I'm back (with a brand new laptop and a lot of photos)!

Seven weeks after my laptop died on me, and after endless hassle with Apple and Icelandic Customs, I have finally received my replacement computer. Words can't describe how happy I am to finally have it! So now it's time to update this - I must admit it feels weird to write a blog post again but I really enjoyed blogging before so I will get back to it!

My last month and a half has been busy, mostly with the two most important aspects of an Erasmus student's life: studying and drinking. Ok, I'm not kidding anyone: some studying, too much drinking. But I'm having fun and enjoying living in Reykjavik. I've done some interesting things and had some fun trips so I'll try and fill you in - but don't worry, I'll keep it brief (mostly pictures)!

Last month my parents came to visit me. It was great to see them and show them the city I live in and also explore some more of the countryside. We visited Jokulsarlon, a beautiful glacier lake in the southeast of Iceland.

We also spent a day exploring Snaefellnes Peninsula.

We found some fairy houses on the way.

Black church at Budir.

Wild landscape.

Black sand beach.

And of course, we did the Golden Circle. This is one of the most popular tourist routes in Iceland and consists of visiting a geyser, a waterfall and Thingvellir National Park, where the Icelandic parliament was founded. I have now visited the Golden Circle three times: once on a university organised trip, once with my parents, and once last week when a friend of Maarit let us use her car for a few days. On this final trip, we also visited Kerið, a crater lake.

Thingvellir.

The geyser at Geysir.

Gullfoss.

Crater lake.

Whilst we were borrowing the car, we did another very touristy trip; we spent an afternoon at the Blue Lagoon relaxing and smearing silica mud on our faces. 

Sometimes it's fun to be tourists in Iceland!

One of the best trips I have had so far in Iceland was a day out to ride to the top of Langjokull glacier in a huge ex-military truck. It was a fantastic day and we also got the chance to see some beautiful waterfalls and hot springs... oh, and did I mention that it was my birthday? Well, it was the absolute best way to turn 23. And of course I followed up the day trip with dinner with my housemates and a great party with my friends in Reykjavik.

We got to ride up front - because it was my birthday of course!

Lovely birthday cake from Enya and Maarit (but nobody else is allowed to call me Lexie!)

I also think I should mention two exciting weather events that have happened here in Reykjavik. Firstly, at the beginning of October it snowed! Apparently that's unusually early, even for Iceland.

The view from my bedroom window on October 8th.

Even more excitingly, last week I saw the Northern Lights. I won't upload my photos because quite frankly, they're embarrassing. But hopefully next time I will learn to use my camera properly and take some nice photos! They were absolutely beautiful and I can't wait to see them more over this coming winter.

And finally (thank you so much for sticking with me), last week we went whale watching. We were  lucky to see lots of dolphins and a minke whale.

Awful photo, but you get the idea.

Ah, that felt good to finally write about my last few weeks! Hopefully everything is back to normal; fingers crossed, no more technology problems and I will update this again soon!

I hate technology

I haven't updated this for two weeks and it's not because I have nothing to write about, but because my laptop is broken. It's been messing me around for several months now and of course it decided that the time to die was during my first week of university in a foreign country. So I've been spending time travelling out of the city centre to the 'Epli' store (the Icelandic word for a certain type of fruit) but I'm still without a repaired or replacement laptop. My poor Dad has been ringing people in the UK for the last two weeks trying to get me a new one so fingers crossed I will have a computer again soon.

But of course, life can never be simple and I've now got a new technology problem. This weekend I went on a trip to see 'Rettir', an event during which the farmers round up their sheep for the winter, and the The Golden Circle, a tour of three of the biggest tourist sights in Iceland. I took loads of photos of the Icelanders rounding up their sheep and I realised that most of my photos are still on one of my memory cards for my camera (I'd been worried that I might lose all my photos with my broken computer). However, when I turned on my camera to take some more photos it came up with an error message saying there was a problem with my memory card and I would need to wipe all the pictures from it before I could use it again. Obviously I didn't want to do this but it meant I could not take any more photos that day. It also means that I may have lost all the photos on that memory card.

So now I have no computer, I think I've lost all the photos of Iceland that I've stored on my computer and I've probably lost all the photos on my camera. And that explains the title of this post: I hate technology.

If I'm able to recover my sheep photos I will write about that soon: I know a post about sheep doesn't sound that exciting but it was a really great day. I also have an exciting couple of weeks coming up as my parents are coming to visit and I have some trips planned. Hopefully my next post will be more positive, written on my own laptop (I'm currently using a university computer and the Icelandic keyboard is very confusing) and will include some photos! Fingers crossed.

Settling in

I arrived back in Reykjavik nine days ago and it's been an absolutely manic week. I've finally found some time to write about what I've been doing, other than Culture Night and going to a certain museum.

I've been to the university several times, at first for introduction meetings and today for my first lecture. I haven't been in university lectures since April and I'd kind of forgotten that the reason I've come to Iceland is to study. I only have six lessons a week but I think it will take a while to get back into the university routine again. The campus is a really nice place to be and most of the buildings I'll be in seem very modern; the most impressive part for me is the university cinema which shows the latest blockbuster films as well as serving as several lecture halls!

