You say to yourself, “Slow breaths… in through the nose… out from the mouth… þetta reddast… it’ll all be fine.” It lasts until you stub your toe. That’s it. You start screaming and shouting and you don’t know what to do. You’re angry, you’re furious. Well, you know what? So am I.
There’s a shit ton to be mad about. I’ve been living for a year in Reykjavík and I genuinely love it here, but sometimes you just look at this one-horse town and shout, “Even the horses are tiny and half-assed.”
Here me out: it was just Pride and Wrath is the next deadly sin. So, whether you’re an all too laid-back local, a tranquil tourist, or if you just need a little more rage in your life, here are some things that piss me off.
Bike lanes! They’re great but why do they just melt into the pedestrian sidewalk? If I’m on a bike, I hate the walkers. If I’m walking, I hate the bikers. This lane merging makes it so that I am granted brief glimpses of sweet separation only to be brought crashing down to reality when, once more, the paths intertwine. To bite the apple is to know your nakedness. What kind of a merciless deity would show me bike lanes, only to take them away… Alþingi.
Þetta reddast! God damn þetta reddast. It’s great to see everyone so relaxed. I have been waiting on my residency permit for months now. I’m gonna get deported before they give me the thing. Well, if the cops decide to get off their asses and find me that is. This is no longer a joke. ÚTL, where the fuck is my permit? I’ve called them, and do you know what they’ve said? “Don’t worry about it. It’ll work itself out.” I just want my papers.
Tourists! They’re everywhere, crawling out of the woodwork, speaking loudly, blocking sidewalks. I’m sick of them. And the locals! They’re everywhere, crawling out of the woodwork, speaking loudly (in Icelandic), blocking sidewalks. I’m sick of them. I think… I think I might just hate people.
The weather! I mean, come on.
The Strætó Sickness! I don’t know what it is. Maybe it’s the suspension, the drivers, the roads, but I know that almost everyone who wasn’t raised on this rock gets immediately car sick when they get in one of those piss rectangles. I don’t care that they painted one into a rainbow, I don’t care that it’s ten minutes late, I just want to be able to go places without my barf bag. To be fair, at least no one sits next to you. One thing I am not mad about is Nordic shyness.
McDonalds! Where is it? Why isn’t there one in Iceland? Where is my Happy Meal? I hate that a mega-corporation has been able to infect me to the point where I crave their products the second there isn’t a drive-thru in my neighborhood. My brain is trained to release dopamine under capitalism and my tum tum wants its 6-piece nuggies.
This article! It doesn’t tell me anything new about Iceland. It’s barely witty or coherent. The person who wrote it clearly knows jackshit about Iceland. Why are you still reading it? Is there something wrong with you? Is there something wrong with me? What is happening right now? Why is the moon so bright? Why did-
Hi,
Editor at the Grapevine here. Sadly, Charlie had to be sedated and escorted off the premises, and as such this article doesn’t have an ending.
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