly sinking in the skyline, Sverrir (the kind guy who let me stay at his place for three weeks) talks about how the 2008 bank collapse and the following crisis has left its marks all around Iceland. Everywhere you see unoccupied construction sites and unfinished projects; the same second the funds ran out, the construction builders left. This depressing image clearly illustrates how an optimistic nation can crash down completely in just one night. As we then drive up to his house again, my first day in Iceland is over. From now on, the days will get shorter quickly, until it reaches a point of near-complete darkness all the time. I wonder how that's going to be.