As well as starting my studies, I've been out and about in Reykjavik a lot during the day and night. On Monday night a group of us went out for someone's birthday and on Friday night there was a huge welcome party for all the exchange students. It's a really nice feeling that whenever I go out I meet dozens of people I know; even just walking to the supermarket I always seem to bump in to four or five other exchange students!

On Saturday night a huge group of us went to see a free outdoor concert for the Icelandic band Of Monsters and Men. They've had huge success around the world and their song Little Talks has been played endlessly in the UK. This was the last concert of their tour and it was a huge homecoming gig for their Icelandic fans. Around 15,000 people showed up and despite the endless rain the atmosphere was fantastic. They were great live performers and it was pretty special to see them at home and speaking Icelandic the whole way through.

One of the most exciting things that has happened for me this week is finally moving out of the fourteen bed dormitory and into my own room! I have a great room but the whole situation is just a little bit strange. My landlord, Fridrik, is very friendly but the most disorganised person I have ever met. I had to wait for six or seven hours to move in to the flat and lots of things still need to be fixed but I'm not convinced that will happen any time soon. Fridrik is getting married next week then going off on his honeymoon for a fortnight so won't be around much. Normally his brother would step in but after Fridrik's stag do, he ended up with two broken ribs and a collapsed lung!

The strangest thing is that one of the guys I'm living with currently doesn't have a room - as in, it doesn't exist! The old living room is currently being turned into a bedroom and until then Sebastian has to sleep in the landlord's guesthouse down the road. The other very weird thing is the number of beds in the flat; my room has a double bed, a single bed and a set of bunk beds. Between five of use we have 14 beds! However, despite all of this I feel I can't complain. My room is huge, clean and modern. The flat is in a good part of town and close to the city centre. And most of all, I finally have a room to myself!

The Icelandic Phallological Museum

This afternoon I met with Andrea and Maarit with the intention of going whale watching. However, we decided that the weather was too bad and we should do something else instead. It seemed sensible to go somewhere inside so I suggested a place I've secretly wanted to go since the minute I got here and saw that it was opposite my hostel: The Penis Museum. I was surprised that they both seemed as interested as I was and we made the decision to go in about ten seconds flat. At this point I will warn you that the following post contains a lot of pictures of penises...

The museum contains the world's biggest collection of penises and related items and contains specimens from all kinds of animals: from guinea pig to reindeer to whale (so I guess in a way, we did end up going whale watching)!

A particularly, um, impressive specimen came from an elephant.

No, it's not its trunk.

Of course being in Iceland, the creatures also included elves, trolls and ghosts! How they obtained these I will never know, but I'm sure they're real...!

Well elves are invisible...

... and trolls do turn to stone...

... and ghosts are white!

Of course it's not just animals included in the museum. There is a human specimen too, and more interestingly several people have promised to donate their penises for many different reasons. One man wants to donate his because he believes it will be a perfect specimen as it's never been used. Another man had jokingly told a friend he would donate his and after his friend died he felt he should follow through with the promise. Of course, these men want to donate once they are dead and no longer need it. But not one man! Here is an extract of his letter, and one of my favourite things I've ever read in a museum (just to explain, he calls his penis 'Elmo'):

It is my intention to submit to surgery as soon as possible, while I am still very much alive and in healthy condition, so that Elmo The Penis will be surgically harvested from my body along with both testicles together with their chords to my abdominal wall; plus Elmo's entire scrotum; plus as much red-headed pubic scalp as we can persuade a competent surgeon to remove from me.

Mental. The last penis-based exhibit I will share with you is a set of silver casts of the 'members' of the members of the Icelandic silver medal-winning Handball team!

I can't help but feel a little sorry for the one in the front centre.

Maybe this hasn't been my most mature post so far, but I would challenge anyone to go into the Phallological Museum and not have a bit of a giggle!

Back to Reykjavik (and Culture Night)

I have emerged from the bubble that is Hotel Nupur! Yesterday we had an eight hour bus journey back to Reykjavik and it feels so strange to be back in civilisation. I would also say it's so strange to be away from all the people I met on the language course but I've already bumped into half of them walking round Reykjavik! I gave up blogging the last week because the internet was so bad so I'll write a little about my last week in the Westfjords and my first night back in Reykjavik.

On Wednesday we went on a trip to a nearby village to watch the Saga of Gisli performed as a one man play. The show was performed in a village hall by a man who wore a stripper-style break away suit (to reveal a viking outfit, thank god) and used puppets and wooden toys to act out the story. It was a bizarre experience and if I'm honest it just looked a bit like the actor was having a mental breakdown on stage. After the show we had to complete an orienteering task - except that a group of us were never given anything to do so we wandered aimlessly in the rain for an hour instead. It wasn't my best afternoon so far!

On Friday we had our final exam. The writing part went well for me but I fell to pieces in the speaking part. In the evening we had our final dinner and ceremony and we were all called to the front one by one to collect our results. I was pretty shocked to find out I finished the course with a mark of 80%! The final night was a lot of fun and a great way to say goodbye to everyone. 

It means something a bit rude, sorry.

One final thing about Nupur: it's been a tradition for the boarding school to take photos of the students and frame them since the school was founded, like this:

The owners of the hotel have decided to carry on this tradition, so here is the class of 2013!

We got back to Reykjavik yesterday evening and all went off to our various hostels/houses. Yesterday was Culture Night in Reykjavik (a mix of music, food, exhibitions, etc all over the city) and although that made it an exciting time to come back, it also meant the city was manic. I got to the hostel I'd stayed in before and wasn't that happy to be put in a much worse dorm that the one I'd been in previously: it's really messy, there were a couple in the bed next to me who'd clearly just... you know, and there's nowhere for me to straighten my hair (I realise how spoilt that last bit sounds)! I considered upgrading but after checking my bank balance today I don't think that's an option.

Anyway, I had a walk round the city and heard all kinds of strange music along the main street. I met some people from the language course and we watched a concert in the city centre, then had a walk around Harpa (the concert hall) and finally watched the fireworks at the harbour. There was something very special about standing by the sea watching spectacular fireworks flying over the ships and Harpa.

It was a fantastic 'welcome back' from Reykjavik and, although I will miss being in the Westfjords, I'm so happy to be back here!

Hiking Mount Kaldbakur

I haven’t hiked up a mountain since... I don’t know, whenever my dad last made me! So I knew that hiking up Mount Kaldbakur last Saturday was going to be a challenge. It’s the highest mountain in the Westfjords at 998 metres (let’s round that up to 1,000) and quite a struggle to climb. Unfortunately it was very misty so we couldn’t get a good view but this definitely added to the experience! I felt quite detached from the real world being so high up on the mountain shrouded in fog.

The climb started with a scramble across a stream and a steep walk along a road, but that was only to get to the foot of the mountain. Once we were there we had to walk along a ridge which was quite scary. I was very glad that the mist blocked my view below so I didn’t know how far it was possible to fall.

Then we had a steep climb over lots of mud and rocks to get to the top. It was tough but very rewarding. It took a group of seventeen of us three hours to get to the top but we didn’t stay up there for too long: it was very cold and wouldn’t stop raining.

I was surprised that my fitness levels hadn’t declined too much in the last few weeks despite doing very little exercise and eating huge amounts of Icelandic skyr (like very thick yoghurt but quite healthy) and chocolate covered liquorice (not at all healthy). I managed to stay near the front of the group the whole way up but dropped further back on the way down; my fitness is better than my coordination and I was a bit scared that I would fall down the very steep mountain!

When we got back to Nupur we only had a couple of hours to get ready to go to a party in Ísafjörður. We had a great night but I did not have the energy to stay up until 7am this time! 

Me, Enya and Maarit.

Also, I was not quite as lucky as last week and got an incredible hangover. I think the last fortnight had caught up with me, and mixed with being tired out from the mountain and drinking just a bit too much wine, I’m ashamed to say I slept until 7.30pm. I only fully woke up when Maarit and Enya bought me a plate of food - I’ve made some very good friends here!

More Ghosts and Abandoned Farmhouses

In my last post I mentioned that we were going to be told a ghost story last Friday night. It turns out the story was quite predictable, albeit very sad, for an old boarding school. In the 1930s a boy called Numi failed his exams and, knowing that he would be severely beaten by his father, he decided his only option was to hang himself in his bedroom. Since then there have been multiple ‘sightings’ of Numi and his room has been kept locked for the last twenty years. Several years ago the owner of the hotel was staying here by himself for the whole winter and as he walked down the corridor he saw Numi in one of the bedrooms: it sounds like something from The Shining!

We were also told another story, not involving ghosts, about an old abandoned farmhouse a few kilometres from here. The farmhouse was bought by an old couple from Reykjavik who decided to spend their retirement in the Westfjords. However, the house was very difficult to get to by road and they struck a deal with a local politician that a concrete bridge would be built for them if they promised to live there for the next twenty years. Sadly, the old man briefly left retirement the next year to work on a ship but the ship came into difficulties and everyone on board drowned. The old woman had to keep her promise and lived there for the next nineteen years until she was able to leave and was sent to a psychiatrist in Reykjavik.

Whilst in Reykjavik she went to the Hallgrimskirkja (the huge church) every day and she collected money from people riding in the elevator to the top. She did this for five or six years until she died and with the money she collected the building of the church could finally be completed in 1986. (Hopefully I’ve got the details of this story right!)

A few days before we heard this story a group of us went and visited the house.

As you can see, the woman’s things are still there. The house has fallen into disrepair and I was a bit too scared to go upstairs as it looked like things had started to fall through the ceiling!

The house was featured in a short film The Last Farm. It’s a very sad film but very moving and worth watching.